Legislative Crackerbarrel in Rapid City

Rapid City’s first legislative crackerbarrel of the 2008 South Dakota legislative session was held at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology today from 9:00 am to 11:00 am.

On hand were Rep. Gordon Pederson (Dist. 30), Rep Brian Gosch (Dist. 32), Rep. Gordon Howie (Dist. 30), Rep. David Lust (Dist. 34), Senator Dennis Schmidt (Dist. 33), Senator Tom Katus (Dist. 32), Rep. Mark Kirkeby (Dist. 35), Rep. Jeff Haverly (Dist. 35), Senator Bill Napoli (Dist. 35), Rep. Mike Buckingham (Dist. 33), Rep. Don Van Etten (Dist. 33), Rep. Brian Dreyer (Dist. 32), Senator Mac McCracken (Dist. 34), and Senator Jim Lintz (Dist. 30).

McCracken was the first featured speaker and spoke of some issues he sees as important in the 2008 legislature. These included property taxes, funding education, and the code of ethics.

McCracken discussed E-911 standards. He said there were 36 answering points throughout the state and standards are needed.

McCracken said the underground lab is the subject of legislation, and the legislature is already working on organizational and administrative structure for the lab in the old Homestake Mine.

McCracken will soon be term-limited out of the legislature, and made a few comments about what being a legislator entails. He said that he would not be attempting to switch houses and running for the House.

Haverly was the second featured speaker. He is in his sixth year in the legislature, and serves on the appropriations committee.

Haverly said he was dissatisfied that technical institutes haven't been addressed as they should be. He said over last summer, a task force looked at tech school funding and analyzed the current funding structure. Haverly said that about 90% of the students achieved job placement in the skills they trained for, and almost that many stayed in the state of South Dakota. However, he said businesses in other states are interested in draining our trained students away from us.

Haverly said he understood that our resources are limited in a state of about 750,000, but he still believes more new programs should be pursued in the upcoming budget. He also criticized the governor's proposed cut in funding for the Highway Patrol, and feared that this would diminish the resources of the patrolmen keeping our highways safe.

Van Etten was the third featured speaker. He is on the taxation committee and human services committee.

Van Etten said there was a big push to immunize kids against the flu in 2007, and over 75,000 were immunized. HPV vaccinations were also offered by the state and 40% of girls between 12 and 18 years of age were immunized. He emphasized that this was a voluntary immunization. Van Etten said the state also received a federal grant to fight obesity last year.

Emerging superbugs and antibiotic-resistant bacteria are a growing concern, said Van Etten, and cases in 2007 increased from 50 to 81 in South Dakota.

Van Etten said food ecoli infections most often come from livestock, and since we are a cattle state, our rates are high.

He said that the $1.00 tobacco tax increase is helping get the message out about the dangers of smoking.

Van Etten is also term limited but doesn't plan to run for the senate.

Howie was the fourth featured speaker. He talked about his proposal to reduce property taxes by 35%. He said this is separate from longstanding efforts such as those by Senator Lintz to make taxes, especially agriculture taxes, fairer. Howie said he knew of young families who are being forced from their homes simply because they can't afford the taxes on their homes. He said some rates are as high as 30% of a person's income, which means that every third year a person in this situation is surrendering their entire paycheck to cover taxes.

Howie is proposing a 2 cent sales tax to provide an across the board 35% reduction in their real estate taxes. It would also be a net reduction in taxes for South Dakotans, since visitors to the state would be paying a significant portion of this sales tax. He said this would make home ownership more affordable, especially for young couples. It would also help senior citizens to stay in their homes, and encourage investment in real estate. Finally, it would make it more affordable for people to stay on family farms, and would thus strengthen our agriculture industry.

He said that it's time to improve the tax situation in South Dakota, but he wanted to be clear that an income tax was not the answer. He said he wasn't "married to" his proposal and would be open to it if someone else had a better idea.

Q & A

A number of questions were asked about workman’s compensation bills and the Department of Labor, such as HB 1037, but none of the legislators present had been given enough time to review them in order to make an informed statement about them. Pederson said most of the bills were only received by committee yesterday. He said it would probably be next Wednesday before any action is taken on them. The Commerce Committee has received several, and Lust said that the Judiciary Committee has received at least one bill.

A question was asked of Howie about how his tax plan would guarantee a reduction of property taxes. Howie said that his proposal provides that the counties will receive payments on property taxes four times a year and they are to be applied specifically toward property taxes. It will be a simple dollar for dollar trade.

Katus said the situation with taxes could get out of hand and expressed the vague sentiment that he didn't like Howie's proposal.

Howie said the fairest tax of all is a sales tax, and even the poor are allowed a refund on the food tax.

Senator Napoli said he gave Howie credit for trying to work on the problem, but Nebraska did this same thing several years ago, and they ended up having a huge sale tax and a huge property tax. Napoli said freezing tax assessments is the only way to provide property tax relief. He said that there is growth in assessments each year. He said Howie's reduction will last 10 years but then we'll be in the same situation we're in now. Napoli commended Howie's efforts to address property taxes, but said he did not support Howie’s bill.

Haverly and Buckingham were asked if they would vote to kill the SB 26 which would authorize standards to be established for a state preschool education program. Haverly said government shouldn’t be involved in pre-k education. He said anywhere you look, state pre-K programs “haven’t worked out. Haverly said requirements end up becoming too bold, and it's not a good idea. He said this will affect the private providers that don't want to be involved. "Government doesn't belong in this business," said Haverly. He said this idea started as a pilot program, but now they want to move it to the general fund, and this will make it an ongoing program. He asked all his fellow legislators to work extremely hard to stop this insanity. Somewhat exasperated, Haverly said that next, government will be asking for control of our infants.

Buckingham said the proposal last year wanted to regulate pre-k through 12, but no rules had been drawn up at the time the bill was offered. He said no statement of intent was provided by the Dept of Education, and he wasn't willing to provide a blank check to the Dept. of Education. He said he wanted to see what the proposed rules said before making any decision this year, but he said he didn't want to put private providers out of business, and didn't believe this service should be moved into government.

Lintz said we've been talking about increasing teacher salaries at the same time we're looking to add to the education budget by including pre-K. And at the same time, we're talking about high property taxes and the need for relief. He said we can't afford to do all this at once.

A question was asked about HB 1086 which would make having a gun on a college campus a Class 1 misdemeanor.

Napoli said our state is one of the few remaining free states where you can live and raise your children with minimal interference from government. He said he saw in a small town recently that there was a gun in the back window of every truck parked on main street, and no one in their right mind would pull a gun and try something there. He said this bill was a bad idea.

Buckingham said this is the worst piece of legislation he's ever seen. He said it would be a Class 1 misdemeanor to bring a gun on campus, but there are a number of exceptions. He said from his experience going pheasant hunting while he attended college, he could see a number of problems with practical application of this bill.

Schmidt said he is a gun owner and supports gun ownership. He credited Paul Harvey with an idea where a town decided to arm all the citizens, and crime rates went down. He said criminals are usually more afraid to commit crimes when they fear encountering a good citizen who is armed. Schmidt said he was a cop for 11 years, and that every day they hoped they would never have to draw their weapon He said 99% of people aren't going to hurt anyone. Schmidt said we should take the guns away from crooks, and if we try to take people's guns away from people, do you think the crooks are going to turn in their guns?

Right as I was leaving the crackerbarrel early for a prior commitment, Katus said that he would be introducing a “living wage” bill that would apply to every business that had more than 10 employees. He said that certain government employees made over $11.00 an hour, and that all employees should make at least this much. He mentioned Wal-Mart’s proposal to bring a second store to Rapid City a few years ago, and spoke of their intention to pay an average wage of $10.00-11.00 an hour in a disparaging tone.

The crackerbarrel continued another 45 minutes after I left at 10:15 am, but further details can probably be obtained at the Hog House Blog and the Rapid City Journal later today or tomorrow. I believe I saw Denise Ross from the Hog House there and the Journal usually covers these events.