We started off our week in the House Education Committee with a room full of concerned citizens. Our first bill that we considered was calling for volunteer chaplains in the Public Schools. This was going to be a problem for schools like Colome where I think that the ministers are from out of town. It still passed out of committee 10-5. We had two other bills that used up our committee time. One we sent to the appropriation committee and the other we tabled. On the floor of the House we passed six bills, but not without a lot of debate. After we adjourned the House for the day, the Military and Veterans Affairs Committee met. I presented a bill HB1068 “An Act to allow a student to wear certain military decorations at a school graduation ceremony”. After pro/con discussion the committee voted 12-0 to pass it to the floor of the House.

On Tuesday we again filled the committee room, but this time it was Health and Human Services. The big topic was “Changing the criteria of Physician Assistants”, and the people who testified were very vocal about this both pro and con. This took up just about the entire time that we had, and our committee also still had to discuss and vote. It came out of committee on a 9-3 vote. The next bill we deferred, and the third we sent to Joint Appropriation on a 11-0 vote. Again, everyone gets to testify, so we sometimes have to put a timer on testimony, and when testimony gets repetitious, people get on the record by a “me too” comment. In the afternoon we voted 34-33 affirming the state’s rejection of carbon dioxide pipelines and sending the resolution to President Trump. Again, we passed several other bills to be sent to the Senate. The last resolution was applying to the United States Congress for a Convention of the States to propose amendments to the United States Constitution. I will forever vote to leave our United States Constitution alone. It was defeated by a vote of 29 for and 38 against this measure.

Wednesday’s Education Committee again brought a standing room only crowd of upset teachers and librarians and parents to testify. Our Chairwoman, Representative Greenfield explained to everyone that there would be a timer, because we had a lot of bills that we needed to get through. Then HB1041 was presented, “An Act to revise and repeal certain provisions pertaining to the state library and state library board”. There were only a couple of proponents and about half a room of opponents. The testimony against this bill was incredible as these people told of what the state library was used for by the entire state’s population. After our committee discussion we voted 13-0 to pass this bill to the Appropriation Committee. We then voted to send the student teacher stipend bill to Joint Appropriation Committee on a 12-2 vote. We voted to send a school security enhancement bill to Appropriations on an 11-4 vote. A bill was presented to make a school bond election happen on Primary or General Election day. This vote was 8-7. On the floor of the House we voted down the requirement for a voluntary school chaplain after much debate. We voted to void covenants relating to firearms and ammunition. We voted to allow students to wear certain military decorations at a school graduation if furnished by the military. We voted to modify practice criteria for physician assistants. We voted to require notice of a county’s canvas, post-election audit, and testing of automatic tabulating equipment be posted to the Secretary of State’s website. And we voted on a number of senate bills that have been sent to us.

On Thursday in Health and Human Services we again had a full house, but everybody could have a seat. Our first bill was about putting medical kiosks with telemedicine capabilities in rural areas. This bill was sent to Appropriations. The next bill HB1069 – “An Act to regulate vapor products. This is what the crowd was about. After some pros and a lot of cons from users and sellers and distributors, we voted 7-5 to send this bill to the House floor. Because we were out of time, we read the bill on hospital drug testing and tabled it to another day. We started the afternoon session with a prayer and the pledge of allegiance like we always do. Then, the Speaker, Jon Hansen, swore in new Representative Jack Kolbeck from Sioux Falls to replace Representative Tony VenHuizen who has been made Lt. Governor. We then dealt with bills ranging from bond requirements for wills to prohibiting the manufacture, sale, or distribution of cell-cultured meat to requiring a report regarding refugee resettlement services to modifying substances listed on the controlled substances list. The requirement for school boards to hold a bond election at a primary or general election was voted on and ended with a 34-34 tie. Again, we dealt with Senate bills that cross over for us to approve or not.

We are trying to keep government small and still handle the people’s business. It is not an easy task.