As you know since I started writing these reports to you folks, my weeks have always ended on Thursday so that I could write this article and have it to your newspaper people before 5:00 on Friday. So today I get to start my weekly report with what happened last Friday.

We started our day voting on something that California apparently doesn’t know that you can do. We voted to promote a resilient and healthy forest by continuing to have an active forest management through retention of the current forestry products industry.

We voted to give the county commissioners more time to fill a vacancy on their board. We changed requirements relating to the operation of beauty salons and booths. They wanted to take a run at the barber shops but left that alone. We repealed a reporting requirement regarding industrial hemp. And we voted to move the oversite of the Brand Board from the Department of Ag and Natural Resources to the Department of Schools and Public Lands, which is another story for another day.

One of the bills that was passed was to permit merit pay as part of the teacher compensation. When the teachers are union, it seems to me that this might be the start of one unhappy group when these start getting handed out within a close knit group. And how does one do the evaluation process?

One of the bills that intrigued me was the establishment of provisions for the temporary training of nonresident doctors. I was told that Mayo Clinic has even sent doctors to Sioux Falls to learn new procedures. That’s pretty impressive.

And then the bill of the day: HB1025-Authorizating the Department of Corrections to construct a prison in Lincoln County, to make an appropriation therefore, to transfer money to the incarceration construction fund, and to declare an emergency. I don’t think that anyone in the room disagreed that our state needs a new and larger prison, and I think that everyone agreed that it’s going to cost a lot of money. But the design and the location of the new prison definitely was not going to fly on Friday. The first thing that happened was an amendment was placed on this bill and was approved. The amendment deleted everything in the bill except for: An act to transfer funds to the incarceration construction fund. After a lot of debate over where the prison was going to go and the design, which had nothing to do with the present bill, we voted. It was defeated 34-35. There was immediately a demand for reconsideration. And that was put off until Monday.

On Monday the first item on the agenda was HB1025A. We voted and the money move was defeated 35-35. Everything else seemed pretty melodramatic after that for the rest of the day even though it was long.

Every bill that went to the committees that had any money attached to it had to go through the appropriation committee or joint appropriation committee. Needless to say, they have been really busy. So as we are fighting amongst ourselves, they are trying to work together to make the best decisions for our state.

Tuesday was another long day that even included a “smoke out” vote on a bill that had been killed. This bill failed to get “calendared” and was declared dead. Tuesday was “crossover day”. This is the last day to pass bills or joint resolutions by the house of origin and the last day to invoke JR-7 in the house of origin.

Wednesday was a pretty normal day with 11 bills to be dealt with. All but one were senate bills, and after discussion and debate we pass all but one. One of the bills of interest to hikers and bikers is limiting the Mikkelson Trail in the Black Hills to no bigger than a Class 1 electric bike on the trail.

On Thursday we dealt with more senate bills. One of the highlights of the day was to make it mandatory that every venue that was hosting a public school function needs to accept cash. Some of the larger venues have gone to cashless admission and concessions. However, the people that testified in committee said that they do have a cash line for admission and concessions. There are some private places that hold school events that do not accept cash. They might decline those events in the future. So before anyone goes to an event to watch your child participate, make sure that you know the rules of that facility before you leave home, especially in Sioux Falls or Rapid City.

That’s all for this week. God bless and stay safe. Representative Jim Halverson