I would like to start this week’s recap off by saying thank you to everyone who was able to attend the Tripp and Gregory Country cracker barrels. There were a lot of good questions and discussion. For all of us elected to represent the district well, we need to hear from you. Thank you! One of the topics that came up was tax breaks and handouts to large corporations. I gave my word that as long as I am in Pierre to represent the good, hard working people of District 21, I would never advocate for or vote to grant targeted tax breaks to these large companies, especially data centers, or approve large sums of money from the taxpayers’ pockets to go to these companies. Last year, on the Senate floor, we defeated a bill that would have granted tax breaks to incoming hyperscale data centers, and I spoke on the floor about how wrong it is that some legislators seem to race to see how they can make it easier for large, usually out of state, companies to come in to South Dakota, yet no one seems to stop and consider the third generation rancher who carries the tax burden year round, or the small contractor trying to keep your lights on and water flowing barely making payments on machinery that sustains their livelihood. I am not here to represent large corporations who can afford to fairly pay their way. I am here to represent you. There will be several different bills on this topic heard in the Senate in the coming weeks.

This was a great week for agriculture country, with several different wins. SB88 is a bill aligning the laws regarding pre-condemnation exams and surveys of land absent the landowner’s permission with a unanimous SD Supreme Court ruling from 2024. The Court found that invasive and destructive surveying practices constituted as a “taking” under both state and federal constitutions. Passage of SB88 will avoid future constitutional challenges to the current law that clearly conflicts with this ruling and avoid costing South Dakota landowners more time and money fighting legal battles. HB1001, as amended, is the result of many hours of meetings, frustration, negotiations, and a lot of out-ofpocket money fighting a battle for South Central South Dakotans trying to responsibly manage their grasslands. This bill came unanimously out of House Ag & Natural Resources Committee Thursday. It will allow landowners to legally utilize prescribed burning on state owned land in conjunction with their own land along the Missouri River. Several years ago, the agreement that landowners had with the Game Fish and Parks was revoked after a department lawyer decided he didn’t believe it would stand under the scrutiny of the courts if anything ever went wrong. This is one of the issues that demanded my time over the interim, and it is exciting to see it paying off. On another note, SB142, a bill I introduced to make campaign finance reporting dates uniform for the different types of campaign committees passed through the Senate uncontested. Requiring annual year end reports for all committees will boost transparency and eliminate confusion. In appropriations we heard from Department of Education and the Board of Regents and discussed education in South Dakota among other agencies that presented. We heard a bill proposing to remove the sales tax sunset. Currently, the state sales tax is 4.2%. The reduced percentage is set to sunset and go back to 4.5% in 2027. The bill passed through committee and will go to the floor for further discussion. State revenues for December came in, and it was a welcome bump of 11.9%. All cards are back on the table for possible increases to the Big 3. Next week the revenue setting sub committee will meet and then the appropriations process starts getting fun.

Saturday, the 14th, we will have cracker barrels at the White Lake school 10am, Corsica Senior Citizens building at 1pm, and Platte at 44 Pizza +.

I pray the Lord would bless and keep each of you.