Category: Uncategorized

Johnson Pledges $2 Million for Launch South Dakota

Initiative Shifts Economic Development Focus Toward Startups

Mitchell, S.D. – Today, gubernatorial candidate and Congressman Dusty Johnson announced that, as Governor, he will invest $2 million from the Future Fund into Launch South Dakota, a new initiative to grow the state’s economy from the ground up by helping more South Dakotans to turn their ideas into thriving local businesses.

“Chasing huge companies like TikTok grabs headlines, but building South Dakota means investing in South Dakotans,” said Johnson. “We’re going to back the people who already call this place home, folks who know their industries inside and out and are ready to build businesses right here where they live.”

Launch South Dakota includes a variety of pro-entrepreneurship policies, including:

• Expanding Proof of Concept Awards: The existing proof of concept programs assist a small number of early-stage entrepreneurs in limited fields with $25,000. Johnson will increase both the number and size of these awards, including the creation of a second $25,000 follow-on grant once key milestones are met. The program will be broadened to better support software, technology, and artificial intelligence startups, which will help South Dakota play a larger role in the growing knowledge economy.
• Investing in Startup Coaching and Mentoring: A Johnson administration will expand support for venture development organizations that provide startup coaching and mentoring for high-growth South Dakota startups. Existing organizations, such as the Enterprise Institute, Startup Sioux Falls, and Wildfire Labs, help South Dakota founders move from concept to customer, often in less than a year. Launch South Dakota will use a competitive process to select both existing and new accelerator programs to expand these services and support more founders statewide.
• Strengthening “Giant Visions” Competition: South Dakota’s long-running Giant Vision Business Plan Competition gives entrepreneurs the opportunity to compete in a “Shark Tank”-style competition, where finalists pitch their business for a chance to win $20,000 in startup funding. Johnson will increase the prize pool and significantly expand the event’s marketing to attract more participants and spark greater entrepreneurial interest across the state.
• Leveraging Federal Funding for South Dakota Startups: South Dakota put its entire $60 million federal State Small Business Credit Initiative allocation into a loan program, missing the opportunity to give high-growth startups the equity capital and technical assistance they need to launch and scale. Most states used at least some of those dollars for venture development for founders. For example, Wyoming used all $58 million of its allocation for venture activities. Johnson will ensure current and future federal funds allocated to South Dakota under these programs will be utilized to their full potential.

Johnson will fund the Launch South Dakota efforts with a $2 million grant from the state’s Future Fund. The Future Fund is a flexible funding source under the control of the Governor with oversight by the State Legislature. The investment would represent the largest one-time commitment to entrepreneurship in state government history.<

“Launch South Dakota will help aspiring founders build the next Docutap, MarketBeat, or Property Meld,” Johnson added. “By unleashing South Dakota ingenuity, we’ll keep our kids here, create higher-paying jobs, and make sure our rural communities don’t just survive, but thrive.”

Support for Launch South Dakota:

“This is an innovative plan that modernizes the state’s approach to supporting South Dakota’s homegrown entrepreneurs. It provides needed capital to startup companies at the earliest stages and makes it easier for founders to build great companies in South Dakota,” said Matt Paulson, Founder and CEO of MarketBeat.

“This plan gives our state an opportunity to keep more of our entrepreneurial efforts in state, stop the brain drain, and create more economic opportunity for our young people,” said Darren Haar, Entrepreneur-in-residence at South Dakota School of Mines and Technology.

“The State of South Dakota’s approach to business development is antiquated. Launch South Dakota provides an opportunity for the state to take a huge step forward,” said Tom Johnson, Former CEO of Elevate Rapid City.

To learn more about Launch South Dakota, please click here.

As mentioned yesterday, State Representative Brandei Schaefbauer announced that we won’t have her to kick around in the State House next year. (Nothing to do with the 4-way primary in her District generated in part by her awful service in Pierre I’m sure..).

During the past two years especially, I watched closely and with growing disappointment as those very principles were bent, twisted and broken by people I thought were my friends, in service of predetermined priorities and unelected stakeholders, some of whom are allowed to enrich themselves and their organizations by influencing the voting decisions of your elected leadership.I found this unconscionable, disillusioning and heartbreaking.

There are specific moments and instances that I could tell you about and describe, but I will keep those details to myself for now.

My reasons for running for this office were to protect the people of South Dakota from the influences I saw pouring into our state from places that do not share our values and are only interested in the expansion of power in service of an un-American agenda. I naively believed that my concerns would be shared and championed by people already in elected office and that we work together to resist those influences and defend our great state of South Dakota.

What I experienced instead was a system of coercion, preordained voting instructions and a stifling of honest debate on the critical issues facing both our state and nation.

People calling themselves “true conservatives” have engaged in back-room dealings and dishonest strategies meant to deceive South Dakota citizens about their true objectives and the values they hold.

During the past two years, an increasingly divisive and unpleasant atmosphere and leadership culture were allowed to take hold, fracturing a previously unified conservative base into splintered factions incapable of consensus and enforced by personal mistreatment, reputational distortion, and ostracism.

You can read the rant here.

… why don’t I think she wrote this overly long rant, flaming her colleagues on the way out? (There are a number of big words in here.)

If at some time in the future, you’re ever feeling nostalgic for Brandei-isms, just remember: if Brandei had her way, we’d be more than 6 months into her civil war by now:

Legislature Steps Up for Cities with Innovative Capital Funding Option
By Sioux Falls Mayor Paul TenHaken

The South Dakota State Legislature recently passed House Bill 1245, which will provide an incredible tool for local fiscal flexibility. By giving cities the option—not the mandate—through a vote of their residents to establish a local funding mechanism for capital improvement projects, this legislation strengthens communities’ ability to plan responsibly and invest wisely in their futures.

Here’s how it works:

• When a community in South Dakota needs to pursue a major capital project, the primary option today is to issue bonds. Bonding is an important and useful tool, but it can also create decades of debt and interest payments.
• House Bill 1245 creates the Community Area ProjectS (CAPS) program, giving municipalities the option to bring an alternative approach to their voters for approval.
• Under the bill, a city must establish a capital improvement board. If that board approves a project, that city could ask residents whether they support adding a temporary 1% sales tax dedicated solely to that project.
• If at least 60% of voters approve, the 1% revenue would be collected and saved to pay for the project up front, rather than borrowing and paying interest for years or decades.
• Once the funds are fully collected, the tax expires and the community must wait two years before proposing another one. This ensures the program is used responsibly and only when needed.

This bill is the very definition of local control. It empowers taxpayers and local leaders with a choice: pursue projects through traditional borrowing, or adopt a save-and-pay approach that avoids decades of interest costs. For many communities, that choice alone can mean millions of dollars conserved and reinvested.

Here’s how this bill could have helped Sioux Falls if it was in place prior to a couple of major necessary capital investments:

Almost 15 years ago, residents voted to build a new Events Center in the city. If a mechanism like the CAPS program had been available at the time:

• Taxpayers would have avoided roughly $53 million in interest and issuance costs that could have gone towards roads, bridges, police vehicles, and fire stations.
• Based on 2012 revenues, the city could have saved enough to pay for the project outright in just 26 months. The city is still making payments for the Events Center today.

Our recently constructed Public Safety Campus is another example. Several years ago, it became clear our police and fire training facilities were outdated and needed to be replaced so we could ensure continued safety of our personnel. When the city moved forward with a modernized campus:

• A CAPS-style approach would have saved an estimated $18 million in interest and issuance costs that could have been redeployed to other capital needs.
• The city could have saved the full project cost in about nine months—less time than it took to design it.

This tool isn’t just useful for Sioux Falls and other larger cities, it can be transformative for small and medium-sized cities across South Dakota. A community like Murdo, for example, has publicly stated they could pursue long-term priorities such as a combined community center, childcare facility, and EMS building without relying solely on long-term debt. Long-term debt ties the hands of future councils, restricts flexibility, and places a multi-decade burden on property taxpayers in a very small community.

HB 1245 doesn’t force any city to use this tool. It simply provides a fiscally responsible option that communities can employ if it aligns with local needs and voter support.

I want to commend the legislators who supported this bill as they deserve a thanks for recognizing what tools cities large and small need to thrive. HB 1245 will help communities be more prudent stewards of taxpayer dollars, more agile in planning, and more empowered to set their own course.

The bill has passed both chambers and has one more step in the process before it becomes law. I look forward to Governor Larry Rhoden signing this bill to give municipalities another tool in our toolbox that supports local control.

Former State Senator Jeff Monroe rolled out his campaign website late this afternoon, which you can find at https://monroeforsd.flywheelsites.com.

Not a ton of information on it yet, but we’re still a little more than 3 months out from the convention.  I’m sure there will be more to come.

Stay tuned!

From Facebook.. it looks like we know what issues Jon Hansen is intending to campaign on. Social wars from 4? 5? years ago that nobody is demanding action on, and shifting property taxes over to sales tax. Which doesn’t solve the problem, largely has lower and middle class families pay it, and kicks the can down the road.

Oh! And let’s not forget that he’s clucking about fighting jobs and development (and president Trump’s agenda) to fight having data centers here, rather than in China.

Little wonder he’s in last place. And that’s where he will remain.

The Rhoden for Governor Campaign released the memo from recent polling that was conducted about the same time as the Emerson Poll results that were released which showed the Governor in third place.

In contrast, the poll from the campaign via Public Opinion Strategies claims that Rhoden is in a much closer race, showing him down only five points as compared to the Emerson poll’s 11 points, after those results hit the media in a blitz, leaving people wondering what was happening.

The Public Opinion Strategies Poll makes the claim that “The Governor is well-positioned to win, and his ballot position is likely to only improve once his advertising campaign begins in earnest.”

With only 1/2 million in the bank as of the last report, and with two of his opponents hitting the airwaves now, his earnest effort probably needs to begin soon if he wants to make that prediction come true.

You can read the memo and decide for yourself:

Rhoden Polling Memo by Pat Powers

 

(Update – Rhoden looks to be starting on the air next week.)

Rhoden Tv Buy by Pat Powers

From Twitter:

Next week, I will bring the SAVE America Act to the floor. Senate Democrats will be forced to defend their outrageous positions on these issues and explain to the American people why common sense and the Democrat Party have parted ways. pic.twitter.com/WrC6igztjN

— Leader John Thune (@LeaderJohnThune) March 12, 2026

The General Appropriations Bill passed, and we were revisited from the ghosts of sessions past, as a number of the same clowns votes against the budget again. And they were joined by new legislators who seem to think that by voting against the budget that they and others just spent more than 2 1/2 months working on it’s something other than pure hubris.

Revisiting the post I did last year on the topic – here is just a small sampling of the things that those voting red cast a vote against:

• They voted against our military & veterans – Ellsworth Air Force Base, funding the South Dakota National Guard, the Veteran’s hospital, and County Veteran Service officers
• They voted against supporting South Dakota housing.
• They voted against workforce education, including resources for (again) veterans, new and expecting moms, and disabled people who want to work
• They voted against healthcare facilities, repairing state buildings, paying for claims against the state, or covering employees through the state insurance pool
• They voted against having their own state e-mail account. Or their own laptops. Or their own iPads.
• The voted against libraries, public broadcasting, and having a state radio network that emergency and law enforcement can communicate on.
• They voted against auditing state government.
• They voted against collecting and distributing sales tax to cities.
• They voted against having video lottery, or managing gaming in Deadwood.
• They voted against resource conservation & forestry.
• They voted against the Animal Industry Board, the Dairy Association, the Wheat Commission, the Oilseeds council, the Board of Veterinary examiners, the Corn Utilization Council, and the South Dakota State Fair in Huron.
• They voted against tourism, the arts, wildlife development, all the state parks, and snowmobile trails.
• They voted against every penny that went from the state to tribal relations.
• They voted against mothers and babies in need of public assistance. They voted against anyone in behavioral health settings, those with addictions, they cast a NO vote to supporting the disabled and more.
• They voted against licensing any and all professions.
• They voted against all vo-tech schools and universities, as well as job service offices and services.
• They voted against schools, teachers and students. And libraries.
• These legislators voted against processing rape kits for crime victims, funding 911 calls, putting cops on the street, paying judges to keep order, and the opposed keeping bad guys in jail.
• They voted against regulating utilities.
• They voted against people to keep an eye on how the state spends money.
• They voted against paying state employees.. and well anything for government.

These legislators – Andera, Auch, Aylward, Baxter, Garcia, Hunt, Ismay, Jensen, Jordan, Kayser, Manhart, Mulally, Randolh, Rice, Schaefbauer, Schwans, and John Sjaarda – these clowns voted against every single thing that state government touches.

(Update – here are the goofballs who did the same thing in the Senate: Nays: Blanc, California Carley, Grove, Hohn, Howard, Marty, Nelson, Pischke, and Voight. Do NOT send them back to Pierre, please.)

They can try to claim that it’s some sort of goofy protest vote. But it’s no different than the fools who drive to a protest and then proceed to block traffic. They’re accomplishing nothing, except adding to people’s annoyance factor and disgust over what happens in Pierre.

These guys allegedly ran for office to make the state better.. and then they vote against literally every person in South Dakota and every thing that state government touches.

Just don’t forget that. Especially next June.

Legislators are in the ending hours of session, and some are making it known that they will not be back next year.

Democrat State Representative and Minority Leader Erin Healy gave kind parting thoughts about her time in the House, thanking everyone for their service to the state and noting that she will not be back next year.

Quickly following was District 3 Republican State Representative Brandei Schaefbauer, who also noted she will not be back.. which gets people wondering, as she has been rumored to be potentially running out of District 31.. maybe this year, maybe in the future.

Brandei quickly followed by noted she’s voting against the budget. So, after months of negotiation and opportunities for input,  she’s voting against Northern State University, voting against cops, voting against processing rape kits, voting against medical services voting against the elderly..

Not thinking this departure from the House of Representatives is going to be a loss.

This morning in an article from the Dakota Scout, Team Rhoden was pushing back against the Emerson College poll that had him mired in the pack of others running in the race for Governor who aren’t Dusty Johnson.

Rhoden’s people were pushing their own polling claiming they’re only five points down according to their own polling, and not in third place, 11 points down as the Emerson College poll claimed.

Larry Rhoden was within 5 percentage points of Johnson in a poll conducted by Public Opinion Strategies, down 28 to 33 – within the margin of error. Toby Doeden followed with 16 percent while Jon Hansen had 10 percent.

and..

The pollsters reached different conclusions. The Public Opinion Strategies firm includes Glen Bolger, who has polled South Dakota political races for decades. The firm concluded that Rhoden had a 9-point lead over Johnson in a head-to-head contest, leading 48-39. The governor also led among base GOP voters and those favorable to Trump.

Read that here.

I have not seen the new poll results myself, but there’s little other information presented such as when the poll was conducted, as well as other factors.  It does closely mirror other poll results I have seen – but those were over a month stale now, and the Emerson poll is less than a week old.

The Governor’s poll may claim that he would fare well in a direct head to head.. but it’s not a direct head to head. It’s a 4-way contest at the moment. And there’s a lot of campaigning before there would be any chance of a head to head.

Stay tuned. Much more campaigning and I’m sure there are many more polls to come.

(And as a sidebar, please keep Glen Bolger who has done polling for many South Dakota candidates over the years in your thoughts and prayers, as it’s my understanding that he has taken gravely ill.)