I was out this week with my wife for dinner, since our stove had been disconnected for several days for a flooring installation. That, and I didn’t want a microwave chicken patty like the kids got stuck with.

In addition to avoiding the microwave, we were also celebrating a big, big job change for her. This week, my wife announced her acceptance of a position at the end of the summer where she will be joining Augustana University as a faculty member, teaching in the field of special education to undergraduate and graduate students.

In concept, it had been a while in coming, as she is set to become “Dr. Powers” this coming December. As she was getting her doctorate, she’d been thinking about what she was going to do with those extra letters behind her name. The move to Augie also made a lot of sense, as she contemplated what the next phase of her professional career was going to be. So, she applied and took the plunge.

She was hired. And simultaneously, my USD bound daughter has switched collegiate gears once again, and is back looking at Augustana. (I’m about ready to give up on her becoming a Jackrabbit, and record a black mark on her permanent record of where she ranks among her siblings as my favorite.)

And of course, fate being what it is, right when my wife was in the process of accepting her job, Augustana U announced who their new president was going to be. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin.

Um.. Really? So, my wife’s new big boss is going to be someone who I actively crusaded against in the field of politics? (Awkward.)

I’m starting to wonder if South Dakota might just be a little too small!

From the Argus Leader, The University of South Dakota Student Senate is apparently setting themselves up to demand that the University willfully deny any inquiries into students’ immigration status, and to declare itself a sanctuary campus where illegal aliens will be shielded:

Student leaders at the University of South Dakota this week debated a measure to make the school a “sanctuary campus.”

The USD Student Government Association passed a resolution Tuesday night urging university administrators to create a policy to protect undocumented students.

Only three USD students are undocumented, said administrator Scott Pohlson, but the resolution’s sponsor Josh Arens hopes the measure is a way for administrators to hear student concerns over President Donald Trump’s immigration policies.

and..

The student government resolution asks USD to assign a contact person to handle all inquiries of a student’s citizenship status.

It recommends that the school create a series of informational sessions to educate students on their rights in regards to federal immigration agents.

It would also prohibit campus security from inquiring about a student’s immigration status, enforcing immigration laws or working with federal agencies including ICE and CBP.

Students who were detained or deported would also be able to continue their education at USD online, according to the resolution.

The main hangup is the provision prohibiting campus security from enforcing immigration laws, Pohlson said.

 

Read it all here.

Should the legislature step in if there are students who intend to demand that universities violate the law, and demand that police stop policing?

Thune Begins Farm Bill Rollout, Introduces New Income Protection Program for Farmers

“I know what it takes to get these farm bills across the finish line, and I know the hard-working farmers and ranchers who will be affected once we do.”

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), a long-time member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, today unveiled the Soil Health and Income Protection Program (SHIPP), the first of many individual farm bill proposals he will introduce over the next few weeks and months. SHIPP is a new voluntary income protection program for farmers that is designed for today’s production agriculture and soil health needs. It would provide participating farmers with a short-term acreage conserving use program, which unlike the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), would require a commitment of only three to five years.

“I’ve written three farm bills during my time in Congress, having served on both the House and Senate Agriculture Committees,” said Thune. “The 2018 farm bill will be my fourth. I know what it takes to get these farm bills across the finish line, and I know the hard-working farmers and ranchers who will be affected once we do. That’s why over the next several weeks, I’ll be rolling out incremental farm bill proposals that will cover most titles of the farm bill.

“The first proposal I’m unveiling would create a new voluntary farm bill program that would provide a short-term option to conserve acreage while protecting farm income. Unlike CRP, which requires a long-term commitment of 10 to 15 years, SHIPP would require only a three-to-five-year commitment. SHIPP would give farmers the flexibility they need to enroll their least productive acreage in this new program in return for a rental payment and additional crop insurance assistance.” 

“Sen. Thune’s new farm bill program has the potential to be a helpful tool for farmers in today’s agriculture economy that has been bogged down by low commodity prices and numerous challenges in meeting the cost of production for most crops,” said Scott VanderWal, president of the South Dakota Farm Bureau. “SHIPP provides a common-sense, voluntary alternative to spending money on expensive seed, fertilizer, and chemicals on our least productive land.” 

SHIPP Highlights:

• Participation is voluntary.
• Operator chooses the land to be enrolled in SHIPP on each Farm Service Agency (FSA) Farm Serial Number (FSN).
• Both the landowner and the operator must sign the SHIPP contract.
• A one-time sign-up will be held, beginning with the first crop year after the next farm bill has been enacted.
• Land is enrolled in SHIPP for three, four, or five years.
• A maximum of 15 percent of the cropland on a FSN may be enrolled in SHIPP, and to be eligible for SHIPP, land must have been planted or considered planted to a commodity crop for three consecutive years prior to enrollment.
• One base acre for each acre enrolled in SHIPP will be suspended and returned to the SHIPP-enrolled farm after a SHIPP contract expires or is terminated.
• Acres must be planted to a low-cost perennial conserving use cover at enrollee’s expense.
• Acres may be harvested for seed after nesting and brood rearing period, but cannot be insured (25 percent reduction in rental payment if harvested for seed).
• Annual SHIPP payment rate shall be one-half of the CRP general sign-up rental per acre rate for the county.
• Premium discount for insured crops planted in a crop insurance unit each year shall be increased by 2 percent if the unit contains acres enrolled in SHIPP. 
• SHIPP acres may be hayed or grazed outside the nesting and brood-rearing period established for the county, with adequate stubble height left standing to protect the soil, as determined by the State Technical Committee.
• At the outset, socially disadvantaged and military veteran SHIPP enrollees would receive 75 percent of the CRP general sign-up rental rate, a 3 percent increase in crop insurance premium discounts, and no deduction in payment for harvesting grass seed on acres enrolled in SHIPP. 

For additional information on Sen. Thune’s commitment to agriculture and other issues that are important to South Dakota, please visit www.thune.senate.gov. 

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Sioux Falls resident Michael Wyland of Non-Profit quarterly has an interesting article on that website about how the Mid Central Educational Coop’s attempts to drag State Representative Kyle Schoenfish’s Accounting firm into a lawsuit filed against the Coop is primarily smoke and mirrors, and not one that’s likely to work:

In response to the unfolding lawsuit, MCEC has taken the unusual step of filing papers with the state court asking that the education cooperative’s auditors be held liable of any damages resulting from the class action lawsuit.

and.

The filing goes on to say if MCEC is found to be at fault in the class action, “such fault is slight in comparison to the fault of Schoenfish & Co., Inc.”

Blaming the auditors is highly unlikely to be successful for at least three reasons. First, audits are not designed to uncover criminal activity such as embezzlement. Second, audits are dependent upon management’s representations of the organization’s finances. If management misrepresents the finances with skill, the auditors won’t know it. Third, the auditors in this case noted material weaknesses in MCEC’s financial controls as well as missing or incomplete management reports expected of federal grantees. The 2014 audit prepared for MCEC included a note from the auditors that it was the eighth year material weaknesses had been reported to the MCEC board of directors.

The tragedy of GEAR UP is more than the deaths of six people and the alleged embezzlement of millions of dollars. The real damage done to Alyssa Black Bear, Kelsey Walking Eagle-Espinoza, and other Native American plaintiffs likely to join the class action is in the misadministration of the GEAR UP program from its inception in 2005 through the following decade.

Read it here.

From Facebook, Cynthia Mickelson announced today that she is taking the plunge and joining her husband Mark (Speaker of the House) Mickelson in running for office:

Thune, Gov. Daugaard Participate in Hearing on Infrastructure

“Eliminating unnecessary hurdles, while maintaining an emphasis on safety improvements, can lead to a better use of both public and private dollars.” 

WASHINGTON  — U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, today led a hearing entitled, “Connecting America: Improving Access to Infrastructure for Communities Across the Country.” Gov. Dennis Daugaard testified at the hearing, which examined the challenges of connecting Americans, particularly in rural communities, to transportation and information networks.

Thune questioned Daugaard about existing programs under the FAST Act, which passed the Senate in December 2015, and how they compared to new policy designs or a project–specific approach.

I’m a bit stumped at the mixed messages being given.

If you recall, Initiated Measure 21, which was passed at the ballot box this past year, severely limited personal lending in South Dakota by placing express interest limits on short-term and other personal lending, by capping the lending rate at 36% for most entities that weren’t regularly chartered banks.

Who was exempt from IM 22?

• State and national banks
• Bank holding companies
• Other federally insured financial institutions
• State chartered trust companies
• Businesses that provide financing for goods and services that they sell

In my opinion, Initiated Measure 21 was a regulatory overreach, by telling the short-term lenders that they could no longer make a profit sufficient enough to cover their risk. In effect, regulating them out of the business.

Now, a new type of banking measure, House Bill 1179 has been bouncing around in the legislature. What does this measure do? It allows certain types of mortgage lending without a license from the state. Specifically, it is “An Act to revise certain provisions related to exemptions from licensure for nonresidential mortgage loans.” The measure allows a person to lend up to 8 million dollars total, exempting them from licensure, oversight, taxation, etcetera.

In other words, this new class of elite lenders get to do what they want. It made it through the House of Representatives with so-so support, and barely passed out of the Senate, making it out of committee with “No Recommendation.”

It’s coming to the finish line. But, when you put it up against IM21, there’s not a lot of consistency.

On one hand, Initiated Measure 21 puts onerous restrictions on the smallest types of personal loans. So much so that it put them out of business. But, if you have enough money, HB1179 proposes to allow a person to loan out up to 8 Million of it without oversight or regulation.

One approach is contrary to free market principles, and the other ignores the fact that in a year the state is going to have a revenue shortfall, they look as if they may exempt a class of money lenders from taxation, as well as licensure.

Instead of legislatively creating the haves and have nots, if they’re going to de-regulate banking, they should consider relaxing state regulations on established state banks, holding companies, trusts, and others as opposed to creating a caste of elite “lending clubs” not subject to regulation or taxation.

Over-regulating lending, or creating a class of lenders we don’t regulate or ask to pay their fair share of taxes at all.

Maybe there’s a happy medium in there somewhere.

AG Jackley Meets with the President, Vice President
and U.S. Attorney General to Coordinate Fighting Crime

Yesterday Attorney General Marty Jackley met with President Trump, Vice President Pence and U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions to discuss strengthening public safety, including addressing violent crime, human trafficking, and controlled substances  from  our  southern borders.

“As South Dakota’s Attorney General and the former Chairman of the Nation’s Attorneys General, I am looking forward to working with our federal partners in continuing to strengthen public safety. Law enforcement cooperation in South Dakota involving the U.S. Attorney, Attorney General, State’s Attorneys, Tribal officers, Chiefs, and Sheriffs, sets a high standard on how to better protect communities by developing task forces and sharing resources,” said   Jackley.

After the meeting, President Trump announced he has directed the Department of Justice to work with state and local law enforcement to reduce violent crime. In addition, the President announced he has ordered the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice, along with the Department of State and the Director of National Intelligence, to coordinate an aggressive strategy to dismantle the criminal cartels that have spread across our Nation.

President Trump has also said he will bring the full force and weight of the U.S. government to combat the epidemic of human trafficking.

In response to Speaker Mickelson’s guest column on House Bill 1200, I’ve had several people point out the article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal opposing the Campaign Finance Disclosure measure.

For your review:

The South Dakota House voted 42-25 last week to require sweeping disclosure of names and addresses of donors to political nonprofits. The bill requires any group that spends more than $25,000 in independent political expenditures in a year, or more than $25,000 on a ballot question, to disclose the names of its top 50 donors. This is the kind of chilling “transparency” legislation you might find in California or Vermont, not a statehouse with GOP supermajorities.

The bill is a response to a new Democratic strategy, unveiled in 2016, to use ballot measures to overcome the party’s failure to win other South Dakota elections. The Mount Rushmore State has a loose ballot-initiative process, and out-of-state progressive groups swamped South Dakota with liberal policy initiatives. These ranged from challenging the state’s right-to-work law to requiring nonpartisan elections. Most failed but donors from outside the state bought enough ads to pass an ugly campaign-finance restriction.

and..

Republicans say this is about exposing outsiders who are meddling in state elections, but both sides know the real goal is chilling political participation. Money for issue advocacy will dry up if donors fear becoming targets of political retribution, boycotts or bureaucratic assaults. (See Lois Lerner’s IRS.)

and..

What silences the political left will end up silencing everyone. That’s why a coalition including the National Rifle Association, Americans for Prosperity and the state Chamber of Commerce oppose the bill. Groups like these helped to defeat the progressive ballot initiatives, which is proof that more voices and better arguments are the way to win debates—not a limit on campaign donations.

Read it all here (Subscription required)

What do you think?

Is more extensive disclosure the answer? Or does the disclosure come with a chilling effect?

President Trump’s Speech Highlights Americans’ Priorities

“We’ve got a lot of work to do, but I believe we can accomplish big things for the American people this year, and I look forward to getting after it.”

WASHINGTON  — U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) issued the following statement after President Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress:

“Tonight President Trump highlighted his continued focus on tackling the issues that matter most to Americans,” said Thune. “I look forward to working with the president to implement policies that will help create jobs and get our economy growing at a faster rate. The Republican-led Senate shares the president’s commitment to repealing Obamacare and replacing it with patient-centered health care that is affordable for every American, to easing burdensome regulations that are driving up the cost of creating jobs in this country, and to reforming our outdated tax code. We’ve got a lot of work to do, but I believe we can accomplish big things for the American people this year, and I look forward to getting after it.”   

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