Casey Crabtree’s Weekly Column: Listening to Constituents
MADISON–The second to last workweek in Pierre found lawmakers focusing on the issues I most often hear about from the people of District 8–lower taxes, workforce development and public safety. Throughout the past several weeks, I have heard ideas and concerns from people throughout the region, and I am proud that the Senate has delivered on its promises.
I am committed to passing tax relief to South Dakotans this year. On Wednesday, I proposed a property tax rebate for South Dakota homeowners. HB 1141 would offer South Dakota homeowners up to $425 in property tax relief each year. If passed by the House and approved by the governor, this amounts to the largest tax relief in South Dakota history at $104 million per year. The Senate and House are also continuing discussions on sales tax reduction. Based on strong revenue projections, I believe we can get the state’s obligations and let our residents keep more of their money in their pocket.
South Dakota’s economy is cooking. But we need more workers to keep the engine roaring, especially well-trained, highly-skilled people. That’s what I regularly hear from the leaders of small businesses and large operations alike. This week, the Senate approved HB 1039 National Guard free tuition at 100 percent at state universities and technical colleges. We are still in discussions to freeze tuition at state institutions. These are top priorities for me because they are important to South Dakota’s future.
On Thursday, the Senate concurred with the House’s changes to the Truth and Sentencing Bill (SB 146). Supported by police chiefs, sheriffs and mayors, this bill aims to keep violent criminals off the streets and protect South Dakota families.
The Madison Elementary School 4th graders and Deubrook High Schoolers visited the Capitol this week and learned about the legislative process. It was great to see these future leaders show such interest in how the state government operates. I was also honored with a visit from my parents, Ken and Cinda, this week. Two District 8 students concluded two-weeks of service as legislative pages. A big thank you to Greta Larson from Lake Preston and Gabrielle Rebelein from Sioux Valley High School. Both represented their families and schools well during their time in Pierre. Thank you!
Next week (this week) is the final workweek for the 2023 legislative session, and we are on track to pass a balanced budget with some incredible one-time investments in the future of the state. As the session winds down, I continue to be confident that South Dakota’s best lie ahead.
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Superb comments from an excellent leader!
Amen
It seems like you are cherry picking constituents comments. While I agree, reduced taxes are desired, this “workforce development” notion is a fallacy when repeated by many business owners. There is a workforce in South Dakota, but it is slowly growing past the traditional selling point of a “low wage state” criteria. Many of the manufacturing jobs recruited to the state came for the cheap labor, that has increased and they are struggling to find labor to work for $11/hr. I appreciate the effort with HB 1039, but I feel like that will only dilute the labor pool (or “workforce”), to drop wages for the employers. We essentially are paying the education bill for cheaper labor as the taxpayer on top of all other NG benefits. Another frivolous expense is the justification for a new state penitentiary (or correctional institution) which will be justified if we keep more people in prison through SB 146. We have enough prisoners, prisons, and crime and this just keeps growing the prison population. Who benefits from this prison, the current state Pen is fine, they don’t need a state of the art facility, the whole point is taking those “criminals” out of society. Now when someone sells drugs with a firearm, we can pay for them to stay in the pen longer, and all those “investors” in the prison industry will benefit and we as taxpayers pay them. Wish we had more fiscal conservatives in state government, the property taxes can only go so high.
workforce development is a much more complex thing than you present here, and the programs are doing the good that was intended.
That is an oversimplification to dismiss the premise. Define why it is more complex as it pertains to HB 1039. We are paying for other peoples education expenses in order to “develop the workforce”. How does this benefit the taxpayer more than the businesses?
Solid Comments – one of the better put together newsletters. Just a side note – I have not seen an advertisement lately for manufacturing jobs with a starting wage of $11. Even McDonald’s in our town is starting their employees with $15/hr plus college tuition benefits. Demand is high for manufacturing employees and you would be a fool to advertise $11/hr.
Agreed, the comment was to highlight those low wages (whether $11/hr or $45k/yr salary) are no longer available to the state. Many of the businesses incentivized to come to the state by Casey (Director of Heartland Economic Development), may be asking why they no longer can find lower wage workers as they were sold this notion to come to the state. The reason we don’t have low wage workers is because demand is high. When those same company owners call Casey to complain, what can he do? One solution may be to increase the supply (or “develop the workforce”), where we as tax payers are going to fund educational expenses to flood the market in order to lower the wages. This would benefit the company that they recruited, but we as the taxpayers foot the bill. This is why I am skeptical of this “need”.
the many sd existing longtime companies need a better trained workforce too. do we abandon any benefit they would get because, ehh they’re here already, don’t have to cater to them?
Well, yes, that is how free market capitalism works, doesn’t it? You are telling me the government needs to expand and cater to these business entities? We pay enough in taxes, and when the state has a $165M surplus, I would rather see that go back to the SD taxpayer as opposed to an out of state corporation that only came here for the “low wage state”.
BOOM! and there it is. we see you clearly now. zero public spending zero need to tax you. there wouldn’t be public schools, public roads, public outhouses if you went to your extreme. you want zero property taxes. good to know.
That is quite the straw man fallacy there, I can do it too!
Look at enquirer, asking for socialism, their Antifa rally must be on a break to make a post! Go back to Dakota Free Press you poser!
As clearly stated, if we have a surplus, I would prefer that money to stay in state and reduce our taxes as opposed to benefit out of state companies. This does not equal anarchy. You really think giving breaks to out of state companies with our tax dollars is good, or fair, to us?