This week in Pierre we continued work in committee and on the House floor. Commerce committee saw some bills dealing with Workman’s Comp claims and heard updates from the Dept of Labor and Insurance. Bills you may have been reading about in the press were dealt with this week in the Senate. Legislation that would outlaw vanity license plates was killed in committee. Senate bill 23 was killed on the floor, which would have given the Department of Education authority to consolidate small schools below 100 students if they hadn’t already done so within two years.

 

We have passed our deadline to file unlimited bills and Tuesday will be the last day to file our final 3 bills. I will have two bills up in House Taxation Committee on Tuesday morning. One will deal with appeals to property taxes and the other will revise certain provisions related to assessments for elderly and disabled persons.  The property tax bills are scheduled to go to the State Affairs committee and have no been put on the schedule yet.

 

I am continuing to work on an education bill that will address teacher’s salaries and allow schools to use TCAP funds for this purpose. The legislation will leave the control of the salary schedules within the districts with the local school boards and administration. There are other bills filed that set the schedules in statute and contain no funding. I don’t believe they are viable options for our schools; however teacher’s salaries in some districts are much too low. In contacting all the schools, I have found that in some districts the base salary is as low as $20,000. The amount of the base salary in each district also appears to have no correlation to the size of the school. This wide range of salaries answers some questions as to why our state has such a low teacher’s salary average, while some school districts are doing a good job in compensating their staff. There appears to be good support to address this issue in both chambers.

 

I want to thank the Kingsbury Co. Cattlemen for the wonderful lunch on Thursday. It was good to see you all and enjoy the excellent homegrown beef.  I also had the opportunity last week to enjoy dinner with the local REA’s and visiting with all the directors including my neighbors Dale and Deanna Olsen and Alvin Kangas.  It was nice to relax for a couple hours and visit with friends from home. Judy Tryzinka, the Codington Co. Republican chairwoman, helped host a lovely reception at the State Library.

 

Amanda Wegner and Sara Holstrom have finished their two weeks as pages and I want to thank them for their service. They are great girls and I’m excited to see how their stay in Pierre will inspire them to continue to impact their communities and state.

 

We were honored to have Senator John Thune address the legislature this week. He provided us with an update on the farm bill and other legislation that Congress will be dealing with in the upcoming months.

 

I sure appreciate all the phone calls and emails. Keep them coming as the session progresses. I can be reached at 881-2526 or by email at Rep.Noem@state.sd.us.