Pat Powers predictably snarkificates on U.S. Attorney Brendan Johnson's opening of a Twitter account:

...isn’t raising his profile though the use of social media a political move for someone viewed by many Democrats as the future savior of the South Dakota Democratic Party? And wouldn’t an increased profile keep his name in play…… say, if a current candidate for US Senate named Rick Weiland were to drop out of the race unexpectedly?

I’m just saying [Pat Powers, "Non-Political Brendan Johnson Now on Twitter @Brendan_SD. In a Non-Political Way," Dakota War College, 2013.06.18].

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Pat. You're just saying the same nonsense you've been peddling for months with your oxygen-wasting Brendan-bashing and thoroughly debunked placeholder hypothesis.

Google "Twitter U.S. Attorney." You'll find all sorts of U.S. Attorneys (Massachusetts, Connecticut, North Texas) doing the same thing Brendan Johnson is doing: using social media to connect with the public he serves. Heck, Pat's old boss, Secretary of State Jason Gant, does the same thing. Are we to dismiss the social media accounts Pat set up for Jason as blatant politicking on the public dime (an activity on which Pat and Jason are experts)?

Powers's criticism of U.S. Attorney Johnson's adoption of social media (hey! Brendan's on Facebook, too!) is hypocritical and inimical to open government. Instead of needlessly and baselessly impugning his motives (which will only drive more politicians away from social media), we should welcome Johnson and all other public officials to speak directly to the people they serve through the wonders of the Web.

Former South Dakotan gone Minnesota Joe Loveland offers this hilariously apt theatrical adaptation of Sanford Health's hasty retreat from merger talks with Fairview Health:

(Dark stage)

Fairview and Sanford CEOs:   (Unintelligible whispers)

(Stage lights come on)

Minnesota Attorney General :  Hey guys, I heard you’re talking about a merger that impacts lots of Minnesotans.  What’s in it for them?

Sanford CEO:   It’s our destiny to be big and go east.

Fairview CEO:  Mumble, mumble, the talks are only in the early stages.

Minnesota Attorney General:  But what’s in it for Minnesotans?  They paid for that University Medical Center.

Sanford: We’re not feeling welcome.  I declare these merger negotiations  over.

(Curtain falls abruptly)

[Joe Loveland, "Sanford CEO Needs to Look in the Mirror," Wry Wing Politics, 2013.04.11]

Loveland isn't razzing Sanford boss Kelby Krabbenhoft out of anti-merger fervor or Minne-xenophobia (a term from another Loveland post on the Sanford-Fairview merger). He just wanted to learn more... and thinks Krabbenhoft botched the PR that could have educated and won over Minnesotans and their duly vigilant attorney general:

I’m disappointed that the drama ended the way it did. Like many Minnesotans I had concerns, but I also had interest. I wanted to see if there was a way a merger could improve things for Minnesota patients and taxpayers. But Mr. Krabbenhoft didn’t appear to be interested in engaging in that topic.

...Rather than blaming Attorney General Swanson, Mr. Krabbenhoft should look in the mirror, because his public relations and government relations was embarrassingly bad. That, not Attorney General Swanson, is the biggest reason why these merger talks never went far enough to be able to fairly evaluated [Loveland, 2013.04.11].

Dang: building your business in a state that demonizes openness and regulation can blind you to the expectations that sensible citizens in other states may have for your expanding operations.

The Building South Dakota fund, our new Republican scheme of ineffective tax handouts to corporations wedded to a few sensible Democratic policies, is rolling toward passage. And our more attentive press people are p.o.'ed. Tom Lawrence says Senate Bill 235 reaffirms our state government's commitment to keeping the press and public out of the loop:

The plan was almost completely assembled in closed-door meetings. Legislators, sensitive to the media and public paying too close attention to such a proposal, rolled it out in a press conference Thursday....

Monday in Pierre, the plan was given a hearing. No one spoke against it, and now it rolls ahead.

This may be a wonderful thing for South Dakota. It may spur investment and create jobs and boost the state’s economy.

It does nothing, however, to dismiss the theory that South Dakota politics and government are decided in private meetings, where the public and the press are not welcome [Tom Lawrence, "The People's Business, Done Behind Closed Doors," Republic Insider, 2013.03.04].

Bob Mercer also steps unabashedly from behind the false curtain of journalistic neutrality and engages in open advocacy for a better, more transparent system of spending the public's money:

The only hearing on the legislation is set for this morning. It is unlikely that the necessary amendments will be ready in time. The amendments can be prepared by the time the legislation reaches the House floor on Tuesday afternoon. If the Legislature and the governor are serious about giving this immense discretionary power to the Board of Economic Development, the process requires the highest possible degree of openness. Voters rejected a similar type of mechanism in November. It would be an insult to try the same thing again, wrapped inside a different envelope. If a state board is going to be given the power to give away millions of dollars annually at its own discretion, in a program that favors a very small group of taxpayers above all others, the public has a right to know what is being attempted and should have the right to express its opinions to that board about each and every proposal. The state Board of Water and Natural Resources has functioned for many years under the very type of open system for its grants and loans [Bob Mercer, "To Whom It Must Concern," Pure Pierre Politics, 2013.03.04].

I'll be waiting for the peanut gallery at Dakota War College to call for Mercer's firing for having the audacity to express an opinion.

But we'll be waiting even longer for our leaders in Pierre to start treating public policy like a public affair and not something they need to keep secret from the rabble.

An eager Sturgis reader passes along the agenda for Tuesday's regular meeting of the Meade County Commission. My neighbor cocks an eyebrow at Commissioner Alan Aker's agenda item to put the bare minimum of information from county commission meetings on the public record:

Consider changing county commission minutes so that only motions and votes are published.

Proposal: County commission minutes would consist only of motions and votes.

• Motions which are not seconded would be in the minutes.
• Motions which are withdrawn would not be in the minutes.
• When motions are modified with the consent of the maker and seconder, only the modified motion will be published.
• Informational agenda items where no motion is made will not be published.
• Comments from the audience will not be published.
• Commissioners cannot request that editorial or informational statements be read into the minutes.
• Comments from other county officials will not be published.
• Veteran of the month will be published.
• Deferrals by the chair or by motion will be published when the matter is a hearing, reading, or decision requiring notice to the public.

Commissioner Aker just can't do without the Veteran of the Month commendations, but he figures the public doesn't need any record of things actually said at commission meetings that shape the debate and decisions of their elected officials.

I glance at Meade County's February minutes and find that Commissioner Aker's proposal would deprive the public of the pleasure and wisdom gained from reading Commissioner Linda Rausch's declaration with respect to Exit 52 landscaping that "I love trees and I love the beauty and I hope this is going to be more beautiful.  We are going to grow a lot of trees and it is not a lot of money, although $2500.00 is still a lot of money if it is in my pocket."

Perhaps Commissioner Aker is simply trying to live up to that tree-love by saving paper. But come on, Alan! Publishing doesn't cost that much. If anything, we should have more in the minutes, not less. If printing the minutes in the local paper is really draining the coffers, how about two versions of minutes: put the bare-bones minutes in the paper, but require detailed minutes online, where publication is almost free.

Ask and ye shall receive... sometimes! I gripe and moan about not getting to see the highly-touted "Building South Dakota" economic development plan before the Legislature's Republican and Democratic leaders spring it on us in committee Monday, and within a couple hours, Bob Mercer gets the good for us. Agreeing that shaping important public policy largely out of public view isn't the greatest idea, Mercer posts a draft of the proposed hoghouse amendment to SB 235 for all to read.

Warning: there is no guarantee that this text is the exact text that Rep. Cronin will lay on the desk of House State Affairs on Monday morning. Senator Corey Brown assures David Montgomery that the legislators won't change it much, but we may spend our weekend dissecting and debating these 40 sections and 6000 words, only to find someone from the second floor of the Capitol marches over to strike and insert and blow up the deal (but Dennis wouldn't do that, would he?).

But because we enjoy this kind of thing, here's my summary of what this new economic development plan may look like:

1. "Building South Dakota" gets all contractors excise tax from new projects receiving tax refunds under this plan, plus half of the unclaimed property deposited into the general fund.
2. 25% of the BSD money goes to a new local infrastructure improvement fund, which gives money to local governments to build roads, bridges, etc. for "economic development projects." That's broader and fairer than the Big Ag road subsidy proposed in SB 155 and suggests SB 155 may no longer be necessary.
3. 15% goes to matching funds for local economic development staff, equipment, and projects.
4. 30% goes to "workforce education," which includes secondary and post-secondary career and technical education.
5. The workforce education provision funds a new limited English proficiency (LEP) adjustment to the formula for state aid to education. This provision does the work of Senate Bill 159 and then some: where SB 159 would add 1% to the state money schools receive for each LEP student, this amendment 25% more per LEP student. Multiply 4,768 LEP students statewide by 25% of the current per student allocation, and that's $5.2 million for more for education.
6. By current LEP student counts, 70% of that LEP money would go to four districts: Sioux Falls, Todd County, Huron, and Shannon County.
7. 25% goes to a new housing fund targeting low-income folks—i.e., anyone making 80% or less of the median income in their area. (Better get someone from Habitat on that board!)
8. Sioux Falls and Rapid City get 30% of the housing money; the rest of South Dakota gets 70%.
9. 5% goes to the REDI fund for grants and loans for small projects—i.e., under $20 million).
10. Check #1 on gubernatorial authority: The Senate gets to confirm the Governor's appointees to the Board of Economic Development.
11. Check #2: The Legislative leadership gets to appoint four more members to the Board of Economic Development. (I like checks! So should you!)
12. The Large Project Development Fund we voters killed last year in Referred Law 14 comes back, but "large" now means new construction worth more than $20 million or equipment replacement worth more than $2 million.
13. Instead of grants from the Governor's slush fund, large projects get "reinvestment payments"—i.e., refunds of sales and use tax paid on construction.
14. Applicants for reinvestment payments must meet specific criteria laid out by this bill and by the Board of Economic Development.
15. Pipelines don't get tax refunds!
16. We publish the names of anyone receiving these refunds, along with a list of all other state and local economic development help their project receives; the jobs, wages, and property taxes they're supposed to generate; and "a statement of why the project would not have occurred in South Dakota without the reinvestment payment" (I really like that!).

I'm looking at that draft and seeing good things. We get more money for clear educational needs. We still have corporate welfare, but we get more accountability for said welfare. We block Keystone XL from taking a bigger slurp of our tax dollars and focus a little more on smaller business and local needs.

If no one monkeys with that bill much before Monday, and unless I hear some reasonable arguments to the contrary, I could support this draft bill.

But we need to see the real text on Monday.

I'd really like to pick apart the big new "Building South Dakota" economic development plan partially unveiled by the GOP and Dem leaders of our Legislature yesterday. But I can't, because the bill that is supposed to carry it to fruition, Senate Bill 235, remains as of this morning an empty hoghouse vehicle.

Now the press tells us that the plan only uses tax dollars from new projects that wouldn't otherwise come to South Dakota. The SD Dems' press release assures us that the plan invests those dollars in K-12 schools, infrastructure, affordable housing, renewable energy, and "community-based growth," which I am given to understand means supporting small-town, homegrown entrepreneurs with the money we get from playing the Toyota lottery.

That sounds better than nothing, and it sounds better than the top-down Governor's corporate-welfare slush fund that we voters nixed in the form of Referred Law 14 last November. But I can't say for sure until I can read the bill, and you and I and anyone else not hanging around the Capitol can't read the bill until Monday, when the promised hoghouse amendment will be posted online after it is moved and likely approved in committee.

There are numerous such empty hoghouse bills waiting to receive and publish their great ideas during the hectic last week of the Legislative session. Especially on an initiative as significant as this economic development proposal, and especially when the legislators apparently have the details in their pockets, ready to go, the Legislature should require the publication of full bills at least 24 hours if not longer before their first hearing in committee. To publicly air specific bill text at the hearing where it will receive its first formal testimony and votes deprives the vast majority of South Dakotans of the opportunity to study, question, and informedly advocate or oppose the legislation that will affect them.

Short of that, I'd like Senator Russell Olson or Rep. Bernie Hunhoff to post the bill text to their Facebook pages today so we can all review it over the weekend and submit our input to our legislators.

Once again I hang my head in shame of my State Legislature. Yesterday the South Dakota House voted 42 to 27 to let school boards put our children at greater risk of violent death by empowering Second Amendment devotees to strut around our schools pretending they are doing something brave and noble with their guns.

House Bill 1087, the school gunslinger bill, compounds its harms by trying to keep them secret from parents and taxpayers. Frankly, as a parent, I want to know exactly which teachers and staff in my daughter's school are carrying weapons. If one second-grade teacher has a gun in her classroom, I will demand that my daughter not be placed in that classroom. If a fellow teacher in my high school is carrying a gun, I will demand that that teacher not enter my classroom while students are present.

Yet as proponent and big shooter Rep. Charlie Hoffman (R-23/Eureka) made clear in the floor debate yesterday, one major point of the school-gunslinger bill is to keep the presence of guns in the school absolutely secret:

Other speakers emphasized the perceived security benefits of this bill. Even if very few schools arm teachers under this measure, supporters said, the ambiguity that perhaps a school might have an armed volunteer would deter shooters.

“The bad guys will have no knowledge of any school that has taken advantage of being able to have a sentinel,” said Rep. Charlie Hoffman, R-Eureka. “That alone will stop many of the people who want to create carnage from doing so” [David Montgomery, "School Sentinels Bill Passes House 42-27," Political Smoekout, 2013.01.29].

Rep. Hoffman is wrong. Parents and attentive crazed gunmen will know whether their schools are submitting to media hype and hysteria and putting their children at greater risk of death by firearm. Section 9 of HB 1087 reads thus:

Any discussion conducted by a school board regarding a school sentinel program created pursuant to this Act shall be conducted in an executive or closed meeting held in accordance with § 1-25-2 from which no printed materials or record may be made available to the public.

Any discussion.... Our open meeting laws and this clause allow discussion in private, but votes still must be public. The board cannot simply come out of executive session and say, "We hereby vote to do the thing we were talking about." The vote must be open, and the public must know what that vote is for.

And there's more: regarding a... program created... created. That's a past participle. When a school board sits down for its first discussion of a school gunslinger program, the program will not yet have been created. Therefore, under the language of the current bill, the creating discussion must be public. Parents and other taxpayers must be able to at least watch if not participate in that discussion. That initial public discussion and subsequent public vote will make clear whether a school has succumbed to Second Amendment fantasies or whether it continues to take serious its obligation to teach children in a safe, gun-free environment.

Rep. Kristi Noem finally gives GOP bloggers something irreproachably positive to crow about her. After a long series of closed, barely announced events, she's hosting real town halls... and she's giving us more than one day's notice!

WHAT: Aberdeen Town Hall

WHEN: Wednesday, January 30, 2013 / 10:30 a.m. CT

WHERE: Northern State University Student Center / Centennial Room E and F / 1200 South Jay Street / Aberdeen, SD 57401

 

WHAT: Watertown Town Hall

WHEN: Wednesday, January 30, 2013 / 3:30 p.m. CT

WHERE: Lake Area Technical Institute Student Services Center / 1201 Arrow Avenue / Watertown, SD 57201
WHAT: Sioux Falls Town Hall

WHEN: Thursday, January 31, 2013 / 10:30 a.m. CT

WHERE: Holiday Inn City Centre / 100 West 8th Street / Sioux Falls, SD 57104
WHAT: Mitchell Town Hall

WHEN: Friday, February 1, 2013 / 10:30 a.m. CT

WHERE: Highland Conference Center / 2000 Highland Way / Mitchell, SD 57301

 

WHAT: Rapid City Town Hall

WHEN: Friday, February 1, 2013 / 2:00 p.m. MT

WHERE: University Center / 4300 Cheyenne Boulevard / Rapid City, SD 57703

Five town halls in one week... that may equal the number of town halls she held all last year. Now let's see if Noem thinks she's met her quota for 2013. Let's also see if she can do us a favor and hold some more town halls in the evening and on the weekend when working folks can get out to see them. (Oh, wait, we can reproach....)

Now that Congresswoman Noem is actually putting some open public interaction on the calendar, Pat Powers can raise the town hall flag and ask why Senator Tim Johnson isn't doing the same. I'll nod to Powers's consistent hypocrisy and agree: Senator Johnson, if Kristi can do it, so can you. More public appearances, from the whole lot of you!