In good news from Pierre, Senator Russell Olson's bill to establish a need-based scholarship program for South Dakota's post-secondary students has yet to garner a nay vote. Senate Bill 237 zoomed through the Senate on Wednesday and now awaits the attention of House Education.
One sticking point: legislators still haven't figured out how much money they are willing to invest in catching South Dakota up with the rest of the nation. Senator Olson originally proposed capitalizing the scholarship fund with $5 million; the bill has been amended to allot a placeholder $1, since legislators just aren't sure yet where they will get the money to fund these scholarships.
Um, fellas? I think Senator Adelstein has an idea on that funding source....
There's another spending bill I'm following and the appropriations committee did the same thing. When I asked Sen. Olson about this he said this is common practice by the legislature to remove the dollar amount in the first committee hearing and then insert the dollar amount back in before it comes up for final consideration.
...which strikes me as a sneaky deal, Elisa. I know it's common practice, but if I'm called upon to vote on a bill, I want to know the dollar figure. It seems good fiscal conservatism would tell me that until I know how much a program is going to cost, I can't in good conscience put my name to it. Now I guess it's not a major sin, since the bill will have back to the Senate for a reconciliation vote if/after it gets a dollar figure from the House. But why not cowboy up? They know how much it will cost to do the program right. They have ballpark figures available. be honest, put a dollar figure down, let us all in on the negotiations.
Indeed. Let us not do French math here and put a real hard number on the target.
There is hope for the party of Lincoln. Good work Senator Olson.
Yeah, but then Russ shows his true contempt for education with his little tirade against schools in the HB 1087 hearing yesterday.