By Sen. Chuck Jones,
District 8
The first week of the legislative session is over and as your Senator for District 8, I look forward to working hard and hearing your concerns.  It has been a positive experience as legislators seem poised to seek bi-partisan approaches to solve challenges and embrace opportunities. I believe leading and legislating isn’t about personal wins. It isn’t about treating other people as objects.  It isn’t about intellectual intimidation and bullying. It’s about what serves the mission, vision and values of the people of South Dakota.  That requires collaboration.
As mentioned in the Governor’s State of the State address, South Dakota has been listed at the best run state in the nation and CNBC rated South Dakota number one for business in 2013. As your Senator, I think it is important we work to balance the budget without raising taxes, promote an agenda of limited government and less regulation, promote economic development and improve our education system.
I will be serving on the Taxation, Education and Commerce and Energy Committees, and as a member of the Education Committee, I take pride in the education of our young people – after all they are our future.  A three percent increase in funding has been proposed and I think this is a good starting point for further discussion.  Common Core will also be an issue this legislative session and I have heard from constituents on both sides as to their feelings on this issue.
Other issues I will be paying close attention to are Medicaid funding, Non-Meandered Lakes Legislation, EB5 Program Oversight and Division of Insurance Regulatory Bills.  I look forward to hearing from you on these issues and others.  I’m not here to give you all the answers.  I’m here to help you find your own and for you to help me find better answers as we navigate through this process together.
You can contact me at sen.chuckjones@state.sd.us or my home phone number is 605-997-3510. Please leave a message and I will get back to you.

By Rep. Scott Parsley,
District 8
The first week of the 2014 Legislative Session is completed. During the opening session the Governor presented the State of the State and outlined his legislative priorities for this session of the legislature.
The Governor’s priorities include insurance reform which seeks to adopt national standards regarding how insurance companies must conduct business in South Dakota.  The Governor also outlined his plan for work force development. Included in this plan is expansion of Career and Technical Education (CTE) which has been a priority for me and others in the legislature for several years. I am excited that the Governor has outlined CTE and other work force development as a priority this year.
I believe work force development begins with early childhood education and strong preschool and elementary school programs. I am hopeful the Governor will include these programs as part of his work force development plan. Along with others, I will be proposing ideas to begin work force development for our children at their earliest age as part of our workforce development legislation.
The Governor also outlined a plan to revise Bank Franchise Taxes for nine large interstate banks doing business in South Dakota.
We also began to discuss recommendations that came from the Education Task Force which met all summer. The conclusion of their work was a recommendation that state aid to education be raised by 3.8 percent for the 2014-15 school year.  Adoption of this recommendation will result in a state aid to education of $4,805, the same level of state aid as 2010.  As you may remember, the Governor is proposing a three percent increase in aid to education. Along with the State Association of School Superintendents, I believe we need to pass the Committee’s recommendation and increase state aid to education by 3.8 percent. While this is a good start, it still leaves schools with no margin for inflation since 2010.
This week we did act on two resolutions that were introduced by the Education Summer Study Committee. The first resolution encouraged school districts to work together whenever they can. The second resolution congratulated our teachers for the job they do and recognized that as a state, we need to do everything we can to attract and retain quality teachers, especially in rural areas. While both of these resolutions passed, I was disappointed that 18 of my fellow House Members voted no on the second resolution.
We will begin discussion of Common Core Standards next week. After extensive discussions with the schools in District 8, I will be supporting the continuation of the Common Core Standards.
Other issues that may come up next week are non-meandering water, a bill addressing shared parenting and school capital outlay dollars.
Finally, I am still very hopeful that we can adopt Medicaid expansion and provide medical insurance coverage to more than 22,000 of our fellow South Dakotans. In some encouraging news, almost two in every three of you agree with me on this issue according to a survey released this week by the National Cancer Society. This statistically valid survey shows that a little over 60 percent of South Dakotans believe we should expand Medicaid, and I am hopeful my fellow legislators can be convinced to make expansion a reality in 2014.
Until next week.

By Rep. Leslie Heinemann, District 8
After finishing up the first week of the 89th legislative session, the tone seems to be very positive. We listened to Governor Daugaard’s State of the State address on Tuesday. He emphasized the need to develop the state’s workforce and addressed some ways to approach our state-wide problem. Chief Justice Gilbertson addressed a joint session of the House and Senate and gave us a report of implementation of the unified judicial system changes that were made as a result of legislation in 2013.
We are happy to have Senator Chuck Jones join us in Pierre. He has been very diligent in working to learn the details of serving as your Senator in District 8. I look forward to working with him on issues that concern the constituents of our district.
Several topics of interest have come up,  but as of this date, only a few bills have been officially filed. There are still many bills in the stage of research and development. Please go to the LRC Web site www.legis.sd.gov to see what has been filed and what is the content of each bill.
I attended the National Guard breakfast on Friday morning. The 1742nd National Guard unit was mentioned and is the only state unit now deployed. It was quite apparent the pride the legislators have for our military and we pray for them and their families.
I also attended receptions for Big Sioux Rural Water and Sioux Valley Energy and had a chance to discuss upcoming legislation with the various board members.
After hearing the news of the water supply being compromised in the city of Madison, I am glad to see that they have been able to minimize the inconviences created during this situation. Thanks to all who put forth such effort in difficult weather conditions.
Please let me know if you will be out in Pierre so I can plan my schedule to meet and greet you. You can contact me at Rep.Heinemann@state.sd.us or the House of  Representative phone is 605-773-3851.