97th Legislative Session, Week 2 Recap

The SD Legislature is getting into full swing with the second week of the session. Bills are beginning to go through committees and onto the floor. With the impeachment hearing of Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg beginning, there was much work to do this week. Three days of public testimony were concluded on the evening of Wednesday, January 19. These hearings were held by the Select Committee on Investigation, whose membership is nine select members of the House.

In the House Judiciary, we heard Bill 1056, an act to revise provisions related to medical cannabis data maintained by the Department of Health. This bill amended the current law to have more specific criteria. It would do three things,

1. Ensure the medical marijuana program is transparent so the State can adequately regulate it.

2. Provide law enforcement the information it needs to investigate illegal activity.

3. Protect South Dakotans from hundreds of adverse drug interactions with medical cannabis and allow doctors to check for adverse drug interactions just like they can for all other medications they provide a patient.

This bill was passed out of the House Judiciary Committee. This is one of many marijuana bills coming to the State Legislature this year.

In House Ag and Natural Resources, House Bill 1039 was heard on Thursday, January 20. It is a bill that deals with tax assessment on actual use of the land. This bill brought lots of interest to the committee with 18 testifiers. It was passed 10-3 out of committee.

After going through redistricting in 2020, a bill was brought to codify and simplify the Redistricting process in the future. The House State Affairs committee passed this bill with two dissenting votes.

Wednesday mornings throughout the session, legislators meet for catacomb caucus. This week I was the guest speaker and gave my personal testimony.

This week, we enjoyed a visit from the Southeast South Dakota Tourism Department, SDSU and today was Children's day with many groups joining us advocating for children.

After today's session, we had a Joint memorial service honoring those legislators who have passed away in the last year.