The Daily Republic, Mitchell, Feb. 22
Criminal justice reforms caused unintentional consequences for local law enforcement
Has South Dakota fixed its high prison population problem, or just kicked the can down the road?
Recently, Gov. Dennis Daugaard touted the successes of the state’s 2013 Public Safety Improvement Act, which focuses on rehabilitating nonviolent offenders by keeping them in the community rather than sending them to an overcrowded prison.
While South Dakota’s Public Safety Improvement Act has saved the state a reported $30 million since fiscal year 2014 by alleviating state prison costs, the reforms have put a significant workload and financial burden on local law enforcement agencies.
County sheriff’s offices and city police departments seemingly are overworked dealing with and arresting repeat drug-use offenders who are flooding local jails.
We know that county jails have never been fuller, and anecdotal evidence from local police officers and sheriff’s deputies say it’s mostly because of people violating probation or their parole over and over. Yet, rather than getting sent to the state penitentiary, they’re forced to go to the county jail.
That certainly is impacting the finances at the Davison County Jail, which saw its overtime costs go about $75,000 over budget in 2016. Other increased jail expenses were due to be about $37,000 overrun on inmate medicine costs and $37,000 over budget for prisoner food.
We know Minnehaha and Yankton counties also have jails that are significantly overcrowded, and the Mitchell Police Division wants to add more officers to staff due to high call volumes.
So the question remains: Is South Dakota actually safer and saving money due to the Public Safety Improvement Act, or was the problem just shifted elsewhere?
We are pleased there are drug offenders being rehabilitated through highly intensive drug courts in some areas. The program has been successful for a large majority of those who chose to sign up for it. But the percentage of users who enter drug court is a tiny fraction compared to the number of addicts in South Dakota.
It seems the people who are released from prison as nonviolent drug offenders are re-entering their community and, rather than getting rehabilitated, violate parole or probation when they go back into the same environment that got them in trouble originally.
Crime in South Dakota has never been higher. Stats show that’s true.
There were 71,014 offenses in South Dakota during 2015, according to the Attorney General’s Office. That year, drug offenses also increased 22.3 percent compared to 2014.
We know there are success stories of people being rehabilitated, and we’re pleased the state is saving dollars to keep people out of the penitentiary. Obviously, change needed to occur in 2013 when South Dakota’s prison population was bursting at the seams.
Though, the repercussions on local law enforcement agencies and county jails have been too much. The Public Safety Improvement Act absolutely alleviated one problem, but unintentionally caused another.
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Capital Journal, Pierre, Feb. 21
Polluting the waters they’re trying to protect isn’t helping DAPL protesters’ argument
We haven’t weighed in too much on the Dakota Access Pipeline debacle occurring a few hundred miles upriver from our community.
Frankly, we thought both sides made compelling arguments. On the one hand was the oil industry, which has been trying to find a safer, more efficient way to transport its product to refineries. The dangers of rail travel, especially for oil from the Bakken oil field are varied and frightening to any community located along the routes those oil trains take.
Pipelines, it seems, are less likely to explode if there’s an accident. Pipelines also tend to be less accident prone than trains. Trains are needed for things other than oil too. At the peak of the Bakken oil boom, our area farmers were left scrambling to find ways to transport their grain to market. Oil was more lucrative to for the railroads to transport so, naturally, oil got priority.
Of course with any pipeline there is always the possibility of a leak. Which is where the protesters’ argument makes a lot of sense.
The Dakota Access pipeline will be, once it’s finished, routed underneath Lake Oahe. If the pipeline were to leak, it could be an ecological disaster of epic proportions for our little corner of the world. A significant portion of our economy is based on the fishing in Lake Oahe, is it wise to risk that for a pipeline that isn’t going to directly benefit us?
A good question to be sure, one that protesters are fighting tooth and nail to ensure the country answers in the negative. They might be right, they might not but our focus is on what’s going to happen this spring.
The water protectors, as they call themselves, lost whatever moral high ground they once had when they failed to clean up after themselves. As snow melts this spring, the flotsam and jetsam, not to mention all sorts of other unsavory things left behind by thousands of people camping in fairly primitive conditions, will undoubtedly make its way into the river. That’s not showing a lot of regard for the water these folks are seeking to protect.
The point has been made. It’s time for the protesters to go home, regroup and come at the pipeline issue from another angle. We can only hope that when these folks do go home, they do so peacefully and that they pack out what they packed in.
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Yankton Daily Press & Dakotan, Feb. 20
Industrial hemp faces obstacles
Gradually, South Dakota may be changing direction on issues involving anything to do with marijuana. At least, the subject of legalizing marijuana can be raised now without it being automatically dismissed and ridiculed in practically every quarter.
But the catch-all specter still does loom on cannabis issues, including industrial hemp. A state House committee last week approved a bill, HB 1204, that would open the door for cultivating industrial hemp, but it still faces a lot of familiar, generalized obstacles.
Industrial hemp is not the same thing as the consumable marijuana, mainly because the former has a far lower level of the psychoactive ingredient THC. So, it might be somewhat unfair to say the Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee’s approval of the plan reflects any kind of sea change regarding the legalization of marijuana. In fact, the House did pass a similar measure last year, but it was scuttled in the Senate.
Hemp’s relationship to marijuana has always been a big strike against it. Industrial hemp plants could be used to disguise marijuana cultivation, hemp opponents charge. Another argument, as put forth by Gov. Dennis Daugaard, warns that the legalization of industrial hemp could open the door to the legalization of medical or even recreational marijuana. And some law enforcement and social services officials worry that legalizing industrial hemp would send the wrong message to kids who are constantly advised on the dangers of marijuana consumption.
Hemp, you might say, has an identity problem.
Fortunately, the committee members were able to separate the potential provided by industrial hemp from the knee-jerk alarm that throws that product and marijuana into the same category.
Industrial hemp has a long history of use, going back at least at least 10,000 years, according to the Canadian Journal of Criminology & Criminal Justice. The fast-growing plant has numerous commercial uses, ranging from ropes to clothing, to foods, lotions and newsprint. According to the North American Industrial Hemp Council, more than 25,000 products can be produced from hemp. As such, it could well rank as one of the most versatile (and marketable) crops a farmer could produce.
Hemp got a big boost from the 2014 farm bill, which allowed states to set up pilot projects for research into hemp production. North Dakota is among those that have embraced this program.
“Industrial hemp is a very, very good, productive, useful product for our agriculture industry in South Dakota,” argued Rep. Elizabeth May in promoting the measure.
The bill would require potential producers of industrial hemp to pass a background check before becoming licensed to grow the crop.
These sound like sensible steps to take in order to simply investigate the economic feasibilities and possibilities of the crop.
Opposition is already forming, and even if it could pass through both the House and Senate, Daugaard has vowed to veto the legalization.
But this is a changing world, in more ways than one. Many states are searching for new sources of revenue, and an increasing number of people are pointing to the legalization of marijuana as one possibility.
However, embracing industrial hemp would make a great deal of sense just from basic agricultural and economic standpoints. One can understand the ties it has to consumable marijuana, but in this age when these plants in general are being given a new look, it should be possible to separate the industrial uses of hemp versus the broader (and misunderstood) family of cannabis.
Industrial hemp deserves that consideration. While it may not reach reality this session, it should eventually be seen as a cash crop that’s worth the research and investment.
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