Noem keeps up with the tradition of past Republican Governors in our state, telling us how poor we are right before the legislative session, then once it is over they start spending money on pet projects (mostly corporate handouts). Oldest trick in the book. This even comes after added revenue from online sales and the half penny increase;
Noem announced her budget plans Tuesday, which urged state departments to tighten their belts as they head into a difficult financial year. That plan included not having any discretionary inflation increases for overall K-12 education, Medicaid providers and state employees.
But that means there will be no change between target teacher salaries from 2020 to 2021, making it the third year the state has fallen behind on its promise to keep teacher pay competitive if the budget passes
I said it was a bad idea to raise taxes because I knew this would happen, the money went straight into the general fund for the Governor and legislature to waste. Even after several years, it still makes me livid that the legislature didn’t find the money elsewhere (that they have in investment funds) to pay teachers more. Now we are back to square one, and an unneeded tax increase to boot. Don’t get me started. Our State government has been inept for decades, and gets worse by the day.
And Democrats voted for this, too, a tax increase on the poor, that is….
( and Woodstock adds: “Yah, I haven’t really been much of a Democrat ever since Slick Willy came up with that ‘New Democrat’ bullshit”….”And I am old enough to remember ‘New Coke,’ too, but at least Coca-Cola came back with the ‘Real Thing'”…..)
imagine the palaces sanford would’ve built if they were able to get medicaid thrown in with that. i’d also guess, they would’ve ended up getting 100% of that tax money.