Latest news with #TonyVenhuizen
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Climate
- Yahoo
Gov. Rhoden launches task force in new executive order
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Governor Larry Rhoden signed Executive Order 2025-06, which establishes the Governor's Resilience and Infrastructure Task Force (GRIT). According to a news release from the Governor's office, GRIT will 'serve as a strategic advisory body to develop policy recommendations, assess risks and vulnerabilities, and support long-term planning and investment in critical infrastructure systems across our state.' What to know about severe weather Monday The GRIT task force will include the following members appointed by the Governor, according to the executive order: Representatives from state agencies for public safety, military, cybersecurity, water and wastewater, transportation, or other agencies as designated by the Governor; Members from industry, utilities, the private sector, and academia; and Subject matter experts in cybersecurity, emergency management, and critical infrastructure. The task force will be chaired by Lieutenant Governor Tony Venhuizen, and Adjutant General Mark Morrell will serve as vice chair. 'I am committed to keeping South Dakota strong, safe, and free for generations to come,' Rhoden said in a news release. 'We pray that the most challenging circumstances will never arise, but we are preparing so that South Dakota can face such situations with determination, resilience, and grit.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
30-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
South Dakota corrections work group formally backs need for new prison
From left, Lt. Gov. Tony Venhuizen, Ryan Brunner of the Governor's Office, and Corrections Secretary Kellie Wasko listen to testimony at a Project Prison Reset meeting on April 29, 2025, in Springfield. (John Hult/South Dakota Searchlight) SPRINGFIELD — South Dakota needs a new prison. How large it ought to be or where are open questions, but a work group appointed to 'reset' discussions on a new men's prison agreed on that much Tuesday during the second of its four planned meetings. State Attorney General Marty Jackley sat silent through more than four hours of testimony and public comment before asking his fellow members of 'Project Prison Reset' to support a replacement for the penitentiary, the 144-year-old quartzite monolith in Sioux Falls known as 'The Hill.' By then, group members had reviewed a dozen potential sites for a new prison, submitted by landowners through a request for information. They'd also sat through presentations on mental health and occupational programming at Mike Durfee State Prison in Springfield, heard from city residents on the medium security facility's value to the Bon Homme County city of 1,900, and had reassured those residents that it would remain a part of the Department of Corrections' long-term facility plans regardless of what happens with the penitentiary. With The Hill, Jackley said, the path forward is clear. It's overcrowded, outdated and unsafe, he said, citing the case of a correctional officer killed by two inmates in 2011 as evidence of the dangers presented by the status quo. 'We can't do nothing,' Jackley said. 'We have to do something.' The unanimous vote in favor of Jackley's motion answers the first of three questions posed in the executive order from Gov. Larry Rhoden that created the group. At a special session in July, the group is meant to deliver recommendations on how large a prison is needed and where to put it, using the results of a consultant's report on the state's existing facilities as a guide. Rhoden backed a plan to build an $825 million, 1,500-bed men's facility on a controversial Lincoln County site during this year's legislative session. The governor has called the penitentiary 'gothic,' and said the site south of Sioux Falls that inspired an ongoing legal battle from neighbors was a 'gift from God,' but was unable to sway lawmakers skeptical about the size, site and price tag. Lt. Gov. Tony Venhuizen was appointed to lead Project Prison Reset after the legislative rebuffing. On Tuesday before the vote, Venhuizen said he agrees with Jackley on the need, but pointed out that the group's schedule envisioned a review of the consultant's report before answering any of the questions posed to it. But 'if you feel that we already know enough to answer the first question,' he said, 'I think that is also very defensible.' Just one work group member suggested otherwise. Dell Rapids Republican Speaker of the House Jon Hansen, who announced a 2026 run for governor last week, tried unsuccessfully to convince the group to hold off on supporting a replacement. Hansen and his announced running mate, Canton Republican Rep. Karla Lems, were vocal opponents of the 1,500-bed plan that failed during the legislative session. Hansen pointed to a presentation on Springfield's Governor's House program from earlier in the afternoon. Inmates who build those affordable housing units are less likely to return to prison, the group learned. Why not explore options for reducing repeat offenses through programming before committing to new facilities, he asked? 'From everything that I've studied, we're an outlier, and it's really high,' Hansen said. 'Before we go jumping into whether we need a new prison, I really think we should pause. Maybe it's part of that report – I would presume it is – what are other states doing?' But Rep. Chris Karr, R-Sioux Falls, said the needs are immediate. Even if the state were to keep The Hill, he said, 'we've got 365 more people than we're supposed to' in the building. 'Even if you disagree with a few of these members on the panel and say 'I still think The Hill's still viable,' etcetera, we've still got to find room for 365 more people,' Karr said. The penitentiary has some supporters. A former inmate who testified Tuesday said he spent time there and at the Federal Correctional Institution of Leavenworth in Kansas, a prison of similar vintage. 'The Hill is functional,' said Paul Cooper, who's employed as a cook in Sioux Falls. 'It's clean, productive. I completely disagree with the fact that it needs to be rebuilt.' Doug Weber, a former penitentiary warden who lobbied lawmakers to vote down the 1,500-bed proposal, told South Dakota Searchlight that The Hill is functional if maintained. Darin Young, the now-former warden who took the job upon Weber's retirement, called the building 'beautiful' in a recent interview with The Scouting Report podcast. Minnehaha County Sheriff Mike Milstead offered a different take on Tuesday. 'I don't need a consultant to tell me that place is a pit,' Milstead said. 'I would not want my son or daughter working there.' Hansen and Lems ultimately joined every other member of the task force in supporting Jackley's motion. Milstead spoke up in favor of consultation with neighbors during the earlier discussions on possible sites. The state got 12 pitches from landowners for possible sites through its request for information. Four were outside of Sioux Falls, in Huron, Grant County (northeast of Watertown), Aberdeen and Mitchell. Prison work group peppered with public testimony in first Sioux Falls meeting Another eight were in the Sioux Falls area, including near the Lincoln County cities of Canton and Worthing and in the Sioux Falls development park that's home to the city's Amazon distribution center. The former Citibank campus just north of the current penitentiary was also offered up as an option, and multiple work group members toured that site recently. Ryan Brunner, a policy adviser for Rhoden, presented the proposals on a spreadsheet and noted that some arrived as recently as Monday evening. The goal, he said, is to fill in the spreadsheet with details on each site's cost, serviceability for utilities and other factors in the coming weeks. 'Is there some way you can put in there what the neighbors think?' Milstead said. 'Some of these are in places where homes are going in nearby.' Brunner said that will be a consideration for any site, as would issues like proximity to 100-year floodplains or interstates and workforce availability. The consultant hired to study the state's needs can fully study three sites once the group narrows its options. As far as public comments, Venhuizen said he doubts neighbors will be silent. Opposition from those who live near the initially proposed Lincoln County site – which is still on the table as an option for the work group – spoke up quickly. 'We put this list out yesterday,' Venhuizen said. 'I'm sure we'll know what the neighbors think in pretty short order.' The locations submitted to Project Prison Reset: Submission 1 – Huron Submission 2 – Aberdeen Submission 3 – Mitchell Submission 4 – Grant County Submission 5a – Citibank Campus Submission 5b – Citibank Campus Submission 5c – Citibank Campus Submission 6 – I-29 Ag and Industrial Park Submission 7 – Moen Parcel Submission 8 – Newman Land Submission 9 – Assam Companies Submission 10 – Kappenman Trust Submission 11 – Canton Parcel Submission 12 – Wayne Township SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Prison reset group meets in Springfield
SIOUX FALLS S.D. (KELO) — Gov. Larry Rhoden's Project Prison Reset's task force has its second meeting Tuesday. The group toured Mike Durfee state prison in the morning. The second half is scheduled to start at 12 p.m. at the Springfield Community Center, in Springfield. The task force is chaired by Lt. Governor Tony Venhuizen. You can watch the livestream in the player above. A variety of presentations are on the agenda, including a review of site submissions proposed for a new prison to be built. KELOLAND News's Dan Santella will bring a full report Tuesday night from Springfield on KELOLAND News. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
04-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
With $50 million spent already, state hires new consultant to restart prison planning
From left, South Dakota Speaker of the House Jon Hansen, R-Dell Rapids, Lt. Gov. Tony Venhuizen, and Ryan Brunner, an adviser to Gov. Larry Rhoden, participate in a Project Prison Reset meeting on April 3, 2025, at the Military Heritage Alliance in Sioux Falls. (John Hult/South Dakota Searchlight) SIOUX FALLS — A $729,000 consultant contract will be added to the roughly $50 million South Dakota has already spent on a stalled prison construction effort. State officials signed a contract this week to pay a consultant to repeat and update a $323,000 prison facilities report that has framed three years of discussions on the state's correctional needs. The contract with Phoenix-based Arrington Watkins is just the latest deduction from a $62 million pool of money spent down to less than a fifth of its original size to prepare for a now-paused Lincoln County prison project. On Thursday, representatives with the Gov. Larry Rhoden administration acknowledged that taxpayers will be out most of that money unless lawmakers vote to revive the controversial project — or a scaled-down version of it — during a June special legislative session. Prison work group peppered with public testimony in first Sioux Falls meeting About $50 million of the money is already gone. It was spent to secure land, design a campus, and secure a stake in the electrical, water and sewer infrastructure that would've been necessary to house and care for 1,500 inmates. The state's under contract to spend millions more, but has paused that work. The state could 'claw back' some of that $50 million, but Lt. Gov. Tony Venhuizen said the administration knew there could be 'significant costs' to shifting course. 'We're doing what we can to reduce that, but it could be a considerable amount, and that's something we have to consider as we move forward,' Venhuzen said after a meeting of the Project Prison Reset work group at the South Dakota Military Heritage Alliance. The state based its earlier decision to pursue an $825 million facility largely on the recommendations of a 2022 report from the Omaha-based DLR Group. Lawmakers rejected that idea in February. That report outlined the state's correctional system deficiencies and recommended a host of potential solutions. The lawmakers most skeptical of the Lincoln County prison proposal repeatedly cited that report's lower men's prison price estimate, as well as its smaller-scale alternative prison construction options. The forthcoming Arrington Watkins report will ask the same sorts of questions. Ryan Brunner, the Rhoden adviser who serves as his point person on prison issues, said Thursday that eight members of the work group reviewed the contract before the state signed it. The state is also preparing to release a request for information, Brunner said, seeking interest from any landowners who might be willing to sell their property to the state for prison projects. After the meeting, Venhuizen said the work group would use the Arrington Watkins report and any interest gleaned from the land-seeking notice to decide where to go next on prison construction. The DLR suggested a 1,300-bed men's prison, but affixed a far smaller price tag than the one lawmakers were presented with last November. Under the direction of the Department of Corrections, a 2022 summer study group endorsed a 1,500-bed facility. Initial 2023 design contracts for that facility, partially redacted versions of which were given to South Dakota Searchlight by the DOC last month, put the top price at $450 million — roughly in line with DLR Group's estimates. An amended contract soon pushed that figure higher. A contract amendment in April of 2024 put the 'not to exceed' price at $740 million. That figure was not offered during a legislative Appropriations Committee the following month, though. At that meeting, and another legislative meeting later that summer, lawmakers were told that the 'guaranteed maximum price' would come in November. By the time that $825 million number arrived, the state had already spent millions to design the facility, drill test bores for a possible geothermal energy system, and to scan for cultural artifacts and wetlands. The state continued to sign contracts for the Lincoln County prison project into early 2025. The $825 million guaranteed price expired in March. Lawmakers who'd hoped to move forward with the project warned their compatriots that the price would only grow through inaction. Michelle Jensen, one of the Lincoln County landowners who sued the state over the prison plan, offered a different perspective in her public testimony to the work group on Thursday. Jensen noted that a final decision from the state Supreme Court in that lawsuit could come after the June special session. The remedy for financial losses in Lincoln County, Jensen said, should have been for the state to 'stop spending money out there if you know it's a thing that might not happen.' Jensen also suggested that the state could sell the land. The DOC transferred about $8 million to the Office of School and Public Lands to obtain the title to the 320 Lincoln County acres upon which it had hoped to build its prison. The land had passed into the ownership of the state Office of School and Public Lands years ago when the owners died without heirs or a will. On a roadside viewing of the property Wednesday afternoon, Brunner told the work group that the state only needed half the property for the prison, and that the other half was reserved for possible future use. Brunner sounded a hopeful note Thursday on a $10.5 million contract with the city of Lennox for a sewer line. The line's not in the ground yet, even though Lennox has collected the money. Funding for all but $500,000 of that contract came from the federal American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. The ARPA dollars had to be obligated to a water or sewer infrastructure project by Dec. 31, 2024. Had the prison project gone forward, Lennox would've been in line for $50,000 monthly payments from the state. Those monthly payments would amount to less than $30 per person for each of the people — inmates and staff — who'd have used the prison's toilets, sinks and showers. 'It's not that much different than your household sewer bill,' Brunner reasoned on Thursday. 'And so we don't start paying that until we actually start running sewage.' If the work group picks a site within 10 miles of Lennox in any direction for any other prison project, Brunner said, the state will still get something from that investment. 'If you're within 10 miles of Lennox, it's possible we could run that line to it,' Brunner said. The state also entered into agreements with Southeastern Electric Cooperative and South Lincoln Rural Water to pay for portions of upgrades planned by the respective utility providers. The state has paid for some of its stake in those projects. Brunner said the state could still pull out of a substation project, since the station has yet to be placed and could move to another location. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
02-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Project Prison Reset: What's coming first
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Conversations on where and how to build a new men's penitentiary in South Dakota have a new focus. Project Prison Reset's task force will tour the South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls Wednesday as well as this rural site in Lincoln County where the state had focused on putting the penitentiary's replacement before lawmakers voted down a bill to appropriate money to build it. Construction to begin on Cliff Ave and I-229 interchange Now, in the wake of that legislative defeat, Lt. Gov. Tony Venhuizen will serve as the chair for the task force. 'The governor's direction to our task force was to take a fresh look at the entire situation. so I am really starting this with the idea that we're in fact-finding mode. so this first meeting is going to be a lot of background information,' said Venhuizen. Eventually, the plan is for a special session of the state legislature to learn in late July. about the group's recommendations. Venhuizen says that Lincoln County site between Harrisburg and Canton is still a possibility. 'I would say all options are on the table, including that one. And that's a piece of ground that we own and that we have spent a certain amount of money on preparing, and that's certainly a factor to consider but i don't think any options are on or off the table right now,' Venhuizen said. Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle will serve on the task force. 'I think everybody may be going into this with somewhat of a predisposition, but we're all trying very hard to put those aside and just look at it from a fresh angle as if we're just starting from new,' Republican Sen. Jim Mehlhaff said. And what happens after* someone has served time is also in focus. 'What are we doing to make sure when they leave prison they're better equipped for life outside the walls. and those I don't think will necessarily be addressed by this committee, but that's I think the larger looming question after we figure out what we need to do facility-wise,' Democratic Sen. Jamie Smith of Sioux Falls said. 'The people that we're sending to prisons, if we don't have good areas for rehabilitation, then I don't think that they're going to come out of prison with a good experience and want to be that productive citizen.' Yankton Police Chief Jason Foote said. Following tomorrow's tours, the task force is set to gather for public comment, presentations and discussion on Thursday in Sioux Falls. Project Prison Reset will next meet in Springfield, S.D. on April 29. The community is home to Mike Durfee State Prison, another South Dakota Department of Corrections facility. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
