Argus Leader
Next November, South Dakota voters will decide the outcome of two initiated measures — one raising the minimum wage and the other limiting health insurance companies.
If history is any judge, both are likely to fail.
Only 13 of 51 initiated measures attempted since statehood have earned a majority, with an average support of 44 percent.
Some of those successful measures have reflected powerful sentiments among the state population: to keep nuclear waste out, to tax cigarettes more and, most popular of all, to impose term limits on members of Congress — though that was ruled unconstitutional.
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The billboard company Lamar is suing Rapid City over a citizen’s initiative that it says “effectively creates a ban on all types of new outdoor off-premises advertising.” Â According to a complaint filed Monday in U.S. District Court, Lamar received 94 sign credits for removing some billboards and replacing others with smaller signs. The credits were supposed to allow Lamar to erect new signs or convert existing signs to digital billboards. Â But in a June 7 election, voters approved measures prohibiting digital billboards, increasing the required space between two signs, capping a company’s sign credits at 20 and limiting the life of unused sign credits to 20 years.
Voters looking to put a tax increase on a statewide ballot as a response to Gov. Dennis Daugaard’s proposed budget cuts might not have to wait until 2012. A bill endorsed Wednesday by the Senate State Affairs Committee would change the state’s election law temporarily by opening the door to initiated measures this November, one year before the next general election.
A labor agency goes to court today in Pierre as it sues state officials over a ballot issue in the November election. The South Dakota State Federation of Labor objects to how Attorney General Marty Jackley explains a constitutional amendment concerning how employees in a workplace may join a union. A hearing begins at 1:30 p.m. today before Circuit Judge John Brown in the Hughes County Courthouse.
In a drive to get an initiative before voters in 2010 that would allow embryonic stem cell research in South Dakota, David Volk is convinced he has tapped into a wellspring of enthusiasm. “For 40 years I’ve been in South Dakota politics in one form or another. I’ve never been involved in a campaign for a candidate or an issue campaign where I’ve had this response,” says the former state treasurer, who suffered from cancer, an area of inquiry for stem cell research.