Opinion

In 2019, farms and ranches enrolled in the South Dakota Center for Farm/Ranch Management program experienced a decrease in net farm income from 2018, according to data compiled for analysis. The median net farm income in 2019 was $40,415 compared to $53,888 in 2018.

Dear Editor, In less than two months we will pause to remember loved ones on Memorial Day and many of us will be taking floral tributes to the cemeteries. As we walk through these revered grounds we expect them to be well maintained places of rest.

Lee Qualm a Platte, SD resident and 4th generation farmer has announced his bid for District 21 Senate. Lee was first elected to the House of Representatives in 2013.

Right now the news on most every TV channel is depressing – rising death count, not enough hospital beds, not enough ventilators. We need a good news story – something about good people making the extra effort. Just such a story boosted my overall morale this morning.

Did the recent legislative session do anything that will affect our hunting or fishing? Senate Bill 25 is going to make hunting and/ or fishing a bit more expensive in the future.

11CHRONICLES 7:14 "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

I was amazed, no, actually shocked, with what I had just read. I wasn’t reading Christianity Today or Lutheran Witness magazines. I was reading the April-May 2020 issue of Petersen’s Hunting. The name of the article was “Dear God” by Joe Arterburn.

PHILIPPIANS 3-13-21 “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

We ended the 2020 SD Legislative Session with the threat of the Corna Virus looming. On Thursday, March 12 we passed the budget. I was pleased that both parties and the administration worked together to come to an agreement with a balanced budget.

The members of the South Dakota Legislature have had two conference calls with Governor Noem and her staff regarding Covid-19 since session completed on March 12th.