Rural schools don’t have enough money, GF&P hunting and fishing license revenues are down $1.4 million, farmers are barely getting by on Trump farm-welfare checks, and South Dakota doesn’t have the money to upgrade one measly old youth prison camp into sellable condition, but somehow Governor Kristi Noem can find $45,000 to throw at a motivational speaker and a scattershot conference:
The state government of South Dakota will spend $45,000 to put on a free motivational conference in December.
…The cost of the conference will be borne by the state Department of Social Services, which will spend $25,000 on it, and the state Department of Education, which will spend $20,000, according to Noem’s office.
Expenses for the conference include the fee of motivational speaker Clint Pulver, of Utah, but Noem’s office said Pulver’s exact fee has not yet been finalized. Other conference expenses include the facility rental, music and entertainment, travel costs for guests, food and signage, Noem’s office said [Seth Tupper, “State Government Spending $45,000 on Motivational Conference,” Rapid City Journal, 2019.11.12].
Wait: we’ve committed to spending thousands of tax dollars on jazzy platitudes from a guy from Utah (and not even Pierre Delecto? Come on!), and we haven’t made the guy commit to a final price? Which of Kristi’s well-paid kin came up with this Ready-Fire-Aim project?
Seems like too liberal and progressive an action to take to me. We should stop this!!
Pulver is on the list of Famous Mormons and he’s a Leading Expert in Employee Retention!
From his bio.
So what is he supposed to do for South Dakotans? Besides take tax $ from schools and families.
This is an eye roller, for sure.
What is your mission on this, Kristi? Dollars well spent?
SMH
Debbo, I took a look at Pulver’s videos as well. Given I only got a taste of what he may speak to, but I got the feeling that if our Principals/Superintendents would wear baseball hats backwards and drum more, they would retain more teachers — or maybe it is the teachers who need to wear more caps backward and drum more to retain more students?
I’m sure in-person is when he will speak of test scores – the ONE issue Governor Noem has addressed in education.
Dana P and O, indeed. Where did they find this guy? Digital yellow pages?
Be a dentist and move to Mexico! Mexico is the new in place to go and has been for some time, if you want dental work done. Indeed, take some time off and enjoy the sun and fun to more than pay for your trip for dental.
“LOS ALGODONES, Mexico ― The billboards that line the stretch of California’s Interstate 8 headed toward Los Algodones make it clear travelers are not on their way to a typical tourism destination.
The signs that beckon Americans as they head west toward Andrade, California’s narrow border crossing, aren’t for resorts or beaches but for dental clinics offering bridges and root canals at half what they cost in the United States. Dental care has become big business here over the last two decades, so much so that American visitors have taken to calling it “Molar City.” An estimated 600 dentists operate out of hundreds of clinics that fill the 1-square-mile town, which is home to fewer than 5,000 permanent residents.”
Our US system of healthcare, ag care has become I don’t care and republicans love it.
In a similar vane, https://local12.com/news/local/ohio-house-passes-bill-allowing-student-answers-to-be-scientifically-wrong-due-to-religion
Kids that use creationism to wrongly answer science questions can’t be punished if they beliefs are religious in nature. Here we go again with religious liberty bull squat.
So no Ohio students will be in science, astronomy, geology, geography, archeology, physics, etc, etc, etc. How do you like that Ohio students? You’ve just had a long list of future options chopped off. I’m sure Ohio teachers love having their GOP lege burrowed so deeply into the schools that they’re now taking on grading tests.
We’ve gone beyond Big GOP Government to ENORMOUS GOP GOVERNMENT!
(From the GOP playbook, “How to Create an Ignorant, Backward Nation.”)
Debbo, if only that were the case. We have all kinds of science deniers heading federal agencies entrusted with the issues of those same sciences.
Noem has yet to define a clear mission for this conference. But whatever the mission, she couldn’t find someone from South Dakota to deliver the message? If she wants a motivational speaker, why not hire our own Holly Hoffman? Or Mitch Olson? THey’re no more qualified to comment on education or human trafficking than Mr. Pulver, but at least they’re from here and will plow more of our dollars back into our economy.