After the exciting little Karr/Rhoden dust-up last November over agricultural pollution, nobody dared to offer any new environmental regulations on farms and ranches this Session. But while Governor Larry Rhoden effectively scared anyone from taking a stick to ag-industrial polluters, Senator Chris Karr (R-11/Sioux Falls) brought more carrots. Senator Karr’s Senate Bill 222 will put $8 million of this year’s loose change into statewide riparian buffer initiatives.
That’s a big expansion of the incentives the state provided under Karr’s 2021 House Bill 1256, which provided $3 million through last year to encourage landowners to plant grass along streams in the Big Sioux River watershed to help filter bacteria from cow poop and other contaminants from the water. The Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources was slow in deploying that 2021 funding, but in 2024 the state got a $5M boost from the American Rescue Plan Act (ah, Biden Bucks! the good old days when the federal government spent money on things to make our lives better). That voluntary program helped create 67 buffer projects covering over 1200 acres along 83 miles of the Big Sioux watershed.
SB 222 will allow the DANR to continue recruiting farmers to take a little creekside land out of producing cash crops and into producing grass and water quality. SB 222 includes an additional $2M for water, wastewater, and storm water infrastructure. It includes an emergency clause, so the moment Governor Rhoden signs it (and why wouldn’t you sign it, Larry? Grassy strips are voluntary, and they’ll put money in farmers’ pockets!), the DANR can start funding eager grass planters.
SB 222 easily cleared the two-thirds vote threshold required by its emergency clause. It passed 28–5 in the Senate and 61–8 in the House. The nays in the Senate were five usually reasonable Republicans—Hulse, Rohl, Sauder, Schoenfish, and Wipf. Farmer and Senator Brandon Wipf (R-22/Lake Byron) said on the Senate floor he does his conservationism with his own money and said state incentives for grassy strips sends the message that farmers won’t do the right thing without the government incentives. Senator Curt Voight (R-33/Rapid City) responded that he’s planted riparian buffers and appreciates the benefits in improving water quality, reducing erosion, and supporting wildlife. The House nays were all radical rightwingers—Aylward, Phil Jensen, Jordan, Kayser, Manhart, Mullaly, Randolph, Rice—who hate government spending and environmental protection.
They should plant Real grass, it would grow higher too and so could they.