Commissioners certify election results

The weather outside was frightful last Thursday but a quorum of county commissioners met anyway to certify Perkins County’s results of last Tuesday’s mid-term elections. Their results had to be received by the Secretary of State’s office by this Monday morning.

Perkins County voters favored Republican candidates. Governor Kristy Noem received 83% of the total votes in this county compared to 62% statewide over challengers Jamie Smith (D) and Tracey Quint (L). Incumbents U.S. Senator John Thune scored 83% of the votes in this county and 70% statewide while U.S. Representative Dusty Johnson’s 79% Perkins County win closely mirrored the state results of 77%.

Other South Dakota state races and judge positions are detailed in the accompanying charts.

Right here in District 28A, incumbent representative Oren Lesmeister (D) narrowly defeated his Republican challenger Ralph Lyon by a mere 43 votes gaining 51% of the votes compared to Lyon’s 49%.

Republican Neal Pinnow, in his first bid for a state legislative seat, easily defeated his opponent Calvin Reilly, receiving just over 85% of the votes. Pinnow will be replacing Sam Marty who was term-limited out.

The Constitutional Amendment to expand Medicaid eligibility within the state scored a 56% win statewide but failed in this county where 59.9% of voters cast a ‘no’ ballot.

The initiated measure to legalize recreational marijuana within the state failed at the local poll by 75% and at the state level by 53%.

Three county commissioners – Chairman Kyle Carmichael, vice chair Rusty Foster and Wayne Henderson – were in attendance when the commission met last week. Joining them were finance officer Sara Stadler, states attorney Shane Penfield, county highway superintendent Cody Green, Sheriff Kelly Serr and courthouse custodian Jackie Van Vactor.

Continuing the conversation from the October meeting, Green reported that the state does not have engineers to assist with county projects. The hope was that the county could save some engineering costs on the Summerville Road project by seeking help from the state. That road is a cost-share with Game, Fish and Parks. GF&P engineers are backed up and “don’t have the time,” according to Green. Therefore, Brosz Engineering, Sturgis, will get the job for an approximate cost of $34,500 for preliminary work, including preparation of the bids. During actual construction to oversee the project, the projected engineering cost is $85,775.

Commissioners approved a bid-letting for next year’s more than $1.2 million dollar Mud Creek Bridge project. That is under a federal replacement plan whereby the feds pay 81%, the state chips in 12% and the county’s share is 5% or approximately $70,000. Construction is scheduled for 2023.

Green submitted a draft proposal, offered by Penfield, for blading secondary roads using secondary road funds. The county will receive bids on March 7, 2023 for the project, which has been divided into quadrants – northwest (48.5 miles), northeast (86.6 miles), southeast (75.2 miles) and southwest (48.75 miles). Contractors will be allowed to bid one section, multiple sections or all of them with the lowest bidder for each being awarded the job. There could be a second blading at the discretion of the highway superintendent.

Bids for the blading project will be advertised this coming February.

A bid opening for the sale of surplus property was postponed. One bid was received for the 1995 oil distributor but left unopened due to an error in the process. Commissioners have now named an appraisal committee, consisting of Sion Hanson, Joel Larson and Branden Landphere and will be re-advertising the surplus items for a later bid opening.

Sheriff Serr briefly visited the board room and announced that he’s in receipt of a $42,000 Homeland Security grant to update his department’s in-car videos and officer body cams. He also announced that he’s in the process of researching ways to upgrade internet coverage in the sheriff department’s squad cars.

Further, Serr spoke about the City of Lemmon’s wish to obtain a drug dog. It’s their project but, if successful, they would probably be requesting some financial assistance from county coffers for things such as any specific equipment that would be necessary. It’s all “still in the fact-gathering stage,” Serr said.

The sheriff will soon be ordering two vehicles for delivery in 2023. The first would be for the sheriff’s department and the other for the City of Lemmon, for which they would be reimbursed. The current state bid for Dodge Durangos is $41,359 each. “You might get them, you might not,” Serr said.

In other business: Custodian Jackie VanVactor joined the meeting to discuss carpet cleaning and lighting in the courthouse. Two pending tax deed agreements were further discussed. Christmas and New Year holidays were scheduled for county employees and Christmas bonuses set to be paid with December paychecks.