Republic Insider

Follow the Jackrabbit women live

If you're interested in the outcome of today's championship game of the Summit League women's basketball tournament in Sioux Falls, you can follow it live by clicking here.

As I write this, SDSU is ahead with about 10 minutes left in the second half. If the Jacks win, they will advance to the NCAA Division I national tournament for the second consecutive year.

Posted by: Seth Tupper on 3/09/2010 at 4:31 PM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Tags: basketball, jackrabbits, jacks, south dakota state university, sports

Reaction to Herseth Sandlin's Pelosi comments

Last week, I wrote a story about comments that Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin made in response to a question about her relationship with Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Specifically, I was intrigued by one extended comment, which I quoted in the story:

“I would describe our relationship as, uh … uh …” Herseth Sandlin said, before emitting what sounded like a half-laugh, half-sigh and finally breaking an 11-second interlude with this: “… one in which she has, uh, I think she would respect, uh, my decision-making process and, uh, one in which she probably acknowledges that I have some disappointment on how this process has unfolded.”

The comment was made during a regularly scheduled conference call with reporters. As far as I've seen, I was the only one of the dozen or more reporters on the call who wrote about the Pelosi comments. That surprised me, given that the comments stood out so glaringly from what otherwise was a pretty routine call.

Rapid City Journal reporter Kevin Woster, who asked the question about Pelosi, has now weighed in on the comment with a post on the Journal's Mount Blogmore. Here's an excerpt:

Let me translate: She’s frustrated with Pelosi and a health reform process in the House that locked out those who tried to modify - or moderate - it and those who represented concerns in their home states, such as South Dakota.

Click here to see the rest of Woster's post.

Additionally, the Blake Curd campaign has made a new video using the audio from Herseth Sandlin's Pelosi comments. You can view that video below.

Posted by: Seth Tupper on 3/08/2010 at 4:15 PM | Comments (6) | Permalink

Tags: blake curd, congress, election 2010, health care, kevin woster, mount blogmore, nancy pelosi, news, politics, rapid city journal, state, stephanie herseth sandlin

Could this 'bee' the solution to Lake Mitchell's algae problem?

The Lake Mitchell Advisory Committee is scheduled to hear a presentation from the makers of the SolarBee at 4 p.m. Wednesday in the Council Chambers at City Hall. The SolarBee is a water circulator that is supposed to be very effective in reducing algae.

Here's an excerpt from the portion of the SolarBee Web site that explains the product's benefits in regard to algae:

The combination of horizontal and vertical mixing sufficiently disrupts the cyanobacteria’s preferred quiescent habitat, negating their competitive advantage over beneficial algae and preventing unwanted blooms, even in nutrient-rich waters such as secondary wastewater effluent and storm water drainage. These benefits of enhanced circulation have been well documented in the scientific literature for many decades, and there is no controversy within the limnological community. For a more detailed discussion, please see the SolarBee White Paper titled: Paradigm shift for blue-green algae control through long-distance circulation: Empirical experience with SolarBee® circulation since 2000.

I plan to cover the meeting, which will be the second SolarBee presentation for me. You can click here to see a story from a SolarBee presentation that I covered in 2007 (no action resulted from the 2007 meeting; if I recall correctly, city officials decided they wanted to be cautious and watch some other lakes to see how various algae-reducing methods were working before doing anything further after Mitchell's aluminum sulfate experiment).

Posted by: Seth Tupper on 3/08/2010 at 1:00 PM | Comments (2) | Permalink

Tags: algae, city council, lake mitchell, lake mitchell advisory committee, local, mitchell city council, news

Across-the-board budget cuts: Smart or irresponsible?

An interesting debate has developed between Republican Gov. Mike Rounds and the Republican leadership in the Legislature.

The debate centers on the $50 million package of budget cuts proposed last week by Republican legislators, and more specifically, the part of the package described as "a 2 percent across-the-board cut, amounting to $7 million, in all areas except K-12 education and Medicaid." (AP story, March 5; our reporter Bob Mercer also has more on this today.)

Gov. Rounds, who has proposed more modest cuts and the use of $32 million of reserves to balance the budget, immediately criticized the across-the-board approach.

"Across-the-board cuts are not specific. It's an easy way to say I'm going to cut but I don't want to tell people I'm cutting them and I want somebody else to do my dirty work for me," Rounds told the AP.

Rep. Noel Hamiel, R-Mitchell, defended the across-the-board approach in a Saturday op-ed for The Daily Republic. He said department directors know their budgets better than legislators, so they should be trusted to find cuts.

"There is wisdom in this," Hamiel wrote. "Who better knows the Department of Tourism than its director?" 

Who's right? Republican legislators, or Gov. Rounds?

Posted by: Seth Tupper on 3/08/2010 at 9:49 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Tags: budget, legislature, local, mike rounds, news, noel hamiel, politics, state

What's going on this weekend in the Mitchell area

Events are as submitted to The Daily Republic and are subject to change.

Community events

Saturday, March 6

Sunday, March 7

Sports

Saturday, March 6

Sunday, March 7

Nightlife

Saturday, March 6

Posted by: Seth Tupper on 3/05/2010 at 5:39 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Tags: local, news, notebook, whats going on

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