Mental health resolution leads to questions on task force assignments

PIERRE — A House Concurrent Resolution calling for a study of the mental health of first responders led to a discussion about how the Legislature decides on creating a task force to study an issue. 

HCR6023 encourages the Legislature’s Executive Board to create an interim study to address the mental health of first responders. 

Rep. Rhonda Milstead, R-Hartford, said South Dakota has a large community of first responders who are well trained on how to do their jobs. However, Milstead said, they are not necessarily trained to deal with what they see on the job every day as they deal with accidents, crimes and fires. 

Rep. Larry Zikmund, R-Sioux Falls, said he once served as a police commissioner on a city commission. 

“A lot of us don’t understand what these people go through,” Zikmund said. 

Rep. Taffy Howard, R-Rapid City, said she would continue her practice of voting against all bills that call for summer studies. At least four other requests for summer studies or a task force have been proposed as House resolutions during the current session. 

“We can only have so many summer studies,” Howard said, noting that the usual procedure is to propose summer studies at the end of the session. “How is E-Board going to handle that?”

Milstead defended the use of resolutions as a way for lawmakers to know about the need in South Dakota.

“You’re going to hear how important something is,” Milstead said of House resolutions. 

The resolution was endorsed by the House on a vote of 59-3 and now goes to the Senate.