South Dakota
Here's What I Know: The return of real polling in South Dakota
The polls are back.
It’s a byproduct of our short attention span, or a fascination with sports metaphors, but every election cycle we get drenched in polling.
This dude versus that dude. Up, down, sideways, trends, subsets, gender, race, age, etc.
Everything you’d want to know on this issue or that.
It’s all quite fascinating.
And potentially dangerous.
I got my first insight into polling many years ago while working in Des Moines.
The late and legendary Tom Fogarty was a reporter for the Des Moines Register who worked on one of the most influential political polls in the country. The Iowa Poll covered more than politics, however, and had for decades by that point.
I was lucky enough to spend some quality time with Tom during the quiet moments in the Iowa Senate, where we both worked as reporters. I was young and learned a lot just watching him and reading his stories.
He was smart, funny, a great writer and unimpressed with people in power. It was like getting a master’s degree in how to be a real reporter.
(He also pulled a masterful prank on me, related to the visit of then President Bill Clinton, a story that is retold in some circles to this day. But sadly, not here.)
What I learned from Tom about polling was the importance of the questions, how they are constructed, how the words you use matter.
I took that background into later jobs where I wrote about polls and then supervised them, working directly with professional pollsters to get the most-accurate results possible.
The world has changed immeasurably since those early days.
There are myriad ways in which groups or politicians gauge sentiment. They use this information to guide their actions and to influence the public.
Which means that accuracy and credibility are more important than ever.
So I’ve been pleased to see the polling conducted in recent months by South Dakota News Watch. News Watch is a nonprofit newsroom founded by a couple of my former bosses at the Argus Leader and staffed by some former colleagues.
Forum Communications, the parent company of Sioux Falls Live, is a supporter and we use News Watch content on our site and the Mitchell Republic.
One of the reasons I’m happy to see News Watch taking up the mission is because of who they choose to do business with, specifically Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy.
That’s the same firm we used at the Argus Leader for many years, including through the highly contentious campaigns for U.S. Senate in the early 2000s.
They are thorough, professional and maintain incredibly high standards for independence.
It’s never an exact science, rather polling is just a snapshot of a moment in time. Many factors can and do influence the outcome.
The results have a margin of error, an important footnote when you’re examining the coverage of a poll. If there isn’t information on sample size, margin of error and methodology, don’t trust it.
Also, remember the further you dive into the numbers – the subgroups of geography, gender, age or race, etc. – the less accurate they become.
There’s a lot of bad information out there, including pollsters experimenting with various digital methods to extract information. We’ve seen time and again wild claims that end up falling flat on Election Day.
I can say without hesitation that Mason-Dixon was solid in service of our reporting and believe them to be so today.
We’ve recently published stories from News Watch on their latest round of polling.
We’ve seen results on ballot measures related to abortion, the sales tax on groceries, recreational pot and open primaries.
The results have prompted responses from politicians and commentators, some dire warnings and other exaltations of glee.
That’s not to say things won’t take a turn.
Contributed
The questions on this year’s ballot have major implications for how South Dakota is run. Direct democracy has been part of the collective heritage in this state since the early days.
While recent years have seen increasing efforts to thwart voter influence in this way, it remains a powerful tool for change in a state where change is rare currency.
News Watch has stepped into a vacuum of polling in South Dakota. What was once the purview of daily newspapers and broadcasters had fallen into a hole of neglect.
I found it notable enough that I rang up Stu Whitney, my former colleague and reporter for News Watch.
Whitney said working with Mason-Dixon has history in the state and the ability to track trends – such as approval ratings for the state’s top politicians – over time. News Watch partners with the Chiesman Center for Democracy at the University of South Dakota to produce the polling.
“It seemed natural in 2024 with such an impactful election, to gauge some of the candidate races but also the ballot measures,” Whitney told me. “Not just the numbers, but to get inside the polling numbers in South Dakota and talk to both sides and get at some of the intricacies of what the impact would be if a measure were to pass.”
Polling gives us a guidepost, a starting point for digging into the public consciousness on an issue.
All of us live in a bubble. It’s easy to let yourself plunge down the waterslide of assumption, that what your circle of friends believes is true reflects the facts on the ground.
It’s not always so.
In fact, it’s rarely so.
A well-executed measure of public opinion, we hope, is fodder for a deeper discussion about the issue or candidate at the center of the question.
Do South Dakotans, for instance, support stringent restrictions on a woman’s right to have an abortion?
Current poll results would suggest no. Why is that?
Should the state reform the sales tax when it comes to consumables – a.k.a. groceries – as proposed on the November ballot?
The News Watch poll indicates that residents do support that.
It’s the next question, the follow-up discussion, that matters, Whitney said.
“Regardless of the feedback, it’s important to enlighten people on these issues,” he said. “When you see the talk about turnout, the low voter engagement, this is going to be on the November ballot and it’s going to affect your life. We want to give you as much information as possible to go to the polls with. Anyone who reads them will see there is not just pure poll numbers, there is perspective in there as well.”
News Watch has plans to continue polling through this election cycle and beyond. There’s a lot we can learn, not just the head-to-head nature of electoral politics, but what’s at the core of our beliefs in South Dakota.
I’m excited to learn more.
Part 2 of a 3-part series.
South Dakota’s weak open records law gives police agencies full discretion on whether to release footage from body or dashboard cameras, and in most cases, the videos of officer conduct are never shown to the public.
South Dakota News Watch made formal public records requests to obtain video footage of use of deadly force incidents from eight separate law enforcement agencies in November, and all of the requests were quickly denied.
On a few occasions, South Dakota law enforcement agencies have released video footage of their own accord but not necessarily in cases where officer conduct is in question.
The Watertown Police Department released a video on Facebook in early November showing officers responding to a possible break-in with their guns drawn only to find a whitetail buck that had made it into a bedroom.
In 2016, the Rapid City Police Department posted a dash cam video to its public Facebook page showing the chief’s nephew proposing to his girlfriend in a mock traffic stop. “This one is too good not to share,” the Facebook post noted.
The Rapid City Police Department rejected News Watch’s request for videos of a May 30, 2023, incident in which an officer fatally shot 25-year-old Kyle
Whiting, who brandished a fake gun during a foot chase. A bystander inside a nearby home was also shot in the abdomen by the officer and survived. The state ruled the shooting was justified.
Still images tend to clear officers
Some police agencies will occasionally release still images from body or dashboard camera videos, typically when the screenshots show an officer facing a clear threat that appears to justify use of deadly force.
In August, the state released an image from video of a July 5 chase in which a Sioux Falls police officer shot and wounded 24-year-old Deondre Gene Black Hawk in the 100 block of Garfield Avenue.
One still image released to the public shows the gun Black Hawk fired at police. Another image shows Black Hawk pointing the gun toward a pursuing officer prior to the shooting, which was ruled justified by state investigators.
In 2022, the Rapid City Police Department took the unusual step of inviting local media to privately view body camera footage showing the shooting of Barney Leroy Peoples Jr., who was killed after pointing a rifle at officers. The video was not released to the public, and the shooting was ruled justified by the state.
“This was done for public interest and public safety to dispel a false narrative circulating on social media that could have led to civil unrest,” spokesman Brendyn Medina wrote in an email to News Watch.
In a move that appeared to have political overtones, videos were released in 2021 showing former South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg being pulled over by officers for suspected traffic violations. The videos and audio showed Ravnsborg informing officers of his status as attorney general during the traffic stops, some of which did not result in tickets.
The videos were released during a period when Ravnsborg was facing possible removal from office for striking and killing a pedestrian in September 2020.
Ravnsborg was eventually impeached, an action supported by then-Gov. Kristi Noem, whose office also made the unprecedented move of releasing videos of Ravnsborg being interviewed by detectives during the investigation into the 2020 fatal accident.
Federal agency released SD shooting video
In general, the federal government provides more public access to police videos than states like South Dakota, and that access was expanded in a May 2022 executive order from President Joe Biden.
That order included a requirement to expedite public release of videos from officers’ body-worn cameras. As a result, in October 2022, the U.S. Department of Interior issued a new policy that required federal officers to wear body cameras and sought to make it easier and faster for the media and public to obtain videos captured by federal authorities.
Due in part to that policy, video of a June 2023 police-involved shooting in South Dakota was released by the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs. In that incident, 39-year-old James Schneider of Watauga fired a weapon and then led authorities on a vehicle chase that ended at the Bullhead Community Center parking lot.
According to the dashboard video, Schneider was waving his arms and holding a handgun in an area where people were present. After he turned to flee into a residential neighborhood, he was shot in the back by an officer. Schneider was found guilty in August of assault and weapons charges after a jury trial and is awaiting sentencing.
In releasing the video, the BIA said it was doing so to be transparent in its operations. To protect the privacy of all involved, faces were blurred in the video.
“The community briefing video is intended to help members of the community gain a better understanding of what occurred,” the BIA said in a release. “We are committed to being transparent with our community.”
Privacy a top concern for agencies
Rapid City police do not routinely release department videos, largely due to privacy concerns of anyone captured in the footage, said Medina, the department spokesman.
“Much of the information collected by (body-worn cameras) is confidential and involves personal information, including that of victims, juveniles, and vulnerable individuals involved in critical and traumatic incidents,” Medina wrote in an email. “It’s important to note that we have had requests from victims and families specifically not to release photos or videos of their encounters with police. Additionally, juvenile and victim information is protected by state statute.”
Almost all states that allow for public video releases do so with caveats that privacy issues and often concerns over protecting prosecutions are met prior to release.
Rapid City shares the management of its video program with the Pennington County Sheriff’s Office, which recently spent about $48,000 to buy 68 Axon body cameras, said sheriff’s spokeswoman Helene Duhamel.
The Sioux Falls Police Department has an extensive video policy that does not typically allow for public release of videos, said Sgt. Aaron Benson.
“Granting public access to dash and body camera video potentially involves numerous issues relating to the rights of all persons in those videos. These rights include but are not limited to general privacy concerns of victims, suspects, witnesses and others, to statutory and constitutional rights of those same individuals,” Benson wrote in an email. “Additionally, release of video can detrimentally affect ongoing investigations, prosecutions and other legal matters related to those videos.”
McPherson County Sheriff David Ackerman, president of the South Dakota Sheriff’s Association, said body and dash cameras are important tools for police agencies in both urban and rural areas, even though his camera program costs about $60,000 a year, roughly 10% of the overall departmental budget.
“These are very valuable tools, and it’s something that in this day and age, every office and agency needs to have,” Ackerman said. “I’m glad where we are today because they’re for the protection of the public as well as the officers.”
Assistant police chief on body cam: ‘I enjoy wearing it’
Monty Rothenberger, assistant police chief in Yankton, said he supports the use of dash and body cameras as a way to increase accountability for officers and to aid in resolving public complaints.
“I wouldn’t do this job without a body camera, and I enjoy wearing it,” Rothenberger said. “I don’t have anything to hide. And because everything is on video, I feel like Big Brother is watching and I support that.”
The Yankton Police Department bought new cameras last year at a cost of about $80,000, he said.
Rothenberger said that while he is aware of South Dakota public records laws that do not require the department to release videos to the public, he said he personally would support the release of videos in a high-profile or controversial case.
“I’m only speaking for myself, but I would never hide anything like that,” Rothenberger said. “That’s not up to me. … (But) releasing that stuff, it’s good that agencies release things when something has gone wrong and they are being transparent.”
Read part 1 of the 3-part series:
Police videos in SD: Public pays costs but cannot see footage As more states begin to provide public access to videos captured by law enforcement agencies, South Dakota continues to keep a tight lid on them.
Publishing Friday, Dec. 19, part 3: A 2020 legislative effort to regulate body camera videos never made it to a vote, maintaining South Dakota’s national reputation for law enforcement secrecy
This story was produced by South Dakota News Watch, an independent, nonprofit organization. Read more stories and donate at sdnewswatch.org and sign up for an email to get stories when they’re published. Contact content director Bart Pfankuch at bart.pfankuch@sdnewswatch.org.
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (Dakota News Now) – The governor’s Correctional Rehabilitation Task Force, which aims to determine the best path forward for expanding services, will hold its second meeting on Wednesday.
The meeting will continue the dive into what programming should look like for the new prison. Officials in the Department of Corrections say they appreciate the attention to the issue shown over the year.
“The focus is in the right place. I think people are asking the right questions. I think that it’s being noticed that reentry in totality is a group effort,” Justin Elkins, DOC Chief of Behavioral Health, said.
Sitting at 43%, lawmakers and the Rhoden administration have dedicated a substantial amount of time to addressing recidivism in the state.
“I think people are starting to see that reentry is something our department needs help within terms of collaboration and relationships. Because we only determine part of the equation when it comes to reentry,” Elkins said.
Corrections Reentry Program Manager Scott Day says this change in perspective regarding inmates is needed.
“95% of these individuals are going to come back into your community. They’re going to be your neighbors. They’re going to work at your local fast-food restaurant or at your local store. You’re going to see them walk down the street. We just need to see as a culture that these aren’t bad people; these are just people who need an opportunity to show that they can succeed.”
The prison reset task force, which focused on the structure of the new prison, ensured that programming space increased from what is currently available, even when the location changed from Lincoln County to Sioux Falls.
“There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t constantly think about what we could do more. And the new prison is needed. We need the space, we need the opportunity to get more programming in there,” Day said.
Day says the investment into programming space is not a matter of being soft on crime but rather smart on public safety.
Copyright 2025 Dakota News Now. All rights reserved.
Link to the listing: https://www.frrmail.com/…
For more information, contact: Cory Busse, Farm & Ranch Realty, Inc., at 785-332-8345 or frr@frrmail.com
KENTUCKY, Hopkins County. Five tracts of river-bottom cropland totaling 597.9 acres sold at auction for $5.39 million, or $9,015 per acre. Tracts ranged from 16 to 255 acres, with much containing drainage tile. Soil types were primarily Karnak silty clay and loam with some Belknap and Robbs silty loam. Structures included a tool shed and a 5,000-bushel grain bin. Tracts ranged in price from $7,800 to $11,500 per acre.
Link to the listing: https://www.kurtzauction.com/…
For more information, contact: Joseph Mills, Kurtz Auction & Realty Co., at 800-262-1204 or jmills@kurtzauction.com.
SOUTH DAKOTA, Dewey County. A contiguous, 1,529-acre farm sold to a single bidder at auction for $2,600 per acre, or $3.98 million. The property was offered in four parcels, two of which were historically in crop production (wheat, oats, corn and sunflowers) and boasted Soil Productivity Indexes of 70 or higher. Another highly productive parcel was planted in grass and alfalfa but could be converted to row crops. The remaining parcel included a blend of cropland, pasture and an updated home with a steel barn, shop, two Quonset-style buildings, continuous panel corrals and water tank.
Link to the listing: https://glcland.com/…
For more information, contact: Kristen Gill, Gill Land Company, at 701.934.2732 or 605.848.4502 or kristen@glcland.com.
**
— These sales figures are provided by the sources and may not be exact because of rounding.
— Submit recent land sales to landwatch@dtn.com
Katie Dehlinger can be reached at katie.dehlinger@dtn.com
Follow Katie on social platform X at @KatieD_DTN
(c) Copyright 2025 DTN, LLC. All rights reserved.
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