Business
SD legislature fails to override veto of tech schools board
High school tech schools are left as an afterthought. Bill was attempt to provide cohesion to schools but concerns over constitutionality, bureaucracy kill it.
South Dakota Gov. Mike Rounds vetoed a bill that would have created a board to oversee the state's four technical institutes, and the Legislature failed to override that veto, The Argus Leader reports. Even so, the issue will be back.
The technical institute bill, a plan to give the four schools their own governing board, made it through the Senate on a 28-6 vote. It fell five short in the House, though, where 47 votes are necessary for an override. The vote was 42-26.
Rounds said the Board of Regents would sue the state and win if the bill passed. The technical schools now are run for the most part by the K-12 school boards in the communities that host them. The state Board of Education also offers some guidance. That has left the post-high school programs as almost an afterthought in education, proponents of an independent board argue.
"Nobody runs for the school board out of a passion for technical education," Republican Rep. Joel Dykstra of Canton said.The regents believe the state constitution gives it responsibility for all post-high school education.