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life habitat. It helps farmers and ranchers, and it's good for the environment.
• We question if the USDA followed the CRP program rules to the letter for environmental reasons despite the well-publicized drought conditions in the Dakotas and elsewhere. Many ranchers who could have used the CRP land have had to sell livestock early because of a lack of feed caused by the drought.
• Much to their credit, sportsmen's groups have supported an early release of CRP land, including wetlands areas.
• The USDA's drought disaster declarations and release of CRP program land for emergency haying and grazing is a welcome decision. But the department could have acted earlier when evidence of widespread drought was obvious to all, and what it has announced represents the bare minimum of what should be done for drought-stricken ranchers.

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• Argus Leader, Sioux Falls. July 26, 2012
• State should invest in higher education
• When it comes to attitudes toward higher education, South Dakota has work to do.
• State residents take up the battle cry of adequately funding K-12 schools, but they rarely chime in when it comes to investing in state-owned universities -- the very system that can produce educated workers who garner higher wages and help fuel the state economy.
• It's been said that it's not just South Dakota's way to spend as much on higher education because people who go to college benefit personally from that experience. In addition, when there are tight budget times -- which is a perennial rally cry in the state -- it's easy to agree to passing the higher education costs on to the students. And the state regental system is forced to do just that.
• Like anything, there comes a point where that defies logic and the market that universities operate in won't tolerate the increased costs, at least not without some negative consequences in enrollments and retention of students.
• The Board of Regents executive director Jack Warner and board president Kathryn Johnson say that it is time to turn the focus back to the overall public good of an educated population. "Many times these are viewed as costs, and they really should be viewed as investments," Warner said at a recent meeting with the Argus Leader editorial board.
• We agree. The importance of higher education in a healthy economy can't be underestimated. The future workforce depends on it. The government needs people

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