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Rapid City and Fort Meade.
• Shinseki has said that he has not made a decision on the Black Hills VA Healthcare System's reorganization plan.
• Save the VA had asked for a meeting with Shinseki in Hot Springs. Sens. Tim Johnson and John Thune of South Dakota, John Barasso and Mike Enzi of Wyoming and Mike Johanns of Nebraska and Rep. Kristi Noem of South Dakota wrote to Shinseki last year requesting that the VA secretary tour the Hot Springs VA medical center before making a decision. Shinseki declined the invitation and suggested that Save the VA come to Washington and discuss their proposal with an undersecretary.
• Fortunately, Sen. Johnson was able to persuade Shinseki to meet the Hot Springs delegation at his Senate office. Johnson's membership on the Senate Appropriations Committee may have influenced Shinseki's cooperation.
• It's not out of the realm to question the VA's sincerity in listening to alternatives to the VA reorganization plan. Despite Black Hills VA director Steve DiStasio asking for different proposals, he later said he couldn't negotiate on any changes. To this day, the VA has not provided complete data supporting its reorganization plan.
• Despite the VA's sketchy proposal and obvious lack of cooperation in analyzing its own plan, Shinseki's willingness to meet with the Save the VA group and hear its detailed proposal is promising.
• We still believe that Shinseki needs to come to Hot Springs and see the facilities for himself prior to making a decision that would have far-reaching impacts on how veterans are treated in a three-state region. But at least now he's listening.
• ___
• Capital Journal, Pierre, Feb. 10, 2013
• Response to historic film shows community at its best
• It was impressive on Saturday to see an overflow, standing-room only crowd attending the private screening of the historical documentary, "The Buffalo King," about South Dakota's own James "Scotty" Philip, one of the figures who helped save the bison from extinction. So many people from the Pierre and Fort Pierre area turned out at Saturday's private screening at the State 123 Theatre in Pierre that the theatre arranged two showings to try to accommodate the demand.
• That's good for us on two fronts. First, it means the community values what filmmaker Justin Koehler and his colleagues have done here (including important contributions by area historians such as Ken Stewart, John Duffy and Lonis Wendt and behind-the-scenes work by the likes of Darby Nutter and Brian Scott). For anyone who cares about the buffalo, that symbol of the Great Plains, the Scotty Philip story

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