Wednesday,  Oct. 16, 2013 • Vol. 16--No. 92 • 22 of 36

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or more to get federal funding to fully restore the programs that are being cut. When the Tribal Council approved the layoffs, it also passed a resolution guaranteeing that those who are furloughed will regain their jobs once funding is restored, he said.
• The federal government is obligated by treaty to fund the programs, Brewer said, adding that he hopes Congress reaches agreement soon to end the shutdown.
• Lydia Bear Killer, chair of the Oglala Sioux tribal health and human services committee, said the government-funded programs are not entitlements, but instead are contractual and legal obligations of the U.S. government. She said the lack of funding on the Pine Ridge and other reservations will also hurt businesses in non-Indian communities near the reservations.

Heavy rainfall setting records in South Dakota

• RAPID CITY, S.D. (AP) -- Wet weather is setting records across South Dakota, but it isn't stopping tourists from visiting the newly reopened Mount Rushmore National Memorial.
• Rapid City, Sioux Falls, Pierre, Huron, Mitchell, Aberdeen and Yankton set daily Oct. 14 rainfall records on Monday, according to National Weather Service reports. Some areas in eastern South Dakota got about 3 inches of rain. Totals were lower in the west, though parts of the Black Hills got several inches of snow. Minor flooding was occurring or expected along some creeks and rivers.
• A couple more inches of snow were expected in the central and northern Black Hills on Tuesday morning, and a winter storm warning remained in effect until noon. Schools in Spearfish, Lead and Deadwood started late, the Black Hills Pioneer reported.
• The soaking follows an early October storm that dumped up to 4 feet of snow in the Black Hills, cutting power to about 30,000 people at one point and killing tens of thousands of cattle.
• However, the recent moisture has been good for the state's staple winter wheat crop.
• "Pretty much everything that's been planted is looking pretty good," South Dakota State University Extension Plant Pathology Field Specialist Bob Fanning told the Capital Journal newspaper.
• And Dwayne Beck, manager of the Dakota Lakes Research Farm east of Pierre said, "We're ecstatic. We never complain about rain in South Dakota."
• Neither were tourists who visited Mount Rushmore, which had been closed due to the partial government shutdown.

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