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a 3 percent boost in state aid to schools, they plan to seek a slightly higher increase. They will support a legislative study panel's recommendation that aid be increased by 3.8 percent to put spending per student back where it was before budget cuts were imposed in 2011 when a sluggish economy limited state tax collections.
• The governor also is proposing a 3 percent increase in state spending on South Dakota's four technical institutes and a freeze on tuition for resident students at the state's six public universities.
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• 3. MEDICAID EXPANSION
• Daugaard has recommended that South Dakota not expand the state's Medicaid program, at least for now, to cover the medical costs of 48,000 additional poor people. The governor doubts the federal government can afford to meet its pledge to pay most of the cost of the expansion, but some lawmakers and health care groups plan to continue their push for expansion.
• No decision will be made until the state budget is passed late in the session, and a Medicaid expansion is unlikely without the governor's support. But backers of the move will try to keep the debate alive with the hope the state will eventually provide the government health care to people who cannot afford buy their own insurance.
• South Dakota's Medicaid program now covers about 116,000 children, adults and disabled people. An expansion, available as a state option under the federal health care overhaul, would add an estimated 48,000 people, mostly adults without children.
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• 4. DEATH PENALTY
• Rep. Steve Hickey, a Sioux Falls Republican who also is a pastor, has said he will ask the Legislature to repeal the death penalty. Hickey previously supported capital punishment but says he changed his mind after reviewing the Bible and deciding that the death penalty does not deter people from committing horrible crimes, save money or improve public safety.
• Hickey has said his bill would apply only to future cases.
• However, Hickey will face long odds in a Legislature that has consistently supported the death penalty. South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley will oppose repeal, arguing that the death penalty is appropriate for vile crimes and is used sparingly in the state.
• Hickey believes life in a cramped cell is a more severe punishment than executing murderers by putting them to sleep with drugs, but Jackley counters that a death sentence protects prison staff, other inmates and medical personnel from convicted

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