Shifting public defender costs to state of South Dakota's budget books gains steam

Measures aimed at county funding relief enjoying newfound success

Decades of pleas from South Dakota counties for help with burgeoning criminal justice and public safety costs have fallen on mostly deaf ears. 

But winds might be changing in 2024 as a half-dozen proposals to provide relief to cash-strapped governments at the county level remain alive heading into the final weeks of this year’s legislative session at the state Capitol.

NEWS: High-powered lobby position comes open as South Dakota’s legislative session proceeds

From putting defense costs for the homeless and incarcerated on the back of the state to creating a cybersecurity fund for counties, lawmakers are considering options that could save the "bastard-stepchildren of South Dakota government" – as one lawmaker put it last year – millions in the years ahead. And in doing so, they might appease South Dakota’s Chief Justice Steven Jensen, who in January called upon the Legislature to review how the state provides public defenders. 

Legislation sponsored by the judiciary would create a summer study to evaluate possible changes. Meanwhile, Rep. Ernie Otten of Tea has a proposal that calls for the state to reimburse counties for costs associated with providing legal defense for the indigent – expenses that cost counties like Minnehaha, Lawrence and Pennington millions each year. And in counties without full-time public defenders, private attorneys are retained at an hourly rate to provide those services.