The study committee had recommended repealing South Dakota’s law requiring bars, stores and other alcohol sellers to post signs warning pregnant women about dangers of drinking alcohol.
That didn’t sit well with some members of the Executive Board, which is the Legislature’s administrative body outside the nine months of the legislative session.
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A majority of the Executive Board concluded Monday that the study committee exceeded the scope of the study that was originally authorized by the Executive Board.
The Executive Board members consequently voted 12-2 to remove the warning-sign legislation from the study committee’s package of proposals and allow the rest to be offered for consideration by the full Legislature when the 2010 session opens in January.
Sen. Jean Hunhoff, R-Yankton, said individual legislators could still propose repealing the warning-sign law. She chairs the Executive Board.
State law currently requires businesses which sell alcohol to prominently display the pregnancy warning signs.
The law directs the state Department of Human Services to provide the signs, which measure nine inches by 12 inches and carry a warning from the state secretary of health.
The warning sign law was originally passed in 1986, when it was approved overwhelmingly on votes of 62-5 in the House of Representatives and 32-0 in the Senate.
The main sponsors of the law that year were Rep. Mary Vanderlinde, D-Sioux Falls, and Sen. Ed Glassgow, R-Rapid City.
Legislators sparred Monday over the effectiveness and necessity of the signs.
Rep. Chuck Turbiville, R-Deadwood, served on the alcohol study committee. He said he heard afterward from several people who questioned the proposed repeal. He said he doesn’t think the legislation should go forward and he proposed removing the repeal bill from the committee’s package.
Rep. Larry Tidemann, R-Brookings, asked what the cost savings might be by repealing the sign in comparison to the costs of one child born with health problems from fetal-alcohol syndrome.
Sen. Craig Tieszen, R-Rapid City, said he arrested many drunken women who were pregnant while he was police chief there. He said they went to an over-crowded and under-funded detoxification center and there was a waiting line for treatment services.
He called the warning signs “a feel-good statute” that isn’t enforced.
Tieszen said keeping the sign law provides legislators with an excuse to vote against tax increases on alcoholic beverages that could be used to pay for services and help county governments financially. “The real solutions to this problem are very expensive,” he said.
Rep. Jim Putnam, R-Armour, said the warning signs are “a very, very small step.”
“It notifies people. If they take that advice, I don’t know,” Putnam said.
He noted cigarette packs have warnings on them too.
Comments
2 comment(s)Concerned wrote on Nov 17, 2009 2:26 PM:
Chris Jongeling wrote on Nov 17, 2009 8:34 AM: