Watzel earns state FFA degree

Madaline Watzel, a senior at Winner High School, recently earned her state FFA degree. This is the second highest degree in FFA.

Watzel’s Supervised Agriculture Experience (SAE) consisted of working  on her family ranch. She put in over 1,000 hours into it over the course of four years.

She feeds, doctors, hays, fixes equipment and markets the cattle from her parent’s feedlot. Each year she has grown her skills and kept documentation of it in order to apply for this award.

Watzel is the daughter of Dean and Barb  Watzel. 

“Madaline is a hard worker and has rightly earned this degree,” said Nicole Roth, Winner FFA advisor.

“It shows her dedication to FFA and she has reaped the benefits of having a supervised agriculture experience in the many skills she has gained including a strong work ethic, dedication and an understanding of and appreciation of agriculture,” said Roth.

Watzel will be recognized on stage at the state FFA convention in April.

“We are so proud of her for accomplishing this honor,” said Roth.

NCAA Division II Coaches Rankings prior to the postseason- Wrestling

In the final NCAA Division II Coaches Rankings prior to the postseason, the Northern State University wrestling team came in with 11 points and receiving votes in the team poll. In addition, three Wolves are ranked individually including No. 11 Kolton Roth (141), No. 8 Wyatt Turnquist (149), and No. 10 James Burks (157).

Turnquist posts a team best 16-2 record in 2021-22 with nationally ranked victories over No. 4 Speelman of Augustana and No. 7 Bailey of UIndy. In addition, the junior is 9-0 in NSIC action and holds a team best four technical fall wins.

Northern State competes next Saturday, Feb. 26 from the NCAA Super Region V Tournament in Moorhead, Minn.

Campbell excels in throwing events

Colome High School graduate Matt Campbell is having a big season for the Doane University men’s indoor track and field team.

Campbell, a former thrower at Dakota Wesleyan, has won in three straight appearances in the men’s weight throw and four of his last five meet appearances in the event overall. His best throw this season came in Doane’s Fred Belle Classic in last January as part of a two event sweep. He had a throw of 64 feet, 8.5 inches to win the weight throw and also won the shot put with a throw of 51 feet-7.25 inches.

On Jan. 22, he was the weight throw champion at the Concordia Polar Dog meet at Seward, Neb., with a throw of 62-8.75 and was second in the shot put at 51-4.5.

His indoor season is coming off a series of top performances in the Great Plains Athletic Conference and NAIA outdoor meets in the spring of 2021. Campbell earned all-American outdoor honors with a fifth pace finish in the hammer throw, 195-6, and was all GPAC in the shot put, discus, and hammer throw with top five finishes in each including second place in the shot put.

For the current indoor season, Campbell has met the NAIA qualifying standard in the weight throw   where he ranks No. 2 in the GPAC has the NAIA B qualifying standard in the shot put where he ranks No. 5 in the GPAC.

Winner to be profiled on Dakota Life

Winner will be featured in an upcoming episode of Dakota Life on South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

On Feb. 16 Dakota Life staff will be in Winner to interview persons for possible stories.

The interviews will held at the Winner American Legion from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Mike Scott, executive director of Winner Area Chamber of Commerce, has lined up time slots for persons to talk to PBS.

Some of the persons who will be interviewed and organizations that will have representatives are Yvonne Hollenbeck, Harvey Naasz, Tripp County Museum, Leahy Bowl, Tripp County Courthouse with veterans memorial and Charters of Freedom, Spirit Gems, Winner Drive in Theater, Community Connections, Tony Berg talking about the Rotary Park, Elks Rodeo, Pix Theater. Scott says there will possibly others who will be interviewed.

From these interviews PBS will pick around five stories they want to feature in the half hour show. A crew will come back to Winner in March to do the filming. The show will be aired on April 7. Prior April 7, there will be a public viewing in Winner, possibly at the Pix Theater.

 “We have given them a bunch of ideas and we will let them decide which direction they want the show to go,” said Scott.

Persons who have questions about Dakota Life in Winner can call Scott at the Chamber at 842-1533.

Dakota Life has been around for 24 years and in the  past has contained a series of stories from a variety of different places.

The show’s producers have decided to do something different. They decided to take the show on the road and visit specific communities.

Since September, each episode has been dedicated to just one town and so far the show has profiled communities such as Flandreau, Mobridge, Milbank, Springfield and Murdo.

Masonic Lodge of South Dakota Awards Elmer Karl

Submitted Photo
Elmer Karl, center, received his 60 year longevity membership award in the Masonic Lodge of South Dakota. The award was presented in his home in Gregory by members of Winner Masonic Lodge 166. Pictured from left are Doug Nelson, Jack Frantz, district master of Dist. 12; Richard Ringstmeyer, master of the Winner lodge and Jim Halverson.

COVID numbers increase

C OVID numbers increase

The COVID-19 cases in Tripp County are showing no sign of decreasing. In fact, they are climbing each day.

The following is figures from the South Dakota Department of Health for Tripp County from Jan. 11 to Jan. 14.

As the newspaper’s deadline on Monday, there were no figures for the weekend. You must also take into account there as a Monday holiday.

 On Jan. 11, Tripp County reported 27 new cases.

On Jan. 12 , there were 12 new cases and 7 probable with 160 actives cases.

On Jan. 13. There were 18 new cases with 2 probable. The active cases climbed to 179.

Tripp County had 18 new cases on Jan. 14. There were 191 active cases.

The test positivity rate for the past seven days was 45.7 percent.

On Jan. 14, South Dakota reported 1,9990 new cases with 26,835 active.

As the Omicron variant gets its grip on South Dakota, persons are reminded to take precautions to remain healthy. That means wearing a mask in public places, washing your hands, STAYING HOME when you are sick  and social distancing.

Winner football team is featured on a limited edition Wheaties cereal box

Dan Bechtold/Winner Advocate Photo
The state Class 11B football champions Winner football team is featured on a limited edition Wheaties cereal box. The boxes are on sale at Gus Stop in Winner for $10. Proceeds will go to the Winner High School athletic department. R. F. Buche, owner of Gus Stop, had the idea of putting the team picture on the cereal box. Several years ago when Winner, Colome and Gregory all won state football titles the same year Buche put that picture on a cereal box.

Covid 19

There are five new cases of COVID-19 in Tripp County as of Monday, Dec. 27. The new probable cases in Tripp County is two and there are 33 active cases.

Statewide there were 428 new confirmed cases and 82 probable cases.

The active cases in South Dakota is 7,224.Six South Dakotans have died from COVID-19 in the past week.

The state Department of Health reports 56.6 percent of the state’s population are fully vaccinated.

Thirty-two percent have received a booster shot.

SD Farmers Union Honors Jim Woster and Joel Keierleber as 2021 Ag Ambassadors

By Lura Roti for South Dakota Farmers Union

South Dakota Farmers Union (SDFU) recognizes Jim Woster and Joel Keierleber for their dedicated service to South Dakota agriculture. The state’s largest agriculture organization named them the 2021 Ag Ambassadors during an awards ceremony held December 16 and 17 in Huron during the organizations 106th State Convention.

“South Dakota’s agriculture depends on strong leadership. And for decades, Jim Woster and Joel Keierleber have provided wisdom, advocacy and support for South Dakota’s family farmers, ranchers and the organizations that serve them,” said SDFU President, Doug Sombke.

Jim Woster grew up on his family’s Reliance crop and cattle operation. He is a 1962 graduate of South Dakota State University. Woster went on to become a cattle buyer, agriculture columnist, Associate Editor of Tri-State Neighbor and an enthusiastic advocate for South Dakota agriculture.

Joel Keierleber fought all odds to follow his passion for farming when as a young man, the third-generation Tripp County farmer endured a devastating farm accident. A conservation-minded and progressive crop and cattle producer, Keierleber saw the need to step away from his farm from time to time to advocate for policy to support family farmers and ranchers in Pierre and Washington, D.C. Keierleber is a lifetime Farmers Union member, serving seven years on the SDFU board of directors.

To learn more about Woster and Keierleber’s passion for South Dakota Agriculture, its people and what they see for the future of agriculture, SDFU recently interviewed the 2021 Ag Ambassadors. Below is the Q&A from this interview.

Q: Tell us about how you got your start in your career?

Jim Woster: My dad, Henry, like a hundred other dads of his generation, was not able to go to college. He insisted that the Woster and McManus clan would go to college. As the oldest, I was the first to attend. And there was never any discussion about where I was going. I was going to South Dakota State University.

He also insisted that no matter what we did after college, we did something that would get us out and off the farm to see what the world has to offer.

From my first trip to the stockyards as a 10 or 11-year-old with my dad and Uncle Frank, I have always been intrigued with the stockyards. I was able to get a job at the Sioux Falls Stockyards working for the Farmers Union Livestock Exchange and never had any urge to go any other place.

Joel Keierleber: I knew I wanted to farm from the time I was 5. I grew up on a dairy farm near Clearfield. The fifth of nine children, I was driving the pickup to help dad feed small bales before I started kindergarten. After high school, I took a course in diesel mechanics and returned home to help dad. Audrey and I began saving money to buy a place of our own before our wedding. A few months before the wedding I was in a serious farm accident. My arm was caught in a silo unloader.

When I was in the hospital, they told me that I would never lift my arm above my head again. They recommended I go back to school so I could get a desk job. I did not listen to them. I figured I had not failed yet. It’s my belief that you have to fail two or three times to see if you can succeed. And Audrey stuck by me.

In 1978 we found our farm, 320 acres, three and some odd miles from Colome. It was a less than ideal time to get started. The Farm Crisis was underway, but somehow, with Audrey’s small teacher’s salary and a lot of pencil to paper, we made the payments. And we’re still here.

Q: What did you enjoy about this career in agriculture?

Joel Keierleber: Caring for the land and livestock. And I get to be creative because I have to be creative. I never stick to one plan. I sit down and pencil it out to see what the most cost-effective way will be to farm and that is what I go with.

Frugal farming led me to no-till management practices. I could not afford tillage. When I started in 1980 the fields were only at .8 percent organic matter, and they did not hold moisture. Today, my fields are between 4 and 6 percent organic matter. I also plant cover crops.

In addition to improving soil health, Audrey and I have planted thousands of trees.

Today, I enjoy sharing what I have learned with the next generation. We are helping a young man who wants to make a career of farming, take over our farm.

Jim Woster: The people. In my work, I represented farmers in the sale of their cattle, hogs and sheep. In the mornings, I’d be at the sale barn and in the afternoons, I’d be out in the country driving up and down the side roads, meeting with farmers to let them know the value of their cattle.

These customers were people like my own family and the neighbors I’d grown up with. I’d pull into a place, walk through their 80 or 90 or 100-head of cattle, tell them what they were worth and then they’d say it was coffee time or lunch time. (It got to where I knew who would invite me in for lunch, so I’d purposefully plan to be at their place around noon.) So, we would sit and visit. I got to be really close with these families.

Like I said before, Stockyard customers were just like the families I grew up with. I always say how blessed I was to have been born and raised where I was, when I was, with whom I was. It may sound hokey, but neighbors helped neighbors. They shared farm equipment and labor. Everybody worked together.

Q: Joel, tell us what you enjoyed about raising your daughters on the farm?

Joel Keierleber: Because Audrey worked fulltime as a teacher, I was always involved with raising our now grown daughters, Brecky Cwach and Christine Wood. I got up in the night to feed them bottles just as much as Audrey did.

When they were old enough, they worked right alongside us. I have always said that our two daughters can push cows through a chute faster than any of the help, who were all boys. When I was in the hospital last fall, the girls worked all the cattle – they got them DNA tested and helped wean.

*Trauma from the farm accident left Joel a Type-1 diabetic at 23. In 2020, he received a kidney transplant. While he was recovering from the transplant, he contracted COVID-19 and suffered multiple strokes. He spent 100 days in the hospital, and away from his beloved farm. Today, he is not fully recovered, but he is farming once again.

Q: Jim, tell us how you became a columnist?
It went back to my work at the Stockyards. As secretary of the Exchange, I would do the markets for radio and TV. And because of this visibility, I would get asked to volunteer to MC different events – SDSU basketball games, FFA banquets, community fundraisers, well one day, I get this call from a Sioux Falls businessman who told me he was starting a farm paper. He was up front with me. He said, “everybody knows who you are, and I need someone everyone knows to be a part of my paper.”

I was up front with him and said, “I am not a journalist or writer.” He told me to just write how I talk.

Q: Tell us about your passion for agriculture advocacy?

Joel Keierleber: Well, somebody needs to stand up for the family farm and individual farmers. I grew up watching my dad’s involvement in farm organizations. He was part of the National Farm Organization. As a child I would go to meetings with him.

I know that as farmers we are busy trying to make money. And some say they do not have time to get involved. But if we do not take time away from the farm to stand up for better prices, we will not be able to make money on the farm.
I have seen what involvement in organizations can do. Farmers Union advocated for Country of Origin Labeling (COOL). And it was good for cattle producers during the short time that we had it.

Jim Woster: The importance of agriculture and family operations really started hitting home to me with the struggles of the 1980s. We lost a lot of good farmers. And I knew a lot of farm families who lost their farms. The 80s were tough, not only economically, but socially for our state.

Q: What are your thoughts about South Dakota agriculture today and into the future?

Jim Woster: For many years, to help solve problems, farmers and ranchers formed groups – whether it be co-ops or commodity organizations. And not all these organizations may have been on the same page when it came to ways to solve these problems. Well, it appears to me, that today, when it comes to working to fix this cattle market issue, everyone is back on the same page. We are one group working together. This is encouraging.

Another thing that we are all on the same about is sustainability. You can’t attend an ag conference without at least one session focusing on sustainability. To ag people, sustainability of the environment makes sense. The land is our life and livelihood.

Joel Keierleber: I hope to see more young people get involved in farming. But it’s tough to get started in agriculture if you do not inherit land from your family. I encourage farmers looking to retire, to seek out a young farmer trying to get started and work with them to take over. I think this is a better plan than selling land to the big farmer buying up all the land in the county.

To help the next generation of small farmers, I feel they need more rural access to non-agricultural income. Since the early 90’s I have worked to get wind development started. Our area is a Class 4 wind area, one of the best in South Dakota. But we do not have the large power lines to move the electricity to areas that need it. There have been numerous groups interested. It has not happened yet.

Decision Issued on recreational marijuana

The South Dakota Supreme Court has issued the decision in Thom, Miller v. Barnett and In re Election Contest as to Amendment A. In a four-to-one decision, the Court held that Amendment A, as submitted to the voters in the November 2020 general election, violated the single subject requirement in the South Dakota Constitution. As a result of the constitutional violation, the Court has declared the amendment invalid.

The Court determined that the provisions of Amendment A embraced three separate and distinct subjects:

(1) Recreational Marijuana—by creating a comprehensive plan to constitutionally legalize, regulate, and tax marijuana for all persons at least twenty-one years of age;
(2) Hemp—by constitutionally mandating that the Legislature pass laws regarding hemp; and
(3) Medical Marijuana—by constitutionally mandating that the Legislature pass laws ensuring access to marijuana for limited medical use for qualifying persons.

In reaching its decision, the majority opinion explained that the provisions involving recreational marijuana, hemp, and medical marijuana each have separate objects and purposes, which were not dependent upon or connected with each other.

The drafters’ failure to comply with the single subject requirement in the South Dakota Constitution Article XXIII, § 1 meant that voters were unable to separately vote on each distinct subject embraced in Amendment A. The Court noted in its decision that the Proponents of Amendment A failed to identify a single “instance when voters in another state have been asked to approve a constitutional amendment to legalize recreational marijuana, medical marijuana, and hemp in a single vote.” One member of the Court issued a special writing joining the majority in finding a violation of the single subject rule, and expressing the view that a violation of the single subject requirement is not necessarily fatal in all instances; but adding that here there was no argument or proof that South Dakota voters would have adopted Amendment A in the absence of the medical marijuana and hemp provisions.

A separate opinion was filed by another member of the Court, concurring in part and dissenting in part, that focused on the long history of the initiative in South Dakota, the deference to be paid to initiated constitutional amendments passed by the voters, and the belief that Amendment A appropriately contains parts of a comprehensive plan addressing the related issues of recreational marijuana, medical marijuana, and hemp. Based on the conclusion that there was no single subject violation, the writing also addressed whether Amendment A is a constitutional revision that should have been submitted to the voters through a constitutional convention rather than by an initiative and concluded that it was not a constitutional revision.

Finally, the Court unanimously held that (1) the circuit court properly dismissed the election contest filed by Thom and Miller; (2) neither Thom nor Miller had standing to challenge Amendment A, but Governor Noem’s written ratification of Miller’s declaratory judgment action allowed for the action to proceed as if it had been commenced by the Governor; and (3) the challenge to Amendment A was not required to be brought before the election.

The Court’s opinion can be accessed on the UJS website at https://ujs.sd.gov.