An Update From the District
The Board President recently distributed an email to all district landowners regarding the public records requests discussed at the May 26 Special Meeting.
Attached to that email was the response prepared by the District’s newly retained attorney.
Because the District chose to distribute the response to all landowners, we believe it is appropriate to briefly discuss what was actually provided.
The Original Questions
The first question was simple:
How did Trustee Matt Christensen determine that a road district could not lawfully conduct a fundraiser?
At the Annual Meeting, residents were told that research had been conducted through the South Dakota Secretary of State website and the Custer County Treasurer’s website.
When asked what information supported that conclusion, no source was identified.
The second question was equally simple:
How did the district go from 34 landowners to 33 landowners?
Not who the current landowners are.
Not copies of meeting minutes.
Simply: what changed?
The Response
The District retained outside legal counsel.
The District increased its legal budget.
The District distributed the attorney’s response to all landowners. We are glad they did, as the members can see for themselves exactly what was provided.
The response included meeting notices, agendas, meeting minutes, screenshots from this website, and a current list of district landowners.
What it did not appear to include was an answer to either question.
Regarding the fundraising issue, no source was identified on either the Secretary of State website or the Custer County Treasurer’s website.
Regarding the landowner count issue, a current list of landowners was provided, but no explanation was given regarding why district records reportedly changed from 34 landowners to 33.
Judge For Yourself
Perhaps the answers are somewhere in the materials provided.
If so, we encourage readers to point them out.
Specifically:
- Where is the information on the Secretary of State website discussing road district fundraising authority?
- Where is the information on the Custer County Treasurer’s website discussing road district fundraising authority?
- Where is the discussion explaining how the district went from 34 landowners to 33?
If those answers are contained within the documents provided by the attorney, we would genuinely like to know where.
The Larger Question
The Board has every right to hire legal counsel.
The Board has every right to distribute the attorney’s response.
The Board has every right to explain its decisions to district members.
But after a special meeting, a budget reallocation, legal counsel, and a district-wide email, the same two questions remain:
What information supported the fundraising conclusion?
And what changed in the landowner count?
Those were the questions at the beginning.
They remain the questions today.
If you received this email, we encourage you to read it and the attachments.