The South Dakota Veterans Council, a veterans advocacy group comprised of the four largest veterans service organizations in the state, is asking all veterans in South Dakota to join them in protesting the way the State has handled the directorship of the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.  All veterans, and other concerned citizens, are asked to write the Governor's Office, and the Division of Military and Veterans Affairs and state their concerns over the handling of this matter (described below) and demand that a full time director be appointed, in accordance with the requirements and precedence of State law, immediately.  The Division has been without a full time director for too long already, and is too important to our veterans to leave in the hands of an interim director until after the 2009 legislative session as the Governor and Adjutant General are now intending.

When past Director Dennis Foell was asked to resign in 2007, the Secretary of Military and Veteran's Affairs, Maj Gen Michael Gorman,  named an interim director to replace him temporarily.  General Gorman stated at the time that he would be retiring himself soon, and he wanted the new Secretary to be involved in the appointment of the next Director.  The situation was less then ideal, but was accepted on that basis; that the new Secretary should not be saddled with a director that he had not appointed.

After General Gorman's retirement, the new Secretary of Military and Veterans Affairs, Maj Gen Steven Doohen, replaced him and set about appointing a Director of the division, which is where the real problems started.  General Doohen wanted to appoint the interim director to the position without due process, but was informed that SD Law requires the Veteran's Commission, a committee six veterans appointed by the Governor to fill an advisory roll to the Division of Military and Veterans Affairs, to nominate the candidate.  

SDCL (South Dakota Codified Law) 33-16-4.1 states "The commission shall nominate the director of veterans affairs to be appointed pursuant to § 1-46-7."

SDCL 1-46-7 states "The director shall be nominated as provided by § 33-16-4.1 to be appointed by the adjutant general to serve at the pleasure of the adjutant general."

Precedent, and prior legal opinions, held that these two laws empowered the Veterans Commission to screen applicants and put forth one name as their nominee, and the Secretary of Military and Veterans Affairs (also the Adjutant General) would then appoint that nominee, who could be dismissed at any time the Secretary chose.  The Commission, therefor, had sway over the choice of the Director, but the Secretary determined how long the Director held the position.  This was a "checks and balances" system that has served the state well in the past.

The new Adjutant General, however, felt he should have more say in the choice and didn't want the Veterans Commission to provide him with only one name.  After some debate, a compromise was reached whereby the Commission would interview eight candidates, and forward five names to the AG, who would then choose his top 2 and return them to the Commission for final evaluation, with his recommendation of ranking.  From those two, the Commission would then return their own top choice for the AG to appoint.

This compromise suffered a major setback when only five of the eight applicants arrived for interviews.  The Commission decided that with only 62.5% of the expected applicants to consider, it was more meaningful to forward on 60% of the agreed recommendation, so only 3 of the 5 applicants were forwarded to the Adjutant General.  The thinking was, why have the preliminary interviews, and still send all applicants to the next phase?

The AG persisted, however, that all five names should be forwarded since that was the compromise reached.  The Commission relented and forwarded the other two applications.  From these five applicants, the AG selected his two choices, including one of the applications that were left off by the commission originally.  This applicant, who was ranked last by the Commission in their evaluations, was listed as the AG's top choice when he returned the names to the Commission for final review.

The Commission evaluated the two remaining candidates again, and decided, by a vote of 4-2, to reverse the order of the names and return their top choice to the AG for appointment to the Directorship.  The AG received their choice, and then declared that his interpretation of SDCL 1-46-7 was that he had sole discretion in who to hire and he overrode the Commission's nomination, appointing instead the candidate that the Commission had originally deemed the worst choice of the five applications received.

The AG has, reluctantly, agreed that he may have overstepped his bounds, and has designated the Director back to Interim status, but left him in the position.  General Doohen's claim is that the wording of SD codified law is vague and needs to be cleaned up by the legislature (in their 2009 session) before any further action can be taken.  This stance would leave the Division of Military and Veteran's Affairs in a state of limbo, with an interim director, for over two years (from the time Foell was asked to retire).  This is NOT a solution to the issue!  At best it is a continuation of the current crisis - lack of a permanent director - and at worst it is an attempt to make an "end run" around the laws of the state and allow the General to effectively appoint a person to the directorship without the due process of a nomination from the Veterans Commission.

Attorney General Larry Long has refused to issue a formal ruling on the interpretation of the law, further perpetuating the problem by allowing the Adjutant General's claim of "vague legal language" causing the problem, despite the history of precedent already established in how the laws are interpreted.

Governor Rounds is trying to avoid the issue.  The Governor could direct the Attorney General to make a ruling on the law and move the issue along that way.  Governor Rounds could also perform the job he was elected to do and be the chief executive of the State by directing the Adjutant General to dismiss the interim director and accept the nomination of the Veterans Commission (or open the position up to new applications and start the process over).  Instead of doing either, the Governor has chosen to issues statements like "...we understand [the Veterans Council members] care deeply about service to veterans, and so do we", while avoiding taking any action that would show his words to ring true.

It is clear to the Veterans Council, and to The South Dakota Department of The American Legion, that the administration will not take any action to rectify this situation unless prompted to do so by their constituency.  To this end, we encourage all concerned citizens to write the office of the Governor, and the Division of Military and Veterans Affairs, and demand that a new director be nominated by the Veterans Commission, in accordance with past precedent, and that this nominee be appointed to the Directorship of the Division of Military and Veterans Affairs.

These offices can be reached at the addresses and phone numbers give below.