A bill to allow students, faculty and visitors to carry firearms on South Dakota college campuses failed two votes last week, but some legislators said Saturday they would vote for the measure if it comes up again.

Rep. Brian Dreyer, R-Rapid City, said Thursday's campus shooting at Northern Illinois University is a prime example of why South Dakota needs the law. Dreyer said getting a concealed-carry permit requires courses in firearms safety and a background check.

"That was a gun-free zone, people," Dreyer said. "If you want to do harm, you can just walk on campus and start shooting. That scares me a lot more than somebody who takes the time to get a concealed weapons permit and goes through that process."

Besides guns, some of the other controversial topics lawmakers discussed Saturday morning were liquor licenses, teacher pay and Bear Butte during a legislative crackerbarrel at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology.

The meeting, one in a series, allowed voters the chance to interact with lawmakers during the session.

Two audience members, Jay Davis and Marvin Kammerer, questioned legislators about protecting Bear Butte, a Meade County mountain considered sacred to many Native Americans.

The House of Representatives last week rejected a proposal by Gov. Mike Rounds to protect Bear Butte from development by using state money, private donations and a federal grant to buy easements from two people who ranch near the mountain.

"Bear Butte's not only a place where people worship, it's also one of the few state parks in the Black Hills region that's clearly being encroached upon," Davis said. "So if you didn't like the governor's plan, what's your plan?"

Kammerer asked when legislators will recognize that "the treasures of nature are few and rare."

"Putting these things into an easement is good policy, and the land will still be paying taxes to the state. If we don't think enough of this to protect it, then we don't stand for much," he said.

Dreyer said he opposed the buffer zone because he felt it would infringe on private-property rights, and he noted that no other state parks have buffer zones. He also couldn't justify spending $1.3 million in taxpayer money to create an easement that would deny public access.

"I thought it was a bad bill. If we were buying the land and bringing it into the state park, I would have supported it. But we weren't. We were paying a farmer to continue to farm," he said. "If the state is going to use public dollars for something, the public should have access to it."

Rep. David Lust, R-Rapid City, gave credit to Gov. Rounds for trying to find a resolution to the issue but said the state shouldn't be in the land-use planning business.

However, Lust thinks the issue will be revisited in the future and said the Legislature needs to address it through easements, outright purchase, private purchase, private easement or some other option, all of which should be explored, he said.

Legislature 'blamed' for low teacher pay

Rapid City school board member Eric Abrahamson questioned teacher-compensation bills in the Legislature that mandate different salary levels and said it seemed like Pierre keeps trying to take control of education away from local boards.

A bill to set minimum teacher salaries at $30,000 and give pay raises through a three-level pay structure based on experience, increased classroom evaluations and advanced education passed the House last week, a day after the Senate approved a similar plan that seeks to increase salaries by raising state aid to school districts and earmarking most of the increase for teacher pay.

Rep. Mike Buckingham, R-Rapid City, said the idea of the tiered system of teacher certification and pay is a reaction to the Legislature being blamed for salary policy, which is set at the local school-board level.

"We're not trying to take away local control. We're not trying to tell school boards and teachers how to negotiate. We're trying to do some things that will turn good teachers into great ones," he said. "I've been six years in the Legislature, and all six years, the Legislature has taken blame for being 51st in the nation in teacher pay. If they're going to blame us, maybe we should take a little responsibility."

Tourists want daiquiris

Legislators have two liquor-licenses bills heading for a likely showdown in conference committee that are designed to change the state's population-based license-distribution system. Current law allows cities and counties to issue one liquor license for the first 1,000 residents and an additional license for every 1,500 people.

Larger municipalities including Rapid City are pushing for the change in order to attract more chain restaurants. Dreyer said the state's population-based liquor laws are antiquated and don't do justice to a city's trade area.

"We've got a huge trade area. People come here to shop, and when they shop, they want to have a steak and eat at a restaurant, maybe have a strawberry daiquiri. You've gotta have a liquor license to do that," Dreyer said.

But Sen. Bill Napoli, R-Rapid City, said the problem is that the bill isn't limited to restaurants; it's wide open. And since video lottery is attached to liquor licenses, it means video lottery would proliferate. That met a stone wall on the Senate floor, he said.

Napoli said an amendment to carve out liquor licenses specifically for sit-down restaurants failed to get support from the bill's original supporters. Now, the bill is back to its original form.

"This is the most convoluted bill of the year," Napoli said. "Is economic development totally dependent on how much booze we drink?"

Contact Scott Aust at 394-8415 or scott.aust@rapidcityjournal.com.