(Sioux Falls, SD) — The latest prison study says that a law passed in 2023 is responsible for some of the increase in the South Dakota men’s prison population. This law requires certain offenders to serve a hundred-percent of their sentence and others 85-percent of their sentence. Critics say it’s fueling the prison population too fast. Senator Erin Healy calls future projections “shocking” and says the state needs to rethink its incarceration policies. But others, like Senator Jim Mehlhaff, say the immediate need for a new facility is clear and expected. The study for the Project Prison Reset task force recommends a new 15-hundred to 17-hundred bed prison to take care of the immediate need for space.
