PIERRE — Lawmakers on a House committee approved a bill Wednesday to establish an advisory council to oversee communication on the welfare of Native American children in South Dakota’s foster care system. But the same committee also voted to reject a bill that would have created a two-year task force to study the welfare of Native children in foster care.
Rep. Tamara St. John, R-Sisseton, sponsored the advisory council bill, describing it as a way for stakeholders from tribes, the Department of Social Services and the South Dakota Legislature to come together once a year to hold a formalized discussion about the care of Native foster children.
“Where do we have that space for innovation, that focus on prevention, or how do we know what we’re looking at in the form of data?” said St. John, an enrolled member of the Sisseton Wahpeton tribe.
A six-month joint investigation by South Dakota Searchlight and the Argus Leader following last year’s legislative session explored the causes, effects and potential solutions to the decades-long overrepresentation of Native American children in South Dakota’s foster care system. Native American children accounted for nearly 74% of the foster care system in June 2023, despite accounting for only 13% of the state’s overall child population.