The State of South Dakota ended the 2015 fiscal year June 30th with another budget surplus. Governor Dennis Daugaard said a combination of lower spending and higher revenue ended with almost twenty two million dollars to carry over to the new budget.
Representative Ray Ring of Vermillion, a member of the Appropriations Committee, says while it is a small percentage of the overall budget, those dollars could have gone to good use.

Ring says this years ending balance is very similar to those of the past several years.

Ring, a former economics professor at USD, says it appears there has been a change in policy following the budget crunch in 2010.

The carry over money was transferred to the budget reserve fund. The state now has just over one hundred seventy million dollars in that fund.