[applause] [cheers and applause] c oh come on. good morning. thank you for that warm welcome and thank you for being in person all the people watching

on line or listening remotely we say thank you for joining us for the 2024 state of the state. you've all been thoroughly welcomed this morning but i want to give a special shout out to a few people in the course i've got to start with first lady catherine and her family members she spirit their sister julie and her cousin lisa and watching on line to the rest of our rest of our extended families and their sons joe and tom and her daughter jesse and their extended families. when you serve your family serves with you so i want to be sure to at this time thank them for all their support in the seven years in today's a special day because it's jesse's birthday and so we need on a one, two, three everybody to yell happy birthday jesse. it will be the largest group to ever yell her birthday at the same time. one, 23, happy birthday jesse [applause]

way to go. you guys did fantastic. [applause] you saw her here on stage but to have such an outstanding partner in the tammy miller. she's an asset for the state of north dakota and we have a historic year in terms of milestones in progress but her background in finance private-sector leadership is the ceo of a company with over 4000 people operating in 29 states you rarely get people like that delete the private-sector and the lieutenant governors made a huge difference to transform government. i want to give her womb were welcome. say thank you for your great leadership. [applause] and kicking us off today after the great music we had and thank you for hosting us and seen a

lot of clever ways to impress the legislature that we need more money for improvements. pulling the plug as we were getting here i think president east end that was brilliant. and for legislators you may want to look at the lector back here. there probably are some upgrades that could be made but here we are at the auditorium's namesake. as you know this is the name, she was the second rough rider award winner in the state of north dakota and one of the states highest honor people in 1951. her success is there success though it's an honor to be in the stage and hollow named after one of our rough riders. the stark county commissioners the whole group fantastic job legislature kicking us off today

senator david hogue are majority leader in our minority leaders you've all been recognized for thank you all for your important leadership in the course they are busy working in d.c. but i do want to say hello important are resisting this hoeven senator cramer and congressman armstrong three people in strong and powerful positions in d.c.. they are good at their jobs as legislators and to help push back the federal government so let's say thanks right now. [applause] and we have our supreme court chief justice jensen and the other justices and districtwide justices. we have three great branches of government in our state and we weren't allowed in time in seven years in office the demographics of retirement is the major

reason that we have set a record. i've had the honor of appointing 20 different district judges and supreme court judges. sometimes you go back in history and sometimes the governor in 40 years in office might appoint two to four. we have done 20. the process has been an important one. we'll talk about behavior health later but i want to share right now as part of appointing judges to get to interview 75 different people that have come up through the judicial system in one of the questions i always ask is how much of your job as a judge advocate in a prosecutor and defender working in her system and north dakota or in the private-sector working with criminal defense how much of your work would go away if we eliminate behavioral health and addiction. i've never heard an answer. think of what is the state and a

nation in our judicial system dealing with the problems of something we can work to fix so keep that in the back of your mind when we are talking about behavior health. we do a nice job on the back in but i do want to say are administered yours also around third judicial area they were carefully behind the scene that they never get recognized. they run it efficiently and effectively. let's say thank you to the frontline workers. [applause] since this is a day for reflection it's the duty and honor and after a appoint them everyone calls them your honor.

due to legislative budget cuts in the governor's office i ride all my own jolts. that's all you're going to get. dad jolts but i learned last week how do you know what a joke becomes a bad joke? it becomes apparent. [laughter] we are done here. [applause] we have a lot of gratitude for the toughest elected job and north dakota of any elected officials. we have great tribal chairs and tribal council spirit lake standing rock chairman janet of veteran turtle mountain chippewa leader chairman hill incredible

folks and we have made so much progress together. one of our top on the objective has been state travel. the collaboration we have had historic tax revenue sharing which senator cook was in the service last friday. they came to his prayer service for the work that he did on making sure we had fairness and equity. the gaming contacts which we issued last year that had been going on for 20 years and agreement that improved our ability to respond and to work with the tribes on cybersecurity because their tribes are being attacked to ransomware through foreign entities. we look forward to building on all of the partners in the five tribal nations. i remind everyone guess they are

enrolled members of tribes that are sovereign nations that every single one is a north dakota system and it's our responsibility and duty to serve alongside with them. from the government to government stamp what i would say encourage all of you to join in our strengthening government to government relationships. our tribal conference you are all invited every agency. i just want to say when we had federal partners to be a part of that they say this is the best government to government tribal state conference in the country. don't miss it. it's coming up in june gill learned a lot and you'll make great relationships. there's economic opportunities as well. we are also grateful for the tremendous dedicated cabinet leaders that we have. it's so important when you are leading in the credit sometimes goes to the governor and lieutenant governor but you can

get any of these things done unless you have people that are driving in the same direction. it's been an honor to work with these cabinet leaders of the haves and they have five he was joined in the last year who are looking forward to working with. she's off to strong start in one of the commitments we have in 2024 from our office is we are digging in as hard as ever in a strategic planning process with all of you. over 75 agencies will be there in the budget process that follows it. we are committed in delivering. albeit delivering the budget address next december before the end of my term. we have three to 27 days left. we will be delivering the best budget the state is ever received and that means it will be better than the last one we did. we are super committed to that process to make sure you have the best starting point in the legislature to make smart investments to take their state forward.

the director has been on the ground and running. this is a huge challenge. we have massive transportation things going on in want to tell him thank you for his collaboration and three new commissioners that started last week when it was an external player and two there were internal. the commissioners here the deputy of texas a much larger job in hhh says our largest agency in terms of budgets and people affairs director bret hawke is taking over and congratulations to director kobe bryant. he has time here in new englund. he knows her system and he'll be fantastic. again for those by people let's give them a hand and say thank you. [applause] we have a small but mighty governor's office team all told

about 16 people. we we are not a big agency but we get a lot done because the people we have work around-the-clock seven days a week. they are all amazing and everyone of them like me will be coasting to the finish line so getting ready for four things helping announce that aren't even being announced today. we are going to keep driving our agenda forward. we did make story progress working with all of you tribes in the legislation and leaders and some the things we have accomplished are the long-standing practical issues and identified and implemented commonsense solutions. these are benefiting us. some of you in this room do that. take one that we didn't even talk about last year during the session because we solved it. protecting over 25% of their

health care 25% of our k-12 students and the entire university of the state owns over $60 billion in property value protected was completely stalled and stopped by the state of for 53 reasons. they said here's a 53 seat -- reasons you can't get a permit. but we work together and got it done in salt it with the joint process with minnesota and it's being billed and by 2027 we are going to have 250,000 people who don't have the worry about it anymore and that will help the economic growth continue in that market. pension reform. mike devore was appearing in its been tried and tried and it happened this year. $1.9 billion we met the obligations completely about 53,000 current members and retirees. now we have a 401(k) style plan

that will allow us and their leaders to recruit young people to work for the state of north dakota. good job. [applause] the primary seatbelt has been tried since 2000. we lose more than 100 people every year to otter deaths are conjuring up a goal of saying there's no acceptable number other than zero. it's not like we got it down to 75 because 75 is still a son and a daughter and niece or nephew. one is to many of the work we can do with d.o.t. human services and a lot of these are impaired driving issues but it took a legislator like dean rommel who helped to drive it and to have the courage to say with and we got a past. we are one of the last states to have a primary seatbelt law. i'm a freedom of liberty guy but

i'm also a guy that guess what there's nothing in the constitution that says you can drive could you have to have a license to be qualified and you need to not be impaired and you have to be qualified to do it. it's not like the right to vote. that's something you apply for and you get the skill to that. if you want to be doing that you have to achieve something so good job. we got it done. corporate farming we had the most outdated corporate farming laws in america. we killed animal agriculture and i mean killed. we are still doing -- and almost no sheep herds and the stated we had less, 12,000 dairy cattle in our state. we were importing milk and of the state. we had one north dakota entity running at darion oregon where

they could do animal agriculture and they had 35,000 dairy in oregon. we and our whole state of 12,000 so i say we ran into the ground. we carved out and said animal agriculture we will protect family farming that the strongest protections for family farmers in the nation. corporations can own land here and if you and i want to start a farm together and you're related to me, we couldn't start a farm together here so we have the tightest protections for family farmers. we can save our tradition and open up the door for cattle and since the law passed we have several, 12,000 dairy firms to want to build on our side of the river instead of the minnesota side or the celtic of the site. we are bringing cattle back

which will save our communities. so that's fantastic in the course interest rates are super high right now. guess what, we have smart leaders and a couple of years ago we said wow maybe we could borrow some money and take some of these big projects like the diversion like the minot floods the money that would flow into our spending like water infrastructure would compete with all the smaller sized megaprojects on the table. 680 million-dollar bonding package and 2021 to support infrastructure upgrades took advantage of historic low interest rates. that would not have happened without senator rich warden sitting in the front pushing through that bill. thank you. [applause] this last year record

550 million-dollar income or property tax relief with the prime sponsor who's always been a champion. he and i are completely alike. we still need to get north dakota down to zero income tax and we'll talk more about that later. thank you craig for being such a strong proponent of lower taxes and her stay. that's just a few of the things in aikido on and on. other than that we have so much work to get them could be a big challenges that lie ahead in the biggest challenge we face in her state is the workforce. we have made significant headway last session to tackle one of the biggest barriers to workforce participation. the legislature came to understand the thing that was holding us back when we have 30,000 jobs open in our state in every restaurant in every manufacture and every farmer and certainly every oil company in the state does not have enough workers and we don't have enough

teachers. we need to make sure we were investing in workforce infrastructure. what is the workforce infrastructure look like today? one of them as childcare. if you have too educated parents that are here are too educated parents want to move here we had the legislature last year that told me personally they finally got the spot or both of their kids were career folks living in south dakota and they would come home starting a family and they wanted to be close to their grandparents and they were coming back to their hometown. they couldn't find it childcare slots and so they move back home. we have made progress on childcare and housing. this will be another big lift. that's not the governments job. workforce infrastructure we have to create the incentives for the private-sector to bring n. to solve these problems. we have to continue to work as one across all of state

government to cabinet leaders are getting so good at right now. and what we have done on the drilling and waters usa and 20 rules that are currently being jammed by the federal government and i say rule of pages. you don't understand the amount of time and energy the ags office in our office and the land board, we are to defend sovereign state license board because these rules are trying to take the power of the state to move it towards unelected bureaucrats in d.c.. we have got to keep fighting back on that and we will do that. we have made great progress in attracting capitol investment into our state and that's how we grow and investment investment in the workforce. we do that for the things we are doing right now reducing taxes cutting red tape. this legislature passed 50 added

that 51 red tape reduction bills we sent them last year and that's fantastic and we are building healthy and vibrant community so we can compete against every other state. every one of job titles i talked about if you're a teacher or nurse or work in manufacturing, if you can do anything even drive a combine if you can work there you can get a job anywhere in this country because they have jobs open in virtually every industry. we are in a competition like never before. their 10 million jobs open in america, 10 million some people move to states because it's warm. we have been quite sold that yet in our state but we had to compete in other ways but one of the ways we compete is on innovation or regulation. in our office we get together and innovation and not regulation. we need a rule to stop some person from from doing that and i say how bout have innovation

so we never had to do it in the first place. we want to unleash her states full potential. innovation in the forward-looking. renovation is looking. but you get a federal role in place by the time they get in pretty soon you're like who's going to monitor that to make sure that company is following that rule? the federal government as we have to stop this issue. we have a government and agent with a clipboard driving around western north dakota trying to make sure that someone is following it and it takes the federal government eight years to go from an idea to implementation to enforcement? we have ripped through four evolutions of moore's law with a computer chip that half the price and by the time you get out there and drive around in your pickup to do some monitoring we could be tracking all that electronically. digitally and remotely.

satellite internet upload whatever you want data that's collected automatically that's accurate fast fast remote and. data is collected by humans that the high cost in and inaccurate but the regulation not only when you make the rule but the downstream costs raises the cost of almost every product in america. our state needs to hold high innovation not regulation of that's part of her past. opportunities have never been greater. with ai and the power of natural language computing it is unbelievable what we can do to transform the way we think about it. it's a super exciting with to do a better job. one of the things that catherine and i learned this last year when we are traveling around the country sharing the amazing story of north dakota at such an honor to represent the state and the rest of the nation does not understand us.

it's not like they don't understand us like they have never met anybody from her state before and probably because of our brand literally because we are in north dakota for the one thing for sure that will be brought up will talk about how cold it is and yes it's super freezing. when we were kids we all froze walking to school uphill both ways 50 below windchill and all of these things are frozen your you brought it in and fought it out. we just play into it when we do that but here's the thing. we understand more than ever in my lifetime i've worked with people from 120 countries who didn't have the right to vote the buchter free speech or the right to assemble in the customers and team members working around the 50 states.

we had a good thing going on here but when you see what's happened in the rest of her country and what's going on here in north dakota we have the best of america right here. [applause] we feed the world. we are the top producer. we should make sure that every k-12 student and every university student in our system understands and can recite this list because if they go what you do in north dakota? how bout we feed the world as the top producer of a dozen commodities in the top five of another eight commodities. and soybeans were shooting up.

soybeans county was the largest soybean producing county in america a couple of years ago. that wasn't possible when i was a kid and now just during this last administration of hours we have gone through processing plants with one open into more on the way. that's close to a billion dollars of capitol investment and value-added around one product soy beans and now we see what's going on with corn and ethanol in the future that has never been brighter. that's fantastic and energy. i've met people that live in north dakota, you guys are an energy state? they didn't know we were in energy state. how can we have people in america who drive an american heat their homes and not know the ones who are providing a big chunk of that. the number three oil producing state. how many school kids would say

how many oil wells we have in north dakota would anybody answer we have 18,733 wells? that's a record and it's going up every month. the permits we are getting when i hear people say we have to ban drilling on federal land i've heard people that said that they get an image of the 1950s rock hudson movie in black and white with oil flying all over and everybody is covered with oil spewing out on the ground and they are like if you do that on federal land we will bring everything. i tell them three-quarters of the well permits we are offering right now north dakota the traditional talk and well is two miles down into miles over. 75% of the new permits are two miles down in three mouse over. we can drill drill and land three miles away sending a check to the federal government to reduce the deficit and no one would step foot on the land.

we had to tell her story. we had to tell her story to the oil industry of today so efficient and so effective in so safe and so smart and so environmentally friendly compared to any other nation. north dakota does it better than anyone and we are losing the battle or hats nationally losing the battle. some people people say we are the bad bad guys. you have fossil fuels? we are helping stabilize the world so we don't have to buy energy from iran and iraq and russia and venezuela. we didn't use that oil money to support terrorism. we have to tell our story here and some people how many people knew in november we set a record for north dakota. $3.5 billion not million, billion cubic feet per day.

3.5 billion cubic feet per day. unbelievable. and what we can do is clean natural gas to heat homes and create electricity create fertilizer about the things we can do these patrolling projects are amazing things that they can do and we always been an all of the the above electricity state. we are all driving towards carbon sequestration and zero co2. that power will help save the nation because every other state is shutting down their base load prematurely at a time when the demand for electricity goes up-and-up. it won't be because of electric cars. it will go up for everything else including, including demand for data services. all of the stuff with ai and ability to transform every job in every company and industry to ai requires power to run those data centers and we should be building building more of those in north dakota.

biofuels and what's happening here in dickerson of banal renewable fuels hydro from the dam. all of the above energy strategies or wind portfolio. we are providing energy cheaper than anyone else and what a surprise interview with so much that was going on in north dakota and tell someone we have the lowest average price of electricity in the nation to customers for all segments in north dakota better, cheaper and faster here more reliable than anyplace else. energy leader of america right here, north dakota. [applause] and how about our military? american should know our air force bases in north dakota schnoor air force bases in the north dakota national guard play a role in protecting our nation's freedom. we have allowed people that say we don't really know what's going on up there.

how about the fact that we are operating at minot two of the three legs of the nuclear triad. we have a missile wing in a bomber wing. how about the fact that you and me, not you and me. grand forks air force base and there's a lot of conjunction with you and me. at the air force base they have a new mission for the global hawks are flying and all being refurbished there. it's $4 billion they are refurbishing with the largest unmanned aircraft in the world. they have 83-foot wing spans. they fly for 24 hours. they leap and forks and flights of the pacific and fly back. that's exciting and interesting. we are such a leader in unmanned aerial systems both commercially and otherwise. the city of minot winning the trophy for going above and beyond supporting airmen and their families. i had a trick question this last

year with a national reporter and talking about the nuclear triad. he asked me hey with the three legs of the nuclear triad and which was your favorite? we underestimate north dakota and this guy guy probably does it know i'm talking about so i'm going to embarrass him on a national program. i said we are the only state that has two of the three but i also said my favorite might be the third uss north dakota one of the largest nuclear submarines in the world and we have this lake that so big. if we can get them back and forth will have all three legs in the nuclear triad. [applause] that would be fun. catherine and i had a chance to be on that incredible boat and i do chance in september 2 change the command that is such an honor for state to be connected with that one piece of the u.s.

navy and a great relationship between that boat and i know many legislators say we should keep that relationship growing. natural resources wow. a gift that we have been given. if you want to get up every day and be grateful for something be grateful for what has given us through natural resources. we have been so richly blessed with the soil that we have across our state and all that agriculture. that only happens because of the rich land we have been given. record amounts of oil and gas production is their geology and we have so many other things we could do here. we have diverse land and stunning sunsets and i think people ought to know the fact that our sunsets are the best in america. we don't have pesky buildings that block the thing.

there's no trees that are blocking your view of the sunset and i don't need minnesota. minnesota has five cities with statues of paul bunyan and you can barely see the guy because there are so many trees. he did all of his best work in north dakota and we are so humbled we don't even have a statue for him. we are just like gone, finished the job done. but with that and i'm sure it's the sunsets but how cool is this? over the majority of my lifetime and for some people even more in the 1930s lived up until this last decade you would have virtually your entire life is the only state in the nation that was a losing population. 49 states grew between 1930 and 2005 and one shrank in north dakota. we had less population in early 2000 then at the end of the depression and you say how did that happen?

it was a keen effort. i was helping in the 1980s with some other people but here we are and what they are natural resources with innovation and a private-sector investment in the western part of our state where we least expected if that's what drove us and the revenue coming up at the oil and gas administration which is a massive input which affects their health care our education our roads are water projects we have been able to leverage that industry in every corner thursday. there is no school kid a living person in our state that hasn't benefited from the oil and gas industry and because of that people are saying wow they have the infrastructure and great schools and great cities and maybe all move there. maybe i will move home. we have young people that are staying. we went from having one of the most -- lowest birthrates to one

of the highest. we set an all-time high record in population this past year. we broke through now we are at 784,000 with an all-time record high population. let's keep that going and if you guys have kids and grandkids that are raising families tell them to keep it up, way to go. .. laborforce participation. we have states we are competing with people are still on the silence of the pandemic. they're working two jobs people in north dakota know how to work. these rankings not only have we become younger and happier, we

have also now become the second best state to raise a family. tell everybody you know, as part of this thing to tell people this is the best place, the best in america with safe cities, great schools you want to raise a family? do it here. guess what we were just recently named, thank you legislature, thank you state water commission, second-best infrastructure in the state and that includes of course our infrastructure related we have invested in our high-speed bandwidth and broadband we have amongst the best broadband infrastructure number two in education and childcare amazing. and a new and that just came out, best estate for business friendliness. this is like one of the best places to do that. another thing along with the friendliest we also have name by forbes magazine's second year old best estate to start a business. best estate to start a business. i've been in business start ups in north dakota and i am telling us a lot better now than it was in the 1980s because we

actually care and we got examples but we have a mentors and programs that help people. one of the reasons why it's a best place to start a business is our failure rate is lower three out of four new startups actually survived that's way higher than other states. so wait to go north dakota. thanks to conservative budgeting, efficient operations, strong revenues and a ton of investment by the private sector that creates all this wealth, guess what. our state this in the best financial shape it has ever ever been. [applause] yes. [applause] on june 30 we closed out the 21 -- 23 biennial record general fund ending balance of nearly one and a half billion dollars for that's a billion with a b for people not familiar with the budgeting process, normally when you plan a budget you try to end the budgeting process with

58 million or 75 million. have a little cushion in there. 1.5 billion. that was our ending balance. we had an estimate it was going to be high. it ended up about 300 million higher than that. so when we were back in the special session -- mike you got this much cash round one of things you might say to yourself is hey, maybe we should give it back to tax payers through tax relief. try to in special session had a bill the got through one of the chambers 91 million ran into a roadblock. we did not get it done but we should keep going. to be competitive and retaining an active workforce which is our number one job to keep her say growing and thriving to give our businesses open. to attract capitol. workforce used to follow capitol. they would be like the company as an ounce for opening a big plant here are from one would move there to get a job there. i've not been on the phone -- i

was on that with the head they got 40000 employees and they operate in 80 different countries were just getting redding -- with the board's boardsapprove three to $50 millr soybean plant in jamestown. i'm like what got this deal forgets on the phone with him he is can we hire 75 people in jamestown? we have a plan for having a hard time hiring there. can we actually get workforce? capitol follows workforce it used to be exactly the other way around workforce will follow capitol we've got to solve the workforce problem every possible way we can we solve it for the energy industry. we have more fracking crews all the numbers for the reserves assured it would be higher, a lot higher all of the companies that work in north dakota warily of 39 rigs operating right that we should have 60s workforce issue. we can celebrate the record high i want to make sure everyone understands we are not where we could be if we solve workforce we could be even higher.

so to be competitive one of the simplest things we could do it without the money to do is get to zero income tax. why does that matter? part of it matters because were competing at states with zero income tax. these dollars and the ending fund balances think about like your checking account the end of the year we end up with more in our checking account than we thought. we have reserves think of those savings accounts and our reserves have never been higher. get this, the budget stabilization fund and the strategic investment and improvement fund which i affectionately called checking account to general fund to we will have a proposal to make the whole thing go away and have the money going to the general fund we can get rid of the whole shift thing some people are plotting from the treasurer's office. this is dollars that just flow in but look at this. look at the scale of this compared to where we were we whenhe took office and this is a reflection. you go around too all the other

reserves we have stacked up these are just a couple of them we have so much cash in so many different places its seven times more than when we took office. at in terms of trust funds because that slide right there and does not include trust funds including the legacy fund that did not exist 10 years ago. and now the legacy fund gets a giant check every month. 30% of our oil tax revenue goes into that. and remember oil taxes for those getting close attention -- be taken off the top. if you do not make income as an individual you don't pay income tax if you are a farmer and don't have an income you don't pay income tax rate you are an oil company we have 10% of your revenue not 10% of your income. it is a revenue taxes what we are doing. as long as we are producing there's money coming in every month and growing and growing. on the next summer of the legacy fund the schools trust fund sits

at 6.1 billion. last year we were kicking $5 million of payment out of that trust fund for common schools that goes out to help reduce property taxes. that just happens without anybody paying attention. we do so much to reduce property tax already in our budget. but anyway we projectable and the current budget cycle in jund general fund balance of 518 million. after six months, through december we are running one or 54 million ahead we are 11% had forecasters to the first six months. things are cooking along and that is great sprayed north north dakota we are hiring. we found out this morning just in today we are tied with a maryland for the lowest unemployment rate in america 1.9%. we found out this morning, just today that we are tied with maryland for the lowest unemployment rate in america.

thank you to all of the private sector folks that are hiring. we talked about new business startups and a great place to start a business, open for north dakota in 2023. we will continue to have demand when we talk about jobs there might be 14, 15,000 and new healthcare as we survey them, they have new positions to post forever. most of them might have 10 or 20 times what is posted. we have a big workforce challenge. the big thing to get here. i went through every other

governor. weber is the strongest, unbelievably strong, our state, we are underestimated. we are so good at so many things, we have never been stronger, financially and economically, people wise, we have never been stronger, we are underestimated by people externally and we have to change that, the way we get capital and we have people to move here. they underestimate we have great weather and they underestimate everything about us and we have to tell our story differently because we are competing and we have to tell our story differently and better. we will shift gears right now and we want to honor those who serve. by honoring those americans that we know in north dakota,

we cherish our god-given freedoms and we honor those. we do that, right now, not everyone in our country is doing that. sometimes i service demands ultimate sacrifice. the whole state of north dakota stood frozen when they saw the news that a police officer was fatally shot from taking action towards an assailant who had ambushed two of his critical officers. along with a bystander who just moved to north dakota three weeks earlier we have one person shot and killed, two people who have taken multiple gunshots down and a citizen that is injured seriously and zach robinson as part of the police department takes action

and puts himself at risk to neutralize the shooter saving countless lives. that individual had 1300 rounds in his vehicle. we came very close to have something that will put us on a different level of national news. in our state, best in america, are men responded. last month, the sheriff's deputy was tragically killed by a crash when he was trying to protect his community. if we moved to the military side, this is not a fatality, on christmas day, i native and army pilot suffered a serious head injury in a one-way drone attack on a u.s. military base. he was not flying a helicopter at that time. we are thankful that he has

been transported back to the united states and he is breathing on his own and has opened his eyes. he is there at walter reed with his wife and mother and other family members. i did not share with him that i would share with this all of you today. let's hold garrett in our prayers. these are people who are serving our country and who are fighting for us. as wars erupt around the world, freedom is not free, we need to be careful with the military and on memorial day, we do a great job with all that. we have to make sure that we are doing that every day.

anyone who has served, any active military, and the veterans, anyone in lawn force past or present, you can stand right now for this chance for us to say thank you. as we have said in addition to our words on applause, we need to make sure that we are showing military gratis tutor through our actions. we have made huge strides towards making our state the most military friendly in the nation. if you are serving here because you are an elected leader, that makes my heart burst with pride for the way you are serving.

we have been taking steps over the last few years. we have expanded tuition assistance, we have cut red tape for military service child providers, of course, contributing to our communities, home to 13,000 active duty and servicemembers who make countless positive contributions to our communities. always ready, always there. high-performing organizations only exist if they have high- performing leadership. the national guard this last few years, if it is soldiers serving at the southern border, or around the nation's capital or overseas, we need to make

sure that the guard members are well trained for their mission any of the guard leadership, i want to see if i can see them and say thank you, you don't have to stand up, thank you so much. our dedication to the military is unwavering. this could not have been accomplished without lieutenant governor tammy miller, there is still more work to be done. we want to keep soldiers top of our mind. so that we can be the most military friendly's date for our military and family, we want to establish a cross agency military friendly working group working with the national guard to some or the task force mind with proposals related to childcare and more

to have those ready for the next legislative session, so we can move towards being the most unitary friendly state in the nation. no doubt that north dakota will forever be the place to be a military member. one thing we have to do, we have to take care of those members after they are out of the military. this is 2024. we want to make sure we are doing the right thing. we have a lot of work to do on this front with the posttraumatic things that happen. every year in our country, completed suicides take the lives of over 6000 veterans and military members in the united states. even at times like this when we are in conflict, we lose more will to completed suicides then we do to actual combat. the veterans are often left without the behavioral health and medical support services that they need to manage their

invisible and real scars. i signed a proclamation declaring 2024 as the veteran military suicide prevention month. developed in conjunction with the american legion's be the one program to connect with veterans who are struggling with suicide. we are honored to have clarence carol with us, the third vice commander, here with other members, if you could stand and be recognized, thank you for all the work that you do. we are looking forward to collaborating with the american legion led by north dakota care is to leave no veteran behind. these veterans have answered

the call to serve. we need to know that each veteran will know that the citizens of our state and our government in the state is behind them and that we have their backs. one thing we can all do right now, to immediately start raising awareness for veterans and our citizens alike, we need to expand the marketing of the suicide and crisis line. effective immediately, what we are doing across the governor's office and every cabinet agency across the date, we will display the 988 icon that will link people to the resources they need so we can have awareness everywhere. people know what to do in an emergency, call 911. people do not know that 988 is the number to call if you know someone is a need for a

behavioral health issue. even if you have an inkling of a concern, call this number. we want to encourage businesses in the private sector to follow suit with displaying this icon that you care for the veterans in the state. let's destigmatize the fear of asking for mental health support. the changer -- challenge of behavioral health is an addition from the start seven years ago. that is one of the five strategic initiatives. when we started that, now we are facing a crisis of mammoth proportions. in the last three years, each year has been a new record of overdose deaths and now we have passed the 300,000 mark in the nation. we have lost five vietnam's two overdosed deaths in 2023.

that is over 300 people per day. that is unbelievable. what we are focusing on hearing in north dakota is increased recovery support services for individuals that got involved with the criminal justice system. that is the most expensive way to treat a behavioral health problem. sometimes it is necessary if it is a violent crime. we need to have services out front that stop people from being in a situation where they have to commit property crimes. we have served 6300 individuals through care coordinated providers. if we can get people who have been in the criminal justice system out and we can keep them out and help them get a job or a place to live or get a

drivers license, we keep them out and then we have more people in the workforce connected with family and their kids and we are spending less money on the backend on incarceration. a win for everybody. substance use disorder vouchers, 7000 people have access these voucher programs. thank you to the legislature, 18 million to help support this. this is a drop in the bucket for what we pay for all of the county and city jails around the state. in the whole justice system. this is what we talked about, 75% related to addiction and behavioral health. we did not have enough providers in our state. there is nowhere near close to enough providers. let's take people with lived experience that can help others stay in recovery and now we have 1000 pierce of ort specialist and over half of them have criminal justice

interactions. these people might have been unemployable and they are working and have a job keeping other people sober and in recovery and off the expensive solution back in criminal justice. one thing you can do in this country, no discrimination, if you have a felony, we can discriminate where you work and where you live. there is new such thing as, i have paid my debt to society. if you have a felony, 40% more things are felony than when i was a kid. then you end up with a thing where you are stigmatized for your whole life. we have 11 providers and 30 recovery homes. again, this is working to keep

people being better neighbors. the behavioral health workforce, they made great strides accessing services for those facing addiction. there are workforce shortages and so in addition to the peer supports program, we are working with university leaders, the healthcare system, private sector, to help solve this critical issue. we will be helped by facilitating conversations across the state regarding the behavioral health workforce specifically. recovery reinvented, unbelievable. what this has done, they have made great strides to eliminate the strain of addiction in north dakota. we know we have made progress. more than 21,000 people have

participated over the last seven years. joining this movement to help individuals find hope in recovery. it is time to ensure that when people seek help we have a workforce there to help them. there is one person i made a huge difference in this. someone had the courage to stand up and share her story to people across the state and across the nation. when she tells her story, it moves people. she has saved lives by doing that. she is celebrating her 22nd here in recovery after decades of struggling with addiction. her incredible work to drive policy and create better solutions for folks has been amazing. if you could please help me welcome the most courageous first lady in the nation.

we know that addiction does not discriminate and it affects every community, especially law- enforcement officers. they deal with far-reaching impacts of addiction on every single shift. ask anyone on highway patrol or anyone in blue. this is what they are dealing with. the same with the courts. it is important that we support men and women in uniform that protect our communities. we back to blue with our words, we need to back with her actions. we provide in hiring and retention bonuses. pay from state income tax and we have offset the cost of routine medical exams. our efforts will not end there. we have other people in our state that we want to bring

forward a plan to stop word all of our law enforcement officials across north dakota, making this a premier place to work in law enforcement where law enforcement is respected. let's be the place where we respect law and order and let's get those people to calm and go to work here. a profession that is respected. every time someone in my family says someone working in law enforcement, we say one thing, thank you for your service. every time, we have to think them. they really are is a thin blue line. we have to extend this to emergence the responders, ems, peace officers and others. we have neighbors that put on firefighting gear, they buckle up in the squad car, they all deserve our gratitude. so much of it is volunteers

still. we have 3500 licensed emergency medical services personnel. a lot of them work in rural locations for free. 7000 volunteer firefighters. we have 10 times as many people who volunteer to go help save their neighbors. if you are a firefighter these days, most of your calls are not fires. most of them are ems related. sometimes as high as 80% is medical related. we are grateful for the service. if there are people here today, firefighters, if you have volunteered for your local fire department, stand up and we will say thank you to you.

here in stark county we are one of these individuals was a best in america kind of guy. he served as chief of the gladstone fire department for 45 years, volunteering. serving the citizens of his community and risking himself to put others safety ahead of his own. he did not stop there, he was active in the local and state organizations. sadly, his family and community lost them to the battle with brain cancer last july but not before he received the spirit of excellence award. he is with us in spirit today and we are honored to have him back here in the auditorium,

his wife, rene, and their two children, their families, joe's mother, all here in the audience today. this kind of story happens over and over in our state. this is the best of america. thank you, warner family, thank you, joe warner, let's give them all a hand. we want to turn actions into ideas. if you are a first responder or you are related to one or you know one, if there is a better way for us, the state government and state legislator, if there is a better way for us to support men and women in uniform, law enforcement, firefighters, first responders, call, write,

email the governor's office, we will turn your ideas into legislation and we will keep doing what we have been doing. we will get rid of the restrictions and we will pass laws for what you are doing. keep those ideas coming. we want to support workers for their physical health and the safety and overall health of the community. one of the ways that we do that is with accessible childcare. we were put into the position to make these incredible strategic investments, one of the things that still remains is childcare affordability. those federal funds went into the north dakota childcare initiative, thank you, legislature, for doing that. what is happening with that investment? 4800 working families have received help with childcare

costs just in the first six months of this biennium. more than 300 childcare businesses have benefited from grants and incentives. when we talk about 30,000 jobs open we did a huge dent with childcare and we are 5000 people it came back to the work horse. other things we are doing to support the workforce, the north dakota job services budget to support the visa program for temporary ag workers. you know how important it is to support farmers and ranchers. some might not know, it is confused and caught up in the discussion about immigration. we have had in some cases visa workers from south africa like these guys pictured here coming to north dakota every harvest season. a 46% increase, they come back and they work for the same

families. we would not have gotten the crop off the last couple of years if it was not for those workers. we have to make sure that we keep that pipeline of people that come here and work seasonally that have the equipment and know how to drive the big machinery, and we established the office of legal immigration to track national talent. we want to make sure that we have the visa appease figuring out and we have a pipeline of people coming that can help farmers. this office earned a coveted spot in the inclusion program which provides assistance for international experts. career academies. this is a big one. rich warner fall hard for this stuff. we wanted to make sure that the funding would be available for the 13 career academies where students can pursue these high demand careers in the trades

and technology. here, southwest area careers, students from seven high schools around this region utilize the state-of-the-art facility that helps students to identify skills and enter the workforce more quickly. a senior at dickinson high has been involved in the diesel tech programs and has developed valuable skills and identified his career path of becoming a welder, which we need. we are short of those all over the state. last fall, he was placed with fisher industries to earn credit on the job. he is still getting his education and getting paid and earning credit. now he has gained the support of the school of science in welding technology. now a look fisher is going to pay him to give further

education. it is working, these partnerships between our education systems filling that gap and i just want to say, thank you for being here. they represent more than 25,000 students around the state that are taking advantage of these things. lance is right here. let's give a hand, where are you, lance? okay. transforming education is the next topic. when teachers and educators use innovative approaches to create experiences outside the traditional classroom, students

drive, businesses win, our economy wins. 10 miles away, janice wagner, it has been a music teacher for 18 years. look at her unconstrained innovation. her passion for her subject which happens to be music, she was selected as one of 50 band directors that make a difference in the school band and orchestra national magazine. one of the things that she has done is brought together 300 students from 13 different schools to create a massive marching band. i will skip the story about me having to go to the music camp up at the border. because i wanted to go to football camp and my mom would not let me go to football camp and i went to music camp. there is a reason i'm not playing a trumpet solo today. she is a fierce advocate for her students. she has brought together all

these schools and is here with us today. go ahead and stand up. national recognition for what she has done. we have a task force that we have put together for the retention and recruitment of teachers. they make a difference and we understand the challenges that teachers are facing. that results in a workforce shortage. we created the teacher recruitment task force to bring the proposals forward. that will help support our leaders and teachers and students to help them develop and grow themselves. that will be over the next several months. they are going to keep going. then task force will be with experts across the task force. our schools are the cornerstone of our communities. this task force has been such

an important thing. going all the way through education and getting them through the school system and then they teach for a year or two, that is where we are losing them. if we can get people to retain a little longer, that can help solve the long-term pipeline, this task force, keep it up. all of the innovative teachers, such as the teacher of the year, sheila pearson, they deserve gratitude. they are dedicating themselves to help drive our future. students represent 20% of the population and 100% of our future. they are instrumental to state success. if we have any teachers that are here today, and you have been teaching at any level, please stand up and let us say thank you to all of our educators. >> and my very first "state of the state" i talked about education innovation and how we have to change the status quo and progress has been made but there's more to do -- is