Tanzania RPCV Tom Katus in race for South Dakota Senate



Katus, then a civil-engineering junior at South Dakota School of Mines & Technology, volunteered for President Kennedy’s first Peace Corps group, Tanganyika. After returning to the United States and completing his college graduate education, he was founding president and chief executive of Volunteer Training Specialists Inc., a private company of 12 American and African owner-employees with multicultural training experience.

Tanzania RPCV Tom Katus in race for South Dakota Senate

Katus announces candidacy

RAPID CITY - Better wages, more money for education and more accessible health care are key goals of Tom Katus in his campaign for the South Dakota Senate from District 32.

“We need to continue to grow our own small-business sector while simultaneously encouraging large companies that pay a living wage to locate in South Dakota,” said Katus, a McIntosh native who has lived in Rapid City for the past 18 years.

“There are 90,000 people without health insurance in South Dakota. We need to help all our small businesses to pool together to negotiate with the insurance companies to enable them to obtain the best health insurance coverage for their employees at lowest costs. We need to look at Maine and Massachusetts, states which are providing health care for most or all of their citizens.”

Katus, then a civil-engineering junior at South Dakota School of Mines & Technology, volunteered for President Kennedy’s first Peace Corps group, Tanganyika.

After returning to the United States and completing his college graduate education, he was founding president and chief executive of Volunteer Training Specialists Inc., a private company of 12 American and African owner-employees with multicultural training experience.

For the past 18 years, Katus’ firm, TK Associates International, has assisted in the launching and development of more than 50 small businesses, tourism attractions, tribes and colleges in South Dakota and the Great Plains region. He wrote the Crazy Horse Scenic Byway proposal for the Oglala Sioux Parks & Recreation Authority for the 133-mile byway from Cactus Flats on Interstate 90 through the Badlands to the entrance of Custer State Park

In a May 31 news release, Katus said there is much to be done in the state Legislature to improve living conditions in South Dakota.

“We have the lowest employee wages and teachers’ salaries in the nation. We have the lowest wages because we have the lowest expectations. We need to increase teachers’ wages and support education at all levels. We need to pay particular attention to providing South Dakota job opportunities to our graduates of BHSU, SDSM&T and Western Dakota Tech,” he said.

Katus volunteered for the U.S. Army National Guard after high school.

After his civil-engineering training at Tech, he received a Bachelor of Science in political science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and completed graduate studies in International Administration at UW-M and UCLA. He has conducted scores of workshops and seminars for small businesses, professional associations and colleges and has published more than 30 professional books and articles. Katus is a founding director of the Rural Ethnic Institute, which has sponsored multicultural community programs in the Northern Plains region for the past 30 years, including the nonpartisan Northern Plains Tribal Voter Education Project for the past 22 years.

As the only Democrat filed for the District 32 Senate seat, Katus does not have an opponent in the June 6 primary. He will face the winner of the Republican primary between incumbent Sen. Stan Adelstein and challenger Elli Schwiesow and Constitution Party candidate Daniel Lautenschlager in the November general election.

When this story was posted in June 2006, this was on the front page of PCOL:




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