The South Dakota Department of Health on Tuesday released a web-based tool to help South Dakotans best identify which priority vaccination group they fall under in South Dakota’s vaccination plan.

The first steps in identifying who and when a vaccine will be made available directly correlates to the vaccine prioritization group individuals fall under. Bank employees are in priority group Phase 1E. The easy-to-use portal will also connect users to hospital systems where they can register to be contacted when it’s their turn to get vaccinated, based on vaccine supply.

Tony Nour has been appointment to fill the Emerging Leaders Work Group seat on the SDBA Board of Directors.

Nour is senior vice president of relationship banking at First PREMIER Bank in Sioux Falls, where he has worked since 2011. He is responsible for providing overall leadership, direction and support for the bank’s core community banking teams, including trust, investments, private, business, consumer and mortgage banking in each of the markets that First PREMIER Bank serves.

Are you interested in becoming an officer of the South Dakota Bankers Association?

SDBA officers include the chair, chair-elect, vice chair and immediate past chair. The SDBA is currently seeking people who are interested in running for the vice chair position, which will be elected at the Quad States Convention on June 15, 2021, in Rapid City.

The SDBA will hold the IRA Update Seminar on March 2 virtually via Zoom. This seminar is designed to review two major pieces of legislation—the Secure Act and CARES Act. There have been a number of IRS notices that came out during 2020 further explaining these two pieces of legislation.

Topics that are timely for this time of year will also be discussed. Covered topics include changes in contribution eligibility, making the transition from 70.5 to 72 for required minimum distributions (RMDs) and how to calculate RMDs in 2021, beneficiary options and an update on COVID-19 distributions that were allowed in 2020.

The balance of power in Washington has shifted, and with the new administration and Congress comes new opportunities to advance sound public policy on the issues facing banking. All of us are obligated to provide our real world expertise, perspective and assistance where needed. As the nation continues to address the immense economic shock caused by the pandemic and build a recovery plan, the banking industry is more important than ever.

The ABA will hold the 2021 Washington Summit virtually on March 16-17. Be the first to hear what lawmakers, regulators and the administration are planning in the weeks and months ahead. Pandemic response and relief, financial inclusion, cannabis banking, as well as clarity and context on fair lending, AML/BSA reform and non-bank entrants to the financial system will be on the agenda.

The SDBA will hold its 2021 State Legislative Day on Wednesday, Feb. 10, virtually via Zoom. This is your opportunity to stay up-to-date on both state and federal legislation which could affect the banking industry and make sure our industry is heard. 

Featured speaker Joan Woodward, president of Travelers Institute and executive vice president of public policy at Travelers, will present "Woodward on Washington: An Economic and Political Outlook." Prior to working for Travelers and Goldman Sachs, Woodward worked on Capitol Hill for 12 years as deputy chief of staff for the U.S. Senate Finance Committee. She also was the chief economist for the Senate Governmental Affairs and U.S. House Budget committees.

Ground Works/SD Ag in the Classroom, created in 2011 with an integrated program approach, uses teaching gardens, summer camps and digital computer programs to deliver lessons in STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and math) education, agriculture literacy and student leadership. The program needs your help.

Last spring, Ground Works/SD Ag in the Classroom connected forth grade students and their teachers through on-air radio interviews. Students and teachers shared the impact of South Dakota Road Trip (an online education platform) on their learning and understanding of the state's agriculture and history. South Dakota Road Trip, which is one piece of Ground Works/SD Ag in the Classroom mosaic, ended the 2020 school year serving more than 8,700 students and teachers.

The ability to respond quickly and effectively to a cyber incident can determine the overall financial and reputational impact on your organization. An incident response playbook is designed to provide a step-by-step walk-through for the most probable and impactful cyber threats and ensure certain steps of the incident response plan are followed appropriately.

Join SBS CyberSecurity for Hacker Hour: Seven Steps to Build an Incident Response Plan on Wednesday, Jan. 27, at 2 p.m. CST. SBS will walk through the seven steps to creating an incident response playbook tailored to your organization. Register for the complimentary webinar. 

On President Biden’s first day in office, the White House issued a memo directing “executive departments and agencies” to freeze any pending regulations not yet published in the Federal Register. These regulations must be approved by a department or agency head designated by the new president; the Office of Management and Budget may permit exceptions to the review process in emergencies or for other urgent reasons.

For rules sent to the Office of the Federal Register but not yet published, the memo directs departments and agencies to withdraw them from the Federal Register and seek approval. For rules that have been published but that have not yet taken effect, the White House asked departments and agencies to consider delaying effective dates for 60 days, seeking public comments and considering petitions for reconsideration.

The South Dakota Department of Health yesterday announced that starting on Monday, Jan. 18, the Department and its health partners across the state will start vaccinating a prioritized population group, within Group 1D, of the state’s vaccination plan. This first prioritized population group will be those 80 and over as well as high-risk individuals and will be expanded to other groups within 1D as vaccines become available. The modification comes amidst the federal government’s plan to release vaccines to states to speed up vaccinations nationwide.

“Given the progress we’ve seen in groups A through C, we are confident that with an increase in vaccine allocations, we can move into a limited population of group 1D. We will begin with those 80 and over and high-risk individuals, and from this starting point, adjust accordingly as allocation permits,” said Secretary of Health Kim Malsam-Rysdon. “We want to reassure those who’ve already received their first dose, and those in groups A through C who are already in the queue, that their second-dose will be available.”

The Federal Reserve has announced that it will return to regular coin distribution for all coin denominations beginning on Friday, Jan. 15. The Fed had previously capped coin orders due to coin circulation issues that resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Fed noted that while coin circulation “has not fully returned to normal patterns,” steady deposits from financial institutions and increased production at the U.S. Mint have enabled it to remove coin allocations. The Fed said it will continue to monitor coin circulation and urged all FedCash Services customers “to continue to order only what they need to meet near-term demand and to deposit any excess coin to the Federal Reserve.”

The Small Business Administration will open the Paycheck Protection Program portal on Friday to lenders with $1 billion or less in assets to begin processing both new and second-draw loan applications. The program will then open to all other lenders on Tuesday, Jan. 19.

The program opened on Monday morning for certain lenders reaching underserved communities, including community development financial institutions and minority depository institutions, to make first-draw loans and was opened to second-draw loans by these lenders on Wednesday.

First PREMIER Bank, PREMIER Bankcard and T. Denny Sanford yesterday announced a gift of $50 million to establish a need-based scholarship in South Dakota. The $50 million gift is just the start of what will be a $200 million endowment to fund future need-based scholarships in perpetuity. 

“Today’s announcement is historic for South Dakota and will help us retain talented young people in our state for generations,” said Gov. Kristi Noem. “We’ve identified the need for this type of scholarship for years, and I'm asking the Legislature to match this incredibly generous gift so that we can continue to make South Dakota stronger for our kids and grandkids.”

The South Dakota Department of Health yesterday released two tools designed to better inform South Dakotans on the ongoing COVID-19 vaccine distribution and administration process. These tools are in addition to the already available dashboard, which is updated daily.

The first tool is a county-by-county map linking residents to the health care system(s) charged in overseeing vaccine distribution and administration in their area, in collaboration with the Department of Health. The second provides residents an estimated timeline of vaccine availability, depending on which priority group (A-E) they belong to in accordance to Phase 1 of South Dakota’s vaccination plan. The latter is also available in Spanish. Detailed information on prioritized populations can be found here: English/Spanish.

The SDBA will hold its 2021 State Legislative Day on Feb. 10 virtually via Zoom. This is your opportunity to stay up-to-date on both state and federal legislation which could affect the banking industry and make sure our industry is heard. 

Featured speaker Joan Woodward, president of Travelers Institute and executive vice president of public policy at Travelers, will present "Woodward on Washington: An Economic and Political Outlook." Prior to working for Travelers and Goldman Sachs, Woodward worked on Capitol Hill for 12 years as deputy chief of staff for the U.S. Senate Finance Committee. She also was the chief economist for the Senate Governmental Affairs and U.S. House Budget committees.

With the passage of Amendment A and Initiated Measure 26 legalizing medical and recreational use of marijuana in South Dakota, the SDBA is committed to supporting its member banks during this transition.

The SDBA, in conjunction with the Montana Bankers Association, is hosting the Cannabis/Hemp Banking 101 Webinar on Jan. 20-21. The webinar, which will be held virtually via Zoom, is an opportunity to learn cannabis/hemp banking basics and a chance to ask questions of industry experts. 

A panel of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last Sunday voted to include financial services workers in Phase 1c of COVID-19 vaccinations. Under the recommendations of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, banking employees would be prioritized for vaccine doses alongside workers in sectors considered essential but with a substantially lower risk of exposure to COVID-19.

ABA strongly urged the committee to include frontline bank employees—such as tellers and loan officers—in Phase 1b, given their regular contact with the public. “We believe these frontline workers face the highest risk of infection, pose the greatest risk of spreading the virus if infected, and are absolutely essential, especially in communities where residents may not have access to electronic banking tools,” ABA said in a letter to the CDC last week.

The ABA has prepared a resource for banks to help them immediately prepare for the large number of EIPs that could be sent via ACH on the first day of processing—which could come as early as this weekend.

ABA is encouraging banks to take steps including planning to have call center and ACH operations staffing levels ready as well as ordering and moving sufficient cash to meet a surge in ATM and branch withdrawals as EIPs land in customer accounts. ABA has also prepared a set of talking points that address the EIPs, as well as other key provisions of the bill.

House and Senate lawmakers late Monday night passed a $900 billion bipartisan coronavirus relief package. President Donald Trump on Tuesday night suggested he might not sign the bill, calling it a “disgrace” and demanding a boost in payments to households.

The ABA has prepared a staff analysis for bankers of the provisions currently included in the 5,500-page bill that affect the banking industry. Among other things, the bill includes several ABA-backed provisions, including:

The FDIC on Tuesday finalized long-awaited changes to modernize its existing brokered deposit rules and foster greater innovation by financial institutions. The final rule establishes a new framework for designating an entity as a “deposit broker” and amends the methodology for calculating the national rate and national rate cap for specific deposit products.

The final rule narrows the definition of “deposit broker.” It also designates certain business relationships and services that meet the rule’s “primary purpose exemption,” and do not require an application to the FDIC. These designated exemptions include: deposits where the agent has less than 25% of the total “assets under administration” for its customers; health savings accounts; deposits related to certain real estate and mortgage servicing transactions; certain retirement funds; and customer funds held for various regulatory, tax and other government purposes.