Hallie Thomas

Q: Please state your full name.

A: Scott Munseterman.

Q: And your position?

A: I am mayor of Brookings.

Q: What was your major in college?

A: I am a chiropractor. I’m originally from Morris, Minn. I served my undergraduate there and then went on to Northwestern Chiropractic College in Bloomington, graduated therewith my doctorate in ’84 and then established my practice in Brookings in ’85. I’ve been in practice in Brookings for about eighteen years.

Q: And what about your family?

A: I have five daughters. My oldest daughter is in the Army Reserve. She was recently deactivated. She’s 22 and will be starting college again since she was taken out for activation. I have another daughter who is here at SDSU for her freshman year. I have another daughter that’s a sophomore and one that’s a fifth-grader and one that’s a second-grader.

Q: What is it like to be mayor?

A: I’m enjoying it. Our city government went through a change about four years ago. We went from a commission form of government to a council form of government. They hired a city manager about four years ago. The council operates and functionns just like a policy making body and then the city manager acts as the CEO and carries out the policy. So there’s no administrative duties to my position but it allows me to do more leadership things with people in the community and boards and some of those things and my main focus has been more along the lines of unity. Trying to bring people together more towards common goals and visions.

Q: How do you see SDSU fitting into the Brookings picture?

A: It fits in so many different ways.

The thing that comes into the top of my mind is the kids here really are our number one resource that we have. Not only in our community, but in our state as well. And we have made the decision to design our economic development program around you guys.

We’re looking at trying to create jobs, we’re looking at expanding the are through developing a research park., puutting knowledge to work in ways that can attract companies to our state and to our community. So it will all hinge on stuff that you guys learn. So that we can keep you here.

Q: What is the third “B” tax?

A: The third “B” is the tax on unprepared foods. The other two “Bs” are booze and beds. We think the third “B” would raise $250,000 so it’s quite a chunk of change.

Q: Where are you at as far as bringing back the third ‘B’ tax?

A: We are working on a promotional plan right now. We are approaching it on a standpoint of three phases.

First phase is we had somebody from SDSU, Abby Bischoff, serve on an ad hoc committe, and what they did was come up with several strategies to draw promotion to Brookings.

The next stage we are going to take is to get all these different groups that do promotion in Brookings to get together in one room and work with these strategies and then we are going to bring it to council where we are going to adopt it into a policy. Then budgeting and spending will depend upon what we decide for policy.

The third “B” comes in after that because we are going to need some funding mechanisms to make that policy happen. We understand that there are a couple of issues surrounding the third “B.” Number one being that students here at SDSU are forced into a tax, it’s not a tax that they can volunteer to take. I think we are the only community that’s a larger community that doesn’t have a third “B.”The recommendation that I have made to the student body is that you guys need to go to the state legislature and try to get that off.

I’d be happy to help anyway that I can. Because it isn’t right that it should be on there, but if it turns out that we can’t get it off together, then I feel that that would bring us together as far as getting the job done. If that means apportioning out those funds to some events that would benefit SDSU’s promotion, I think more people would be receptive to that idea if we cross the legislative hurdle first.

Q: What knowledge would you like to pass on to the student body?

A: I went through a lot of school and one of the hardest things for me was to maintain a good focus on what I wanted to be.

I just want to encourage the students to work hard. You need to hang in there, work hard andkeep focused on what you want to do.

Really seek the purpose for who you are and what you are made to be and just get online with it, because it’s very fulfilling once you get there.