I'm so old I can remember Governor Kristi Noem's much-ridiculed "Meth, We're On It" anti-drug campaign.
Looks as if some elements of that mirth are being repeated with South Dakota's big media worker recruitment campaign, Freedom Works Here.
Apparently, part of that is the freedom for a politically connected vendor which got the contract to swipe ideas from South Dakotans.
Reporting for Sioux Falls Leve, Patrick Lalley writes in Noem-as-worker concept lifted from Sioux Falls advertising firm's proposal:
SIOUX FALLS – The theme of South Dakota’s Freedom Works Here marketing campaign is familiar now, Gov. Kristi Noem featured in various roles as a skilled worker inviting people to move to the state for a good job.
The idea for the campaign – Noem as the main pitch person in a series of ads – came out of a request for proposals issued by the Governor's Office of Economic Development in January. The company that produced and placed the ads was awarded the $5 million contract in a competitive bid process that compared proposals from seven firms.
You won’t find any reference to the governor as a welder or electrician or dentist in the winning proposal from Go West Media, however. No concepts – known as “the creative” in advertising and marketing circles – were included in the documents published on the state’s open records website.
It wasn’t Go West’s idea to begin with, based on documents and multiple interviews with sources close to the process.
The Noem-as-worker concept came from a different bidder, the Sioux Falls firm Lawrence & Schiller.
Documents obtained by Sioux Falls Live detail the plan, including sketches showing the welder scene that mirror the final product. How the concept from one proposal ended up in the product of a different bidder isn’t known.
Ian Fury, Noem’s spokesman, denies there was any copying of ideas in the bidding process and Go West’s leadership says they always intended to have the governor involved with a humorous approach . . .
I'll be a blue-nosed gopher. And who are these well-paid plagiarists? Lalley reports:
Go West Media is a “doing business as” entity in South Dakota of Strategic Media Placement, which is part of the political consulting firm The Strategy Group.
The Strategy Group is prominent in Republican political circles, working with candidates for president, Congress and governorships, including Noem’s 2022 reelection campaign. Yoho is also the CEO of Vivek Ramaswamy’s presidential campaign and is connected to Corey Lewandowski, an informal adviser to Noem.
The questions about how Noem’s political consultant won a taxpayer-funded contract has attracted attention of leaders in the South Dakota Legislature, who this week questioned GOED staff about the contract and authorized a formal letter asking for more details.
The absence of a creative concept from Go West follows a series of stories published by Sioux Falls Live raising questions about the contract, including that the Ohio firm’s presentation lacked any breakdown of how the $5 million would be spent, a key point of comparison between bids.
The similarities between Lawrence & Schiller’s submission and the final ads raise further questions about the bidding process. . . .
But sources familiar with the discussions and presentations during the bidding process for Freedom Works Here said that while there was discussion of putting the governor up front, it was never in the context of jobs or as a worker.
That came from Lawrence & Schiller, one source said. . . .
Read the whole article at Sioux Falls Live. Nothing rewards South Dakotans than paying people in Ohio for ideas generated in Sioux Falls.
As Lalley reported, there's more. At the Sioux Falls Argus Leader, Annie Todd reported in South Dakota's Freedom Works Here recruitment campaign starts new phase amidst scrutiny:
The Freedom Works Here campaign is set to roll into its second phase, according to a release Wednesday from Gov. Kristi Noem's office.
The next phase of the controversial workforce recruitment campaign is expected to cost $1.5 million, a fraction of the initial phase, which clocked in at $5 million. It's unclear when the next phase will start.
The workforce recruitment campaign, which has run since late-June, has come under intense scrutiny in the past few days as lawmakers asked the Governor's Office of Economic Development, which has administered the campaign, about the success of the campaign so far.
Those details have been vague, with GOED Commissioner Chris Schilken explaining the campaign had had more than 800 million impressions, with more than 7,000 people having requested information about South Dakota and 1,900 people proceeding to the final stages of finding a career in the state.
But Schilken could not tell lawmakers Monday during a meeting of the Appropriations Committee how many people who had seen the workforce recruitment ads had actually moved to South Dakota.
On Tuesday, the legislative Executive Board voted to send a letter to GOED requesting more information about the marketing RFP for the campaign.
The letter would include "the RFP process that was administered, the companies that applied, the information requested, how submissions were compared, the criteria that was used to make a final determination, who determined that criteria, what was submitted and the individuals involved with the selection process," and must be returned by Dec. 18 to the E-Board.
The Ohio-based Strategic Media Placement won the RFP in April. The group has political connections to Republican presidential nominee Vivek Ramaswamy. . . .
Lovely.
Image: A photo of a page from Sioux Falls firm Lawrence & Schiller's proposal for the Freedom Works Here campaign that includes possible scenarios for advertisements. Patrick Lalley / Sioux Falls Live
Related posts
- The first step to recovery is admitting there's a problem; or, Meth, We're On It in South Dakota
- KOTA: South Dakota teen meth use rates have actually declined over the past two decades
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