When state employees who live in Pierre have to fly somewhere on official state business, can they be reimbursed for the mileage from their home to the Pierre airport?
Plain-English summary
State Auditor Alice Kundert asked AG William Janklow whether state employees who live in Pierre (the state capital and the post of duty for most state employees) should be reimbursed for trips to the Pierre Municipal Airport when their state work required them to fly elsewhere.
The applicable rule was 51:01:02:01 of the State Board of Finance, which said state employees would be paid 14 cents per mile for use of personal automobiles when "engaged in official business outside city limits of their designated posts of duty or place of service." The rule clearly excluded reimbursement for travel inside the city limits of the duty station.
Pierre Municipal Airport sat just outside the Pierre city limits, only a few hundred yards beyond the city boundary. So an employee driving from a Pierre home to the airport spent most of the trip inside the city limits (no reimbursement) and the last few hundred yards outside the city limits (potentially reimbursable). The Travel Commission's approval was required for the reimbursable portion, under rule 5:01:03:07.
Janklow's literal answer was that an employee could claim mileage for the few hundred yards outside the city limits if they secured Travel Commission approval. But as a practical matter, processing a voucher for a few cents was a waste of state resources. The opinion's tone is dryly resigned: technically yes, but please don't bother.
The bottom line: Pierre-resident state employees should not expect mileage reimbursement for their airport drives. The only legally reimbursable portion is trivial, the administrative process to claim it is non-trivial, and the State Auditor's office reasonably could decline to process such micro-claims.
Currency note
This opinion was issued in 1975 during AG William Janklow's tenure. Subsequent rule changes, statutory amendments, and policy decisions have updated state employee travel reimbursement. Treat this page as historical context, not current legal advice. The 14 cents per mile rate is long obsolete (the IRS standard mileage rate and state mileage rates have both increased substantially since 1975). The State Board of Finance and Travel Commission rule structures may also have been reorganized. Modern questions about state employee travel reimbursement should be verified against current administrative rules and Department of Administration policies.
What the opinion meant at the time
For Pierre-resident state employees, the practical effect was clear: don't claim mileage for routine trips to the Pierre airport. The de minimis reimbursable portion was not worth pursuing.
For the State Auditor's office, the opinion provided cover for declining to process such claims. Voucher processing costs outweighed the few cents at stake.
For Pierre's state agency travel administrators, the opinion gave a clean policy answer: budget for round-trip airport mileage for Pierre-resident employees as zero, or treat it as part of the employee's general commute (which is never reimbursable).
For state employees living outside Pierre who came to the Pierre airport to fly elsewhere, the opinion did not directly address their situation. Reading by analogy, the trip from their home to the city limits of their post of duty would be reimbursable (since the post-of-duty exclusion only applies inside the post-of-duty city). The Pierre airport is outside Pierre city limits, so the question for such employees would be whether to treat the airport as a destination outside their post-of-duty city, in which case the full trip from home to airport (minus any city-limits portion at their home end) would be reimbursable. The opinion does not analyze this.
Common questions
Q: What is a "designated post of duty"?
A: The location where the employee normally works. For Pierre-headquartered state agencies, the post of duty was generally Pierre. The mileage rule treats travel within the post-of-duty city limits as part of the normal commute and therefore not reimbursable.
Q: Why are commuting expenses not reimbursable?
A: Standard public-finance principle: the employee is presumed to take responsibility for getting to and from work. Reimbursement would effectively turn a commute into compensation. The exclusion applies only inside the city limits; trips outside the duty-station city limits on official business are different and may be reimbursable.
Q: Why was the Pierre airport built outside city limits?
A: The opinion does not say. Many municipal airports sit just outside city limits for noise, land cost, or land-use compatibility reasons. The exact location relative to the Pierre city boundary is what created the de minimis reimbursable portion.
Q: What was 14 cents per mile in 1975 dollars?
A: Roughly equivalent to several times that figure in modern dollars, but still a small per-mile rate. The 14-cent figure was a fixed administrative rate set by the Board of Finance, not pegged to fluctuating costs of vehicle operation. Modern rates are usually pegged to IRS or federal GSA figures.
Q: What does the Travel Commission do?
A: It reviewed and approved travel for state employees. Rule 5:01:03:07 required Travel Commission approval for many categories of travel reimbursement. The Commission's function was to prevent unnecessary travel and to ensure travel expenses fit within budgets and policies.
Q: Could the employee claim parking or other airport-related expenses?
A: The opinion only addressed mileage. Airport parking and other ancillary expenses would be analyzed under their own travel rules, which the opinion did not reach.
Background and statutory framework
State employee travel reimbursement in 1975 was administered through a combination of the State Board of Finance (which set policy rules) and the Travel Commission (which approved specific travel). The system aimed to balance encouraging legitimate business travel against guarding against double-dipping or excessive reimbursement.
Rule 51:01:02:01's exclusion of inside-city-limits-of-post-of-duty travel reflects a standard principle: commuting is not state business. Distinguishing legitimate business travel from commuting was administratively easy at the city-limits boundary line.
The Pierre Municipal Airport's location just outside city limits created an unusual edge case that did not arise for most state employees. For employees living in Pierre with a Pierre post of duty, the airport drive was almost entirely commute-like but with a sliver of out-of-city travel at the end. Janklow's opinion handled the technical answer (yes, the sliver is reimbursable with Travel Commission approval) but acknowledged the practical reality (the administrative cost outweighs the benefit).
The opinion is unusually dry-witted for an AG opinion. The phrase "as a practical matter, it is a waste of the state's resources to process vouchers for a few cents" is a rare moment where the AG explicitly invites the state to ignore a technically valid claim.
Citations and references
Administrative rules:
- Rule 51:01:02:01 of the State Board of Finance (mileage reimbursement; excludes within post-of-duty city limits)
- Rule 5:01:03:07 of the State Board of Travel (Travel Commission approval requirement)
Source
Original opinion text
April 10, 1975
Miss Alice Kundert
State Auditor
State Capitol
Pierre, South Dakota 57501
OFFICIAL OPINION NO. 75-67
Trips to Pierre Airport
Dear Miss Kundert:
You have asked whether state employees who reside in the capitol city of Pierre should be reimbursed for trips to the Pierre airport when their duties require them to use air transportation to other locations.
Rule 51:01:02:01 of the State Board of Finance provides in part:
Employees shall be paid in lieu of actual expenses of transportation, fourteen cents per mile for use of privately owned automobiles when engaged in official business outside city limits of their designated posts of duty or place of service.
This provision clearly prohibits reimbursement for travel within the city limits of the employee's duty station. Although the Pierre Municipal Airport terminal is not within the Pierre city limits, it is within a few hundred yards of the city limits. Arguably, a claimant could be reimbursed for those few hundred yards of travel if the claimant has secured Travel Commission approval pursuant to rule 5:01:03:07. However, as a practical matter, it is a waste of the state's resources to process vouchers for a few cents. Therefore, it is my opinion that state employees who reside in Pierre may only be reimbursed for the portion of their trip to the Pierre airport which is outside the city limits of Pierre. Furthermore, the claim must be accompanied by Travel Commission approval as required by rule 5:01:03:07 of the state Board of Travel.
Respectfully submitted,
WILLIAM J. JANKLOW
ATTORNEY GENERAL
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