HURON – If elected state treasurer, Aaron Matson said he will always remember that he has been entrusted by the public to serve them first.
“It’s my job to help each and every South Dakotan have a better life,” he said at the District 22 Democratic Forum on Thursday.
Matson, who has a doctorate degree in political science from the University of Dakota and is a Lutheran pastor while also serving as communications director for the Democratic Party, said he thinks the treasurer’s office could do a better job promoting what it does to help people.
With scandals, complacency and one-party rule, Matson said he thinks those on the other side of the aisle have forgotten a key point.
“Public administration and public service is first and foremost about the public and how we serve the public,” he said.

The son of teachers, Matson said he is a fourth-generation South Dakotan who has a myriad of job and life experiences to bring to the position of state treasurer.
From his parents, he said he learned the values of hard work, integrity and public service.
Through high school, college, seminary and graduate school, he worked hard at a number of jobs because he said nothing came easy.
“I haven’t had anything given to me,” he said. “I’ve had to work for it.”
When he counsels people as a pastor, Matson said he doesn’t ask them if they’re a Democrat or Republican or who they voted for in the last election. In these settings, he said he sees “people at their best and at their not so best.”
Democrats have a good chance of winning key races in the November election based on the energy he is feeling as he travels the state, Matson said.
“It’s been really encouraging,” he said.