Reliable, Trustworthy Reporting, Capturing The Heartbeat Of Our Community
Reliable, Trustworthy Reporting, Capturing The Heartbeat Of Our Community
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It's easy to understand but hard to remember that the one task of the Nebraska Legislature is to pass a balanced budget during the 90-day session and to make adjustments to and pass that budget again in the 60-day session. Mission accomplished again by the 2024 Legislature, which has a little more than a week of session left. The simple task often gets lost in the shadow of high-profile issues, such as this year's struggle to find a solution for skyrocketing property taxes. With all eyes on...
"If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all." – Thumper "The tongue of the wise makes knowledge attractive, but the mouth of fools blurts out foolishness." Proverbs 15:2 CSB Nebraska's unique one-house Legislature is back in the national spotlight again, for all the wrong reasons again. Last year it was a session-slowing filibuster accomplished by a couple senators who were upset with a bill restricting access to medical services for transgender youth. This year, it's a move seeki...
Let's talk about that big day coming up this weekend, Easter. Some of you, like me, consider it a holy day. To others, it's just a holiday. It's also a family day, a time to gather around the table and talk about the future, maybe let the young one's hunt Easter eggs. Eat some ham. Eat some chocolate. As a kid, it meant wearing your Sunday best. For me that was this little blue and white sailor suit, a cotton garment that required my mom to spend extra time ironing on Saturday night. Believe...
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely is a proverbial saying reportedly coined by the English nobleman Lord Acton in 1857. How much power should be given to the executive branch of Nebraska state government is a topic for discussion by state lawmakers and political observers alike. Currently there are 18 code agencies, which answer to Governor Jim Pillen. The Legislature is considering measures addressing the situation. Sen Steve Erdman of Bayard wants History Nebraska (formerly...
There are a lot of ins and outs in party politics during an election year. Who's in the race and who's out? All eyes have been on the Legislature where the big surprise came from Republican Julie Slama – rhymes with drama – announced she wouldn't seek a second term representing southeast Nebraska's District One because she was going to take her recently earned law degree another direction. But before the appointee of then Governor Pete Ricketts could relish the attention one more time, the ven...
Three of the four kids in my family were born on the same day in December over a span of 14 years. The "other" one was born on March 1. To appease her, my older sister and brother and I told the March-born she was special because she shared a birthday with the State of Nebraska! (I'm pretty sure it didn't work.) So, happy belated 157th birthday Nebraska. And happy 82nd to my late sister. Too much cake and party hats? Where are we now? Let's take a look. A is for agriculture. Still more counties...
With the short session of the Nebraska Legislature slightly more than half over, repeat after me: When it comes to taxation, it's all about whose ox is getting gored. The governor wants a 40% reduction in property taxes by the end of the year. I'm in! Cut me a check. Sorry. That's not how this works. The cuts will be made and somehow credited to your tax bill by the county, which will somehow find a way to use it up before you see it. Just watch. Even more sorry. The state must pay for the...
Ed. Note: Sen. Dorn’s letter to the editor is in regards to an editorial by J.L. Schmidt, statehouse correspondent for the Nebraska Press Association. A recent editorial in this publication showed no understanding of the constraints on city governments regarding rundown properties, citing LB 45. While it would be most desirable for all property owners to keep their properties in peak condition, that is not the reality; thus, communities across the state are left with buildings which continue to deteriorate. Let me start at the beginning of h...
Wait, what? Governor Jim Pillen has reversed his opposition to a federal summer grocery program that would aid around 150,000 children of low-income families. Pillen succumbed to a lot of outside pressure from a bipartisan group of state lawmakers, a bill introduced by one of them to request the aid and another state senator who made it his priority to ensure it would be debated in the remaining days of the legislative session. Back in December he proclaimed that he didn't "believe in welfare."...
I'm sure that a year ago the Revitalize Rural Nebraska Grant Program proposed by Sen. Myron Dorn of Adams and passed by the Legislature sounded like a great deal. Administered by the Department of Environment and Energy, it's intended to provide money to help towns under 5,000 populations with the cost of clearing away rundown buildings. Some consideration is allegedly given to historic properties. But there's nothing really being done to address the root cause of the dilapidation. Dorn's heart...
Full disclosure: My wife and I drive a four-year-old hybrid sedan. It runs on the electric motor up to 15 miles -per- hour before the gasoline engine engages. It feels and sounds like it's dead at stop signs. It averages 44 miles-per-gallon in highway driving. But it's a hybrid, not an all-electric vehicle. U.S. Senator Pete Ricketts has vowed to use every tool he has to fight President Joe Biden's electric vehicle mandates. Nebraska Governor Jim Pillen has signed a letter to Biden as one of 16...
I was not shocked, just disappointed when Governor Jim Pillen announced that he was going to reduce Nebraska's collective property taxes by $2 billion this year, somehow. Imagine that. In a short session in what also happens to be an election year, but without a specific plan, the first-term Republican is going to achieve a 40% property tax reduction in a single year. "I'm committed. I'm all in. The problem has to be solved," he said. As he has before, he talked again about a hard cap on local...
John Lajba has grown accustomed to having Lady Liberty loom over him while he works in his downtown Omaha studio. Still, the sculptor would rather see the weathered 9-foot copper statue depart his studio shelf – its home for the past 30 years – and placed back where it belongs. "It's been ... out of sight and out of people's memories for too long," Lajba said. He might get his wish. Momentum appears to be building to restore and return the statue to its pedestal in Omaha's Turner Park, whe...
Omaha Senator Justin Wayne, chair of the Judiciary Committee, has offered a bill that would put Nebraska's Legislature in charge of the state's prison system, which is currently under the purview of the executive branch. Given the way things have been going with the Department of Correctional Services, especially the selection of a site for a new prison in northeast Lincoln that was changed to an allegedly more acceptable site at the last minute, I like Wayne's proposal. If made law, it would pu...
Volleyball is set to start a new chapter in Nebraska and at the helm is a woman who quietly helped establish the game's stronghold in the state. Few own the imprint on Nebraska volleyball that Diane Mendenhall does. The Ogallala native has held just about every role – player, coach, analyst, administrator. When she was named president of the new Nebraska pro volleyball franchise, it gave the brand-new Omaha Supernovas instant credibility, said former Husker volleyball coach Terry Pettit. "She's...
Comments from two state senators from Omaha have pretty much diminished hopes for a "normal" session of the Nebraska Legislature this year. "I think it will be a difficult session again. I'm not backing down," said Sen. Kathleen Kauth as she gave priority designation to the Sports and Spaces Act that would bar biological males from participating in K-12 sports designed for females and would block trans students from using a bathroom designated for other than their gender at birth. "I will do...
The hole keeps getting deeper. Remember when I suggested someone should give the governor a shovel so he could dig a deeper hole for himself? That was when he had refused to read a published report on high levels of nitrates on his pig farms because it was written by "someone from Communist China." He subsequently refused to apologize to the reporter with a Chinese surname who is a graduate of an American university and has been working for news organizations in the United States for several yea...
They're back. The 108th Legislature, Second Session, convened Wednesday. One can expect proposed bills and discussion of some hot button issues, as well as what could be a protracted debate on rules. It's likely that state Sen. Tom Brewer of Gordon will have something to say about guns in schools. The Education or Revenue committees will likely address school financing and the Executive Council will seek discussion about putting legislative committee clerks in a pool to provide uniform training...
A change is gonna come. Leaders of the Nebraska Legislature want to streamline the process and perhaps change a few rules during the upcoming short session to avoid the mess of last year's 90-day struggle. A short recap. An Omaha senator introduced a measure to limit medical care for transgender youth, clearly something that is part of the Republican Party national agenda, but not a Nebraska issue. What resulted was months of filibuster by two other Omaha senators that slowed the Legislature to...
Remember the Christmas bonus? Probably a thing of past given the changed face of the workplace. Perhaps your "bonus" allows you to work from home. Be grateful the next time you slide in behind your computer, in your jammies at some odd hour to complete a project. It seems that even the work-from-home mentality is changing in favor of the hybrid work week – two or three days in the office and two or three days working remotely. The latest figures from the University of Nebraska at Omaha's C...
The chickens are coming home to roost. Several tax watchdog groups say the Legislature, at the behest of the governor, has gone overboard in depleting state revenue by earmarking too much for property tax relief. But Governor Jim Pillen debunks the reports. He said they came up with different numbers than he did. Here's the rub. He hasn't read the reports. Let that sink in for a minute. Not unlike the reports on higher than acceptable levels of nitrates in the groundwater near his pig farms. He...
Governor Jim Pillen wants all state government employees at their desks in their assigned departments beginning next month. He said the pandemic-era remote is over, although both empirical and anecdotal evidence nationwide show a workplace change that was pandemic caused has become the new normal. Oh, and never mind the fact that some state agencies have remote and telework policies that have been in place for 15 years. And, of course, not every department has the physical space available for...
Just when you thought the drought was bad, deserts have started popping up in Nebraska. Pick a topic: childcare; food; maternal health care. They have been discussed in the interim by lawmakers and deserve to be included among bills under consideration next session. It's time to start looking at problems affecting Nebraskans and not the national agenda of one political party. For example, the state could help encourage more doctors to dedicate their time and specialty to labor and delivery care...
So, how about we rethink Thanksgiving? Oh, I don't want to take away the tradition of turkey and football and listening to Uncle Harold's stories about the big war in which he never fought but he does remember what life was like back then. Those are family legend, just like Harold. I'm not going to disrespect the traditional gathering or what we learned in school about the Native Americans and the pilgrims getting together to eat and drink and talk about western expansion and what kind of corn...
I don't remember much about my recent 64-block ambulance ride from my house to an urban hospital, but I was told after the fact that it was a matter of a few minutes to keep my body from going into septic shock. The whole incident helped me understand the critical importance of getting rural patients to medical care as quickly as possible. It also speaks volumes about staffing those ambulances with competent medical professionals. That's why I support the efforts of Sen. Myron Dorn of Adams in...
