'Good Life District' idea 'a mess' of unintended consequences

LINCOLN - Be wary of unintended consequences.

That's good advice for any endeavor, and appears to be the problem facing proposed retail/sports/entertainment developments called "Good Life Districts."

The recent effort to create such districts was well intended. The idea was to lure out-of-state shoppers, visitors and youth sports teams to spend millions in Nebraska, rather than Kansas City, Des Moines or Minneapolis. 

Envisioned at Gretna's Nebraska Crossing mall were stores like Nordstroms, IKEA and Crate & Barrel (high-end retailers that have bypassed Nebraska) along with youth sports complexes to lure regional tournaments. Hotels and restaurants would cater to visitors, creating a "transformational" attraction rivaling The Legends development in Kansas City.

The state would devote half of its sales tax of 5.5% to help finance such mega developments that must cost more than $500 million and would lure more than 600,000 visitors a year.

The developer of Nebraska Crossing told state lawmakers that he could attract everything from a pro hockey franchise to an Olympic training center for USA volleyball to the Omaha suburb, along with indoor surfing and rock climbing outlets. 

But somewhere along the line, the Good Life District idea got off track.

Six communities have offered to host Good Life Districts, and the generous state tax break it provides, making you wonder if every one will be "transformational" and lure 600,000 visitors a year.

The Good Life District idea was novel. It departed from past state tax policy, which had not granted tax breaks for retail development. That's because a new shopping center typically just steals shoppers from old shopping centers - shifting rather than growing the economy - and retail jobs typically don't pay wages that will support a family.

So, the state wisely has focused its tax incentives on manufacturers and big corporations that pay good salaries and are more likely to be around in 30 years or so.

But you gotta wonder how many shoppers will venture to Nebraska to shop at a mega shopping mall and play in a regional sports tournament, when plenty of those places and events already exist in other cities. 

It reminds me of the pitch promoters of the Kearney Archway Memorial made years ago - "if we build it and plop it over Interstate 80, travelers will pull over in droves." They will pay to see it, they said, providing plenty of revenue to finance the multi-million dollar, fort-like arch. 

That projection was not even close.

The Good Life idea was described as "a mess" recently by former State Sen. Lou Ann Linehan, who sponsored the Good Life bills, according to the Nebraska Examiner. 

A clean-up bill, passed hurriedly in the waning hours of the 2024 session, failed to solve the problems with the initial Good Life bill, passed in 2023.

The fiasco is part of a trend. Too many legislative proposals - including major changes - are introduced with the idea that any glitches can be hashed out later, as the bill works through three rounds of debate before the full legislature.

But that often doesn't allow enough time for lawmakers, as well as lobbyists and those representing competing interests, to digest what exactly is being amended, and then amended again. The clean-up bill was passed in the waning hours of a session, when attention was focused on a lot of other matters.

The result is unintended consequences.

Right now, the status of the Gretna/Nebraska Crossing project - which had grown to an anticipated 4,500 acres - is uncertain.

Gretna voters appear to have narrowly approved a Good Life District, but it's one that apparently won't include the main advocate, Nebraska Crossing developer Rod Yates. Yates recently sought to drop out of the partnership with Gretna, and is calling for a new law to allow him to work with the state on his plans, and not the city.  

Kind of makes your head spin, sort of like state lawmakers trying to sort out last-minute deals in the legislature and foresee any unintended consequences.

Paul Hammel has covered the Nebraska state government and the state for decades. He retired in April as senior contributor with the Nebraska Examiner. He was previously with the Omaha World-Herald, Lincoln Journal Star and Omaha Sun.  A native of Ralston, he loves traveling and writing about the state.