LINCOLN - The Legislature launched its 2020 session on Wednesday and may be poised to move into what could be an uncharacteristically swift start.
Speaker Jim Scheer of Norfolk is prepared to schedule early floor debate on two major bills, the Revenue Committee's freshly devised property tax relief proposal and a business expansion tax-incentive package to replace the current Nebraska Advantage Act, which will expire at the end of the year.
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LINCOLN — With the start of the 2020 state legislative session on Wednesday, a committee appears to have reached agreement on a proposal to gradually reduce local property taxes.
The plan, drafted mainly by State Sen. Lou Ann Linehan of Elkhorn, would increase state aid to K-12 education by about $530 million over three years, while seeking to reduce property taxes a like amount by lowering the valuation of property for school tax purposes.
The property tax relief would be delivered mainly through new “foundation aid,” which would send school districts $695 in state aid per student in the first year and increase that to $2,265 by the third year.
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LINCOLN - Senators are pretty much in agreement the 2020 session will be taken up with property taxes, business tax incentives and what to do with excess tax collections over the past year.
Last year, the long 90-day session ended a few days early, with no resolution on those key issues senators had worked throughout the session to resolve.
They got a warning from Speaker Jim Scheer in those last days about what would happen in a 2020 short session that lasts only 60 days.
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LINCOLN - New year; new decade; new legislative session. And there's some mystery ahead.
The safest prediction for the 2020 Legislature, which convenes on Wednesday, probably is that not much big is going to happen.
Some incremental reform or progress, perhaps. Lots of defense.
"Holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation," the online dictionary says when you look for the meaning of conservative.
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LINCOLN — Gov. Pete Ricketts once again named property tax relief as his top priority heading into the new legislative session.
But tax cuts for military veterans, funding for flood recovery and money to continue addressing the state’s overcrowded prison system also rank high on his to-do list for the year.
Ricketts sat down with The World-Herald ahead of the Legislature’s Wednesday kickoff. He sounded some familiar themes during the conversation, including the need to control spending, oppose new taxes and encourage economic development.
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LINCOLN — A committee of state lawmakers is planning an 11th-hour, full-court press to craft a new property tax relief bill prior to the start of the 2020 legislative session.
The Legislature’s Revenue Committee, which oversees state tax policy, plans to meet Monday and Tuesday in hopes of finalizing the details of a proposal in time for the Wednesday start of the 2020 session of the Nebraska Legislature.
In between the two closed-door meetings, the eight senators on the committee plan to have lunch with Gov. Pete Ricketts in pursuit of his support.
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LINCOLN - Since the beginning of 2014, at least 56 certified Nebraska educators were caught having inappropriate communication or sexual contact with students.
Their misconduct ranged from sexual intercourse with a student to dinner and a movie with a student.
At least 74 students or recent high school graduates were victimized. In some cases, the abuse occurred years before the perpetrators were caught.
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Just in time to cope with increased tensions with North Korea and Iran, U.S. Strategic Command is warily watching the world from a new bunker.
Last month, with zero fanfare, StratCom moved its battle-watch staff from the old hilltop headquarters building at Offutt Air Force Base — where teams have operated continuously since 1957 — into the brand-new $1.3 billion command-and-control facility about 500 yards away.
“It’s all come to life,” said Vice Adm. David Kriete, StratCom’s deputy commander, who supervised the move. “The first evening, we had one of our nuclear command-and-control exercises. We’ve been off and running ever since.”
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LINCOLN — Lack of progress in reducing overcrowding in Nebraska’s prisons is spawning a proposal to plan for a new 300-bed work-release facility in Omaha.
State Sen. Steve Lathrop of Omaha, a leading legislator on corrections issues, said he’ll introduce a bill when the State Legislature convenes this week to begin planning a community corrections facility, which could cost upward of $40 million.
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LINCOLN — Tricia Rohde had experienced plenty of violence from students in her 20 years of teaching.
Her life changed one day in 2017, when a student with a history of aggression emerged from her calming room and started pummeling Rohde in the head and face. The student stopped to pick up a waste basket and throw it at Rohde before continuing the attack.
In particular, the state teachers union called for passage of Legislative Bill 147, a student discipline bill introduced last year by State Sen. Mike Groene of North Platte, the Education Committee chairman. The measure is slated for debate on Jan. 13.
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The Food and Drug Administration plans to ban the sale of fruity flavors in cartridge-based e-cigarettes, but the restriction won’t apply to tank vaping systems commonly found at vape shops, according to people familiar with the matter.
The action is seen as a compromise between Trump administration officials who want to address a rise in teen vaping and those concerned about the impact on small businesses and the possible political fallout for President Trump, these people said. Polls commissioned by the vaping industry have shown an outright ban would be unpopular in key states for the 2020 election.
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LINCOLN - Property taxes are figured by multiplying the value of your property by the tax rate set by local governments, including schools. Sen. Lou Ann Linehan’s latest proposal would lower residential and commercial valuations in calculating school property taxes, from 100 percent of market value to 95 percent in the first year, then to 90 and 85 the next two years. Meanwhile ag land would go from 75 percent of market value now, to 65 percent the first year and 55 percent the second.
In an interview with NET News, Linehan described what she’s trying to accomplish.
“The basic idea: over three years we reduce property taxes significantly by reducing valuations and increasing school aid significantly,” she said.
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DENVER — In a large warehouse, LivWell Enlightened Health feeds its cloned cannabis plants a custom blend of nutrients, sprays them with filtered water and pumps extra carbon dioxide into the air, and releases three types of insects to clear1 unwanted pests without the use of toxic pesticides.
Every part of the growing process is meticulously documented and evaluated to refine the process.
After 20 years of experience, legal marijuana growers in the U.S. have the reputation of creating the best product in the world, scientifically grown and tightly regulated for quality and safety.
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LINCOLN - A new year arrives on Wednesday. And it promises to be a momentous year. Ushering in a brand new, and probably dangerous, decade.
We get to decide, and define — perhaps even discover — who we are this coming year.
President Trump's bid for a second four-year term will provide that opportunity.
The 180-degree switch from Barack Obama to Donald Trump was sudden and dramatic. Was that a permanent, or semi-permanent, choice, or an expression of the moment?
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The rise in student wellness applications arrives at a time when mental health problems among college students have dramatically risen. Three out of five U.S. college students experience overwhelming anxiety, and two of five students reported debilitating depression, according to a 2018 survey from the American College Health Association.
Despite the epidemic, though, only around 15 percent of undergraduates seek help at university counseling center. These apps have begun to fill students' needs by providing ongoing access to traditional mental health services without barriers such as counselor availability or stigma.
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OMAHA - The most solar power in state history should flow into the electrical outlets of eastern Nebraska homes and businesses by 2024.
That’s when the Omaha Public Power District aims to finish Nebraska’s largest solar power project, building it in or near the 13 counties OPPD serves. The new solar farms could be located in more than one site.
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LINCOLN — Gov. Pete Ricketts and the state prison workers union announced an agreement Friday on wage hikes and a new pay structure aimed at resolving staffing problems in Nebraska prisons.
The long-sought changes target high turnover rates and hiring difficulties in the overcrowded and understaffed prison system. The plan includes an increase in starting wages, plus step increases for employees who remain on the job for designated amounts of time.
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LINCOLN — Gov. Pete Ricketts offered a mild rebuke, and a state lawmaker offered to toughen a state law about advertising by state constitutional officers, in the wake of revelations that State Treasurer John Murante has spent nearly $600,000 on hundreds of ads that prominently feature him.
A Sunday World-Herald story detailed how Murante had opened a state treasurer’s satellite “outreach” office in Omaha about four months ago that is virtually unknown to the public, and how he’s spent nearly $600,000 on public service ads in the past six months with a company for which he used to work.
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LINCOLN - Inmates at a Lincoln prison damaged a housing unit during a Christmas Eve disturbance that began when staff confiscated food and homemade alcohol, according to a Nebraska Department of Correctional Services spokeswoman.
About 14 inmates at the Diagnostic and Evaluation Center, 3220 W. Van Dorn St., broke furniture, cracked a window and disabled surveillance cameras in the incident that started at 7 p.m., spokeswoman Laura Strimple said in a news release.
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OMAHA - The brand-new sportsbooks at Iowa casinos put up big numbers in their first 3½ months of operation, fueled in part by Nebraskans crossing the border to place bets that are illegal in their home state.
More than $152 million worth of bets were placed at the 19 state-regulated casinos across Iowa between Aug. 15 — the date legal sports betting commenced — through the end of November. In gambling parlance, that’s called the “handle.”
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