Does Omaha Have a Homeless/Crime Problem?

Yes, says Devon Kurtz of the Cicero Institute; no, says Omaha Mayor John Ewing.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Scott Gorges. I was shooting off my big fat yap
last week about something that really, I I know I
shouldn't talk like this. I sound hateful and mean spirited,
and it seems like I don't care about humanity. And
it's true I am all those things, but I don't
want it to seem like that. It's the facade, it's

(00:20):
the persona. But we are talking last week about the
one hundred and seventeen, one hundred and thirteen whatever it
was people who have died this year in Omaha while
being in a state of homelessness, and they were having
a candlelight vigil and talking about how someone is described
as the mother of all the homeless people in Omaha

(00:41):
had died this year and she and others were looking
down so proud of them for being out there as
homeless people and homeless advocates talking about still being homeless
and how what a great thing it is, and it's not.
I don't know if you've noticed, it's cold, it's winter.
It's cold. It's dangerous, and the cold and the winter

(01:02):
is just one of the dangers. I would think that
perhaps the one hundred plus people who have died while
homeless in Omaha this year might be looking down at
these advocates and saying, you know, now that I've had
a chance to rethink it, perhaps doing the things that
don't lead to me being homeless might be a better
thing to do. This is the subject of a study

(01:24):
from an organization called the Cicero Institute. Report says the
stakes of Omaha's homeless crisis are getting higher. Devin Kurtz
is public safety policy director with the Cicero Institute and
co authored this study and joins us now here on
news radio eleven ten kfab Devin, thank you very much

(01:46):
for taking the time. A lot of people in Omaha say, yeah,
I see a few people payhandling at this intersection in that,
but I don't think Omaha has that big a homeless population.
What caused your organization to look at Omaha nebrass as
being a hotbed for homelessness?

Speaker 2 (02:04):
Sure, thank you so much for having me on. And
I think it's it's important to think about homelessness not
just in terms of kind of the absolute size, because
it's true, homeless populations even nationwide, even in places like California,
you know, are large, but not not that large in
comparison to the general population. But what we've seen over

(02:25):
the last decade is just a massive increase of a
particular type of homelessness, people living on the street, people
who are refusing shelter, people who are you know, building
kind of sprawling encampments that that often are are associated with.
Was not just kind of disorder and blight, but but
also a lot of other dangers, whether that's substance abuse

(02:47):
or or criminal activity you know, up to including murder
and sexual assault. I mean, the rates of violent crime
committed by and against homeless people often you know, between
two homeless individuals, is astronomically higher than the general population.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
The woman I mentioned a moment ago is kind of
considered like the den mom of some of Omaha's homeless
is a woman named Chrissy Gallagher McMillan, and she actually
is one of those who testified against a bill before
the Nebraska unicamerl that would have regulated camping on public
of private property and allowed law enforcement to require people

(03:28):
to move into shelters or designated camping areas, especially on
nights where it's dangerously cold. She said, we don't need
to do that. She froze to death last winter.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
That's exactly right. I remember this hearing very well. I
was there testifying alongside a couple of business owners in
Tumbaskunty Sheriff Henson, and it breaks her heart. I mean,
I do this nationwide. I go around and I testify
on these issues, particularly around unregulated street camping, and so
often I raised these problems with mortality and crime and

(04:03):
and and the uh my view just kind of despicable
ignorance of humanity when we when we allow these things
to fester in our community. But this this really captured
it in a way that is just horribly tragic. The
fact that there was someone who participated in that hearing
who ended up dying from the very thing that we

(04:24):
were talking about. It shows that the stakes are, as
I said, in this peace getting getting much higher. And
and every year we delay and the legislature delay is
taking action on this, and cities like Omaha or Lincoln
delay taking action on this, more people are going to die.
And and I think that it's those vigils that you know,

(04:44):
there was one here in Salt Lake where I live.
I've seen them nationwide. These visuals are are while moving
in unacceptable reality. We should try to move to a
world in which there are no visuals because people aren't
that on the street, because people aren't also just getting
into a house and then immediately dying from overdose, which

(05:05):
is something I've written a.

Speaker 3 (05:06):
Lot about as well.

Speaker 1 (05:07):
Yeah, I've used the example of someone is a danger
to themselves and others, right like running around seventy second
and dodge here in Omaha, you know, naked and with
a gun and threatening people. Obviously police intervene. But if
someone is a danger to themselves and potentially others by
living on the streets, no one seemingly is thinking we

(05:29):
need to do anything about that. What is it you
would like to see law enforcement have the opportunity to
do for people who are living on the streets, who
are in and out of shelters. Oftentimes they've got drug
and alcohol violent tendencies. There are some people that say,
I don't go into the shelters because there are crazy

(05:49):
people in there who are dangerous and violent. So I
feel better just living out here on the streets. And
I've gone out with you talked about Douglas County Sheriff
Aaron Hanson. I've gone out with them. I've talked to
these people and it's really really sad to talk with
these people and the stories of what they're experiencing in
and there's nothing that law enforcement can do to better

(06:10):
the situation unless they make the choice. Do you think
law enforcement should have more stringent things that they can
do to protect people from living on the streets.

Speaker 2 (06:21):
Absolutely, And I think it's it's a multi pronged approach.
I think that the biggest challenge with homelessness policy is
that the advocates for the homeless have tried to paint
this issue is one strictly of poverty, when even you know,
the most layman observer can obviously see that that's not
the case for people who are living on the streets,

(06:42):
and they've tried to make it one where where this
is a sort of monolithic population that all of them
are the same, they all have this this you know,
homeless status in common, but they refuse to accept that
there's actually a lot of different reasons that people become homeless.
And that's where what we you know, as a first steps.
You know that the bill that you'd mentioned that would

(07:03):
give law enforcement greater authority and enforcing laws against camping bands,
moving people out of homeless encampments and compelling them to
go into shelter or face arrest. I mean when we've
I've seen a lot of states take action on this.
Kentucky comes to mind, you know, and the lead up

(07:23):
to that bill being passing Kentucky, people said this is
going to lead to a mass arrest of homeless people.
That's not exactly what happened. In the first six months,
out of seventeen hundred people living on the street, only
two of fifty five were even cited by law enforcement,
and even fewer. I think it was nineteen that ended
up actually getting arrested. And yet we've seen more people

(07:45):
moving into shelter. I mean that this was captured in
another piece in Boise, Idaho, where some some journalists for
talking to some homeless people after they were enforcing a
camping band in Boise, and the man simply said, well,
I'm not allowed to sleep in the park anymore, or
I guess I'll go into shelter. For some portion of
the population, it's as simple as creating that pressure. Now,

(08:06):
there's another issue you mentioned around making sure that shelters
are actually safe, and as a part of this that
we have to look at someone's underlying needs. Are they
simply a criminal? Who is who was? Almost sixty one
percent of people living on the street in the brass
Thea are registered sex offenders. It's going to be a
different situation for them than for a lot of others.

Speaker 3 (08:26):
Because we have to look at it and say, are.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
These people actively committing crimes? If they are, then they
don't need shelter. They actually do need to go to jail.
But then we have to look at okay, well are
people you know, is it more behavior healths? Is it
mental illness? Do we need to expand civil commitment, which
is the process of hospitalizing an individual for psychiatric conditions

(08:50):
that prevent them from being able to function safely in society.
That's something we've been very supportive of and I think
we would love to see in Nebrassa as well, because
we need to make sure that when someone walks into
the shelter that they do feel like that is their
first step to getting off the street, and not that
they're sort of, you know, being being pushed into a

(09:11):
place full of legitimately dangerous people. That's an unacceptable thing
to to forest veterans and families and the elderly into
an environment that's not safe. But we have to take
the lack of safety, you know, take as a as
a real thing that's occurring, and respond to it appropriately.

Speaker 1 (09:30):
Talking here for a few more minutes with Devin Kurtz.
He's with the Cicero Institute. Their report is the stakes
of Omaha's homeless crisis are getting higher. He's our guest
this morning on news radio eleven ten. Kfab Devin, follow
my reasoning on this and let me know if I'm
if I'm on the right track. I completely understand the
advocates out there that say, you know, Scott, you are

(09:53):
just one missed pay check away from being homeless. So
many people are. I don't know that I'm one miss paycheck,
but I understand their reasoning that a lot of people
have unforeseen hardship. Medical bills pile up, mistakes are made,
and next thing you know, you lose your house. And
I have nothing but the utmost compassion for people who

(10:16):
have fallen on these hard times. If that hits me
in my life, Devin, I go stay with family who
will have me. At some point, though the family says,
all right, you can't stay here anymore, maybe because I'm
dangerous and drunk and abusive. So then I go stay
with friends, and once I exhaust all the friends who

(10:38):
allow me to stay and sleep on their futon here
and there, then I'm out in the streets. It's not
like someone is like, well, I got fired from my job.
I guess I live in the park. Now we're talking
about months down the road and generally kicked out of
family and friends' homes because of dangerous and abusive behavior.
So when we're talking about people living on the streets here,

(10:59):
we're not exactly talking about, you know, the Bob Cratchetts
of the world and tiny tim and that kind of thing.
Am I right?

Speaker 3 (11:06):
That's exactly right.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
And I think it's important to note that four people
who you know say they fall through those cracks that
you described as family and friends support, that they don't
have that big of a social safety net. Those individuals
will end up in a shelter and they will be
out of that shelter within four to six weeks. So
for the people who are truly economically homeless, they're cycling

(11:30):
through at a much higher rate. They're getting out of homelessness,
they're exiting almossness. They are not the ones living in
the park. Most homeless people don't live outside. Most homeless
people moved to the shelter system, moved through traditional housing
or other government programs, or gospel missions and other kinds
of community organizations, and they get out of homelessness. What

(11:50):
we're seeing, what we've really seen over the last five
to ten years, is that as we have expected less
of the individuals that are living on the street, and
we've we've allowed their disorder and their and their encampments
and their way of life to uh, you know, sort
of spiral publicly, and at the same time, we've asked

(12:14):
far less of our service dividers. We've moved funding away
from programs that integrated treatment and required some amount of
treatment for the most addicted, with the most mentally ill,
as we've defunded those and moved it towards programs that
simply provide housing vouchers and and don't really look at
the underlying needs and risks of this population. We've see

(12:36):
that the people who live on the street are it's spiking,
it's increasing year every year and has increased a substantial
amount over the last decade. And I see this nationwide,
in state after state. We see this happening.

Speaker 1 (12:50):
The dangerous to the public because people say, like, hey,
if someone's living out there homeless, they're not bothering you. Well,
in many instances they're they're living on private property or
near enough to private property that it makes parents say,
I don't feel safe with my kids playing outside. It
makes business owners say, I got people bothering my customers

(13:11):
as they're coming in here. You've got homeless people who
are stumbling into traffic and getting hit by cars. And
then you've got the arson that fire Chief Kathy Bosman
talked about with Mary Ewing just a few weeks ago
about how when it gets so cold like this, people
go into condemned or vacant buildings and to stay warm

(13:33):
they set fire to whatever they have. This sometimes causes
the building to catch on fire, which of course can
go to neighboring homes and businesses as well. But your
report also Devin talks about how Nebraska and Omaha specifically,
if we don't enforce laws against homeless encampments, squatting, open
drug use, and the rest of it, we might be

(13:54):
out tens of millions of dollars in federal support.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
Right, that's exactly right over the summer, the White House
announced some changes through an executive order to several federal
agencies grant programs, So the Department of Housing and Urban Development,
Department of Transportation, Department of Justice, Helping Human Services. I
mean this is billions, uh, you know, in grants nationwide.

(14:21):
And for a city like Omaha that recently decided not
to ban free camping, that's in direct contradiction of that
executive order, which allows the or that doesn't just allow,
it actually orders these agencies to take action to to
have less funds be allocated to communities that are not

(14:42):
actively enforcing campings, wanting, et cetera. And then and the
simple reason is that this has created a dangerous environment that,
as you said, affects businesses, affects residents. But it also
from the feral government's perspective, do they want to be
investing in communities that are unwilling to keep their projects safe?

(15:03):
I mean, just think of construction sites. If you have
someone who is squatting in a construction site and burns
it down, this is a very real possibility. And it
would be foolish for this Partment of Transportation to make
significant investments in communities who are unwilling to take action
to protect those projects, so it really makes a lot
of sense. It is also some policy leverage. I mean,

(15:24):
the federal government has made it clear that if communities
do take action on these kind of public safety priorities,
that they'll actually get more fundings from the federal government.
So it's not just a stick. There's also a trot
that if cities and states start to play along and
respond in a way that it is more proactive, they'll

(15:44):
get more resources to kind of build momentum to finally
address some of these issues that up to this point
have seemed fairly intractable.

Speaker 1 (15:52):
The Cicero Institute a public policy organization in favor of
small government and big freedom online at Cicero Institute that's
cicro Institute dot org. Devin Kurtz and his colleague doctor
Chris Sharp have written this report here called the Stakes
of Omaha's Homeless Crisis Are Getting Higher. You can read

(16:12):
it on the website. Go to Cicero Institute dot org
search Omaha and it's right there. Devin, thank you so
much for this report. I really appreciate the time you
spent looking into this issue here in my hometown and
our community. And telling us about it here on news
Radio eleven ten. KFAB, thank you so much for having
me welcoming onto the program. Always someone I've enjoyed talking

(16:33):
to over the years, whether on or off the radio.
Former Douglas County treasurer who's now the mayor of Omaha.
Are you getting used to that title, John Ewing?

Speaker 3 (16:43):
Yes, I am man. Thank you very much. I love
being on the show with you and just wanted to
congratulate you on your new role as Omaha's morning voice,
the morning show host for KFAB. So thank you for
having me well.

Speaker 1 (16:58):
As I you know, when you take over for someone
who's been in that position for a while, you're gonna
have your detractors. My inbox is steady stream of people
saying I'm miss Gary. It's just over and over Miss Geary.
Every single emails. People going tolerate you, but I miss Geary.
So I look. I signed up for the battle and

(17:20):
Gary Sadelmeyer left an incredible legacy that I will try
not to completely destroy. Let's talk about a few policy
things here and then do some holiday action here. I
just spent some time on this program this morning talking
with an advocate with the Cicero Institute. This is an
organization that just wrote a report about Omaha's homeless population,

(17:45):
and they say that because of the one hundred or
so people who have died on the streets this past
year in Omaha while being in a state of homelessness,
that not doing anything to change these pies is a
dangerous thing, especially for those people. Now, you've been working

(18:06):
on this with the Council, with advocates here. This is
a study throughout the winter to see what might need
to be done differently, what have you determined here as
we've gotten into the cold winter months about Omaha's homeless
population of what more can be done to assist them.

Speaker 3 (18:23):
Sure, First, let me say also congratulations to Gary on
his well deserved retirement. He was a voice for Omaha
for decades and I appreciated working with him as well.
One of the things I would say is we always
have to be careful with statistics. Not one hundred people
have died on the streets of Omaha because of homelessness,

(18:48):
So I would rather have people get an accurate statistic
when they make those type of claims. Now, having said that,
we have worked with seven team organizations that provide outreach
service to the people that are homeless and unsheltered in
our community. They are out on the streets every day

(19:12):
reaching out to those who are homeless and trying to
offer them services. Those who do take the offer of
shelter or services, we can do everything we can to
help them. There are individuals, however, who refuse to take
the assistance, who refuse to go into shelter, and there

(19:34):
are a number of reasons for that. Certainly, we have
individuals with mental health illnesses. We have individuals who have
drug dependency. We have individuals who don't trust the shelters.
We have individuals who may be a family or a
man and a woman, or have a pet and not

(19:55):
have ready access to the shelters. So what we are
trying try to do is have them work differently in
terms of the service providers to see how they can
provide services for all of the people that need them.
We're also doing everything we can to build that coalition

(20:16):
and look at providing resources so that people do have shelter.
It's always a tragedy when someone dies because they're homeless
and unsheltered, so we have to continue to be vigilant
and make sure that we're doing everything we can to
reach out to them.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
I don't want to get too keyed up on numbers,
but it was a report from WAWT First Alert six
news last week that said that that vigil downtown was
honoring one hundred and seventeen homeless individuals who died in
Omaha this year. I was stunned by that number. You're saying,
be careful of focusing too much on that number.

Speaker 2 (20:55):
Why would you go to that say?

Speaker 3 (20:57):
Yes, I'm saying, based on the information I have from
my homeless coordinator, that number is not accurate. I don't
know what the accurate number is, but if we had
one hundred and seventeen people die on our streets for
any reason, that would be a catastrophe in Omaha. But
we certainly will look to see if we can get

(21:19):
a more accurate number. But that number just as inaccurate,
and it doesn't take into account people that were no
longer on the streets, and that it is people that
were homeless at some point.

Speaker 1 (21:33):
Yeah, we'll have to see what happens here. We're in
a trial period that goes into the spring where you
and the council will address this. Again. Here's a story
I wanted to ask you about as well as we're
talking with Mayor John Ewing, City of Omaha. Here on
eleven ten KFAB Fox News New York Post are reporting
here are some stats from the Major City's Chiefs Association,

(21:56):
the MCCA. They cover violent crime reporting, and this is
for January through September of this year, and the report
from Fox says major cities see violent crime surge as
national rates plummet significantly in twenty twenty five. The subheadline says,
new survey shows Omaha, Atlanta, Columbus among cities reporting increases

(22:20):
in homicide, rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults. Do we have
an issue with the crime spike in Omaha this past year?

Speaker 3 (22:30):
I don't think we have an issue specifically with the
crime spike. I think we have an issue, quite honestly,
where we've had, unfortunately a number of domestic violence related
homicides and so that has skewed the numbers, and that's
something we certainly have to be looking at, working with

(22:50):
our service providers such as the WCA and others, to
ensure that we can keep domestic violence situations from results
in homicides. But that's been the biggest issue that I've
seen over this year.

Speaker 1 (23:08):
Yeah, it says Omaha reported increases in all four violent
crime categories homicide, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. I know
we've had relatively low crime rates in Omaha for several years.
I don't know what the numbers are associated with these,
But you're saying that, obviously, we don't want any of
this to happen in our community. But the fact that

(23:31):
Fox and The New York Post are saying, yeah, Omaha,
they seem to be suggesting Omaha is one of the
most dangerous places in America to live. You'd push back
on that.

Speaker 3 (23:41):
Oh, absolutely. When you look at and I'm looking at
what I believe the correct number is now. When you
look at the number of homicides, for instance, in Omaha,
we had twenty six so far this year. That's an
increase that is unacceptable. But that's an increase from twenty

(24:02):
I believe last year to twenty six this year, with
a number of domestic violence homicides contributing to that increase
a couple more. That doesn't make that doesn't make Omaha
one of the most violent cities in the country. When
you look at cities our size, our numbers are usually
about one fifth to one seventh of some of the

(24:25):
major cities in the country.

Speaker 1 (24:28):
Omahamir John Ewing with us here on news radio eleven
ten kfab I talked a few weeks ago on this
program with a business owner who is in that area
between the Old Market and Midtown crossing. And as you know,
because this is on your route to work, the construction
downtown in the Midtown, whether it's streetcar related or whatever,

(24:51):
is almost in some instances just about impossible to get anywhere.
Pedestrian traffic has been closed down because the streets are closed,
and these business owners say, people can't get to our businesses.
We were told that a lot of this construction for
the street car would be done at this point. Now
it's resett and it might be another six months down

(25:12):
the road, and they say, these businesses we're going to
close unless the city of Omaha does something. You've been
on a record. You talked with Gary here a couple
of weeks ago saying, I don't know what the city
of Omaha can do for these business owners. Is that
still as you talk with these business owners as well,
is that still your track here that Omaha can't do

(25:33):
anything to try and alleviate some of the pain of
the congestion with traffic and also the problems with the
business owners.

Speaker 3 (25:41):
Well, I've never said we can't do anything. What I
have said is here's what we've done. First, we got
the Harney Street Bridge open as quickly as we could
to be able to assist businesses during the Christmas season. Secondly,
we delayed the Farnham Street Bridge Molessian until January after

(26:02):
the Christmas holidays, so both of those routes would be
open so people could patronize businesses. We've also developed a
passport program that encourages people to actually patronize these businesses
and be able to help them survive the streetcar construction.

(26:23):
When I started as mayor, the project was about a
year behind, and part of that was simply because there
were disputes about different aspects of the contract, and I've
tried to get those resolved and get everybody working and
get everybody back on track. We believe the vast majority

(26:44):
of the construction will be over here in the next
few months and people will be able to drive and
have access to these businesses. We also have a number
of parking structures that people can park in and then
walk to the businesses, and we've tried to encourage people
to patronize the businesses with our efforts at showing that

(27:09):
you can make it to these businesses, patronizing them ourselves.
Taking Ali the trolley and driving the streetcar route to
show people that you could get through and that you
can patronize these businesses is a little more difficult, absolutely,
but we have to have people who are willing to

(27:29):
take that little extra time to be able to go
in and patronize the businesses. The city, as determined by
the City Attorney, cannot provide private businesses financial resources because
of the streetcar.

Speaker 1 (27:46):
Yeah, that's the quote I was referring to, that the
city of Omaha can't just pay to keep businesses over.
Where do you draw that line. You've got to empathize
with these business owners. I mean you drive around Absolutely,
you drive around downtown and it's like Amos has closed.

Speaker 3 (28:02):
Well, I don't agree with I don't agree with the
idea that Omaha's closed. I agree with the idea that
construction is difficult. I think everybody knew that when the
streetcar project was started several years ago. As I've said consistently,
we are going to do everything we can to ease

(28:23):
the pain when it comes to construction, which is what
we've done with Harney Street and Farnham, and then we
are going to try to get this project done on
time and on budget. So we're doing everything we can
to make those things happen.

Speaker 1 (28:38):
We have streetcar construction going to be a major issue
for twenty twenty six in the City of Omaha. As
you begin your first full year as mayor of Omaha,
what are some things you're looking at doing or being
a part of in Omaha in twenty twenty six.

Speaker 3 (28:56):
Well, we're always when it comes to the streetcar, we're
going to keep pushing to.

Speaker 2 (29:00):
Get that done.

Speaker 3 (29:01):
But we also have some major initiatives that we will
be announcing when it comes to our parks and increasing
the access to them and improving the quality of our
parks in our outdoor spaces. I believe that's a significantly
important aspect of the quality of life for the people

(29:21):
of Omaha. One of the things I also talked about
during the campaign was increasing staffing for the Omaha Police Department.
We estimate that in twenty twenty six we will be
very close to full strength, making up the shortage of
approximately one hundred officers that I inherited, so we're going

(29:44):
to continue to keep our promises to the people of
this community. We're going to hopefully be able to build
up national level soccer complex for our young people to
be able to have tournaments and opportunities here in Omaha
rather than having to travel to other cities. We're looking
to potentially have a professional soccer team down in Omaha

(30:09):
downtown area and potentially be able to recruit a women's
professional soccer team as well. We're also going to be
fully implementing the affordable housing project that we started with
the forty million dollars in the urban core, so that
we can have that money then be able to be

(30:29):
utilized outside of the urban core as the proceeds are
turned around from that particular effort and potentially have an
impact of about one hundred and twenty million dollars for
affordable housing as that money turns over three times or

(30:50):
so in our community. So those are some of the
major things that we're working on. We're also going to
be reporting on all of the task force groups that
we together so that people can see the way forward
with some of the major issues that they've talked about
in our community.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
It's midnight tomorrow night. People are yelling Happy New Year?
Where are you? What are you doing tomorrow night?

Speaker 3 (31:16):
Tomorrow night at midnight, I hope to be at home.
We will go down for the lights. Then we will
probably go to one or two church services, and then
we will try to be home as quickly as we
can so that we can enjoy New Year's and midnight
at the comfort of our own home. And I would

(31:40):
ask people to stay safe, don't drink and drive, and
certainly don't do the suit the celebration by firing off
your weapons and things in the city, because those things
sometimes have unintended consequences. So I would just ask everyone
to stay safe.

Speaker 1 (31:58):
Unbelievable that people do that. So when I ask you
to think back on New Year's Eve, the clock striking midnight,
as you look back on your life and your misspent youth,
perhaps what story pops out as Wow, that New Year's
Eve got crazy? Now come on, you've got a T
shirt on that says coolest Mayor on one of your
Facebook posts. I'm expecting a good story here.

Speaker 3 (32:21):
Well, I don't know that I have any really good stories.
I spent most of my life since I was twenty
years old. Work in most New Year's Eve, you know,
with the police department. I think one of the best
stories I have is having a New Year's Eve celebration
at church and then going to a friend's house who

(32:45):
had just purchased a new home and being able to
bring in the new year with them and friends and
having an opportunity to celebrate till wee hours in the morning,
which is not my normal way of doing things. We
had a great opportunity celebrating with friends and being able

(33:05):
to encourage people who were a little bit younger than
us as they were being able to become homeowners.

Speaker 1 (33:14):
Man, that is that's such a politician answer. I'll get
the real story from you some other time. Hey, Merry
Christmas to you and Christmas and your family, and happy
New Year. Do you guys look forward to talking more
in twenty twenty six.

Speaker 3 (33:29):
Happy New Year to you and your family as well,
and thank you for the opportunity anytime.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
That is Omaha Mayor John Ewing here on news radio
eleven ten KFAB. Scott fordhes well, you're going news radio
eleven ten Kfab