April 9, 2026 • 41 mins
Jason Lanaha joins the show to breakdown new developments and progress. We also get into the road conditions of West Omaha and how they are (or are not) being maintained.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Anything goes with us. And I don't think I'm on
fire today. I think I'm a little wet today. It's
raining out there. Peyton is with us today. Good morning Peyton,
Good morning Geene. It's wet outside and it's cold in here.
I know it's freezing in here, but I'm not going
to complain. You know, my office at City Hall, it
was either really hot or really cold, and I would
much rather have it cold any day than it'd be
a too warm here. Probably this place will be warm,
(00:22):
too warm tomorrow. But my fingertips are numb today. But
you know what we want to again, We want to
hear from you, whether it's city, state, national, the world.
Of course, the streetcar is always up for discussion, and
you're going to hear plenty of opinions from me. It's
your chance to speak up and sound off. You can
send your emails today to comment at kfab dot com,
(00:43):
or you can call us at four oh two five five,
eight eleven ten. I have a special guest this morning,
and I think people are going to be very interested.
Jason Lanaha is in here, who is president and CEO
of Lantahai Real Estate.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Good morning, Good morning, Geene. How are you?
Speaker 1 (00:58):
I am, I am just great. Jason's been in this
studio before. I know you've done Grow Omaha show before.
But you know, I just wanted to start out because
I think everyone that has lived in Omaha for any
period of time recognizes the Lanaha name, and I think
they think automatically the nursery. And that was started way back,
probably nineteen seventy four, I believe what I read by
(01:21):
your dad, Dave. And it started out with ten acres
of land that he purchased at about one hundred and ninety
second Center. Now I read he owns over and manages
over seven hundred acres for his nursery.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
I believe it. Yeah, that is that is a big operation.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
That is pretty amazing. And then because I said, most
people think about the nursery, but I don't think a
lot of people really know as much about Lanaha real
estate as they do about the nurseries. And you are
the president and CEO. This was established in nineteen eighty eight.
It's corporate, commercial, mixed use, residential. You do just about everything,
(02:01):
don't you.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
I don't know if that's good or bad.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Well, yes, and you know what I read your web
page yesterday, and it says we dream big and we
work hard to create better cities for our clients, partners, stakeholders,
and our community. Wow, you can't do much better than that.
That's a pretty good mission statement right there. But let's
just start out and talk a little bit. You know,
(02:23):
there were some they're not small, but there were some
smaller projects than the ones I want to talk about today,
and I primarily want to talk about three today. I
want to talk about the Mutual of Omaha Tower, which
you are the developer for downtown, which is approaching its
final heights. I want to talk about Heartwood Preserve. Everybody
(02:45):
wants to know about that, and that is the big
development that Applied Underwriters is doing, which is the old
boys Town property at about one hundred and forty fourth
in Dodge. And then another site that everybody is curious about.
And even when I was still mayor, I got a
lot of calls about is the old Mutual site at
Midtown and you're the developer for that too. So just
(03:06):
go back in time a little bit. The development Hawthorn, Yeah,
out on H Street about one hundred and eighty I
think Q across to Millard West. That was a land
of hot project, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:18):
There are quite a few projects out west. And and
I'll dip into the history really quick. So when my
father started the nursery business, he grew all of his
own trees, which required a lot of land. And then
eventually the city, as we all knew, grew west. And
there's a better use for some of that land than
more productive use than trees. And so the trees kept
(03:38):
moving further west, and my father got into single family development.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
So like the Hawthorn neighborhood bay would, there are a
bunch of them out there.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
The sanctuary, the sanctuary, yep? Is that what you did
or your dad?
Speaker 2 (03:49):
We both worked on that one, okay.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
But and then just as we have progressed, it's gone
from single family to some commercial to now we're dipping
our toes in a few towers.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
It's great. I know your name is around and these
developments that I mentioned, these are major developments going on
in Omaha right now. So let's start out with the tower,
the Mutual of Omaha Tower downtown. It is approaching, as
I said, it's final height, which is, if I recall
about six hundred and seventy seven.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Feet, that's exactly right. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
See, I remember that, and it will absolutely redefine Omaha
Skyline in the future. And I remember all the early
conversations about them building a new headquarters, making it look
like a campus. Where would it be, should it go
out west? Where should it go? And I know everybody
around the table thought a corporate headquarter building for Mutual
(04:42):
of Omaha belongs right downtown, and so that's where it is.
We had a lot of negotiating with that because I
thought that the best site for that would be where
the Dale Clark was, and we did a bit of
a landswap there. The city built another downtown library and
then demo the Dale Clark. So you take it from
(05:03):
there and tell us about the tower, tell us about
when it will be done, tell us some of the
features about it too, because it is quite amazing.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Yeah sure, so, yeah, a little bit of history.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
I mean, we started working on this thing in twenty
twenty one, and these things take a while. And this
is a perfect example of kind of that ven diagram
of city government leadership, corporate government leadership, and private development
coming together for a shared vision that most importantly serves Mutual.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Bomhont its associates. That's the number one goal.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
It's got to serve that and help their growth and
talent attraction, et cetera. But it also means a lot
for the city. And we all talked about you know,
you can't name a single healthy city.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
In the United States that has a decaying urban core.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
And so I know we have all worked for so
long together and so many people to protect urban core
gets us into the street car all these other things
it does.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
And I'm still the biggest cheer leader.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, well I'm right behind you.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
So but yeah, and so the building six hundred and
seventy seven feet tall. It's really one of the first
major post COVID towers.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
In the country.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
And so the whole building's redesigned how you know, mutual
desires to work in the future, and so with it
is a really flexible.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Workspace and amazing amenities.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
You have exercise facilities, six restaurant concepts, outdoor garden areas
where they kind of meetings.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
It's just it's a really special place.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Well, you know, a lot of people ask me, they said,
will Mutual of Omaha fill up that building? Because so
many people now are working from home and Mutual of
Omaha has four thousand employees in the city of Omaha.
Now they're not all at work at one time. But
talk a little bit about that, about building this huge
skyscraper when a lot of people are still working remotely.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Yeah, sure, so you know the main messaging.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I don't want to get in front of Mutual of
Omaha on that, but here are a few facts.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Well, you said flexible workspaces, and that's where I want it.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
And so yeah, you know, Mutual Oomha's coming out of
somewhere in the ballpark of one point three million square
feet and the towers by eight hundred thousand square feet,
So it's it's and it's assigned to the same number
of people. So it's just a lot more efficient. So
it's actually quite a bit less space than they're currently in.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Yes, and that that's what I think is important. It's
less space than they currently have at Midtown. But it's
just going straight up. I remembered I was there for
the groundbreaking and I remember talking to the architects. Yeah,
and those are the same architects that designed the skyscraper
in Oklahoma City. I can't remember the name of the building, yes,
(07:50):
And I remember saying to them I can't imagine what
it would be like to design a skyscraper. And I
remember they looked at me and they go, oh, it's
so much fun. And I thought, I guess, if that's
what you do for a living, is design skyscrapers, this
one would be really fun and it will be the
tallest building downtown.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Oh yeah, absolutely, Okay.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
And I think that that's something that's that you weren't
trying to achieve, but you did achieve it.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
No, once again, you know, the guiding light on this
is what is good for a client. And the size
ended up being what it is because of the space,
programming and understanding how the various departments want to work.
It wasn't designing a building and then putting people inside.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
It was the other way around.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
And forty four stories.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
It's forty four stories. You know, it's a little deceiving
because our floor to floors are very high. They're atypical,
so they're fifteen feet, which is great, makes more natural light.
The top floor forty four is actually a double floor height,
so I guess the roofline's more like forty.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Five and the top floor is like it's like two floors.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
Isn't it is, Yeah, it is. It's beautiful. It's about
thirty feet tall.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
Boardrooms up there and to the other associates as well
to use during the day, and you can imagine the
views are pretty nice.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
Unbelievable. And that crane, my gosh. I used to look
at that crane from my window at City Hall. But
it's the building itself six hundred and seventy seven feet tall.
The crane can go up seven hundred and fifty feet.
I mean, that's it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
Yeah, you know, it's pretty cool to watch too, because
those cranes build themselves up and take themselves down.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
It's pretty interesting.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
I know, it's amazing to watch them. I can't I
can't imagine being a crane operator. It's it's unbelievable, big toy,
I know, I guess it is. And with all the
windstorms and things we have, I think, oh geez, what's
going to happen to that crane and it still is standing.
So the one thing I did want to bring up
to is seventy three percent of the dollars spent were
(09:46):
with local folks.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
That's one hundred percent, right.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
And I think that's really important that you guys can
bring out too that this building downtown resulted in a
lot of jobs and a lot of employment and a
lot of businesses getting doing very very well because of
this building. The other thing is is the first fourteen
floors is parking, and the city has purchased that garage, correct,
(10:11):
So I think that's important for people to know that
that was built with the building, designed with the building,
but the City of Omaha purchased the garage. They will
own and operate it. So it can be used obviously
for mutual employees, but it also can be used in
the evenings and weekends for events downtown.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
That's exactly it. So it accomplishes two purposes.
Speaker 3 (10:29):
One, it provides parking for a large headquarters during the
day during business hours, and then it opens up in
the evening for folks coming down to the park or
whatever else is going on downtown.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
And you know, the City of Omaha does build and
operate a lot of garages because then we can we
cash flow them. You know, they pay for themselves. You
build them with bonds, and then they cash flow because
people pay to park in them, and they cash flow
and that's how we pay for them.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
And you know, another interesting thing about the street car,
and I know, I'm sure we'll get into that, but
the streetcar also connects all of these.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Assets, yesslutely does. And I and we've had a lot
of calls on this show about the streetcar, and I
know there's still people that are very skeptical, are totally
against it. But you, as a developer and other developers
along the streetcar corder, you do realize how this will
connect all those things to bring people in around and
(11:19):
out of downtown without having to worry about surface parking
and taking up space that could be businesses and employment
for parking.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
It's exactly it. I mean, we need density.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
We have I think I heard you mentioned yesterday is
a fifty five hundred lane miles yes, which is great.
I mean we're growing and there's there's parts of the
cities that you know are less dense and it's appropriate
for suburban setups. But the reality is the more density
we can put on top of the same infrastructure.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
The better it is.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
If we want to lower taxes, we want to do
all these things. We want to have improved roads. You know,
people talk about potholes, all these things. We need people
and more tax payers on more of them in every
mile than less of them, right, and that the density
of the street car, all these things, that's that's how
we accomplish that, and that's good for everybody.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
In the city.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
And that's how you broaden your tax base exactly. I mean,
if you want lower taxes, and you want lower taxes
for everybody in Omaha all the way out to the
Elkhorn River, you broaden your tax base. And this is
one way that we do it. Excuse me, Peyton has
my cough button over there, and I'm still sound a
little gravelly this morning. One other thing I wanted to
(12:29):
bring up is right now in downtown half is dedicated
to parking, and at any given time half is vacant.
Can you imagine bringing four thousand mutual of Omaha employees
downtown in trying to cover most of downtown with surface parking.
You just can't do that. And the street car is
going to enable, which we're going to get to next
Midtown crossing to some of the employees can park at
(12:52):
Midtown and one of the three garages that are at
Midtown because the city is purchasing those garages, park there
for a low fee. Jump on the street car, take
it downtown too, mutual of Omaha or any other business downtown,
and that's the great benefit for it. So let's jump
to Midtown. So many people have asked me, what is
going to happen to Midtown? Are those buildings gonna just
(13:14):
sit there and be vacant? And you are the developer
of Midtown and I know there's probably not everything you
could reveal about your development plan, but hopefully you could
tell us a lot about it. I think you already
have a name for that, and that's Midtown Forward, yep.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
And that's more of an effort than a name for
an area.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
But you're master planning everything, So tell us what you
can tell us.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
Yeah, sure, So a couple things. One, as we back up,
this is a a higher view of what's important for
our city. We can do developments anywhere, but there's certain
areas that our opportunities actually grow our city. And when
I say that, I mean actually bring new jobs, a
(13:59):
new company into our city. And so that at a baseline,
that is what we want to do on that campus.
And we've been working a lot to set the foundation
for that to where we can actually go out around
the country and say why Omaha here's why move your
people here. And it's not just the new jobs coming,
but it's also we have these wonderful institutions, the Med Center, Creighton.
(14:21):
We want to keep those people here. They don't need
to leave to grow their business. They can stay here
and grow their business. And so that's the baseline. If
there's one place in the city, in my opinion, we
can really grow, it's that area. And it's because the
parking's in place, the street cars connecting it. You have,
i believe, our largest employer at one end of the
(14:42):
streetcar line.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Which we need to get it to the right.
Speaker 3 (14:45):
And you're going to come down to the convention Center
and hopefully the airport someday and you don't have to
squint very hard to see that vision someday of what
it can be. And so at a baseline, that's what
we want to accomplish there.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
And we're talking from I eighty to thirty six Street.
That's a big swath of land right there in an
urban setting. Yeah, you don't find that too.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
Often, and that's the reason.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
If we piecemeal it, it can still be nice, but
it won't be transformational. And so we're gonna try the
hard way and actually build stuff that matters, that brings jobs,
that broads that tax space.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
So that includes several parking lots, surface lots. It includes
the three parking garages that the city has purchased now
and the existing two mutual buildings, the North Building in
the South building. Can you explain a little or tell
us a little about are those buildings gonna stay?
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Yeah, So the short version is, yes, those buildings are
going to stay once again back to what we deem
to be our civic duty. The current mutual headquarters between
Dodge and Farnham. It's just it's an important building for
a city. It'd be ashamed to tear it down. And
with that though, it's a very outdated building. And so
we are actually going through that right now. What uses
(15:57):
can we put in that. We're building our underwriting model
and so we're hoping to announce something on that soon. Okay, good, Yeah,
And so that building will stay. The South Building on
the south side of Farnham is a wonderful building that
will always stay.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
That's a useful office building.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
It has such an I like the look, it has
such an art deco look to me.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
Yep, it's a good building. It's a very functional building.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
The original headquarters started and I want to say as
nineteen ten, it's been added on four times, technically five.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
The tower pieces.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
Built in two and so with that you just get
these huge cores. It's hard to get sunlight to the middle.
And so that's the challenge of how do we reutilize
that put more bodies in the area. And so we
have some pretty good ideas and some good momentum on that.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
So when do you think you might be announcing something
that'll be happening there?
Speaker 2 (16:47):
Yeah, for sure this year.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
Okay, good, good, Yeah, that'll be great because I know
people were really worried about is that going to be
just vacant there? Because Mutual of Omaha is midtown and
so now I think, knowing that both of those buildings
will remain, they were going to be redeveloped, that whole
area is going to be redeveloped. But once again, I
have to emphasize, and I know you agree with me,
(17:10):
it's very rare to have such a swath of land,
an urban land, near public transportation. So the streetcar really
comes into play in redeveloping this area and making it
something major.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
Well, to be clear, this would not be happening in
the way that it has potentially happened without the street car.
And once again I understand, thank you, Jason, and you
did not pay me five bucks to say that.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I'm not kicking I mean, but it's very true.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
And I'm very like, extremely confident that when this is
up and running, I think everyone's going to see it
and go oh wow, that makes a lot of sense. Yes,
and we've seen it in places like Kansas City. I
believe that's already been extended or in the.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
Press extent standing it north and south. Yeah, because it's
so popular there. Now we only have about a few
minutes left. But I have to get to Heartwood Preserve
because Heartwood is the old the development at the old
Boys Town property about one hundred and forty fourth in
Dodge between Dodge and Pacific, And I want you to
you are the developer of that area. And I'm out
(18:16):
there at least three times a week because I love
Charleston's and I like that Starbucks out there too. But
this is residential, it's mixed use, it's pedestrian friendly. They're
senior living. Boy, I just want you to talk about
what's happening there and if you could give it. The
middle is called the row, and I want you to
People are saying what's going to be in there? What's
(18:37):
going to be in there? So whatever you can tell us. Now,
it started out with Valmont's headquarters. Are there. That Carson
Group has that huge building that's you could see on Dodge.
There's one that I keep on texting you saying what's
happening here? That's all glass and has a parking garage.
And that's that's Olsen, I believe. Okay, So just if
(18:57):
you can go through and talk to us a little
bit about what's happening out at Heartwood Preserve.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
Yeah, so first I want to make sure I'm clear.
So Applied underwriters and Jeff Silver and Steve Menzie's had
the vision for let's call it the five hundred acres
right south of Pacific all the way have to die.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
And I know both of them well and what great
people they are.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
They've been very good stewards of the Katy. It's once
again it's easy to do easy things. It's hard to
do hard things, obviously, and they're doing it the right way.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
And so we're fortunate My company, Landaha is fortunate.
Speaker 3 (19:29):
To be able to develop what's called the Row, which
is the downtown of Heartwood Preserve. We hope to make
it the downtown of West Omahawk. So what's happening there now.
Our first one hundred and fifteen thousand square foot building
is wrapping up right now, and once again, Olson, a
great Nebraska growing company, is the anchor tenant.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
First parking structures up.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
We will be breaking ground here in a couple months
on a wonderful hotel, so four star Marriotte autograph hotel
called the Elowin and that will.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Be in the middle in the Row area, that is
right next.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
To the the building where Olson's going into and they'll
share that same parking structure, so that would be a
six floor hotel, super high end. We're pretty confident we
can get the highest rates in Omaha actually there, and
that's that's our goal. There a lot of businesses out
in West Omaha and they don't have a place to stay,
so we have that. We're going to be breaking ground
later this year in the first multi family building as well,
(20:20):
once again very urban in the second parking structure will
also break around this year.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Okay, what about that. There's a huge amount of parkments
that Broadmoor is doing right north of Millard North.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yes, exactly. Okay, they have a huge number of.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Okay, and are those anywhere near opening?
Speaker 3 (20:38):
I don't know that answer, I have to you, Okay.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
So I mean all of that is really good news.
I know people are really excited about it, and they
want to know everybody when there's a new development, they
want to know what's going to be there, what stores
are going to be there. Is there going to be
retail out there?
Speaker 4 (20:56):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Yeah, there's a lot of retail. And this is the
idea of these these parking structures. They're shared parking structures.
So in theory, the office folks that there during the
day and the retail folks come at night. So and
that is how it has to work. And so we
have intentionally focused on bringing the office there first.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
That brings all the population in the folks, and I
hope in the next i'd say ninety days, sixty to
ninety days, we'll be able to announce it. Another pretty
attractive headquarters out there as well, one hundred and fifty
thousand square foot Class A office building.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
So there's a lot going on and yet a lot
still to come.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
You got that right, Okay.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Now, the last thing I got to ask you because
people want to know, what is that enormous building that
is on the south side of Pacific right across across
from Millard North, And that is Applied Headquarters.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
That is Applied Underwriters new headquarters. And it is a
spectacular building.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
And I was in there long, long, long time ago
and I did a virtual tour once of it, and
it is it is amazing. But that is their headquarter
building right now. They are they have a presence in Omaha,
lots of employees in Omaha, but their headquarters is in
south of San Francisco.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Correct. Their headquarters is now in New York City.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Okay, in New York City, but the.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
Vast majority of their employees, as I understand it, are
here in Omaha.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Yes, And then do you have any idea that you
could tell us when that is due to be open?
Speaker 3 (22:20):
I believe in talking with Jeff Silver, I believe it's
opening up later this year.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
Okay. Yeah, yeah, I heard the fall, but I just
didn't know if you had any updates.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
I don't have any insight, but stay tuned.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
There's more coming.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
They're just finishing out the insides of it, and once
again we're going to be bringing thousands of employees out
to Hertwood, Okay, and they're a big part of that.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
All right, Well, boy, I could sit and talk to
you another hour or so. You are a busy man
with the Tower, Mutual of Omaha Tower, downtown, redeveloping a
midtown where Mutual is, and doing Heartwood Preserve, plus a
lot of other developments. Jason Lanaha, thank you so much
for being here today.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
I appreciate it. I really enjoyed it, and it's always
good to see you.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Good to see you too, and I'll have to meet
you out at Charleston sometimes trying to schedule that for
a while, I know, because I want to know all
sorts of things that are going to happen out there.
But it's what a great development that is. So thank
you for being with us, and I know Peyton's telling
me get going. Woman. Thank you again to Jason Lanaha.
I could have kept him on another hour talking about
what's going in at Heartwood Preserve. I know everybody is
(23:22):
quite interested in that, and of course the old Mutual
side at midtime of about what's going on in there,
and I think he reassured us that those two old
buildings are going to remain there. So and today, guess what.
The ballots for the primary are now available. I got
mine yesterday in the mail. I like to vote by mail.
My husband is one of those that loves to vote
(23:44):
in person to go on election day. But when I
was mayor for twelve years, I thought if something I
get really busy and I can't make it and I
don't get the chance to vote, I would just die.
So I love it and I love to be able
to look at the ballot for a while. But the
one thing I really want to say again to everybody
listening is how important it is to vote in this election.
(24:06):
A lot of people think these midterm elections aren't as important.
The election is May twelfth, but there is a lot
of people a lot of really really important seats that
are on the ballot now, from US Senate to the
governor to the second congressional district, secretary of State, attorney general.
(24:27):
There are a lot of very very important positions that
are on the ballot now. And a lot of people
will tell me I don't vote in the primary, just
vote in the general. Primaries are so important too. Because
you know, you got to get two people through the primary,
and the voter turnout typically has been very, very poor
(24:49):
in Omaha and in Douglas County. And if you want
the voice of the people to be heard, and that's
what elections are all about, then people have to have
their voice be heard and they have to go out
and vote vote otherwise. You know, I go back to
my election, not are my defeat the last time and
the voter turnout was about twenty eight percent in Omaha.
(25:10):
Now is that letting the voice of the people be heard?
And so I just really encourage people to get out
there and vote, whether you do it in person, ask
for an absentee ballot. We make it as easy as
we possibly can.
Speaker 5 (25:22):
What is the importance of these statewide and even local elections?
Does it mean more for a constituent when they're voting
for these local positions.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Well, you know, they call them the down ballot different positions,
but they aren't really important. I mean, when you talk
about maybe the Nebraska Public Service Commission, or you talk
about Douglas County Board, Douglas County treasure Douglas County District
Court clerk, you may not think that these are as important,
(25:52):
but they absolutely are because this is how Douglas County,
the county that you live in, and this is how
the city of Omaha, this is how well this is
who is going to be leading and running the city
and the county, and this is why these are important
and so to me, they they may not seem as
important as the governor or the US Senate, but they
(26:15):
really are. And we got to get out there and
we've got to vote learning community for example. A lot
of people don't even know what learning community is, but
it's still important. And let your voice be heard and
study these issues too. I think the mail in ballot
gives you the opportunity that you can you can look
up who these candidates are and you can study who
they are and what they stand for. And we're going
(26:36):
to try to have some candidates on this show too.
Typically we don't have a whole bunch of candidates just
to come on and do their speeches. But at the
same time, if they if they're saying that they're going
to accomplish something special, I'd like them to come on
and say, how are you going to accomplish that? You know,
if somebody running for the legislature is saying I'm going
to lower your taxes that I would like them to
(26:57):
come on and say how exactly are you going to law? Yeah,
let's do that. So you know, we're going to have
some of the candidates on the show so that we
could have a good conversation with them.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
Steve on the phone lines at four zero, two, five, five, eight,
eleven ten has something to add to this conversation, Steve,
You're live with Jean Stauthart here on the KFAB comment line.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
Good morning, Hello, hello Steve here. I agree it's important
to vote in the primary, and it sounds like twenty
eight percent is not a great represented representation in our
federal elections. It's been below fifty percent sometimes of eligible
voters that actually vote yes. But as a counter example,
I would give myself as a counter example, I flung
(27:36):
Republican voted view for every election except for the last one,
and it came down to the street issue.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
Street or street street cars?
Speaker 4 (27:45):
Would you like to hear.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Were you talking about the street or the street car?
Speaker 4 (27:53):
The streets? I live in Skyline Ranches. We were acquired
annexed against will and told we'd have the same or
better services for the same or lower taxes. The street
in front of our house was due to be repaved.
It's blacktop that needs to be repaved retopped every five
to seven years, and it was due to be retopped
(28:13):
that very next summer. And you were not in office
at that time, but your predecessor was and said, since
they took over, they unscheduled the repair and the maintenance,
and they continued to I continue to call every year,
and they continued to defer it every year. They've now
deferred that overde maintenance fifteen years. The streets continually deteriorated,
to the point that parts of the street wash off
(28:34):
into my driveway and into my yard every time it rains.
And so, just as you would neglect your body if
you didn't never ate proper food, and just as if
your car would quit working if you'd never changed oil
or maintained it, the street has not been maintained. It's
been neglected, and it's been forced into the deteriorating condition.
And yet I pay the same streets. I just went
(28:55):
into chat GPT and said, are there any cities in
the United States where residents are required to pay for
their own street repairs? So the city tells us we'd
have to pay for our own repairs, and that was
never the case before we're annexed, and it said no.
There are a few exceptions that Omahona Brass is one
of them. So it's a huge outlier to live in
what's supposed to be a great city and yet your
street is neglected and you paid taxes sports b repair
(29:17):
and it's not repair. There was a huge bond issue,
as you talked about yesterday, and one of the top
neighborhoods listened with Skyline Ranches, and this was going to
address The money came in, it got spent on adjacent
neighborhoods and other neighborhoods and didn't touch ours except for
one street. And we continue to suffer for that. And
that's why there's a law suit going on right now.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
I appreciate your call, and you know you are aware
there was a lawsuit. Did the Skyline Ranch people filed
a lawsuit against the city with that the city prevailed,
They did appeal it, the city prevailed again. But it
is not true and it is not accurate that I
said that if you want your streets repair, you have
to pay for him yourself. Even the current Mayor John
(29:55):
Ewing had a TV commercial during the campaign that says
Mayor Stouther says, if you want your streets repaired, you
have to do it yourself, and that is not really
true at all. What I did is when I became mayor,
it used to be that these unimproved streets, which were
not only in Elcorn but all around the West Side
area that did not have storm drains, curbs, gutters, sidewalks,
(30:17):
that if they wanted them repaired, you had to pay
one hundred percent the homeowners. The cities were concentrating on
the mains and the secondaries. What I did is I
got a group of citizens together. They met for about
a year and they are the ones that came up
with a plan that the city council approved, and that
was establishing a plan for road maintenance district In street
(30:38):
improvement districts, one would be concrete with storm drains, curbs, sewers,
et cetera. And the other one would just be an
asphalt overlay. Since then, there has been probably over a dozen,
if not more, neighborhoods that have taken part in that,
and what it became is basically a fifty to fifty split.
(30:59):
The city would come out and engineer it. The city
would pay for it half of it, and then the
homeowners that their property abutted on the area being rehabilitated
would pay for half and they would be assessed for
a period of fifteen years or so, or they could
pay for it upfront. So it isn't that you have
to pay for all of it yourself. The issue that
I had is this was agreed on by the city
(31:21):
council and a lot of neighborhoods have already taken part
in it. So what I did is I said, well,
the issue with Elcorn in a long skyline. True, it
was annex during the Faihi administration. I understood that there
had been legal cases and the city prevailed on those.
But I said, I don't think we could just come
in and rehabilitate the streets along Skyline. It would have
(31:45):
to be every street in Elcorn that the City of
Omaha annexed. It couldn't just be this street or that street.
We'd have to do all of it. And I asked
public Works. I said, give me a number, give me
a cost. It would cost the City of Omaha to
rehabilitate every street out in Elcorn that was annexed and
the cost was about five hundred million, and it was
(32:09):
just it was cost prohibitive, you know. I said that
we passed that bond issue of two hundred million back
in May of twenty twenty. It was reauthorized in November
of twenty four for basically another two hundred million. But
they are What the Public Works Department does is they
prioritize which streets that they're going to come in and
(32:29):
rehabilitate the problem with those areas, especially in the West
Side area that has already partaken in our street maintenance
District road improvement district policy that has been in place
now for about ten years. What would we do if
we went out there and just did Elkhorn's and said, okay,
with Elkhorn, you don't have to pay all these other
(32:50):
people did. Would we have to go back and refund
their money to them that they've already are paying fifty percent?
It becomes a matter of fairness to and so so
I know the frustration out there. I know people told
me they said, we're not going to vote for you
anymore with Elcorn. I know the current mayor, Mayor Ewing
made a lot of what I would consider promises. I
(33:13):
know since he was elected mayor, he has come back
to the folks out there along Skyline and said, Nope,
we're not going to do it. We're not going to
come out here and do it, which was a campaign
promise he made, and now he's saying, nope. You know what,
the position that I had was accurate, and we're not
going to come out there and do the streets and
pay for them one hundred percent. It would result in
(33:33):
a tax increase, a quite large tax increase for the
City of Omaha if we were to do all of
Elcorn Street at no cost whatsoever. So understand the frustration
because it was treated very differently when it was Elcorn.
I am not aware of anything Mayor Fayhi said when
it was being annexed. I mean, I would have to
(33:54):
go back in search and history what I was told.
Promises were made, but we could not find anywhere in
writing that it guaranteed those folks out there that the
city would do it at no cost to them. So
I understand the frustrations. But as we go back where
we are now, I know Mary Ewing has now come
back and said we will keep up with our street
(34:16):
Maintenance District road improvement district plan that we've had in place.
We will do it, We'll engineer it, will do it.
It'll be about a fifty to fifty split. And keep
in mind too, with that plan in high poverty areas,
which there are more in the eastern northeastern portion of
our city in high poverty areas, if over half of
the property owned owners sign up for this, then they
(34:37):
will do it at one hundred percent in those areas
because they are high poverty. Steve, I didn't mean to
cut you off for filibuster you here, but we've got
to move on to some other issues. But I do
want to just say again, is you know that issue
out in Elcorn along Skyline Drive. Understand it looked into it. Yeah,
So I did have a committee of citizens that met
(34:59):
for about a year. They came up with the recommendations
for the street improvement or the road maintenance district. It
went to the city council. City council approved it. Any
changes in that policy the city council would have to
approve too. And I even brought that back to the
city council and had Brinker Harding, who is the city
council member out in that area, discuss it with it,
(35:21):
and the city council members who have had a lot
of citizens in their district already take part in that said, no,
that's not fair just to do one area of Omaha
at one hundred percent. Keep in mind too, that your
current mayor is not going to do it either. Your
current mayor, although there were promises made during his campaign
about the streets in Elkhorn, he is keeping with that
(35:42):
current policy that was established when I was mayor. Now
another thing, since we're talking about Rhodes, we did have
a caller yesterday I wanted to follow up on and
just in case she's listening again, but she brought up
Maple Street being in bad shape, and then she brought
up and it's in bad shape, but she's seeing bike
lanes being put in, and why are we putting in
(36:03):
bike lanes when the street is deteriorating? And you know,
I always tell everybody if if I could get some
more information or if I forgot to say something, I'll
certainly come back and address it again. And this is
one of those those issues because what I didn't mention
and I should have, and I apologize for this is
Maple is a state highway. Maple is a state highway
in Omaha. It is just like L Street, Dodge Street.
(36:28):
These are all state roads within the city of Omaha.
Maple is not in the best condition, but there are
no current plans for rehabilitation with Maple because that would
be done by the Nebraska Department of Transportation. The DOT
does the state roads in Omaha. We provide the maintenance,
(36:48):
so we fill potholes, we will plow it. But if
that street, Maple is to be rehabilitated, that would come
from the state DOT. And right now there is no
current plans rehabilitation of Maple Street. Dodge needs works too,
and like I said, so does L Street. And if
the state gets that on their list, it's basically the
(37:11):
state funds it with a local match, with some type
of a local match. But right now there is no
plans for construction. Unfortunately on Maple Street. There are no
bike lanes on Maple either that I'm aware of. But
they did, and I think this is what she mentioned.
The caller do a road configuration on one hundred and
eighth Street north of West Maple to Fort and they
(37:33):
did add bike lanes on one hundred and eighth and
that was a Vision zero project, So she did bring
that up. But I just wanted to make sure you
knew that maple for the condition that it is. It
is a state highway and the state has no current
plans for rehabilitation. I think that's important to know.
Speaker 5 (37:48):
Gene takes all these questions very seriously. She has about
eighteen notepads over there. I think she's went through two
pens already this morning. So I take a lot of
all of this is very very important to her, and
we just these questions. She goes and asks the person
that she has best in mind to answer that.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
Well, I really want to make sure if I'm providing
information which I want to, that I'm providing the most
accurate information I can. And you know, I will always
say if I could add more, if I forgot something,
I'll always come back and add it, because I want
you to have the most current information I could possibly
give you.
Speaker 5 (38:22):
As we wrap up the show today, Gene, I have
kind of a fun question for you here, and this
is coming from David. David asked you a question here.
Why doesn't Omaha have an amusement park? I miss pa
Andy Park and Funplex is just too small. Why can't
Omaha have a big theme park? What are the first
steps to making something like this happen? And then David
(38:45):
used College World Series how that would be an absolute
cash cow during the CWS.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
You know, I think it's all a man a matter
of priorities and money. You know, people bring me the money,
people like when the caller the other day brought up
the baseball fields in the softball fields. It's all a
matter of the need is the need? There is there
a need for an amusement park? I mean, does the
vast majority of voters in Omaha and taxpayers think we
(39:12):
need an amusement park? And if so, how do we
pay for it? Because every election, you know, the number
one issue in the state and the number one issue
in the City of Omaha is we want lower taxes.
We want you to cut your spending and we want
lower taxes. At the same time, we want more and
we want better services and we want the roads done.
(39:32):
So it's really it is a difficult thing to manage
a city budget. You know, the city's general fund is
over five hundred million dollars and it's it's all paid
for with tax dollars, property taxes, restaurant tax, sales tax,
and it's all a matter of juggling those. So if
there are things that people really want and and a
(39:54):
lot of people want them, then it's always a consideration.
But it's always a matter of how are we going
to lower our spending, lower taxes and still fund more
things on the backs of the taxpayers.
Speaker 5 (40:09):
We got about two minutes here, Jean, Just a quick thought,
this is coming from Ken Jean left off the important
election of Papillion mayor. Papillion in Starpy County is critical
to Nebraska's future growth.
Speaker 1 (40:20):
I agree. Just yeah, a little tech and you know what,
let me add something. There is a candidate for Papillion
mayor that is actually going to be on our show
next week to talk about that. And so I think
that that, of course, Papillion is important, and they are
growing by leaps and bounds. And when a surrounding community
or city does well, you know, we all do well.
(40:41):
It's it's in our area here, and we want Papillion
to do well. So, yeah, that race is coming up,
and they obviously are in the primary two, and we're
going to have one of those candidates be on our
show next week and I'm going to ask them a
lot about papillion, because I think that's interesting to everybody.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
That's very important.
Speaker 5 (41:01):
And next Monday, I'm not going to announce it today,
we said we talk about it tomorrow, but we have
a very very special guest coming on Monday.
Speaker 1 (41:09):
Monday is going to do the whole show with me,
a really special guest, and you're gonna love it. So
you got to listen in Monday. But thank you so
much for being with us today. Thanks for listening, and
we'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
See you guys tomorrow,
Anything goes with us. And I don't think I'm on
fire today. I think I'm a little wet today. It's
raining out there. Peyton is with us today. Good morning Peyton,
Good morning Geene. It's wet outside and it's cold in here.
I know it's freezing in here, but I'm not going
to complain. You know, my office at City Hall, it
was either really hot or really cold, and I would
much rather have it cold any day than it'd be
a too warm here. Probably this place will be warm,
(00:22):
too warm tomorrow. But my fingertips are numb today. But
you know what we want to again, We want to
hear from you, whether it's city, state, national, the world.
Of course, the streetcar is always up for discussion, and
you're going to hear plenty of opinions from me. It's
your chance to speak up and sound off. You can
send your emails today to comment at kfab dot com,
(00:43):
or you can call us at four oh two five five,
eight eleven ten. I have a special guest this morning,
and I think people are going to be very interested.
Jason Lanaha is in here, who is president and CEO
of Lantahai Real Estate.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Good morning, Good morning, Geene. How are you?
Speaker 1 (00:58):
I am, I am just great. Jason's been in this
studio before. I know you've done Grow Omaha show before.
But you know, I just wanted to start out because
I think everyone that has lived in Omaha for any
period of time recognizes the Lanaha name, and I think
they think automatically the nursery. And that was started way back,
probably nineteen seventy four, I believe what I read by
(01:21):
your dad, Dave. And it started out with ten acres
of land that he purchased at about one hundred and ninety
second Center. Now I read he owns over and manages
over seven hundred acres for his nursery.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
I believe it. Yeah, that is that is a big operation.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
That is pretty amazing. And then because I said, most
people think about the nursery, but I don't think a
lot of people really know as much about Lanaha real
estate as they do about the nurseries. And you are
the president and CEO. This was established in nineteen eighty eight.
It's corporate, commercial, mixed use, residential. You do just about everything,
(02:01):
don't you.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
I don't know if that's good or bad.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Well, yes, and you know what I read your web
page yesterday, and it says we dream big and we
work hard to create better cities for our clients, partners, stakeholders,
and our community. Wow, you can't do much better than that.
That's a pretty good mission statement right there. But let's
just start out and talk a little bit. You know,
(02:23):
there were some they're not small, but there were some
smaller projects than the ones I want to talk about today,
and I primarily want to talk about three today. I
want to talk about the Mutual of Omaha Tower, which
you are the developer for downtown, which is approaching its
final heights. I want to talk about Heartwood Preserve. Everybody
(02:45):
wants to know about that, and that is the big
development that Applied Underwriters is doing, which is the old
boys Town property at about one hundred and forty fourth
in Dodge. And then another site that everybody is curious about.
And even when I was still mayor, I got a
lot of calls about is the old Mutual site at
Midtown and you're the developer for that too. So just
(03:06):
go back in time a little bit. The development Hawthorn, Yeah,
out on H Street about one hundred and eighty I
think Q across to Millard West. That was a land
of hot project, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:18):
There are quite a few projects out west. And and
I'll dip into the history really quick. So when my
father started the nursery business, he grew all of his
own trees, which required a lot of land. And then
eventually the city, as we all knew, grew west. And
there's a better use for some of that land than
more productive use than trees. And so the trees kept
(03:38):
moving further west, and my father got into single family development.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
So like the Hawthorn neighborhood bay would, there are a
bunch of them out there.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
The sanctuary, the sanctuary, yep? Is that what you did
or your dad?
Speaker 2 (03:49):
We both worked on that one, okay.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
But and then just as we have progressed, it's gone
from single family to some commercial to now we're dipping
our toes in a few towers.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
It's great. I know your name is around and these
developments that I mentioned, these are major developments going on
in Omaha right now. So let's start out with the tower,
the Mutual of Omaha Tower downtown. It is approaching, as
I said, it's final height, which is, if I recall
about six hundred and seventy seven.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Feet, that's exactly right. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
See, I remember that, and it will absolutely redefine Omaha
Skyline in the future. And I remember all the early
conversations about them building a new headquarters, making it look
like a campus. Where would it be, should it go
out west? Where should it go? And I know everybody
around the table thought a corporate headquarter building for Mutual
(04:42):
of Omaha belongs right downtown, and so that's where it is.
We had a lot of negotiating with that because I
thought that the best site for that would be where
the Dale Clark was, and we did a bit of
a landswap there. The city built another downtown library and
then demo the Dale Clark. So you take it from
(05:03):
there and tell us about the tower, tell us about
when it will be done, tell us some of the
features about it too, because it is quite amazing.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Yeah sure, so, yeah, a little bit of history.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
I mean, we started working on this thing in twenty
twenty one, and these things take a while. And this
is a perfect example of kind of that ven diagram
of city government leadership, corporate government leadership, and private development
coming together for a shared vision that most importantly serves Mutual.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Bomhont its associates. That's the number one goal.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
It's got to serve that and help their growth and
talent attraction, et cetera. But it also means a lot
for the city. And we all talked about you know,
you can't name a single healthy city.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
In the United States that has a decaying urban core.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
And so I know we have all worked for so
long together and so many people to protect urban core
gets us into the street car all these other things
it does.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
And I'm still the biggest cheer leader.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, well I'm right behind you.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
So but yeah, and so the building six hundred and
seventy seven feet tall. It's really one of the first
major post COVID towers.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
In the country.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
And so the whole building's redesigned how you know, mutual
desires to work in the future, and so with it
is a really flexible.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Workspace and amazing amenities.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
You have exercise facilities, six restaurant concepts, outdoor garden areas
where they kind of meetings.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
It's just it's a really special place.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Well, you know, a lot of people ask me, they said,
will Mutual of Omaha fill up that building? Because so
many people now are working from home and Mutual of
Omaha has four thousand employees in the city of Omaha.
Now they're not all at work at one time. But
talk a little bit about that, about building this huge
skyscraper when a lot of people are still working remotely.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Yeah, sure, so you know the main messaging.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I don't want to get in front of Mutual of
Omaha on that, but here are a few facts.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Well, you said flexible workspaces, and that's where I want it.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
And so yeah, you know, Mutual Oomha's coming out of
somewhere in the ballpark of one point three million square
feet and the towers by eight hundred thousand square feet,
So it's it's and it's assigned to the same number
of people. So it's just a lot more efficient. So
it's actually quite a bit less space than they're currently in.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Yes, and that that's what I think is important. It's
less space than they currently have at Midtown. But it's
just going straight up. I remembered I was there for
the groundbreaking and I remember talking to the architects. Yeah,
and those are the same architects that designed the skyscraper
in Oklahoma City. I can't remember the name of the building, yes,
(07:50):
And I remember saying to them I can't imagine what
it would be like to design a skyscraper. And I
remember they looked at me and they go, oh, it's
so much fun. And I thought, I guess, if that's
what you do for a living, is design skyscrapers, this
one would be really fun and it will be the
tallest building downtown.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Oh yeah, absolutely, Okay.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
And I think that that's something that's that you weren't
trying to achieve, but you did achieve it.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
No, once again, you know, the guiding light on this
is what is good for a client. And the size
ended up being what it is because of the space,
programming and understanding how the various departments want to work.
It wasn't designing a building and then putting people inside.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
It was the other way around.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
And forty four stories.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
It's forty four stories. You know, it's a little deceiving
because our floor to floors are very high. They're atypical,
so they're fifteen feet, which is great, makes more natural light.
The top floor forty four is actually a double floor height,
so I guess the roofline's more like forty.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Five and the top floor is like it's like two floors.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
Isn't it is, Yeah, it is. It's beautiful. It's about
thirty feet tall.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
Boardrooms up there and to the other associates as well
to use during the day, and you can imagine the
views are pretty nice.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
Unbelievable. And that crane, my gosh. I used to look
at that crane from my window at City Hall. But
it's the building itself six hundred and seventy seven feet tall.
The crane can go up seven hundred and fifty feet.
I mean, that's it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
Yeah, you know, it's pretty cool to watch too, because
those cranes build themselves up and take themselves down.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
It's pretty interesting.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
I know, it's amazing to watch them. I can't I
can't imagine being a crane operator. It's it's unbelievable, big toy,
I know, I guess it is. And with all the
windstorms and things we have, I think, oh geez, what's
going to happen to that crane and it still is standing.
So the one thing I did want to bring up
to is seventy three percent of the dollars spent were
(09:46):
with local folks.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
That's one hundred percent, right.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
And I think that's really important that you guys can
bring out too that this building downtown resulted in a
lot of jobs and a lot of employment and a
lot of businesses getting doing very very well because of
this building. The other thing is is the first fourteen
floors is parking, and the city has purchased that garage, correct,
(10:11):
So I think that's important for people to know that
that was built with the building, designed with the building,
but the City of Omaha purchased the garage. They will
own and operate it. So it can be used obviously
for mutual employees, but it also can be used in
the evenings and weekends for events downtown.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
That's exactly it. So it accomplishes two purposes.
Speaker 3 (10:29):
One, it provides parking for a large headquarters during the
day during business hours, and then it opens up in
the evening for folks coming down to the park or
whatever else is going on downtown.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
And you know, the City of Omaha does build and
operate a lot of garages because then we can we
cash flow them. You know, they pay for themselves. You
build them with bonds, and then they cash flow because
people pay to park in them, and they cash flow
and that's how we pay for them.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
And you know, another interesting thing about the street car,
and I know, I'm sure we'll get into that, but
the streetcar also connects all of these.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Assets, yesslutely does. And I and we've had a lot
of calls on this show about the streetcar, and I
know there's still people that are very skeptical, are totally
against it. But you, as a developer and other developers
along the streetcar corder, you do realize how this will
connect all those things to bring people in around and
(11:19):
out of downtown without having to worry about surface parking
and taking up space that could be businesses and employment
for parking.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
It's exactly it. I mean, we need density.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
We have I think I heard you mentioned yesterday is
a fifty five hundred lane miles yes, which is great.
I mean we're growing and there's there's parts of the
cities that you know are less dense and it's appropriate
for suburban setups. But the reality is the more density
we can put on top of the same infrastructure.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
The better it is.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
If we want to lower taxes, we want to do
all these things. We want to have improved roads. You know,
people talk about potholes, all these things. We need people
and more tax payers on more of them in every
mile than less of them, right, and that the density
of the street car, all these things, that's that's how
we accomplish that, and that's good for everybody.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
In the city.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
And that's how you broaden your tax base exactly. I mean,
if you want lower taxes, and you want lower taxes
for everybody in Omaha all the way out to the
Elkhorn River, you broaden your tax base. And this is
one way that we do it. Excuse me, Peyton has
my cough button over there, and I'm still sound a
little gravelly this morning. One other thing I wanted to
(12:29):
bring up is right now in downtown half is dedicated
to parking, and at any given time half is vacant.
Can you imagine bringing four thousand mutual of Omaha employees
downtown in trying to cover most of downtown with surface parking.
You just can't do that. And the street car is
going to enable, which we're going to get to next
Midtown crossing to some of the employees can park at
(12:52):
Midtown and one of the three garages that are at
Midtown because the city is purchasing those garages, park there
for a low fee. Jump on the street car, take
it downtown too, mutual of Omaha or any other business downtown,
and that's the great benefit for it. So let's jump
to Midtown. So many people have asked me, what is
going to happen to Midtown? Are those buildings gonna just
(13:14):
sit there and be vacant? And you are the developer
of Midtown and I know there's probably not everything you
could reveal about your development plan, but hopefully you could
tell us a lot about it. I think you already
have a name for that, and that's Midtown Forward, yep.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
And that's more of an effort than a name for
an area.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
But you're master planning everything, So tell us what you
can tell us.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
Yeah, sure, So a couple things. One, as we back up,
this is a a higher view of what's important for
our city. We can do developments anywhere, but there's certain
areas that our opportunities actually grow our city. And when
I say that, I mean actually bring new jobs, a
(13:59):
new company into our city. And so that at a baseline,
that is what we want to do on that campus.
And we've been working a lot to set the foundation
for that to where we can actually go out around
the country and say why Omaha here's why move your
people here. And it's not just the new jobs coming,
but it's also we have these wonderful institutions, the Med Center, Creighton.
(14:21):
We want to keep those people here. They don't need
to leave to grow their business. They can stay here
and grow their business. And so that's the baseline. If
there's one place in the city, in my opinion, we
can really grow, it's that area. And it's because the
parking's in place, the street cars connecting it. You have,
i believe, our largest employer at one end of the
(14:42):
streetcar line.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Which we need to get it to the right.
Speaker 3 (14:45):
And you're going to come down to the convention Center
and hopefully the airport someday and you don't have to
squint very hard to see that vision someday of what
it can be. And so at a baseline, that's what
we want to accomplish there.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
And we're talking from I eighty to thirty six Street.
That's a big swath of land right there in an
urban setting. Yeah, you don't find that too.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
Often, and that's the reason.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
If we piecemeal it, it can still be nice, but
it won't be transformational. And so we're gonna try the
hard way and actually build stuff that matters, that brings jobs,
that broads that tax space.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
So that includes several parking lots, surface lots. It includes
the three parking garages that the city has purchased now
and the existing two mutual buildings, the North Building in
the South building. Can you explain a little or tell
us a little about are those buildings gonna stay?
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Yeah, So the short version is, yes, those buildings are
going to stay once again back to what we deem
to be our civic duty. The current mutual headquarters between
Dodge and Farnham. It's just it's an important building for
a city. It'd be ashamed to tear it down. And
with that though, it's a very outdated building. And so
we are actually going through that right now. What uses
(15:57):
can we put in that. We're building our underwriting model
and so we're hoping to announce something on that soon. Okay, good, Yeah,
And so that building will stay. The South Building on
the south side of Farnham is a wonderful building that
will always stay.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
That's a useful office building.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
It has such an I like the look, it has
such an art deco look to me.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
Yep, it's a good building. It's a very functional building.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
The original headquarters started and I want to say as
nineteen ten, it's been added on four times, technically five.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
The tower pieces.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
Built in two and so with that you just get
these huge cores. It's hard to get sunlight to the middle.
And so that's the challenge of how do we reutilize
that put more bodies in the area. And so we
have some pretty good ideas and some good momentum on that.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
So when do you think you might be announcing something
that'll be happening there?
Speaker 2 (16:47):
Yeah, for sure this year.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
Okay, good, good, Yeah, that'll be great because I know
people were really worried about is that going to be
just vacant there? Because Mutual of Omaha is midtown and
so now I think, knowing that both of those buildings
will remain, they were going to be redeveloped, that whole
area is going to be redeveloped. But once again, I
have to emphasize, and I know you agree with me,
(17:10):
it's very rare to have such a swath of land,
an urban land, near public transportation. So the streetcar really
comes into play in redeveloping this area and making it
something major.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
Well, to be clear, this would not be happening in
the way that it has potentially happened without the street car.
And once again I understand, thank you, Jason, and you
did not pay me five bucks to say that.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I'm not kicking I mean, but it's very true.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
And I'm very like, extremely confident that when this is
up and running, I think everyone's going to see it
and go oh wow, that makes a lot of sense. Yes,
and we've seen it in places like Kansas City. I
believe that's already been extended or in the.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
Press extent standing it north and south. Yeah, because it's
so popular there. Now we only have about a few
minutes left. But I have to get to Heartwood Preserve
because Heartwood is the old the development at the old
Boys Town property about one hundred and forty fourth in
Dodge between Dodge and Pacific, And I want you to
you are the developer of that area. And I'm out
(18:16):
there at least three times a week because I love
Charleston's and I like that Starbucks out there too. But
this is residential, it's mixed use, it's pedestrian friendly. They're
senior living. Boy, I just want you to talk about
what's happening there and if you could give it. The
middle is called the row, and I want you to
People are saying what's going to be in there? What's
(18:37):
going to be in there? So whatever you can tell us. Now,
it started out with Valmont's headquarters. Are there. That Carson
Group has that huge building that's you could see on Dodge.
There's one that I keep on texting you saying what's
happening here? That's all glass and has a parking garage.
And that's that's Olsen, I believe. Okay, So just if
(18:57):
you can go through and talk to us a little
bit about what's happening out at Heartwood Preserve.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
Yeah, so first I want to make sure I'm clear.
So Applied underwriters and Jeff Silver and Steve Menzie's had
the vision for let's call it the five hundred acres
right south of Pacific all the way have to die.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
And I know both of them well and what great
people they are.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
They've been very good stewards of the Katy. It's once
again it's easy to do easy things. It's hard to
do hard things, obviously, and they're doing it the right way.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
And so we're fortunate My company, Landaha is fortunate.
Speaker 3 (19:29):
To be able to develop what's called the Row, which
is the downtown of Heartwood Preserve. We hope to make
it the downtown of West Omahawk. So what's happening there now.
Our first one hundred and fifteen thousand square foot building
is wrapping up right now, and once again, Olson, a
great Nebraska growing company, is the anchor tenant.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
First parking structures up.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
We will be breaking ground here in a couple months
on a wonderful hotel, so four star Marriotte autograph hotel
called the Elowin and that will.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Be in the middle in the Row area, that is
right next.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
To the the building where Olson's going into and they'll
share that same parking structure, so that would be a
six floor hotel, super high end. We're pretty confident we
can get the highest rates in Omaha actually there, and
that's that's our goal. There a lot of businesses out
in West Omaha and they don't have a place to stay,
so we have that. We're going to be breaking ground
later this year in the first multi family building as well,
(20:20):
once again very urban in the second parking structure will
also break around this year.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Okay, what about that. There's a huge amount of parkments
that Broadmoor is doing right north of Millard North.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yes, exactly. Okay, they have a huge number of.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Okay, and are those anywhere near opening?
Speaker 3 (20:38):
I don't know that answer, I have to you, Okay.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
So I mean all of that is really good news.
I know people are really excited about it, and they
want to know everybody when there's a new development, they
want to know what's going to be there, what stores
are going to be there. Is there going to be
retail out there?
Speaker 4 (20:56):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Yeah, there's a lot of retail. And this is the
idea of these these parking structures. They're shared parking structures.
So in theory, the office folks that there during the
day and the retail folks come at night. So and
that is how it has to work. And so we
have intentionally focused on bringing the office there first.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
That brings all the population in the folks, and I
hope in the next i'd say ninety days, sixty to
ninety days, we'll be able to announce it. Another pretty
attractive headquarters out there as well, one hundred and fifty
thousand square foot Class A office building.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
So there's a lot going on and yet a lot
still to come.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
You got that right, Okay.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Now, the last thing I got to ask you because
people want to know, what is that enormous building that
is on the south side of Pacific right across across
from Millard North, And that is Applied Headquarters.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
That is Applied Underwriters new headquarters. And it is a
spectacular building.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
And I was in there long, long, long time ago
and I did a virtual tour once of it, and
it is it is amazing. But that is their headquarter
building right now. They are they have a presence in Omaha,
lots of employees in Omaha, but their headquarters is in
south of San Francisco.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Correct. Their headquarters is now in New York City.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Okay, in New York City, but the.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
Vast majority of their employees, as I understand it, are
here in Omaha.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Yes, And then do you have any idea that you
could tell us when that is due to be open?
Speaker 3 (22:20):
I believe in talking with Jeff Silver, I believe it's
opening up later this year.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
Okay. Yeah, yeah, I heard the fall, but I just
didn't know if you had any updates.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
I don't have any insight, but stay tuned.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
There's more coming.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
They're just finishing out the insides of it, and once
again we're going to be bringing thousands of employees out
to Hertwood, Okay, and they're a big part of that.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
All right, Well, boy, I could sit and talk to
you another hour or so. You are a busy man
with the Tower, Mutual of Omaha Tower, downtown, redeveloping a
midtown where Mutual is, and doing Heartwood Preserve, plus a
lot of other developments. Jason Lanaha, thank you so much
for being here today.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
I appreciate it. I really enjoyed it, and it's always
good to see you.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Good to see you too, and I'll have to meet
you out at Charleston sometimes trying to schedule that for
a while, I know, because I want to know all
sorts of things that are going to happen out there.
But it's what a great development that is. So thank
you for being with us, and I know Peyton's telling
me get going. Woman. Thank you again to Jason Lanaha.
I could have kept him on another hour talking about
what's going in at Heartwood Preserve. I know everybody is
(23:22):
quite interested in that, and of course the old Mutual
side at midtime of about what's going on in there,
and I think he reassured us that those two old
buildings are going to remain there. So and today, guess what.
The ballots for the primary are now available. I got
mine yesterday in the mail. I like to vote by mail.
My husband is one of those that loves to vote
(23:44):
in person to go on election day. But when I
was mayor for twelve years, I thought if something I
get really busy and I can't make it and I
don't get the chance to vote, I would just die.
So I love it and I love to be able
to look at the ballot for a while. But the
one thing I really want to say again to everybody
listening is how important it is to vote in this election.
(24:06):
A lot of people think these midterm elections aren't as important.
The election is May twelfth, but there is a lot
of people a lot of really really important seats that
are on the ballot now, from US Senate to the
governor to the second congressional district, secretary of State, attorney general.
(24:27):
There are a lot of very very important positions that
are on the ballot now. And a lot of people
will tell me I don't vote in the primary, just
vote in the general. Primaries are so important too. Because
you know, you got to get two people through the primary,
and the voter turnout typically has been very, very poor
(24:49):
in Omaha and in Douglas County. And if you want
the voice of the people to be heard, and that's
what elections are all about, then people have to have
their voice be heard and they have to go out
and vote vote otherwise. You know, I go back to
my election, not are my defeat the last time and
the voter turnout was about twenty eight percent in Omaha.
(25:10):
Now is that letting the voice of the people be heard?
And so I just really encourage people to get out
there and vote, whether you do it in person, ask
for an absentee ballot. We make it as easy as
we possibly can.
Speaker 5 (25:22):
What is the importance of these statewide and even local elections?
Does it mean more for a constituent when they're voting
for these local positions.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Well, you know, they call them the down ballot different positions,
but they aren't really important. I mean, when you talk
about maybe the Nebraska Public Service Commission, or you talk
about Douglas County Board, Douglas County treasure Douglas County District
Court clerk, you may not think that these are as important,
(25:52):
but they absolutely are because this is how Douglas County,
the county that you live in, and this is how
the city of Omaha, this is how well this is
who is going to be leading and running the city
and the county, and this is why these are important
and so to me, they they may not seem as
important as the governor or the US Senate, but they
(26:15):
really are. And we got to get out there and
we've got to vote learning community for example. A lot
of people don't even know what learning community is, but
it's still important. And let your voice be heard and
study these issues too. I think the mail in ballot
gives you the opportunity that you can you can look
up who these candidates are and you can study who
they are and what they stand for. And we're going
(26:36):
to try to have some candidates on this show too.
Typically we don't have a whole bunch of candidates just
to come on and do their speeches. But at the
same time, if they if they're saying that they're going
to accomplish something special, I'd like them to come on
and say, how are you going to accomplish that? You know,
if somebody running for the legislature is saying I'm going
to lower your taxes that I would like them to
(26:57):
come on and say how exactly are you going to law? Yeah,
let's do that. So you know, we're going to have
some of the candidates on the show so that we
could have a good conversation with them.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
Steve on the phone lines at four zero, two, five, five, eight,
eleven ten has something to add to this conversation, Steve,
You're live with Jean Stauthart here on the KFAB comment line.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
Good morning, Hello, hello Steve here. I agree it's important
to vote in the primary, and it sounds like twenty
eight percent is not a great represented representation in our
federal elections. It's been below fifty percent sometimes of eligible
voters that actually vote yes. But as a counter example,
I would give myself as a counter example, I flung
(27:36):
Republican voted view for every election except for the last one,
and it came down to the street issue.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
Street or street street cars?
Speaker 4 (27:45):
Would you like to hear.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Were you talking about the street or the street car?
Speaker 4 (27:53):
The streets? I live in Skyline Ranches. We were acquired
annexed against will and told we'd have the same or
better services for the same or lower taxes. The street
in front of our house was due to be repaved.
It's blacktop that needs to be repaved retopped every five
to seven years, and it was due to be retopped
(28:13):
that very next summer. And you were not in office
at that time, but your predecessor was and said, since
they took over, they unscheduled the repair and the maintenance,
and they continued to I continue to call every year,
and they continued to defer it every year. They've now
deferred that overde maintenance fifteen years. The streets continually deteriorated,
to the point that parts of the street wash off
(28:34):
into my driveway and into my yard every time it rains.
And so, just as you would neglect your body if
you didn't never ate proper food, and just as if
your car would quit working if you'd never changed oil
or maintained it, the street has not been maintained. It's
been neglected, and it's been forced into the deteriorating condition.
And yet I pay the same streets. I just went
(28:55):
into chat GPT and said, are there any cities in
the United States where residents are required to pay for
their own street repairs? So the city tells us we'd
have to pay for our own repairs, and that was
never the case before we're annexed, and it said no.
There are a few exceptions that Omahona Brass is one
of them. So it's a huge outlier to live in
what's supposed to be a great city and yet your
street is neglected and you paid taxes sports b repair
(29:17):
and it's not repair. There was a huge bond issue,
as you talked about yesterday, and one of the top
neighborhoods listened with Skyline Ranches, and this was going to
address The money came in, it got spent on adjacent
neighborhoods and other neighborhoods and didn't touch ours except for
one street. And we continue to suffer for that. And
that's why there's a law suit going on right now.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
I appreciate your call, and you know you are aware
there was a lawsuit. Did the Skyline Ranch people filed
a lawsuit against the city with that the city prevailed,
They did appeal it, the city prevailed again. But it
is not true and it is not accurate that I
said that if you want your streets repair, you have
to pay for him yourself. Even the current Mayor John
(29:55):
Ewing had a TV commercial during the campaign that says
Mayor Stouther says, if you want your streets repaired, you
have to do it yourself, and that is not really
true at all. What I did is when I became mayor,
it used to be that these unimproved streets, which were
not only in Elcorn but all around the West Side
area that did not have storm drains, curbs, gutters, sidewalks,
(30:17):
that if they wanted them repaired, you had to pay
one hundred percent the homeowners. The cities were concentrating on
the mains and the secondaries. What I did is I
got a group of citizens together. They met for about
a year and they are the ones that came up
with a plan that the city council approved, and that
was establishing a plan for road maintenance district In street
(30:38):
improvement districts, one would be concrete with storm drains, curbs, sewers,
et cetera. And the other one would just be an
asphalt overlay. Since then, there has been probably over a dozen,
if not more, neighborhoods that have taken part in that,
and what it became is basically a fifty to fifty split.
(30:59):
The city would come out and engineer it. The city
would pay for it half of it, and then the
homeowners that their property abutted on the area being rehabilitated
would pay for half and they would be assessed for
a period of fifteen years or so, or they could
pay for it upfront. So it isn't that you have
to pay for all of it yourself. The issue that
I had is this was agreed on by the city
(31:21):
council and a lot of neighborhoods have already taken part
in it. So what I did is I said, well,
the issue with Elcorn in a long skyline. True, it
was annex during the Faihi administration. I understood that there
had been legal cases and the city prevailed on those.
But I said, I don't think we could just come
in and rehabilitate the streets along Skyline. It would have
(31:45):
to be every street in Elcorn that the City of
Omaha annexed. It couldn't just be this street or that street.
We'd have to do all of it. And I asked
public Works. I said, give me a number, give me
a cost. It would cost the City of Omaha to
rehabilitate every street out in Elcorn that was annexed and
the cost was about five hundred million, and it was
(32:09):
just it was cost prohibitive, you know. I said that
we passed that bond issue of two hundred million back
in May of twenty twenty. It was reauthorized in November
of twenty four for basically another two hundred million. But
they are What the Public Works Department does is they
prioritize which streets that they're going to come in and
(32:29):
rehabilitate the problem with those areas, especially in the West
Side area that has already partaken in our street maintenance
District road improvement district policy that has been in place
now for about ten years. What would we do if
we went out there and just did Elkhorn's and said, okay,
with Elkhorn, you don't have to pay all these other
(32:50):
people did. Would we have to go back and refund
their money to them that they've already are paying fifty percent?
It becomes a matter of fairness to and so so
I know the frustration out there. I know people told
me they said, we're not going to vote for you
anymore with Elcorn. I know the current mayor, Mayor Ewing
made a lot of what I would consider promises. I
(33:13):
know since he was elected mayor, he has come back
to the folks out there along Skyline and said, Nope,
we're not going to do it. We're not going to
come out here and do it, which was a campaign
promise he made, and now he's saying, nope. You know what,
the position that I had was accurate, and we're not
going to come out there and do the streets and
pay for them one hundred percent. It would result in
(33:33):
a tax increase, a quite large tax increase for the
City of Omaha if we were to do all of
Elcorn Street at no cost whatsoever. So understand the frustration
because it was treated very differently when it was Elcorn.
I am not aware of anything Mayor Fayhi said when
it was being annexed. I mean, I would have to
(33:54):
go back in search and history what I was told.
Promises were made, but we could not find anywhere in
writing that it guaranteed those folks out there that the
city would do it at no cost to them. So
I understand the frustrations. But as we go back where
we are now, I know Mary Ewing has now come
back and said we will keep up with our street
(34:16):
Maintenance District road improvement district plan that we've had in place.
We will do it, We'll engineer it, will do it.
It'll be about a fifty to fifty split. And keep
in mind too, with that plan in high poverty areas,
which there are more in the eastern northeastern portion of
our city in high poverty areas, if over half of
the property owned owners sign up for this, then they
(34:37):
will do it at one hundred percent in those areas
because they are high poverty. Steve, I didn't mean to
cut you off for filibuster you here, but we've got
to move on to some other issues. But I do
want to just say again, is you know that issue
out in Elcorn along Skyline Drive. Understand it looked into it. Yeah,
So I did have a committee of citizens that met
(34:59):
for about a year. They came up with the recommendations
for the street improvement or the road maintenance district. It
went to the city council. City council approved it. Any
changes in that policy the city council would have to
approve too. And I even brought that back to the
city council and had Brinker Harding, who is the city
council member out in that area, discuss it with it,
(35:21):
and the city council members who have had a lot
of citizens in their district already take part in that said, no,
that's not fair just to do one area of Omaha
at one hundred percent. Keep in mind too, that your
current mayor is not going to do it either. Your
current mayor, although there were promises made during his campaign
about the streets in Elkhorn, he is keeping with that
(35:42):
current policy that was established when I was mayor. Now
another thing, since we're talking about Rhodes, we did have
a caller yesterday I wanted to follow up on and
just in case she's listening again, but she brought up
Maple Street being in bad shape, and then she brought
up and it's in bad shape, but she's seeing bike
lanes being put in, and why are we putting in
(36:03):
bike lanes when the street is deteriorating? And you know,
I always tell everybody if if I could get some
more information or if I forgot to say something, I'll
certainly come back and address it again. And this is
one of those those issues because what I didn't mention
and I should have, and I apologize for this is
Maple is a state highway. Maple is a state highway
in Omaha. It is just like L Street, Dodge Street.
(36:28):
These are all state roads within the city of Omaha.
Maple is not in the best condition, but there are
no current plans for rehabilitation with Maple because that would
be done by the Nebraska Department of Transportation. The DOT
does the state roads in Omaha. We provide the maintenance,
(36:48):
so we fill potholes, we will plow it. But if
that street, Maple is to be rehabilitated, that would come
from the state DOT. And right now there is no
current plans rehabilitation of Maple Street. Dodge needs works too,
and like I said, so does L Street. And if
the state gets that on their list, it's basically the
(37:11):
state funds it with a local match, with some type
of a local match. But right now there is no
plans for construction. Unfortunately on Maple Street. There are no
bike lanes on Maple either that I'm aware of. But
they did, and I think this is what she mentioned.
The caller do a road configuration on one hundred and
eighth Street north of West Maple to Fort and they
(37:33):
did add bike lanes on one hundred and eighth and
that was a Vision zero project, So she did bring
that up. But I just wanted to make sure you
knew that maple for the condition that it is. It
is a state highway and the state has no current
plans for rehabilitation. I think that's important to know.
Speaker 5 (37:48):
Gene takes all these questions very seriously. She has about
eighteen notepads over there. I think she's went through two
pens already this morning. So I take a lot of
all of this is very very important to her, and
we just these questions. She goes and asks the person
that she has best in mind to answer that.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
Well, I really want to make sure if I'm providing
information which I want to, that I'm providing the most
accurate information I can. And you know, I will always
say if I could add more, if I forgot something,
I'll always come back and add it, because I want
you to have the most current information I could possibly
give you.
Speaker 5 (38:22):
As we wrap up the show today, Gene, I have
kind of a fun question for you here, and this
is coming from David. David asked you a question here.
Why doesn't Omaha have an amusement park? I miss pa
Andy Park and Funplex is just too small. Why can't
Omaha have a big theme park? What are the first
steps to making something like this happen? And then David
(38:45):
used College World Series how that would be an absolute
cash cow during the CWS.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
You know, I think it's all a man a matter
of priorities and money. You know, people bring me the money,
people like when the caller the other day brought up
the baseball fields in the softball fields. It's all a
matter of the need is the need? There is there
a need for an amusement park? I mean, does the
vast majority of voters in Omaha and taxpayers think we
(39:12):
need an amusement park? And if so, how do we
pay for it? Because every election, you know, the number
one issue in the state and the number one issue
in the City of Omaha is we want lower taxes.
We want you to cut your spending and we want
lower taxes. At the same time, we want more and
we want better services and we want the roads done.
(39:32):
So it's really it is a difficult thing to manage
a city budget. You know, the city's general fund is
over five hundred million dollars and it's it's all paid
for with tax dollars, property taxes, restaurant tax, sales tax,
and it's all a matter of juggling those. So if
there are things that people really want and and a
(39:54):
lot of people want them, then it's always a consideration.
But it's always a matter of how are we going
to lower our spending, lower taxes and still fund more
things on the backs of the taxpayers.
Speaker 5 (40:09):
We got about two minutes here, Jean, Just a quick thought,
this is coming from Ken Jean left off the important
election of Papillion mayor. Papillion in Starpy County is critical
to Nebraska's future growth.
Speaker 1 (40:20):
I agree. Just yeah, a little tech and you know what,
let me add something. There is a candidate for Papillion
mayor that is actually going to be on our show
next week to talk about that. And so I think
that that, of course, Papillion is important, and they are
growing by leaps and bounds. And when a surrounding community
or city does well, you know, we all do well.
(40:41):
It's it's in our area here, and we want Papillion
to do well. So, yeah, that race is coming up,
and they obviously are in the primary two, and we're
going to have one of those candidates be on our
show next week and I'm going to ask them a
lot about papillion, because I think that's interesting to everybody.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
That's very important.
Speaker 5 (41:01):
And next Monday, I'm not going to announce it today,
we said we talk about it tomorrow, but we have
a very very special guest coming on Monday.
Speaker 1 (41:09):
Monday is going to do the whole show with me,
a really special guest, and you're gonna love it. So
you got to listen in Monday. But thank you so
much for being with us today. Thanks for listening, and
we'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
See you guys tomorrow,
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