State of the City Breakdown

Omaha Mayor John Ewing gave his first state of the city in office on Friday afternoon. Jean Stothert dissects his speech and takes calls.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I am your current host of the Comment Line that's
ten to eleven every day Monday through Friday, and we
really want to hear back from you. We want to
get your feedback, We want to get your comments, concerns, questions, complaints,
really anything goes, whether it's state, city, national, the world
and of course the street car and we will have
a lot of guests and plenty opinion for me. If

(00:22):
you want to call in, you can call us at
four two five five eight eleven ten, or you can
email us at comment at kfab dot com. You know, Peyton,
I was just listening to Rosie and Scott talk about
Mac talk about coach McDermott retiring, and I just got
to tell you one little story about them. Quite a
few years ago. There's a tradition at the Press Club

(00:46):
that you get your face on the barroom floor to
be honored. And there was a time that both Mac
and Doug McDermott together had their face in the barroom
floor and they asked me to roast them, and I did,
and I swear it was the first time in my
life that I looked small. Those are two tall glasses
a lotter right there. Yes, they really are and I'm
pretty tall. I mean I've always been close to six

(01:08):
feet tall that people that have never seen me in person,
I'm kind of shrinking now. I'm barely five foot ten.
I'm like the incredible shrinking woman. But those two guys
are big guys, and it was really fun roasting him.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
But I still have a couple of pictures of.

Speaker 1 (01:22):
Me and them, and I did look pretty tiny next
to them. The other thing is is Brian Kulkbrenner came
into my office along with Baylor Sireman, along with Father Hendrickson.
They brought me a basketball and he and Kolkbrenner am
I saying that right Kulkbrenner, It's the first time somebody

(01:42):
had to duck to get in the office, to get
in my office with I mean, he is really tall,
so tall, and he has giant hands too. I shook
his hands and he has no wonder he can palm
a basketball. But we have a lot to talk about today,
and I want to get started because Mayor John Ewing
gave his first Date of the City address on Friday.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
I listened to it.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
I gave twelve State of the City, and you know,
I'm going to talk about it. I'm going to talk
about some different parts of it, and I want to
hear your feedback and we'll open it up afterwards. Of course,
you can give us feedback on anything or ask questions
about anything, but i'd like to hear what you thought
about the state of the city. There was an article
in the World Herald about it. But I will say
this to start out with state of the cities are

(02:24):
supposed to be about the mayor's accomplishments, where we are
now and where we are going. And before I say
anything about the state of the city, I want to
say something about leadership. There's a lot of characteristics that
a leader needs to have, and I've talked about that
a lot over the past twelve years, and I think
one that is so important is integrity. I mean, everybody

(02:46):
wants their elected officials to be honest, and that's what
integrity really means. But of course we want our elected
officials to be honest, that's human nature. But honesty also
means not taking credit when credit is not do And
here's what I want to talk about today. Maryor Ewing
campaigned for five months, brutally criticized me and just about

(03:08):
everything that me and my administration were doing from roads
to police, affordable housing, parks to potholes and sinkholes. And
now it's business as usual and they're doing things just
as my administration was doing it.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
I will say this, I did not. I listened.

Speaker 1 (03:27):
I had a lot of people listening, and with the
exception of a few things, he talked about a few promotions,
a few new positions, some task forces and surveys. He
was doing a little bit about five million dollars to
the parks if the city could match it. Besides that,
I will be honest with the listeners, I did not

(03:49):
hear one new initiative that Mayor Ewing initiative initiated. Almost
everything he talked about was already underway, and it was
underway by what I did and what my administration did.
So let's talk about some of that and then let's
get some feedback. First of all, the parks. He brought
up that that is one of his big priorities this year,

(04:12):
and again I have always I want to start out
with saying my priorities were the same for twelve years.
Number One, my priority was public safety, and that is
government's number one responsibility is keeping the citizens safe. Second
was managing and creating, developing the city budget and keeping
taxes as low as we can. Third was economic development,

(04:33):
and the fourth was improving the taxpayer experience. So those
are mine. Marry Ewing's priorities are number one affordable housing,
then economic development, homelessness, parks, poverty elimination, plan risk and
resilience which is climate, and roads in infrastructure. So his
are quite different than mine. But if you notice that
public safety and keeping taxes low in city budget is

(04:57):
not one of the priorities, which is a concern parks.
It is a priority to him and it was to
me too. You have to keep in mind that when
COVID hit and we got all of the COVID money
from the federal government, I did put ten million additional
dollars into parks. I'd increased the park's budget when I

(05:19):
was mayor, and I worked with philanthropy a lot, which
he mentioned working with philanthropy, but I worked with them
a lot with our park system. The mayor mentioned some
improvements at Miller, Cunningham, Levi, Carter. Those three are in
North Omaha. All of those improvements were already underway, all

(05:41):
of them. Miller Park was Cunningham, it became under it's
a city park, but under private authority, not authority, but
private management in twenty nineteen.

Speaker 2 (05:54):
This has been going on since then.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
Levi Carter when he talked about a new facility there
and talked about what it is indoor and outdoor, that
was already under construction with my administration, Tranquility, he brought
up and talked about getting a lot of soccer and
doing soccer tournaments at Tranquility that was already underway. The
design was underway, the partnerships were developed, so those things

(06:20):
were already underway. I do He only mentioned Tranquility out west,
like I said, the rest were in North Omaha, But
say what about South Omaha? What about Manden Park? What
about Lynch Park? And talking about I am working with philanthropy,
he did mention that five million dollars was promised to
the City of Omaha by Philanthropy for the parks if

(06:42):
the city of Omaha could match it. So he didn't
go into saying will the City of Omaha match it?
But I have to remind people just look at the
Riverfront Parks. We were working with Philanthropy for years and
years and years with the Riverfront Parks. Four hundred million
of private money went into the Jean Lahi mal Heartland

(07:03):
of America Park in Lewis and Clark Landing. So this
is something we were doing. Look at the luminarium down
on the on the riverfront there on the landing. The
luminarium is totally privately funded on city city property. So
those are things that we already had underway. I want
to point that out, and I think that's important for

(07:25):
people to understand and to consider. When hearing what the
mayor was saying, I know that there was He did
say that we have more transformation potential than we ever have,
and it's more than plugging a maintenance hole.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
What does that mean?

Speaker 1 (07:43):
I have no idea, because again, when you talk about
these parks that he was talking about under construction, are
the plans these were already way underway. I will point
out with the parks, there is no park director right now.
I went through a national search. I hired a new
parks director, Matt Kalsovich. I thought he did a fantastic job.

(08:06):
Before that, I had hired Brooke Bench, who, by the way,
in twenty twenty went over to help manage and be
the executive director of the Lake Cunningham Development Trust. They
were great parks directors. But my parks director that after
I did a national search, was fired about four weeks

(08:26):
after Mary Ewing took office. They said he resigned, but
he was given the option to resign. They already did
one national search. Mary Ewing reported, we're going to do
a national search and we'll have a new parks director.
They already did a national search and they didn't pick anybody,
so they don't have a parks director as of yet.
One thing that I did commission and was already underway

(08:49):
is a new parks master Plan. And I think that
that was very, very important because we do have two
hundred and fifty six parks in the City of Omaha,
fifty six. Some are big, some are smaller, but that's
a lot of parks. And when we did the movement
to go forward with redoing our city master Plan, or

(09:11):
Mary Ewing addressed it as the comprehensive Plan, I asked
the Parks Department to also do a city Parks master Plan,
and that was underway and Matt Kalsafitch was doing that plan.
So I think that's important to point out. Two all
that was was already underway.

Speaker 2 (09:28):
Can I ask you a follow up here.

Speaker 3 (09:29):
I've gotten quite a few emails and phone calls since
we've had the comment line open about why hasn't there
been a new parks director? And people have given their example, Oh,
I live next to this park, and they're absolutely this
is happening. Do you need a parks director? How long
does it take? And is ten months now approaching with
no parks director? Is that an issue? Is that approaching
critical time?

Speaker 1 (09:50):
It definitely is an issue because we're heading towards summer,
We're heading towards when the swimming pool's open, when we
have all of the camps like Humble. Everybody wants Humble.
He does have an acting parks director, and that is
the same man that has been there a long time
that I had it as an acting parks director. But
you definitely need a parks director two hundred and fifty

(10:12):
six Parks in Omaha. He was developing the new park's
master plan. You need somebody that is in charge. You
need somebody that is going to do and develop the budget,
to manage the budget, to be able to prioritize where
the city is going. And I think it's vitally important
as we're coming into the summer. So it was announced

(10:32):
that we will be doing a national search and we
will have a new parks director. But I want to
remind people that this administration subtle, I mean I said subtle.
Ewing's administration already did one national search and didn't find somebody.
So it is really important that we move forward with
that with the parks. And obviously is what I said
about with using the Riverfront Parks as an example. We

(10:56):
have been working with philanthropy for years to and because
philanthropy thinks our parks and our park system are good.
So anyway, that's probably enough about the parks, except he
mentioned that there would be a consultant that would be hired,
and that also was initiated by my administration, that parks consultant.

(11:19):
I was already interviewed by it a year ago, by
the park's consultant, so that was already underway. So I
want to make sure people understand that now I want
to move up onto public safety. He didn't mention it
hardly at all. I mean, he didn't talk about where
we are as far as public safety crime statistics. These
are things people want to know. Public safety, Fire and

(11:42):
police are two thirds of our city budget. They are very,
very important. The one thing that he did say is
he said that we have a class going on now
of recruits. That we have more applicants than we have
had in years, and that is good. I mean, I
think that is great. But I think it's because of
the initiatives that we already had underway that I worked

(12:06):
with the police with and the chief with that was
approved by the city council over a year ago. And
the one thing that people need to be reminded of too,
is when we had this great decrease in the number
of applicants, it wasn't because of the mayor. It was
because of what was happening in twenty twenty. It was

(12:28):
George Floyd and it was COVID, and it happened all
over the country. Those that wanted to go into law
enforcement said, hey, forget it, don't want to do it.
Remember when we were having the protest here in Omaha
and the riots, and they were riots. When it turns
into violence and it turns into breaking the law, and
so I had to deal with that. So we have

(12:48):
been working to come up with new initiatives to make
it more attractive to be an Omaha police officer, and
I believe they're working so great, but that includes increased salary,
That includes increased entry level. My initiative was to make

(13:08):
sure that the Omaha Police Department was paid at least
five percent more than any law enforcement agency in Nebraska.
I did approve year round applications. Now that's okay, the
year round applications, but it really I think people think
that year round applications mean we will be having more
recruit classes or more academy classes, and it really doesn't

(13:31):
mean that at all, because it takes twenty two weeks
to go through the police Academy for regulars, ten weeks
for laterals. Those are already law enforcement in other agencies
in Nebraska. So all together, it takes about nine months
from the start of the academy for them to be
officers because then there's fifteen weeks of field training too.

(13:55):
So to say we will we have a lot more applicants,
and they had about nine hundred applicants for the January class,
which I'm thrilled with. But to say we will be
fully staffed by the end of the year, which was
said possible but really not probable because of the time
that it takes. We usually can't get in more than

(14:16):
two classes Academy of classes a year, and that's with
them being full as they can.

Speaker 4 (14:21):
Now.

Speaker 1 (14:21):
The January class started, they had forty one regulars in
that class. I think a few dropped out. They're about
down to thirty seven.

Speaker 4 (14:29):
Now.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
Right now we have eight hundred thirteen police officers. We
are budgeted for nine hundred and six, so right now,
that means we're still down ninety three. We get that
class done, that'll get us up to eight fifty. Okay,
keep in mind we're budgeted for nine oh six, but
we're going to have retirees too. We'll have retirees this summer.

(14:51):
That's going to bring us down again. And so you
got to understand that. It's kind of you know that
you have a class, you try to get them up
to full strength, but with retirees and resignations, it always
goes down again. So I am thrilled that there are
around nine hundred applicants. I think it's because of a
lot of the initiatives that we started. But to say

(15:14):
that we will be fully staffed by the end of
the year, we're probably going to have to go into
next year to do that the mayor did make a
statement to that the fire department will be fully staffed
the fire department, and it got a lot of applause.
The fire department has been fully staffed. In fact, the
last class that we had that I was responsible for,

(15:35):
we took into consideration the retirees that were going to
happen in the summer and we overstaffed them. So fire
has never really had a problem with applicants either it
was police. So to say that fire is full, it
will be fully staffed, like there has been something a
new initiative or something new done is kind of misleading
because we already have been fully staffed with fire. Once again,

(16:01):
I want to say these things were talked about, but
I think it's important to say don't take credit where
credit is not due. I'm thrilled with the results of
what's going on. But let's talk about a few other
things that he did mention. He did talk about homelessness,
and he talked about that he is going to take
a deeper, more holistic look at homelessness, and I will say,

(16:24):
so did we. I mean that was something when I
hired the first homeless service coordinator, I helped develop the
job description brought her on. She was so busy. We
let her hire an assistant, Kirk. They are doing a
fabulous job and they are out there in the community
working with our community outreach agencies all the time. The
last State of the City that I had, I featured

(16:48):
her and talked about what she was doing, and featured
a lot of the homeless outreach that we have presently
in Omaha. So that is something that again, if the
number of unshell altered or going down, I'm happy with that,
but I think it has a lot to do with
the initiatives that were already underway. Affordable housing is another

(17:10):
area that he brought up once again, We already had
the Planning Department create what we called a happ Plan HAAP,
and that's Housing Affordable Action Plan, and we already had that.
We already had that in place. We are already working
on ways that we can encourage more affordable housing. We

(17:31):
already had a great partner with Front Porch Development. He
did mention something that was different, and that was he
said he had secured forty million in streetcar bonds to
use towards affordable housing. But we had talked over and
over about with the streetcar. It was going to generate

(17:52):
enough revenue that there would be enough revenue in economic
development to not only pay for the construction of the
streetcar but also go to affordable housing. So this additional
forty that came in from Lows year, that's great that
they agreed to do that. That's kind of putting them
ahead of time. But to use streetcar bonds was already

(18:14):
part of the plan, and so you know, we're glad
that that is happening. We do need some more affordable housing,
but the amount that is going into it is is
minimal compared to what we really need.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
Did you have a question? You're looking at it like
you had a question.

Speaker 3 (18:31):
Is this is we're getting into a lot of good
things here. We're getting a couple of phone calls coming in.
I think we're going to head a break here, okay, and.

Speaker 1 (18:39):
Then I have just a couple more points they want
to take, and then I'd really like.

Speaker 2 (18:42):
To open it.

Speaker 3 (18:43):
What are some things? Give us some bullet points of
some things you're interested in talking about.

Speaker 1 (18:46):
Well, one thing I wanted to mention is this poverty
elimination plan he did bring up, and you know that
is state law. We had to have a plan for it.
Can you eliminate poverty? You cannot. I mean, it's nice
to have a plan, it's nice to have goals. But
some of the things he mentioned early childhood education increased, GEDs,
talked about high school students all vitally important. Because I'm

(19:10):
an old school board member for Millard, I understand how
important all that is. But should the City of Omaha
be involved in that and be talking about perhaps the
Omaha taxpayers paying for that when we have our school districts,
we have their elected boards. And if you look at
your taxes, folks, sixty two percent of your property taxes

(19:31):
goes to the schools. So is that something that the
City of Omaha should be engaged in or should we
just really work on good partnerships with the school districts
to see how we can help. And I really do
want to talk about Rose. I'm going to talk about
that a little bit more before we start taking calls.
I think there was a real missed opportunity not to

(19:52):
talk about LB eleven sixty five, and that is how
the city is our will respond to recent reports of
falling by as for is jobs and businesses, So those
are really really important too, and just lastly, real quickly,
he did bring up that he's going to have some interaction.

(20:13):
He wants to hear back from the citizens. So he's
going to have the chance for the Omahans to interact
and let them know their opinion. And he talked about
postcards and surveys. Keep in mind, what about town halls.
I did over seventy two town halls when I was mayor.
There's nothing better than having people just come in and

(20:33):
asking you questions. And also, if interaction with the citizens
is so important, why is the official city Facebook page
not allowing comments.

Speaker 3 (20:46):
This is the KFAB comment line with your host of
the show, Jean Stothard. My name is Peyton high Lock,
producer or the show, and Geen, I'm gonna ask you
one question here about the streetcar, and we'll let you
continue with your state of the city. This one comes
from Nancy and she had a question for you. She said,
my question has to do with the street car and
the Mutual of Omaha. Is it true that Mutual of

(21:08):
Omaha would leave the city if the streetcar did not
get underway?

Speaker 1 (21:13):
No, that was a rumor, But you know I started
talking to Mutual years ago about expanding their campus or
improving their campus, and they were looking at different areas
in Omaha. They were looking at their current campus whether
they needed to redo that, they were looking at areas
out west, they were looking all over. Now, Mutual of

(21:37):
Omaha could leave if they wanted, They could be anywhere
they're you know, a huge, huge, Fortune five hundred company.
But I felt very very strongly that a Fortune five
hundred company skyscraper belonged downtown to enhance our skyline. That's
where they were really needed. And so I did work

(21:57):
with them on securing that site where the deal Clark
Library was. We basically did a landswap because they were
going to build on the old U. They were looking
at building on the old UP site, which is that
vacant block that's across the street from Union Pacific now.
But I really felt like they needed to be there.
They would have a hard time Mutual of Omaha building

(22:18):
on a one block with four thousand employees like they
have without the streetcar right now, that garage and if
people have to drive around downtown. I was just down
there this weekend twice. But the first fourteen floors of
that new skyscraper is parking first fourteen floors, and that's

(22:41):
a twenty two hundred car garage.

Speaker 2 (22:43):
It's huge.

Speaker 1 (22:44):
After it is built, the city is going to buy it,
operate it, and manage it. It'll cost the city about
one hundred million dollars to buy that garage. But the
city then will operate and manage it, and they will
be able to use it evenings and weekends for events
downtown too. The city builds garages and manages them because

(23:06):
we can cash flow them, so we can pay the
bonds that we use to build the garage with the
revenue that they produce. And so that's why the city
has quite a few parking garages. We have two underway
right now too. We built one in the Blackstone, for example,
because we cash flow them. But Mutual of Omaha could
not build on that spot where the Dale Clark Library was,

(23:28):
which is a perfect spot without the streetcar. They couldn't
have done it because their employees, like I said, are
four twenty two hundred car garage. Not all employees are
going to be there at the same time, but it
allows them a lot more flexibility. I never heard that
they would leave Omaha if we didn't build a streetcar. Actually,
the agreement with Mutual in the streetcar said that the

(23:48):
city would have a good faith effort, and that's the
words that we're used bringing the streetcar around where the
new Mutual tower is. It's pretty amazing to be downtown.
I think I've told you. I know a lot of
people complain about downtown and about the construction. I think
I told you I was meeting a friend of mine

(24:10):
downtown for lunch not long ago, and I ended up
in Iowa because I mean, the construction is confusing and
I was downtown every day.

Speaker 3 (24:19):
So how many people are saying, take that gene, how
does it feel now?

Speaker 1 (24:23):
I know, I know what it feels like, but it
is confusing, but it will be fantastic when it's up
and running.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
By the way, I saw Bob Dylan downtown on Saturday night.
That was pretty cool. Good show. Yeah, it was pretty cool,
very good.

Speaker 3 (24:35):
Okay, Well, here we go in light of the state
of the city on Friday, and you know this little
streetcar comment that we had. Let's let's get to this
one real quick.

Speaker 2 (24:44):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (24:46):
I don't have a name for you here, but here
we go. This is a talkback Mike on the iHeartRadio
app or you can give us a call four a year, two, five, five, eight, eleven, ten,
or email us at comment at kfab dot com.

Speaker 4 (24:58):
Hey, just feedback. We're not going to keep listening to
the gene stotheart. I should have been elected show. Let's
move on. Quit bad quit badgering the administration the elections over.
You lost because of the streetcar. That's why I didn't
vote for you. You're a good mayor, but I don't

(25:19):
want a streetcar. Now, let's move on and talk about
other things. Recites Omaha City politics.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
We can talk about anything. We're just taking the calls
and the emails as they come. And I said, anything
goes and you know fair enough, the streetcar, you are right,
is one of the reasons that people didn't vote for me.
And I will own that. I said all the time,
I will own the streetcar. There was a lot of
thought that went into it. It was recommended by the

(25:48):
Urban Core Committee that came out of the chamber, but
I'm the one that pushed it along and I'm the
one that sent it to the City Council for approval.
So I will own that. But it's not the only reason,
you know. I will say that there's a lot that
went into me not winning my fourth term. I did
win three, but not winning my fourth term. It had

(26:08):
a lot to do with low voter turnout twenty eight
percent voter turnout for the general election of the City of
Omah and all the council members. It had a lot
to do. There's something called voter fatigue, and people say, well,
you're doing a good job, but move on. Let's get
somebody else to give them a try. Definitely, because I'm
a Republican and a blue dot city that had a

(26:30):
lot to do with it. The Democrats were engaged in
energetic and the Republicans frankly stayed at home. And that
concerns me about the twenty twenty sixth election. And I
will say this publicly, Trump derangement syndrome was out there,
and because I was a Republican, that was out there
and that added to it too. But you know, I'm

(26:53):
not here doing this show to say I should be elected.
I've spent twelve years as mayor and four in the
city council. I do know a lot about city government.
You asked me a question about the city, whether it
be the budget, the fire, the police, the parks, the planning, Department,
the libraries. I'm sure I could answer it, or I
could get you the answers. But you know, I have

(27:13):
no regrets. I really don't. I have no regrets of
serving three terms, and really, now that the election is over,
I am good as can be. I tell people, retirement's
the best job I've ever had. And so it's not
that I'm saying to people you should have elected me.
I'm just saying, let's hold the current mayor accountable. Let's

(27:35):
hold him accountable for what he promised, and let's hold
him accountable for what he's saying. That's all I'm asking
because they did it with me well, and.

Speaker 3 (27:43):
Quite frankly, there's nobody more qualified to talk about it
than you. I mean, you know it better than anyone else.
You've been in that seat. You understand, and it's current,
it's relevant. It happened on Friday. This is the time
to talk about it exactly.

Speaker 1 (27:55):
But you know, you want to talk about the legislature.
What's going on so important for this d to Nebraska.
They have to add that budget in by Friday. I'm
happy to talk about that. I'm happy to talk about
things in the world like the what happened at LaGuardia
last night. Unbelievable. And I'm happy to talk about what's
going on in the Middle East. I had Don Bacon

(28:15):
on the other day. He's so informative and talking about
what's going on in the Middle East and is there
a chance to have peace our stability there. So I'm
open to anything. It's not just sour Grape's. Oh shoot,
Jean's not mayor anymore. You know, you get over that
really really quickly, you really do, and you got to
move on. I lost a race in twenty two thousand

(28:35):
and six for the legislature. I lost this one. The
other races that I've been in I've won. I've been
elected for twenty seven years. I've loved him all really.
I've loved being on the Millard School Board. I loved
being on the city Council. I love being mayor. So
I don't have any regrets. And I'm not saying you
should have voted for me. I'm so sad. I just
think there's a lot of things that went into it.

(28:56):
But hold your mayor accountable.

Speaker 3 (28:58):
That's what I'm asking to go to the phone lines
now four zero, two, five, five, eight eleven ten. This
call comes from Brad Brad you're on the KFAB comment
line with Jean Stoutht.

Speaker 5 (29:10):
I'm Adam Mayor. I've always supported you. I'm surprised that
you endorsed the liberal Democrat John Frederickson in District twenty.
Could you please give me your reasoning behind that. I'm
talked him about property tax. It seems like some many senator.
He's at the beck and call of the Teachers' Union,
so I don't think he's going to help on property tax.

(29:32):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (29:33):
Sure I can answer that.

Speaker 1 (29:34):
And you know John fredericson number one endorsed me and
supported me when I was running for mayor, and that
he went on a limb for me for that. I
will say this, of all of the Omaha legislators that
represent Omaha that I needed to be working with when

(29:55):
I was mayor, I would say John Frederickson was one
of the most responsive to what I had questions or
I had issues with what was going on in the legislature.
He was very concerned about Omaha. He was always available
to me more so than almost anybody else when I
had questions, and so he came out and he endorsed me.

(30:18):
He said he supported me and he asked me at
that time, he said, if I run again, would you
support me too? And I said, you have been a
good friend to me and to the city of Omaha.
Not knowing who else was going to be running, so
I told him I would, and so yes, I did,
And I just did it because again, I think that

(30:40):
he has done.

Speaker 2 (30:41):
A lot for Omaha.

Speaker 1 (30:42):
And you know, we may be different on a lot
of subjects, we may have different opinions on a lot
of subjects, but he really cares about Omaha. He's available
and he listens. And so the other candidate, the Republican
candidate in District twenty, I have not met him. I'm
going to. He called me the other day, left a voicemail.
I didn't want to call him this weekend. One of

(31:05):
my best friends is helping with his campaign, and so
I'm very much open to talking to him too. The
one thing that I always did and I will continue
to do, is if I endorse one candidate for a position,
I will never come out and trash or criticize the
other candidate. I will just give him an endorsement or

(31:27):
a support to say you've done a good job, and
that's it for me. I'm not going to come out
and criticize any other candidate. So yes, I did. I
did tell him that, but I did tell it. Leave
Matt because he has been very helpful to me.

Speaker 3 (31:40):
Before we finish up with your state of the city dissection,
let's go to Dave here on the phone lines. Dave,
you're on with Geen Stouth here on the KFAB comment line.

Speaker 6 (31:50):
Thanks a lot, Gene. I appreciate all your service that
you've done in the past. The one thing about the
parks that I really noticed was I was happy to
go the Ford Memorials. I had never been there. I'm
sixty two years old, and I noticed how bad shaped
the areas and it needs painting. The inscriptions of the

(32:12):
governors or old the mayors aren't updated. It's really a
park that I think a presidential park. You know, we're
lucky enough to have that in Omaha. I just think
it needs some tender, loving care. I want to hear
your thoughts on it.

Speaker 1 (32:31):
I couldn't agree with you more. And you know, we
got quite a few complaints about that. I remember one
time the American flag that was flying out front was
ripped into and somebody sent me a picture and I'm like,
oh my goodness, this cannot be so once again that
because it is basically like a you know, a dedication
to a former president, I think it needs a lot

(32:53):
of special attention. And that's one of the reasons again
I will I will repeat myself, but we have two
hundred fifty six parks in Omaha, and that one is included.
We needed a plan to prioritize. You can't address them
all in a year, but we needed a plan to
prioritize that should be prioritized. And that's why we're redoing

(33:14):
the city's park master Plan. But I couldn't agree with
you more. But there's a lot of parks that need
new equipment, new playground equipment. It was brought up this morning.
I think Scott talked about Crier is going to be closing.
They're changing a lot of the old, old swimming pools
that need millions of dollars worth of work into splash
ground splash pads because the maintenance is so low for

(33:38):
those and the liability is so low for those. And
so you know, it's not only the parks. Taste care
of the parks, the swimming pools, the community centers, the
golf courses, you know, we have four nines and four
eighteen golf courses in the city of Omaha. It was
Mayor Subtle that changed them into an enterprise. And now

(34:01):
all the money that those golf courses makes goes back
into the golf courses for maintenance and improvements. So all
of those are things that we have been working on.
But I agree with you about Ford. It's not in
good shape and it really needs a lot of attention.

Speaker 3 (34:17):
One thing that as we look towards the state of
the city, one thing on Mayor Ewing's priority list was homelessness.
Is that correct?

Speaker 2 (34:27):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (34:28):
Yeah, And so I have an email here from Randy
and it says, let's consider something real. Are any of
the Omaha schools teaching these kids how to properly fill
out a job application? People who have job acquisition skills
are far less likely to be homeless.

Speaker 1 (34:45):
That's true. That's true. Absolutely, it's true. But when you
really understand homelessness, I mean you're talking about two different groups.
You are talking about sheltered and you're talking about unsheltered.
The unsheltered is what's giving getting a lot of a
tension lately because of the encampments. There is a reason
why there are people that are unsheltered when we have shelters,

(35:08):
A lot of them don't want to go into the
shelter because they don't want to follow the rules in
the shelter. There are some for instance, with animals with
dogs and cats and that they don't allow and shelters.
And then there's that issue of what is going on
mentally with these folks, and a lot of them not
only have mental issues, they have physical issues. In fact,

(35:32):
the shelters will tell you so many of these unsheltered
have more physical issues than they do mental issues. And
so that again is why I wanted a homeless service coordinator.
I wanted somebody that was in the Mayor's office that
reported directly to the mayor to work with all of
our outreach and street outreach that we have.

Speaker 2 (35:52):
You know, I still.

Speaker 1 (35:53):
Call our homeless service coordinator when I go to that
target at one hundred and twentieth in l all the time.
And if you got I think if anybody goes there
like I do. There's a little tiny street between I
Street and EL Street. It's right by where Starbucks is
and home depots on the other side. That's not a
city street. There is a little tiny medium there and

(36:15):
there is an person there all the time.

Speaker 3 (36:18):
We all have one in mind, right, we always have. Oh,
there's always going to be somebody there.

Speaker 1 (36:22):
And if you see it, call you know, I called
directly our homeless Service coordinator because I know it and
I think she's done Tamra done such a great job.
But call the Mayor's hotline four four four five five
five y five and report it and they'll send somebody
out there. And so you know, these things are ongoing.
If we if there was a way to eliminate homelessness,
we would be on it. But there are homeless in

(36:45):
every single city. But like I said, some just don't
want to go into shelters because they have other issues.
And then they have rights we have to admit, I mean,
we have to understand, not admit, understand that they have rights.
And you know, unless if they're on public property, unless
they are obstructing like a sidewalk downtown, they have rights too.

(37:08):
And so you got to keep that all in mind
when you're talking about are homeless. But I said, if
it was something that we felt like we could do
to eliminate it, we certainly would do. But you're always
going to have those that choose to be homeless for
whatever reason. The state of the city to address was
given by Mary Ewing on Friday. I felt like it
was important to talk about it today. I'm giving you

(37:30):
my take of it. These are my opinions. I'm giving
you the facts, and I want you to know it's
up to you to make your decision about what you
think about the current administration. I'm not trying to say
that I still am sour grapes about not winning this race.
I'm saying, here are the facts. They are the facts,
and then you make up your own mind. Alls I'm

(37:51):
asking is that you hold your mayor accountable. And with that,
I wanted to bring up the roads, and that's something
I could talk about for probably the entire higher hour.

Speaker 2 (38:01):
But in the campaign I.

Speaker 1 (38:02):
Had heard over and over and over John Ewings saying,
and to a lot of people that were very interested
in this, that the problem with our roads is the
he would use the word is the recipe for our
concrete And he was saying, I will come up with
a different recipe to make it more durable. I heard
it myself. I was there with him, so asking what

(38:24):
is your new recipe? What are you doing to make
the worlds more durable? The facts are that every several
years the Public Works Department works with a group of experts, scientists,
leaders and universities, suppliers, users of concrete and they come
up with any new mix of concrete that could be

(38:47):
more durable, and then it is going It goes to
the city Council and the city council approves it. It
was approved just about a year and a half before
by the city Council a new recipe that but apparently
John Euing wasn't aware of at the time, so he
kept on talking about a new recipe. I would like
to ask what that new recipe is. Keep in mind

(39:09):
as far as snow and ice, to very critical about
our snow and ice removal. You know, we have a
great plan the Public Works Department as far as snow
and ice. It won a national award in twenty nineteen.
We budget or I budgeted in my budget over nine
million dollars a year for snow and ice removal. And

(39:30):
so with snow and ice, it's easy to complain, but
you are really you have a great plan, You hire
great people in the Public Works Department, and then you
are at the mercy of mother nature. And you know
what mother nature usually wins. So you know that the
roads are something we could talk about a lot, but
it's important to know that this recipe that was talked

(39:50):
about a lot, it's addressed about every two years by experts.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Real quick, here, Gene, we've got about a minute left.
With the a new library going up on seventy second
in Dodge, can you give us just a little insight
about the decision made on that one in the location.

Speaker 1 (40:06):
Yeah, and that was excuse me, that was a lot
of philanthropy involved in that. That's about one hundred and
fifty eight million dollar building that the city put in
twenty and the rest with philanthropy, it was private money.
It will be a city library and it will be
managed by the city and it will have city employees
in there. It is a public library and it's going

(40:28):
to be opening soon.

Speaker 2 (40:29):
And if you haven't seen it, you have to go
through it.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
It looks beautiful, does It's magnificent And it's better inside
than outside. I mean outside it has this sleek glass look,
but is it beautiful. And it is going to be
a model for libraries I think all over the country.
It's great, and we should be proud we have that
right there at seventy second Dodge.

Speaker 3 (40:49):
This is the KFAB comment Line. Your host of the show,
Jean Stothard. I'm your producer, Peyton Hilock. Always reach out
to us at comment at kfab dot com and we
will see you guys tomorrow right here on news radio
eleven ten k fa B.