Industry sign banking nebraska lease template computer
hello and welcome to this installment of inside Omaha on this episode i talked with Jen Krieger Jen is the senior director of public policy over at the greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce she also does lobbying for the chamber when the state legislative session rolls around for a while I've been wanting to get someone on the podcast who knows a bunch about what's going on down in Lincoln and Jenn was a perfect guess for that we get into some of the basics around the state legislature how it works how it functions we also get into this last legislative session some of the dramas that happened some of the important bills that got passed and we also talked about the future and what we should look forward to in 2020 it was fantastic talking with Jen and I think you all will enjoy this episode so please enjoy our conversation [Music] all right let's get the show on the road Jen I appreciate you taking the time to talk with me today so I want to get into all the craziness from the last legislative session and kind of where the Chamber's minds at and kind of what your what you're looking for looking towards for that for the next session but I thought it'd be a good idea to kind of start with the basics so for those who don't know Kai get you get you to explain you know what is unicameral and kind of go through a bill on the hill type scenario sure so the Nebraska Legislature is organized as a unicameral that's unique we're the only state in the Union who has one house so every other state has a house and a Senate - two chamber legislature we only have we call it a unicameral but this their titles are senators but the head of the group is known as the speaker so it's kind of a hybrid of a house in the Senate there's 49 members officially nonpartisan elected to represent districts all over the state based on population and so as I said it's officially nonpartisan so there's no caucusing which is different than all the other states there's no minority leader a majority leader people obviously people know what people's party affiliation is but there's no kind of formalized structure for that it's not caked into the structure of know anything I previously worked in Colorado and there was a lot of partisan control over just what bills were heard based on the party in control they had a lot of they had a lot of sway and in what bills were taken up or not taken up so that's unique to Nebraska and I think it really benefits our state bills can be introduced by Senators in the first 10 days of the legislative session first 10 working days then all the bills are really other than very unusual circumstances are that universe is closed for the rest of the session so those ideas either come from constituents or they come from organizations or advocacy groups sometimes the senator here's a when they're campaigning so there's different ideas they may hear be contacted by state agency with a problem the governor certainly has policy ideas that he wants addressed in the session so that's kind of where the bills come from the bill ideas come from do you need to come locked and loaded essentially yeah I mean I think I think most people try to have their ideas ready to go in some form by the beginning of January when the session starts but certainly as the session goes on you can amend bills but really you the introduction of bills has to take place by those first is there anything restricting we restricting a bill to be introduced or is it kind of just everyone just throws what they have and then from there well I guess we'll get to that right so yeah I mean the legislative rules only allow for introduction to bills in those first 10 days so so yeah once that day 10 is up its you've lost your opportunity to introduce something new so then when a bill is introduced every bill has a hearing in a committee of jurisdiction it gets assigned to a committee it has a hearing the committee takes testimony on the bill proponents opponents and neutral testimony and then the committee will decide whether or not to advance the bill to the floor for full consideration so they'll take a vote on it if a bill comes out of committee its advanced to the floor and then there are three stages of debate general file select file and final reading the bill has to be advanced by the full legislature on each of those three rounds before it goes to the governor when the bill gets to the governor he can either sign the bill he can veto the bill or he can let the bill become law without his signature so that's kind of the basics on the legislative process of course there's lots of pitfalls yeah a long manhole stretch but that's kind of the simplified streamlined way something is the governor's signature more of a formality if if they can come law without his signature on it yes although he it's very rare I would say I can't think of a time that this governor has let I don't think this particular governor has let they'll become law without his signature so he will either typically sign a bill or veto it and it's I'm thinking back to previous governor's it's not a it's a fairly rare occurrence that a governor would let a bill become law without it it's just really unhappy with it or like an over a veto override or something you know you know override would only take place if he actually vetoed it so so sometimes you know maybe he has some uncomfortable feelings about the bill but doesn't feel like it's strong enough it just doesn't happen okay we don't see it it's just interesting yeah and then so there's a legislative session is either 60 or 90 days depending on the year it's correct so the legislature operates in a biennium so we've just finished the first year of the biennium and that was what's called a long session so that was a 90 working day session starts at the beginning of January ends around June 1st and then typically that's long because the they address the budget in the long session and then the second year which will be next year is the short session that's usually beginning in January through about middle of April so okay that's long and short sessions are known that way so I guess we can just talk about that while we're here is you what do you think of that format where it's kind of a it seems almost like a sprint at the beginning of each year depending on the year it's a very short sprint or long spear and then you have a long period to kind of write figure stuff out so I think it's it works for the most part because in the long session obviously they need to do the budget that takes a little bit more time so they really do need a lot of that time now I will say this particular year the legislature ended several days early they didn't use their full allocation of ninety days which is makes for an interesting year especially when certain things don't pass you have some people unhappy that the legislature leaves early any like a majority vote just to say we're done yeah there's a motion at the end motion to adjourn sine die and so that's the motion but usually the speaker decides we're you know we're really out of things to work on so we're gonna try to adjourn early in the short session that really helps senators because those are two always in election years so Nebraska has its primary in May so the legislature tries to wrap up its work in mid-april so that way any members of the legislature their campaigning have some time before the primary to spend on the campaign trail so so practically speaking it works well for that short session so that people who are who are seeking re-election can focus on their campaigns a little bit it seems like a long waiting period if you're kind of closed on something and then you kind of have to punt it for potentially nine months that's true and I mean people feel the pressure of that right I mean they know that if you're going to get down to the last five days if you don't pass something you know it's gonna be six months before you can address it again so you think higher quality stuff comes out of that because it might be like ah we are time's running out we just get something you know it does nothing yeah it's kind of a double-edged sword I mean in that in some circumstances they do their best work when they are faced with a deadline because they know they have to get to a compromise but also there are some situations where it's advantageous to one side or the other to kind of run the clock out so you see both you see you see some good stuff happen and then you see some people who try to use it as a deterrent right you can't intentionally drag your feet right and when the time is right right you know don't let anything pass right okay well I guess we can just get into this last session so how did you what was your general sense afterwards or during this last session was there anything that particularly stood out to you it was every session or every legislature is unique and that the personalities change the previous legislature had a long battle at the beginning over the rules and it really kind of poisoned relations in a way for quite a while we did not have that this year and so I would say in general the legislature worked pretty well together they really showed progress almost from the first day they their heads down and got quite a bit of stuff done I think observers would say however that the two largest issues facing the legislature were both not resolved this year and so that's left a lot of people unsatisfied and knowing that they have to come back next year and that would be proper in the property tax issue and the business incentive issue both of those bills got tied together and both of those failed to pass so they're both left on the table for next year and I think there's a level of frustration that there were on both sides of those are both both of those issue areas that they didn't secret didn't have resolution this year why they get tied together just because they're both really high priority they're both really high priority I think certain people thought that they had leverage by tying them their issue had leverage by being tied to the other issue they represented different factions of people as far as getting the votes so I thought that some people I think thought it was a strategy that could succeed to tie them together but once one went down the other went down pretty quickly right out so almost seems like a prisoner's dilemma type issue I mean I guess there's but um so yeah so that was the big topic and so I guess we can get into the imagine she imagined act right that's what it's called so that was the big business incentive correct package so I guess for people weren't familiar with kind of the gist of it what would you say that the executive summary of it sure so lb 720 which is the imagine Nebraska AK which you referenced was the Chamber's biggest priority for the legislative session the current main line incentive program in Nebraska is called the Nebraska advantage act and that is scheduled to sunset at the end of next year December 31st 2020 so our economic developers at our chamber and at the other chambers realized that it's time that that act be updated there's it was passed in 2005 and so our economy in 2019 it doesn't look like it did in 2005 I mean just from the entrepreneurship and expect a lot of companies that exist now didn't exist then so we wanted an economic development tool for the state that was more targeted on the way that business operates today so we've we tried to in crafting the bill we tried to improve on use the existing structure of advantage which I think companies really liked but try to improve on some of the deficiencies that have come about in the years since the bill was passed so we changed administration of the program from the Department of Revenue to the Department of Economic Development we increased wage requirements significantly in the bill to better reflect our current workforce situation and we did a lot of cool things with innovative ways to use for a company to use their credits once they had earned them for either student loan repayment or relocation expenses some things that were more talent focused and not just simple tax credits I mean these companies can still use them to offset their taxes but they can use them in other ways to recruit talent which we thought something that we heard a lot about from our companies that they wanted to be more focused on on their workers so it's a very complicated program but we felt like we did a good job of kind of capturing what's going on in economic development right now and also what companies are working are looking for we had at the table riding the bill all the we think the brightest minds in economic development across our state we had a great bill sponsor senator Kohl Truman mark Coulter man of Seward who was really passionate about the bill it got out of committee and it got on to the second round of debate select file and then it failed to get enough votes about with about five days left in the session and that was a bill that was kind of didn't get votes because people were upset that the property tax bill didn't pass so 7:20 was kind of the victim of that was it you think it was a look like from the outside was kind of a direct retaliation for it just tit-for-tat yeah I think I think that's an accurate assessment but having said that it stays on select file going into next session so it won't have to be reintroduced it won't need another committee hearing it'll be it is positioned to move fairly quickly and we would like it to move quickly and to take away any uncertainty for businesses we think that's we've already heard from projects at the Omaha Chamber that they don't they want some assurance that the new incentive plan will be in place and so we want to be able to give them that that certainty so we're confident that the Legislature will not let the program expire without a new program in place yes I started I really didn't think about is a lot of businesses you're trying to project in the future and kind of plan what they're going to do next they kind of need that assurance we build like that the thing that businesses hate more than anything is uncertainty because they plan yours in advance and so they just want to be assured that and it in some ways they don't even care what it looks like they just want to be assured what it will be so they can make decisions based on so we're that's probably our number one motivator is to get them some certainty yeah and how much does what other states are doing influence how you write a bill like this or the the need for a bill like this but I feel like it's almost I mean I think I don't think I think about it wrong but it seems like a zero-sum game between the states around you because everyone's kind of competing for the same thing at the end of the day right it really is and there there's a faction of people who believe oh we shouldn't have incentives we should just lower our taxes dramatically and then we wouldn't need them but if you talk to our economic developers the fact is that every state around us and pretty much every state in the country has some sort of incentive program so we put ourselves at a competitive disadvantage if we don't have some kind of attraction package in place so we're competing all the specially Omaha when we're sharing a border you know we're right on the state border with Iowa or we're competing for projects with Kansas City or Chicago or Minneapolis Austin or Oklahoma City or Salt Lake City Phoenix Portland I mean we're in competition with all of those major metro areas and we have to be able at some point to put a package on the table for these companies and so if we just don't have anything to offer that will take us out of the game almost from the beginning yeah I don't think I don't see how the state could benefit without having was if it weights another year I mean I don't feel like it hurts everybody in the state right yes yeah so what I guess what were the main you kind of touched on a little bit so what were the main arguments against it it was it just a general kind of a philosophical big picture just we we could there's other ways to do this right I I would say the overriding thing was from opponents who voted against it was we think we should hav
an incentive program and this is probably well intended and well designed but property taxes more of an important issue and it's more pressing until that is taken care of we can't support something like this I think you do have a handful of senators who who just don't like incentives they see it frequently from the rural senators we heard a lot about this is just a program for Lincoln and Omaha so there was some of that pushback but and then there was I would say there was a group of progressives a small group of progressive senators who didn't feel like it went far enough with some issues like LGBT protections and paid family leave and those kind of policy issues that they would like to have seen the Chamber's push a little bit further on that side but for the most part the core opposition was the rural a group of rural senators who weren't necessarily opposed to the bill but just as I said just felt like that property tax is the number one concern in Nebraska and that should be addressed before anything else that's interesting that progressive there was a block of progressives that didn't want it I kind of seemed like they're just banking on the fact that they're still next year and there's more they can be put in there there was a lot of there was a lot of that sentiment across the floor even with girls is we don't we don't need to do this this year we all we have next year to address it I think our argument to that was the certainty argument that we talked about is that businesses you know we don't want to be up against the deadline but when we do this because we want we don't want to scare any projects away we don't want any businesses to think we're not going to get this taken care of but we are where we are and the chain our Chamber is fully committed to getting this done as soon as possible next year so how do you see so we mentioned progressives rural-urban how do you see the the state legislature split yes the question so I think really there is a it split really three ways and possibly four I think you do have that kind of rural conservative contingent then I would say you sort of have a moderate or centrist maybe Republican more a little bit more urban but not necessarily group in the middle and then you have 18 Democrats on the other side so I would say those are the three major factions but within the Democrats I would say there is certainly a split between Democrats that heavily lean more progressive and then more of I would say for lack of a better word more establishment Democrats or or kind of traditional only 18 out of the 49 are Democrats you say that's correct and I think I think there are 17 Democrats and one independent if I'm correct so okay that Senator chambers and he usually usually takes the position of the Democrats so okay so it seems like it's definitely leaning right but I mean not necessarily that's probably how the votes always go is this not like the Republicans are just running the town right yeah I I have said for years that the bigger split in the Nebraska Legislature is not Republican Democratic it's rural urban and so you have shifting coalition's all the time and keep in mind even though it sounds like eighteen of 49 is not a lot but you to get a bill passed cloture you need 33 and so 17 no votes is enough to block the 33 you need so if the Democrats stick together they can automatically on a bill they can automatically prevent a bill from getting closer to advance so it's that 17 is kind of a magical number and they've gotten there so now great they don't always stick together as a group but frequently they do so that's they have they're able to wield power if they choose to they're able to stop things that they don't like mm-hmm they put their foot down when they when they need to so what do you what do you think the main difference between rural and urban is it more or less I mean obviously ones in a city and other ones more spacious area but is it just a different philosophy on governments or is it more of just each side has a different reality to their life and they have to stick together to stick with their own and that's a bad way to say but you know I think I mean the taxes issue I keep bringing that up but that that really is a big issue I think the AG senators would probably tell you that the state has not done enough to address the burden that has been on the backs of AG property tax payers that they feel like when corn prices were really high in 2012 everything was fine and then when court when commodity prices have tanked and land valuations have gone up and that's shifted in their minds has shifted a lot of money away from helping rural Nebraska to urban centers and they don't think that it's fair that they have to shoulder more of the burden than the cities and then I think there's also just a demographics issue in that a lot of rural small rural communities have shipped a lot of their young people to Lincoln in Omaha to go to school and then a lot of them don't often return to their small towns I mean I grew up in a small town you know and I I'm one of those people who didn't go back so I think there's some frustration that they think their kids are being used to kind of fuel the growth of Lincoln and Omaha and then like in Omaha or not in turn you know turning around and helping them but so not only you're taking our money you're taking taking our kids - exactly so there's some there's some hard feelings about that and it's not it's you know some of it is justified mm-hmm I mean I don't I free I don't think Omaha and Lincoln always do it best the best job of understanding the challenges that the rest of the state faces but at the same time you know people who live in rural areas don't frequently don't understand you know the needs that we have in the urban centers as well I mean it's really easy to just get in a bubble I think there's a statistic out there where if you ask someone what the most popular car is someone in a city will say like a sedan or like a smaller car but in reality it's actually a pickup truck right and like people living in the city we just won't even guess that but someone out in rural Nebraska that's just a little way that you can kind of just notice that rolling kind of their own little bubbles right how does it seems like the governor kind of threw a rent I don't know for wrenches right word but it seems like he wants lower taxes property taxes without raising them anywhere else which seems like you're threaded a needle here right I mean he's and the governor has been very strong about the fact he will not raise taxes even to provide other tax relief he does it to him it does not make sense when you're raising the burden on somebody else to lower somebody else so he's been pretty strong about that the revenue committee had lb 289 which was their first attempt at the property tax proposal and by the end of the session it kind of morphed into this Plan B or Plan C which was they'll be 183 but their initial plan was to remove the sales tax exemption from several categories at one point they discussed raising the sales tax rate and then sending that money all the property taxes but you're right the governor was adamantly opposed to that so I think he would say that there are you can't just shift the tax burden from one class of taxpayers to the other that's not true tax really in his opinion mm-hmm which I mean I think there's some good points in there yeah so I guess that's kind of where the last session was left off as kind of a stalemate between though the property tax and the business incentives but it let's to like there's a lot of other good bills that got passed yet the the Regional Transit Authority yes I think that was those are the right words for that the industrial hemp bill and there's a lot of other smaller ones so I mean like you said there's a lot of bills passed what were some of those in there that you were kind of excited about that that made its way through lb 492 which is the Regional Transit Authority bill you mentioned that was something that's really exciting for us in the Omaha metro area of the chamber has started work on a regional transportation strategy so that was kind of the underpinnings to a change in state law that we kind of needed to to allow for creation of that Regional Transit Authority as we put our plan together and move forward so we were really happy that to see the legislature address that they had actually it didn't get as much press but they put together a pretty solid budget state budget for the next two years and funded important priorities did well with University funding and the there was really not I don't think there were any vetoes from the governor on that so that budget went through pretty pretty well of course we had the tragic floods in March across the state and so I would say the legislature did a really good job of kind of being present to address whatever issues came up there and and was responsive to the needs of the agencies you mentioned the hemp bill that was lb 657 that legalized industrial hemp that our our chamber really didn't take a position on that bill but there were there was a lot of support for that probably more than more than people were expecting from both sides right I thought was right I'm surprising to be honest right so there and there's always bills in the legislature that don't get a lot of press or don't get a lot of attention but maybe make a big difference a small group or a single group or so there's always victories every year they did they got a lot of bills passed this year that that addressed a lot of real issues for people and they don't necessarily make headlines but they mean a lot to say yeah that's a good point sometimes I mean could we do that locally or even nationally we always look for the big bill that's going through or new tax cuts or whatever and everyone gets all worked up about that but in reality there's a lot of smaller stuff going through where you kind of chipping away a lot of the problems instead of trying to fix it one big clench yeah which yeah it's easy to forget it's more I guess it gets the headlines more with the big bills and stuff so it's more interesting to read about I guess there was another bill and I'm not going to remember the number but that seeks to have the state get a little bit more involved with the o-p-s pension issue that's an issue that the pension for the o-p-s teachers is pretty severely underfunded so there's been some progress in trying to address that issue that's an important local issue for us and the Legislature passed that so that's a good first step towards addressing that problem so one thing I'm interested to hear your perspectives on is that there's no hiding the fact that in DC it's very hyper partisan right now do you get the sense that some of that is trickling down to more local governments specifically you know the state legislature I think for the most part no I mean you do see pockets of it but that body is very unique and that most of the people who go there are very dedicated to the institution and they really do have kind of a the Nebraska pragmatism of you know we're sent here to get work done and so and I think that officially nonpartisan status helps a lot I mean you think that actually I do I think it helps when you don't have kind of a caucus leader or a majority leader or something calling the shots and everybody feels like whatever their bill is at least it's going to be given a fair shot and so I do think you have a lot of people that are really committed to trying to address real problems now that doesn't mean that partisanship doesn't ever come up I mean there certainly were squabbles this year on the floor we're one side or the other felt marginalized or felt ignored or felt you know put down and and that happens and you know it's a little personal it but it's 49 people who obviously who from across the state with different perspectives and they're ambitious people because they're running for office and so they're always going to be some personality conflicts and some just differences of opinion and so sometimes it gets heated I mean I'm not gonna say it doesn't but I would say at the end of the day almost all of them are very committed to doing the right thing for the state mm-hmm do you get the sense that the changing media landscape has any effect on how I guess how Senators interact with their constituents but also just where leverage effect leverage kind of changes when the media landscape changes where you have weaker and weaker I feel like in rural Nebraska is almost like a media desert in a way and then you have the World Herald which kind of covers the whole region then you have this new thing called social media where each person you have a direct they don't you need a middleman anymore it's permissionless media when it kind of should you get a sense that the the changing media landscape is kind of affecting the political dynamics yeah this is the first year that I think there was a noticeable change with especially with social media as far as and you probably have you have a couple of younger senators that were elected who are far more adept at it than previously and and used it more frequently and so you would have a lot of senators which is when I work for the Lidge my start of my career 20 years ago in the legislature they couldn't even use the internet on the floor so - and then now you see people literally tweeting or you know whatever from their desks it's it's changed a lot but this year I feel like certainly some of those younger senators and even some of the more seasoned ones have embraced that social media presence more so than I've seen it before this year and that's kind of led that there have been a couple times that that's led to some blow-ups - oh really I'm kind of with the older members of the body who really are not in favor of kind of tweeting out every thought you've ever had and then younger members who maybe see it as a very effective way to get right to their constituents yeah quickly so and then of course you have and you've always you always will have kind of coordinated campaigns to contact senators you know that used to be by mail or phone calls now that's either email or social media stuff and that yeah that's kind of an endless never-ending thing I mean and people are always going to contact their Senators but I think this year has been the most dramatic I've seen as far as use of social media and I just expect that to increase yeah it's an interesting power dynamic because if you look nationally there's a few representatives on both the left and the right where in years past they would it wouldn't be nowhere near the main conversation but now they're getting pulled in because they have millions of social media followers it's like this new source of power that is permissionless no one has to grant you you can just start tweeting and build a following yourself yeah and and nobody's nobody's policing it you know I mean it's just like it's instantaneous so it's it's made waves it's definitely changed the way certain people have you know we're even staying and standing in the lobby checking our own phones to see what they're what they're saying or tweeting or you know so it's it's just a different everyone's our media company that's right so do you think it's gotten when you talk to state legislators do you feel like technology has allowed their constituents to talk with them more is there kind of a void there between community involvement and what's going on on the Capitol I think um I think it kind of takes down the mystique of oh it's the senator and I you know I can't go to the Capitol or I can't you know I'm intimidated to call I think when you can see it on your phone or your computer screen their social media presence that it probably is like oh I can just send them a message and it's not that intimidating but it is more human yeah it is but at the same time you know the kind of sort of an amenity of the Internet it probably lets people be more aggressive and they would be Twitter comments right you want a good one go to Don Bacon's Twitter and just look at every time we post something just look at the comments it's always just like I says full of yeah and people
I don't know if they feel like uninhibited or they nobody's gonna police it but I just think people say things that they would a lot of times never say to somebody in person so it's probably helped open the door and that it's so easy to communicate with your representative but at the same time it's maybe coarsened the dialogue a little that you feel like you didn't just say whatever you want to say and there's no you know there's no responsibility there dude legislators might just this might depend on the region but do they feel I don't know if enough is the right word right enough pressure from their constituents when they're doing something or they do they get the sense they're kind of on their own and then afterwards you'll explain it I think it depends on the legislature I mean there are some that are like you know you'll say something and they'll say oh I can you know I would get killed in my district for that or so and certainly some of it is the issue and some of it is their reelection status frankly when they're in their first term and they know when they have to run again a lot of them are more cautious about certain votes or certain decisions sometimes when they're in their second term and not all of not all of them do that but some of them certainly when they're in their second term and they know they're not running again they there's a group of them that have feel like they have more freedom to kind of just follow their own instincts and there's kind of a difference in opinion from I've perceived from elected officials in am I elected to go represent the voice of my constituents and the position of my constituents or was I elected because people trust me to use my own judgment and vote the way that I think is appropriate and so you I've seen people on both sides of that yeah that is kind of a fundamental question I think maybe that when people feel more and more connected to whoever's representing them it kind of moved the needle kind of moves a little bit towards that we got to always do with the constituents right want rather than use my independence right thought making ability is to move this forward right so you mentioned some new senators wasn't there a pretty good class this a lot of new senators this session there's I think you put me on this fun I can't remember the exact number we only had we had a small group of term-limited senators I would say there is around 10 or 12 I'm gonna have to fact check that that we're new out of 49 so relative in the past couple of cycles but as I said earlier every new class changes the personality of the body and so this one definitely did that it's but they all do right I mean they're all does that make your life harder because you have a bunch of new very relationship based and so and especially for somebody in my position who is there and interacts with senators every day really all you have is your own reputation and so you want to be an honest broker with them and you want them to be honest brokers with you and so it takes time to build relationships so people can trust you and certainly when you throw you know ten new people or twelve new people in the mix every two years you know that's tough and then they really because the term limits they can only serve eight years so you're basically turning over the full body every year you're so good I mean it's but you know that's what we're there for is to is to establish those relationships and and help people you know trust what you're saying is is what you mean so this is kind of a hotly debated topic but do you think the term the term limits is ultimately a good thing or is it harder to build those relationships where if two people are in the legislature for twenty years that you already know where the other person stands and what they can do to work with them and right then kind of played more of a long-term game rather than short-term election cycle type games I'm personally not a fan of term limits I think we have term limits already and it's called voting and if you don't like your person then you just vote them out and I worked for somebody who defeated a four term incumbent so I know that it can happen I think especially with the unicameral the the learning curve is so steep that by the time you really understand what what you're doing what you're working on what the policy issues are you're probably four to six years into your turn and then and then all of a sudden you're out and I think it really hurts our state when we don't let our our brightest might when we arbitrarily limit the service of our brightest people to two terms I mean there's been a push for maybe expanding that to three terms I think that's a better idea to at least that gives people more time to serve when they kind of have figured out what's going on I understand the argument that we need new ideas and fresh blood and I I don't dispute that but I I'm not a fan of the arbitrary to two-term limit I think it does in our specific circumstance it does not serve our state well to limit in that way but I see where people are coming from when they get sick of politics as usual and they think that they think that you need new people in there and I and that's not necessarily the worst thing it's just let's what if you have somebody new in there who's great that you wish could stick around and then ya can't to say I mean I think both sides with this to be a really good argument right but do you think you said it takes around four to six years where people really get their feet saddle up and kind of know how to play the game so are these first few years our new senators just kind of in over their head well it's funny because you have they also feel the pressure of eight years right so they they get really aggressive about if they want to serve in leadership positions you know maybe as a chair of a committee or maybe as you know whatever else they understand that their own clock is ticking so they get really aggressive probably starting in year two and start running for chairs maybe when they're not quite fully aware of all the responsibilities that come with then I don't blame them because they only have a certain amount of time so they want to maximize that but it's just I mean nobody can know everything that that body deals with when they come in I mean even if even people who kind of staff members or lobbyists or whoever works around the building I think it's a different game when you're actually in there and have to take votes like that's overwhelming so is it you ever interact with people who just have no idea what they're getting into and they're gonna they're just like what why did I do this and the most frequent thing I hear from new senators and I frequently say what you know what was the biggest thing you learned or whatever how much time it takes I think they are all overwhelmed by this myth that it's just gonna be six months in Lincoln or you know but it's they're all like long days long weekends you know reading constituent mail stuff they didn't even think about they're almost universally surprised by the amount of time that it takes yeah and then I mean get into the pay debate where I mean they're how much they're getting paid I think like ten twelve thousand twelve year spending probably how many hours total on this and I mean yeah you don't want to overpay people were working in that position by the same time you got to give them something where they can live off anymore it really limits the quality of people who are able to run I mean you don't have a lot of younger people or people kind of in the prime earning years of their careers that are able to take that time away from their jobs for a $12,000 a year you know so-called part-time position that really isn't part-time I mean you can't you don't you have a lot of people who are retired in the body and you have a lot of really young people who haven't really started their careers and there's not a lot of people in between because they're just not able to make that sacrifice maybe they have small children or whatever but they just can't they can't do it and so you're really limiting a large group of people from survey yeah it's it's a definitely interesting problem that it's it's kind of hard to sell like hey come pay me more it's about - lets all give ourself a raise like right all the hard things to get people get voters to get behind absolutely almost used as a weapon against you it's very difficult it's it's a very difficult problem I think the combination of term limits and the low legislature pay is has a big impact on who runs so can you just sense the fear when people have to go and vote for the first couple like is that a big hurdle that people you work with have to get over is actually putting their name down on a piece of paper saying they want it this way sometimes although I also see the problem that sometimes people are too trusting and frequently we see you know they'll co-sign a bill or co-sponsor a bill and then not have understood the full story and then illness and you see that frequently with new senators then you'll see oh I didn't I didn't realize what I was asked I need to take my name off another I shouldn't have introduced this bill so I think there's really you're just thrown in the deep end right I mean there's a little bit of training before you start but also there's all these you know I don't blame them there's all these people telling them what they should do or shouldn't do and some I think some that's why I'm kind of a fan of people who just kind of put their heads down their first year or two and and just listen and learn and not talk a little bit but were they mean yeah as I said people are feel the need to be aggressive because they have a very short limited period of time to be there so you're a position where you have to count votes and know who's voting where how long would that take you to figure out from what I read that's kind of a imprecise science right yes you know I would say every session I'm still learning yeah it's that also is very relationship based and you know when you ask somebody where they are you have to be able to trust that that's where they are and if you don't trust them you either have to keep going back to them or having other people confirm it so it's kind of a really time-consuming thing seems you're I would imagine that consumes your brains you're constantly thinking through everyone rethinking it I have a little card you know in my book in my purse I probably have 20 cards and my book in my purse on different bills and I'm constantly looking at over going will they stick where they told me they will be or maybe they won't commit to me where they are so we have to you know continue to go back to them and go back to them and figure out where people are but yeah vote counting is an exact science yeah it's it's a it's a part of legislative life that I've never really thought of I was reading a book by about Lyndon Johnson and apparently he was really good at counting and that everyone would come to him because he always had the number well that's another key part of it you want to work with people who you also if you ask them to go talk to people that you can trust that they're bringing you you know an accurate vote count and then there's also people don't realize it with their Senators in the body running their own vote counts too so I'm trying to figure out who you can trust inside the body to help you with your vote counts drawing out that web just like a headache just so many lines going everywhere a lot of checkmarks yeah so you say it's very relationship based how do you how do you think about maybe building relationship between an Urban's senator and a rural one like how do you approach the process of finding middle ground right great question I think realizing that there's the success of the state depends on lifting all sectors of the state right it's not in trying not to design something that's gonna purposely harm another side of the state I think that our economic development work has really tried to focus on that like not only what benefits Omaha companies specific to our chamber but also what can work in smaller communities and what programs that work for us won't work for them and vice versa you know their their economic development programs that the rural Nebraska use is that we don't use and we shouldn't use right I mean because they have different needs than we do so I think just situational awareness of how can this benefit us all and you know rise all boats it's the best approach to that and try really try very hard not to pit people against each other is it's very divisive and really harmful being closed minded is how you make your position I'm impossible to work right with what you do absolutely yeah it's this current legislative session was definitely interesting some kind of curious moving forward kind of where's that where does the Chamber's mind that with other approach in the offseason best way to put it or interim we call it interim how you thinking about that and how you're approaching the next session right so our biggest priority is getting 720 across the finish line so that's our you know we're already talking and meeting and planning on that having conversations with senators and recognizing that probably that still will be tied to property tax in some way so just navigating that shoring up our votes making sure that people that were with us will stay with us and in finding a couple more we're also we've also been involved in the blueprint Nebraska work so they just released their report last week or this week I guess and so figuring out what legislative implementation of some of those recommendations will look like and what our role is in that process so if someone's not familiar with blueprint Nebraska blueprint Nebraska was a I think about two-year effort of business leaders across the state to really examine about 15 or 16 sectors of our state and how we can help it grow and what are our what are our strong points and what are our challenges or our limitations and and how we can affect change so those were broken out into various industry groups education talent workforce manufacturing transportation etc healthcare military and they all made policy recommendations so branding was another one so there'll be some things that the legislature is involved with and some things that will be outside of the legislature but that'll be part of and that's probably a three to five year implementation strategy for their recommendations so we're just figuring out how we can be helpful in in the beginning of that process especially what things need to go before the legislature so when it comes to economic development is I mean does how many levers are there to pull when it comes to governments getting involved with it it seems like kind of a most of time you think of it as get less government get them out of there and like let people just be grow their business right in a lot of ways that's what we try to do right I mean we we fight against any kind of extra regulation or additional levels of bureaucracy that that harm businesses or get in their way but there are some things like we do need as we talked about we do need an incentives package we need to make sure that that provides certainty there are some things state money's like prototype grants for startups they're encouraging access to venture capital Nebraska ranks pretty low on access to capital for entrepreneurs so doing things that we know our state areas that we know our state lacks and putting some more state focus on that there's a program called intern Nebraska that a lot of our companies have found very popular and we think it's a good talent retention tool that we provide their state funds for job training and foresight and building development so we do have a pretty extensive toolbox we just need to make sure those things are funded adequately but for the most part we you know we try to we try to add pay for lower taxes always and as little regulation as is possible so businesses can just do their thing and also think interesting that it seems like the business community is getting more and more behind public transit it seems like that's you know in the past you norm
lly wouldn't think to associate those two things but like the tides kind of change in there right so that our chamber did 2040 strategy and that's based on people in place and a very strong element of place is a transit public transit option so we have hired a full-time staff member to work on implementing a regional transportation strategy and that's an essential element of talent recruitment and retention that we think that younger people it's really important transportation is really important to them and where they choose to locate so we're putting a lot of resources at the chamber towards that that development and I think we'll see a lot of effort in that space in the next 2 to 4 years probably mm-hmm which is it was almost like the I don't know if the Amazon bid was a wake up call but it seemed like it made pretty clear that just publicly there's kind of like a public showing of what what bigger companies are looking for and is it was only just interesting to see public transit kind of at the top of their list it's a lot of people had a business leaders probably ought to wake up and realize like oh this is we can't sleep on this anymore we don't choice to sleep on this anymore right and I mean we've had a problem in our city for a long time of access to jobs right I mean there's people especially in the northern and southern parts of the city who who if they were to take the current bus system to let's say new jobs in Sarpy County for example dad some of those data center jobs that's just not a viable option for them they cannot spend two hours every morning on a bus to get to a job and then two hours home that's not that's not a job they would be willing to take so we have to do a better job infrastructure wise of connecting available work to available workers it's it's interesting you in this podcast because I feel like just talking to people around the community that's a conversation that just I feel like it's always coming up and it's right it's it's amazing how central it's becoming as time goes on yeah I work site we're very excited about it it's weird it's a big project and but that's one of the things I love working for the Omaha Chamber because we do think big yeah try to do big things so is there any big other than the imagine imagine act is there any other big kind of proposals for this for this next session are you keeping it on the DL for now we're working on a couple of things I think we will probably not next year in that we just need to take put advantage to bet I mean put the imagine act to bed but I think we'll and blueprint worked on this some I think we'll probably get real serious about a real study of the tax structure overall tax structure I think you know our current tax code was written in 1967 it's kind of like what I said about the incentives we were running a 2019 economy on a 1967 tax structure so I think it's really time for certainly smarter people and I yeah to look to take a really hard look about is this the best way we can do this is this tax structure reflective of our current economy and kind of where our needs are going I don't anticipate we'll be working that probably in the 2020 session but I would I would think that that'll be in probably in the following session yeah kind of work on the foundation a little bit sort of adding duct tape here and there right about workforce is there a lot of like workforce type yeah where our talent people at the chamber we're working on a couple ideas looking at some best practices in other states I think you know businesses identify that workforce is their number one issue even more than taxes so I I feel like the time is right in our state to do a major workforce bill I think it's always kind of been like kind of a number two or number three or number four issue like oh yeah we'll get there when we you know have time but I think there's a lot of people in the workforce space community colleges labor unions the Chamber's a couple senators that are really interested in doing something big on workforce so we are having actually having some of those meetings right now to see how I can come up with some kind of Workforce package for next year yeah that I feel like you just always hearing the brain drain issue absolutely I'm tracking or retaining talent that's to the Chamber's motto but it seems like it's a problem that everyone wants to solve but no one really has the best solution for it yeah I think I mean I think there's issues on sort of the skills side of the house but then there's issues on more of the talent or people side of the house right the retention recruitment and retention piece but also the you know we have a very high percentage of our population in Omaha that has more than one job and so the good part of that is that they obviously show that they have great work ethic but the bad part of that is that they're underemployed and they're not making the wages that they need to wake so how do we upscale those people who we obviously know have great work ethic and get them into better jobs for them and their families mm-hmm and I think there's some movement I think federally as well we're trying to push more apprenticeships slightly programs and my personal biased opinion all this is I think that's apprenticeships are just it makes so much sense to where you get someone in the job early you can train them up more exactly instead of kind of going off to a four-year school and kind of guess you know what you can kind of get them in early and quicker but yeah apprenticeships are definitely something that's on the table for that internships apprenticeships and on-the-job training of skilling people great schools trade schools more emphasis on directing students into the trades exposing students to the trades yeah you know earlier in their schooling I think it's interesting thinking about ways to expand what the trades Arps I I do a software development I honestly think of it more of a as a trade than a like something I need to go to school for right so it'll be interesting to see how that all plays out and I think right like you said that's everyone's talking about it well we have we know for sure specific to tech we have a huge shortage of tech workers and our markets so that's a we just unveiled a new initiative on on tech talent so and recruiting tech talent to Omaha and actually we paired with with Lincoln on it which is one of our first major initiatives that we've so intentionally paired with Lincoln on and that's a tech talent recruitment piece that works and what we're actually talking about this for the podcast where Lincoln and Omaha aren't that far why don't we work together and where we just join forces and be stronger together yeah do you guys think at all about like healthcare or student loan issues they the way I think about it is it's it's almost harder for people coming out of school to take risks right because either a their they have a bunch of loans student debt and B I mean it's it's kind of a messy world out there for private health insurance that's not through a company so I feel like the risk-taking potential of the people in the world who's going to take the most risks it's going way down because they just financially just doesn't make sense for them right on student loans that's another I mean when we talk about workforce bills we probably have like 20 ideas on the table so some kind of student loan repayment program or tax credits or whatever it is that's definitely some kind of component of a workforce bill healthcare I mean Medicaid expansion past on the ballot last year and so that will be implemented in the state I think by October that's not an issue the chamber has really played much in from a policy perspective it's been pretty highly politicized and you know we have a lot of members that are on different sides of that issue so we have kind of intentionally stayed out of that issue but it's it's a hot topic and I'm sure we'll see more in the legislature on that subject in the next year as you know I think it's one of those national issues that are kind of trickling down because everyone's pitching the medicare-for-all right and this just has you to translate the anger there right here for it yep well cool so it's um around time which be wrapping up is there any last words you want to give to the listeners out there I would just say be engaged and if they're if you're a Chamber member even if you're not a Chamber member if you want to weigh in on something feel free to contact us but you should always be contact your Senators contacting your Senators if you have a position on something what would you recommend the best way to approach that I think you can go to the legislators web slater's website if you want to email them but yeah so we talked about earlier you can most senators aren't have a social media presence so angry tweet that's you can always tweet or Facebook them if that's your if that's your bag but just be informed because when more people know what's going on the process works a lot better mm-hmm that's good it's about to end it well Jen I appreciate you taking the time to talk with me and thank you good luck with everything thanks very much
