A Voice of Eviction
BY Chris Bowling, The Reader
Dana Swope was one of many residents forced to leave an apartment complex in midtown deemed unlivable by the City of Omaha in late January 2022. Reader reporter Chris Bowling sat down with her for Reader Radio in Swope’s former home on the third floor of the Flora apartments at 2577 Jones Street on January 25 to learn about how she ended up paying $700 a month in a cramped studio apartment with mold, no heat and mice.
Unfortunately her story may not be that uncommon as many in Omaha pay too much for poor, substandard living arrangements as the city is short 80,000 affordable housing units.
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Do Space will distribute 945 free Chromebook computers, mobile hotspots and Internet access to Omahans who do not have access to a computer and Internet service at their home. Individuals who are 18 years or older can apply online to the Do Space Tech Pack program or in person at Do Space at 7205 Dodge St., where paper applications will be available. Hurry! The application period will close in June, 2022.
From Scott Blake: There have been four vacancies on City Council (Reynolds 1958, Friend 1994, Terry 1999, Anzaldo 2000) where the outgoing council member was still on the council, and none of the outgoing council members voted for their replacement and did not participate in the vacancy process. But, Rich Pahls did when he resigned. NOISE is publishing Blake’s letter to the 2022 Charter Convention about why this was allowed.
On June 18 the Poor People’s Campaign is holding the “Mass Poor People’s & Low-Wage Workers’ Assembly and Moral March on Washington and to the Polls.” Organizer Angela Montalvo shares details on how to join the march and some statistics on poverty in Nebraska.
Sen. Megan Hunt writes: On May 2, in a truly unprecedented event, a draft decision on the Dobbs v. Jackson U.S. Supreme Court case was leaked to the public. If that opinion becomes final, it will strike down Roe v. Wade and set back fundamental rights in this country by half a century. It’s important to note this is not yet an official ruling—but in Nebraska, we should prepare for the worst.
HURRY UP! If you want to participate in the Omaha city charter convention, a public hearing will take place on Apr. 5 and a vote by the city council will take place on Apr. 12 to start the convention by May 16, 2022. The last conventions were in 2003 and 2013 so the next convention was expected to be in 2023. Why the rush? We don’t know. NOISE is republishing a blog from One Omaha so citizens know how to get involved on short notice and some tips on testifying before city council this Tues. Apr. 5.
“Two years ago, very few Nebraskans — and hardly any Americans — had even heard of critical race theory (CRT), which lived in rarified academic circles,” writes former executive editor of the Omaha World Herald, Randy Essex, a native Nebraskan from rural Beatrice. Essex explains what CRT is, what it is not, and offers some examples to illustrate why Nebraskans should have no fear in learning about how America’s history of racial injustice shapes the present.
UNO Chancellor Joanne Li celebrates the steps UNO has taken to ensure that “every Maverick has a seat at the table.” She traces this commitment back to 1969 when 54 Black students were arrested for protesting their voicelessness on campus. Li pays tribute to some of the many alumni who have chosen to give back to the community. She writes, “The challenge we face today as Nebraskans and as a nation is that not enough people have the opportunity to grow as individuals and apply their talents to their community.”
Sarah Johnson, former city council candidate in District 1, has been a fixture at weekly council meetings. After the vote to demolish the W. Dale Clark library and give the land to Mutual of Omaha to build a corporate headquarters, she has decided that she’s can’t take it anymore. Johnson writes, “You won’t find me wasting my energy with “public engagement” at city hall any longer.
A library cardholder since before she learned to write, NOISEmaker Michaela Wolf laments the loss of the library overlooking the Gene Leahy Mall. Wolf questions why such decisions are made behind closed doors in our final community response piece about the demolition of the central library.
The strong mayor system is why Omaha's mayor can make major decisions, such as tearing down a library to offer the land to a Fortune 500 company to build a new headquarters, without first consulting the city council.
The "strong mayor/ weak council" is a system in which the mayor has considerable authority over the day-to-day operations of the city government, much like the CEO of a business. By comparison, the city council operates more like a company's board of directors.
How did we get a strong mayor and weak council? More importantly, can it be changed? In a community response piece, Pete Fey weighs in on the history of the Omaha City Charter Convention with an eye on 2023 when the next convention will take place.