North Platte Telegraph. April 27, 2024.
Editorial: Unicam was better in 2024 … but about tax relief …
Before discussing what wasn’t done about Nebraska’s property tax crisis, let’s talk about the one thing the 2024 Legislature absolutely had to do and did.
The 49 senators so trapped themselves in the partisan quicksand of filibusters in 2023 that countless simpler, less sexy but still vital issues were set aside.
That had to stop.
One of George W. Norris’ key goals in pushing for the Unicameral in 1934 was to make lawmakers work together on everyday, down-to-earth matters on which political parties stand in the way of common-sense solutions.
Norris’ goal has mostly been met over the decades. And it was in 2024.
Senators came together to harness more than $1 billion in federal aid to keep rural hospitals afloat. They made Medicare Supplement coverage available for many disabled people who need Medicare well before age 65. And they agreed counties should be able to offer emergency aid to struggling veterans no matter when they served.
We could cite many more examples. But Lincoln County residents, from those most personally affected up to Sen. Mike Jacobson, helped enact bills to solve or ease those three issues.
Our lawmakers have learned how to unite on small matters. But the tough ones? Like property taxes?
Gov. Jim Pillen set an admirable goal in January: By April, complete a 40% cut in statewide property tax collections between last year and this year.
It seemed unlikely, given the typical lack of ability, will or even desire among too many leaders to pull it off.
Sing along: “Yes, property taxes are out of whack. We must come together to fix that. But …”
… but the people who support our (fill in the blank) interest group are already too burdened. Make someone else help.
If everyone says that, nothing happens. Pillen, like so many before him, underestimated the power of the “but.”
Senators were given two plans over the last month to start rebalancing the property-sales-income tax fiscal stool. The Telegraph published analyses of both. Both showed they would have helped in Lincoln County, even if they didn’t reach Pillen’s 40% goal.
Senators shot both down because the foes of other types of taxes again raised enough fear of electoral defeat to bring out their inner “but.”
Thus Pillen told senators as they left Lincoln to plan on coming back to deal with property taxes. It’s just halftime, the 1970s Husker hero said.
Not to throw cold Gatorade now on “Coach” Pillen (we know he’d welcome that at game’s end, if he wins), but a special session would be useless unless Nebraskans at last admit we can’t merely cut our way to tax relief.
After all, Governor, they still don’t want to pay just a little more even for soda pop and candy at your halftime concession stand (or grocery or C-store), to mention an attention-getting revenue-raiser you (unlike your predecessor) was willing to embrace.
Yes, senators did much better in serving Nebraskans in 2024. There wasn’t enough courage among them to do more on property tax relief.
But who must find the courage? Them? Or us?
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McCook Gazette. April 23, 2024.
Editorial: New nursing home rules threaten rural communities
The recent move by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to implement minimum staffing requirements in long-term care facilities has drawn significant opposition from lawmakers, and rightfully so. Led by representatives like Adrian Smith and Senator Deb Fischer, concerns have been raised about the potentially devastating impacts of these rules, particularly on rural communities like those in Nebraska’s Third District.
U.S. Rep. Adrian Smith has highlighted the disproportionate impact of nursing home closures on rural areas. These closures are exacerbated by workforce shortages, which have only been aggravated by the pressures of the ongoing pandemic. Implementing arbitrary staffing ratio mandates, as proposed by CMS, threatens to exacerbate these issues, placing more communities at risk of losing access to essential long-term care facilities altogether.
U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer has echoed these concerns, emphasizing the potential devastation these rules could wreak on nursing homes across the country. Her legislation, the Protecting Rural Seniors’ Access to Care Act, seeks to prevent the implementation of these rules and establish an advisory panel to identify alternative solutions that won’t harm seniors’ access to care. With over 90 organizations endorsing her efforts, it’s clear that there is widespread concern about the impact of these rules.
The proposed rule from CMS, which would require 75% of nursing homes to increase staffing to comply, fails to consider the unique challenges faced by rural areas. In states like Nebraska, where historic staffing shortages are already a pressing issue, meeting these standards would be incredibly difficult, if not impossible. Instead of addressing these challenges, the rule threatens to exacerbate them, pushing already struggling facilities to the brink of closure.
It’s evident that the Biden administration needs to reconsider its approach to addressing staffing issues in nursing homes. Rather than imposing one-size-fits-all mandates that fail to account for the realities of rural communities, the administration should be focusing on promoting innovative solutions to build up the workforce. This includes extending successful staffing flexibilities implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic and working collaboratively with lawmakers and stakeholders to identify targeted, effective strategies.
As representatives like Adrian Smith and Sen. Deb Fischer have rightly pointed out, the current approach to nursing home staffing rules is deeply flawed and could have dire consequences for rural communities across the country. It’s time for the administration to listen to these concerns and work towards solutions that support, rather than undermine, access to essential long-term care services for seniors in rural America.
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Lincoln Journal Star. April 27, 2024.
Editorial: New nursing home rules threaten rural communities
Gov. Jim Pillen’s initial plan to reduce property taxes by 40% by raising sales tax by 2 cents ran into a buzzsaw of opposition as soon as it was introduced to the Legislature in January, decried as a tax shift by conservatives and as a regressive tax increase for renters and those who don’t own significant property.
So the plan was altered, first, by reducing the sales tax increase to 1%, then by dropping it altogether and proposing a bill that, combined with tax relief measures passed last year, would have reduced property taxes by an estimated 22%, but would have offered no net savings to property owners who were taking advantage of income tax credits that the measure would have eliminated.
But that plan, which hiked sales tax on vaping products, hemp products, cigarettes, soda and candy, veterinary care, dry cleaning and lottery tickets, failed to garner the 33 votes needed to overcome a filibuster on the final day of the legislative session.
Later that day, Pillen, in his session-ending speech to lawmakers, repeatedly chastised the Legislature for its “unacceptable” failure and pledged to call the senators back to Lincoln for “as many sessions as it takes” to try to force them to do something to reduce property taxes this year.
Calling a special session might be emotionally satisfying for a clearly disappointed Pillen and plan supporters.
But he has to have learned the same lesson as every Nebraska governor since the 1970s — that it is far easier to talk about property tax relief and reforming the state’s taxation system than it is to get any plan through the Legislature.
That will remain true for any special session that Pillen might call. He’ll still need 33 votes for any plan to survive a near-certain filibuster with legislators from Omaha Sen. Justin Wayne to conservative Sen. Steve Erdman of Bayard cautioning that those votes will be no easier to find in August than they were in April.
More problematic, there appears to be no concept, much less a detailed plan, that will receive the broad support needed from the public and interest groups for it to have a chance at legislative approval.
Raising the sales tax will continue to be opposed as regressive by some and as a blow to the state’s retailers, who fear a loss of business due to the higher prices after an increase, particularly on expensive items.
Eliminating sales tax exemptions sounds good. But the industries whose ox would be gored by the newly imposed taxes are certain to oppose any such plan.
And, Pillen and legislators past and present have seemingly tied the state’s hands-on tax matters by taking income and corporate tax increases off the table, making it impossible to come close to balancing the so-called three-legged stool of property, sales and income taxes.
So rather than calling a special session and wasting legislative time and energy on plans that have little chance of approval, the state and efforts to reduce property taxes would be much better served by the creation of a working group made up of a range of interested parties to come up with a plan that has a chance of passage in the 2025 Legislature.
END