Omaha Forums

Mello will challenge Stothert for mayor

Everyone knew he was thinking about running against Stothert, but I didn't think he would run against a popular Stothert. I was told he would only run if she was vulnerable....

Roseann Moring / World-Herald staff writer wrote: Mello’s proposals include:

• Creating an infrastructure bank to raise funds to repair the city's aging streets
• Pushing to turn Eppley Airfield into an international airport
• Promoting more public-private partnerships
• Setting a goal for the number of high-paying jobs he wants to bring into the city

Outside of not being able to ditch the restaurant tax, which was a campaign promise of hers, and public service gaffes here and there, Stothert has been a decent mayor. Opinions may change by election time, but at this point, I think that she would weather any re-election contention.

Did he hit the term limits? Could be the reason he is running.

iamjacobm wrote:Did he hit the term limits? Could be the reason he is running.

He's at term limits in the legislature. Also, I doubt he'll be able to defeat Stothert. She's been a decent mayor, despite any significant landmark projects under her belt like Fahey or Daub. But, even as a fairly liberal person, I've appreciated the job she's done on taking on the Police and Fire unions.

Garrett wrote:

iamjacobm wrote:Did he hit the term limits? Could be the reason he is running.

He's at term limits in the legislature. Also, I doubt he'll be able to defeat Stothert. She's been a decent mayor, despite any significant landmark projects under her belt like Fahey or Daub. But, even as a fairly liberal person, I've appreciated the job she's done on taking on the Police and Fire unions.

Given the debt status of our city, I appreciate her willingness to forego the "legacy" projects.

I will most likely vote for the current mayor. She understands Omaha's needs she also has been expanding the tax base and has created large surpluses for the city to use. I'm wary of this new comer because it sounds like he wants to spend like crazy and I do want Eppley to become a international airport but that would most likely mean moving or doing expensive upgrades to the current terminal's. Also Stothert has been expanding the police force which needs to happen to better protect Omaha! Omaha needs Mayor Stothert not this other person. I'm already seeing tow the line democrats lining up to support his bid. Let's hope those new areas she annex helps her out!

bigredmed wrote:

Garrett wrote:

iamjacobm wrote:Did he hit the term limits? Could be the reason he is running.

He's at term limits in the legislature. Also, I doubt he'll be able to defeat Stothert. She's been a decent mayor, despite any significant landmark projects under her belt like Fahey or Daub. But, even as a fairly liberal person, I've appreciated the job she's done on taking on the Police and Fire unions.

Given the debt status of our city, I appreciate her willingness to forego the "legacy" projects.

Precisely.

What influence does the mayor have on the Omaha Airport Authority, other than appointing the board? Just trying to figure out how the mayor can just "make Epply an international airport"

While the ball park was built under Fahey, the need for the restaurant tax also began with him. Omaha had a financial crisis & he borrowed money from the Police & Fire pension fund to help fix the problem, with promises of taking care of the repayment on down the road. So we are now & for the foreseeable future paying for that. Not Stothert's fault. I really don't care if it goes away or not, it's a nuisance tax and on an individual tab it's not a lot, but if it helps, then I'm ok with it. I still remember the nickel a pack tobacco tax to build the Devaney Center. Never went away. This won't either if the past is any indication

OmahaJaysCU wrote:What influence does the mayor have on the Omaha Airport Authority, other than appointing the board? Just trying to figure out how the mayor can just "make Epply an international airport"

I have no idea what his plan is or if he actually has a plan at all. That said, presumably if a mayor wanted to make Eppley an international airport (it already is) for commercial passengers he or she would 1) fund the building of a FIS facility. 2) The city would provide a revenue guarantee to an airline/s to guarantee non-stop service to a a destination/s.

Question what would it take to make Eppley a international airport? Would it require new facilities or maybe a new airport entirely? Also what would happen with the taxes and how would he pay for that massive expansion?

OmahaFan wrote:Question what would it take to make Eppley a international airport? Would it require new facilities or maybe a new airport entirely? Also what would happen with the taxes and how would he pay for that massive expansion?

Read through this thread for a number of thoughs on this

http://www.eomahaforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=3297

OmahaFan wrote:Question what would it take to make Eppley a international airport? Would it require new facilities or maybe a new airport entirely?

Exactly what I said in the post right before yours. You need a 15,000 square foot customs and immigration facility. If they want to do it any time before rebuilding the terminals they can accomplish it with a standalone facility These 3 posts explain the situation pretty well.

http://eomahaforums.com/viewtopic.php?f ... 40#p258586

http://eomahaforums.com/viewtopic.php?f ... 80#p264503

http://eomahaforums.com/viewtopic.php?f ... 47#p265247

Donald Trump has said a hundred times during his campaign that our airports are dumps and third world and he wants to take federal money and make them modern. The guy rides around the world in his own jet with his name on it so I figure he would know better then most of us if our airports are sub par or not. Vote Trump if you want the airport improved!

This pretty much sums up Jean Stothert:


That is her web site on a mobile phone. Looks like her staff rushed one together on Saturday night (and didn't have time to go buy a photo, just copied one they found on the internet, not bothering to notice the image was watermarked) once the World-Herald broke the news that Heath Mello was running. Kind of like how Stothert suddenly took an interest in ConAgra when word came out that they were about to announce they were moving their headquarters to Chicago. Being unprepared (snow storms, ConAgra, and now re-election campaigns) then scrambling at the last moment seems to be a common theme with this Mayor.

GRANDPASMUCKER wrote:Vote Trump if you want the airport improved!

It's adorable that you actually believe what he says...

LOL, I would rather look at that watermarked stock photo then the Absolutely Terrible photo they have up there on the desktop site!

Wrong White Balance.
Blown out Highlights.
Crooked buildings.
Poor use of Photoshop when trying to remove building signs.

I would think even an armature could do better than the photo up there now

HR Paperstacks wrote:

GRANDPASMUCKER wrote:Vote Trump if you want the airport improved!

It's adorable that you actually believe what he says...

Soon we will have a Republican president who has vowed to update our airports working with a Republican Congress and Omaha's Republican Mayor and Nebraska's Republican Governor. Yeah I do believe you can pretty much expect to see some major improvements coming to our airport in the next 5 years.

I hope they do make Eppley a International Airport with Custom officers manning post. One reason is because I'm wanting to maybe become a Custom's officer and be able to work in Omaha instead of some far flung border patrol post or International airport which require's moving and no the Federal Govt doesn't pay your moving expenses.

Going off topic regarding Trump's comment's I do agree that our airports need to be fixed but I'm not really sure how he would accomplish his plans on fixing our nations infrastructure he hasn't given really any great ideas on how to pay for it or even how he would lead such a massive investment into upgrading our nation. I'm a Republican myself but some of Trump's ideas are just far out there and I don't like Clinton's either. Though I do agree the nations infrastructure including Omaha's needs to be updated for the 21st century.

I was listening to a radio show one time and well it scares me a little bit but one massive solar flare which can happen at any time really can knock out our entire electrical grid with one X flare ( Biggest solar Flare). We have ways to protect our electrical grid which would include "Hardening our Grid" which I think should be part of any upgrading of infrastructure. America needs to be updated to 2.O to succeed otherwise we will just crumble under our failing roads, railroad, pipes , Electrical grid etc.

OmahaFan wrote:I hope they do make Eppley a International Airport with Custom officers manning post. One reason is because I'm wanting to maybe become a Custom's officer and be able to work in Omaha instead of some far flung border patrol post or International airport which require's moving and no the Federal Govt doesn't pay your moving expenses.

Again Eppley already has this.

I have not seen one Custom official while walking the Terminals or going through check points. Where is this Custom facility you talk about? Is it located somewhere else at the airport? No offense intended btw. Just curious!

OmahaFan wrote:I have not seen one Custom official while walking the Terminals or going through check points. Where is this Custom facility you talk about? Is it located somewhere else at the airport? No offense intended btw. Just curious!

Read the 3 links (all to posts on this site in the Eppley thread) I provided in my response to you on Sunday above and if you still have questions after that we can talk.

Thank you

Why are mayoral elections held on odd years?

daveoma wrote:Why are mayoral elections held on odd years?

To ensure low voter turnout?

zippy wrote:

daveoma wrote:Why are mayoral elections held on odd years?

To ensure low voter turnout?

That's what it seems like to me.

daveoma wrote:Why are mayoral elections held on odd years?

A few years ago Sen. Krist tried to change it to even years after a 29% voter turnout for Mayoral, City Council and School Board elections. State law requires all Nebraska cities to hold their municipal elections during state and federal elections, but Omaha and Lincoln both have Home-Rule Charters which placed the elections on odd years thinking it would generate greater emphasis on these elections, however the opposite has happened, people get sick of the National elections and after that they simply don't care.


.

At least Omahans have control over city elections unlike state and federal. The 2nd District electoral vote goes to a Democrat one time and everybody wants to go back to winner-takes-all. That gets shot down so they redraw the 2nd District to include 100.000 plus Sarpy County Republicans. What a crock.

choke wrote:At least Omahans have control over city elections unlike state and federal. The 2nd District electoral vote goes to a Democrat one time and everybody wants to go back to winner-takes-all. That gets shot down so they redraw the 2nd District to include 100.000 plus Sarpy County Republicans. What a crock.

Agreed. I think gerrymandering is part of the reason republicans still control congress. They certainly aren't liked by the vast majority of the country.

daveoma wrote:

choke wrote:At least Omahans have control over city elections unlike state and federal. The 2nd District electoral vote goes to a Democrat one time and everybody wants to go back to winner-takes-all. That gets shot down so they redraw the 2nd District to include 100.000 plus Sarpy County Republicans. What a crock.

Agreed. I think gerrymandering is part of the reason republicans still control congress. They certainly aren't liked by the vast majority of the country.

Now keep in mind that Democrats screwed themselves here first. Back when they controlled things in the Clinton admin, they gerrymandered urban districts to create predominantly black districts giving them a permanent advantage. The left over populations became increasingly Republican and lumped into these districts.

We really need to go towards geographic districts that don't regard color, race, or political parties.

bigredmed wrote:

daveoma wrote:

choke wrote:At least Omahans have control over city elections unlike state and federal. The 2nd District electoral vote goes to a Democrat one time and everybody wants to go back to winner-takes-all. That gets shot down so they redraw the 2nd District to include 100.000 plus Sarpy County Republicans. What a crock.

Agreed. I think gerrymandering is part of the reason republicans still control congress. They certainly aren't liked by the vast majority of the country.

Now keep in mind that Democrats screwed themselves here first. Back when they controlled things in the Clinton admin, they gerrymandered urban districts to create predominantly black districts giving them a permanent advantage. The left over populations became increasingly Republican and lumped into these districts.

We really need to go towards geographic districts that don't regard color, race, or political parties.

Dream on.

RNcyanide wrote:

bigredmed wrote:

daveoma wrote:

choke wrote:At least Omahans have control over city elections unlike state and federal. The 2nd District electoral vote goes to a Democrat one time and everybody wants to go back to winner-takes-all. That gets shot down so they redraw the 2nd District to include 100.000 plus Sarpy County Republicans. What a crock.

Agreed. I think gerrymandering is part of the reason republicans still control congress. They certainly aren't liked by the vast majority of the country.

Now keep in mind that Democrats screwed themselves here first. Back when they controlled things in the Clinton admin, they gerrymandered urban districts to create predominantly black districts giving them a permanent advantage. The left over populations became increasingly Republican and lumped into these districts.

We really need to go towards geographic districts that don't regard color, race, or political parties.

Dream on.

Nebraska's 3 house districts have to be divided more or less evenly based on population. If the Republicans would have succeeded in changing back to a winner-take-all system, they might have actually hurt their chances if urban Omaha's growth continues to outpace the rest of the state. If the demographics keep turning more blue in Omaha, the state could turn blue under winner-take all. It's probably more likely that Nebraska will lose a congressional seat as other areas of the country outpace us in population growth. In that case, it will probably stay red. I agree gerrymandering sucks and both parties are guilty of it. Maybe there is some way to draw the lines more geographically. At least avoid splitting counties.

Either way, suburban Sarpy will continue to outgrow urban Omaha. So winner-take-all or not, I can't see Nebraska or the 2nd District going blue anytime soon. I'm just curious why they had to flip-flop eastern and western Sarpy County when they redrew the District. That's what put the 2nd District back in the red. Bellevue seems more of an Omaha suburb than Gretna. I also read that the 3rd District may be eliminated by 2020.

daveoma wrote: Agreed. I think gerrymandering is part of the reason republicans still control congress. They certainly aren't liked by the vast majority of the country.

It only appears that way to people who don't interact with others who share an opposing point of view. You know, those ones that preach open-mindedness, tolerance and inclusion yet go cry and riot and burn things down when their candidate doesn't win?

I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

NEDodger wrote:

daveoma wrote: Agreed. I think gerrymandering is part of the reason republicans still control congress. They certainly aren't liked by the vast majority of the country.

It only appears that way to people who don't interact with others who share an opposing point of view. You know, those ones that preach open-mindedness, tolerance and inclusion yet go cry and riot and burn things down when their candidate doesn't win?

I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

Sounds like Trump himself. Election was rigged if he didn't win, ban all Muslims, deport everyone who's here illegally, beat people up for me and I'll pay your legal fees, etc.. Temper-tantrum Trump. Yeah, I know who you are talking about.

choke wrote: Sounds like Trump himself. Election was rigged if he didn't win, ban all Muslims, deport everyone who's here illegally, beat people up for me and I'll pay your legal fees, etc.. Temper-tantrum Trump. Yeah, I know who you are talking about.

You're comparing rioting and burning down cities to deporting people who are here illegally?

Oh, gotcha - you're one of those folks who demonizes deporting illegals while at the same time decrying stagnant wages.

Also, Daveoma can stand up for himself. Unless he's in a "safe space" because someone called him out?

How about that mayoral election? I wonder how people will react to Stothert saying she'll scale back the restaurant tax after making repealing it one of her original campaign promises 4 years ago and then doing nothing. Also I'm curious as to what her "transportation" improvements goals are.

There was a tweet that said she said the time is right for a modern streetcar and Hal Daub yelled in support from the crowd.

I have always liked Mayor Stothert alot and always voted for her for years.........BUT!......after reading in the paper today that she claims she voted for John McCain instead of Trump I'm calling her out for either being a ding bat or a traitor or both. If the Democrats want to roll out a legit alternative I'm one Republican who will sure give them a good look now! Shes done in my book along with the traitor State Senator Benedict Sasse.

NEDodger wrote:

choke wrote: Sounds like Trump himself. Election was rigged if he didn't win, ban all Muslims, deport everyone who's here illegally, beat people up for me and I'll pay your legal fees, etc.. Temper-tantrum Trump. Yeah, I know who you are talking about.

You're comparing rioting and burning down cities to deporting people who are here illegally?

Oh, gotcha - you're one of those folks who demonizes deporting illegals while at the same time decrying stagnant wages.

Also, Daveoma can stand up for himself. Unless he's in a "safe space" because someone called him out?

Just wanted to point out that the protesters are mimicking what they saw during the election. When you don't get your way, you bully your peers and you bully women like Kelly Megyn for asking tough questions.

Some people that are here illegally were brought here as children and went through our school system. And now you want to tell them that this isn't there home and they need to leave?