Clerks have stolen from 17 Nebraska towns in past decade
Published by Flatwater Free Press 6/17/22
In Nebraska, 14 city and village clerks have been charged for theft or violating public resources over the last decade. Those clerks, plus another who took money but wasn’t charged, stole an estimated $1.7 million from 17 small towns across the state, according to audit reports and restitution orders.
That total doesn’t include four other cases of theft or mismanagement by county officials since 2012, three cases of financial mismanagement by village and city board members.
And many more Nebraska small towns may be sitting ducks for future theft — or may not know they are already being targeted.
A whopping 158 towns in Nebraska have gone more than 20 years without a full financial audit, including four towns where former clerks were charged with theft, according to data collected by Flatwater Free Press from state audit records.
Photo by Addie Costello
Published by Flatwater Free Press 7/8/22
It’s the middle of summer break, but Precious McKesson sees only a handful of kids riding bikes near her home.
“If they don’t have to be outside, they’re not,” McKesson said.
McKesson, president of the North Omaha Neighborhood Alliance, believes she can see the effects the growing summer temperatures have on residents. Although summer temperatures are rising across the city, McKesson said there’s a noticeable difference, specific to her neighborhood.
“Visually it looks hotter because it’s nothing but dirt, just open land,” McKesson said.
The numbers back her up.
Published by Flatwater Free Press 8/5/22
Jasmine Gutschow felt nauseous when she woke up a few days before Thanksgiving last year. She brushed it off as typical pregnancy symptoms. She told her fiance he should head into work – the baby, not due for six more weeks, wouldn’t be coming anytime soon.
Three hours later, after her contractions started, after they sped for the hospital, after their 2003 Tahoe broke down, after her contractions quickened to every two minutes and Gutschow’s fiance frantically dialed 911, it had become crystal clear that this baby had other ideas.
Gutschow sat curled in the passenger seat on the shoulder of Highway 10 near Upland, trying not to scream in pain and scare the two other children in the car – there had been no time to find a babysitter.
“
I really don’t want to have this baby on the side of the road,” Gutschow said as she told Gregory – call the ambulance.
The car problem: A faulty fuel pump.
The bigger problem: The couple lives 50 miles, and an hour’s drive, from the hospital where Gutschow receives maternity care.
The couple lives in Franklin, inside a county of 2,889 residents in south-central Nebraska. Like 55 other counties in the state, Franklin County has no hospital offering birthing services.
The long drive can lead to far worse outcomes than mere added mileage. Rural regions of the state accounted for roughly 40% of births from 2016 to 2018. During that time, rural Nebraska had a rate of roughly 52 severe maternal mortality cases per 10,000 deliveries, notably higher than the urban rate of 45, according to the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services.
Photo by Laura Beahm for the Flatwater Free Press
Published by Flatwater Free Press 8/19/22
Kylie Adolf knows what it takes to run a successful second grade classroom.
She needs jump ropes. Tissues. Colorful paper. Puzzles. A princess puzzle is always a good idea.
But the Omaha second-grade teacher can’t request those supplies from her school and expect to find them in her supply closet the next week. There are no funds in the budget for that.
Instead, she spends her own money out of her teacher’s paycheck. Instead, she posts to Facebook and asks friends and strangers for help.
“My dream is to create a safe, functional space that kids know they are loved and cared for,” Adolf wrote to potential online donors.
Adolf spent an estimated $3,000 between her own money and donated money equipping her classroom last school year, her first year as a full-time teacher.
That’s not atypical. American teachers spent an average of $750 out of their own pockets – much of it on basic school supplies, according to a recent survey.
“It is a little bit frustrating when I actually added up and really thought about all the money that was poured into making everything happen the past school year,” Adolf said.
Nebraska teachers are increasingly turning to local donors and parents as they search for solutions.
Hundreds of teachers in at least 66 different Nebraska towns collectively requested more than $160,000 for classroom supplies for this school year as of August 10 on DonorsChoose, a crowdfunding platform for public school teachers.
