Eye-Popping Overtime: Prison Employees Double Salaries, Causing Burnout and Costing State Millions
About 145 employees of the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services made at least half their base salary in overtime — part of spiraling overtime costs in the prison system that created a $48 million tab for taxpayers in the past three years.
By Natalia Alamdari and Yanqi Xu.
Originally published in Flatwater Free Press. Republished in The Reader.
Reed Moore’s Daily Rundown
International Holocaust Remembrance Day
Today’s news is reminded of this quote from Winston Churchill — “Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.”: Sen. Steve Lathrop of Omaha introduces a criminal justice reform bill in the Legislature, the Grand Island Public Schools teachers union says the district is shorting the pay of some teachers, and Mayor Jean Stothert is excited about plans to plans to demolish the downtown library, erect a new Mutual of Omaha headquarters and build a streetcar line — but many constituents are not.
Harper’s Index Facts of the Day
- Percentage of people killed by police between 1980 and 2018
whose death certificates list a different cause of death: 55 - Percentage by which more men died from police
encounters than from testicular cancer in 2019: 135
Source: University of Washington (Seattle)
Reed Moore’s COVID-19 Roundup
As announced in the Wednesday, Dec. 29, bonus newsletter, in light of the Omicron variant, Reed Moore will replace the “Thing To Do” section with a COVID-19 spotlight featuring coronavirus-related content. The Reader believes it’s irresponsible to promote events when hospitals are nearing capacity and some community members refuse to get vaccinated. As cases continue, The Reader won’t promote any events — be they concerts, plays, art-gallery openings or stand-up comedy — that don’t require
masks, vaccination and social distancing.
- Dig deeper into the hospital decompression program, slated to add almost 100 skilled nursing care beds across the state.
- Two cases of the Omicron subvariant, BA.2, are found in Douglas County.
- Want to help the community track coronavirus case numbers? Fill out the Douglas County Health Department’s COVID-19 Home Test Reporting Form.
- Dive into the state’s nursing shortage.
For nationwide COVID-19 case
and vaccination trends, click here.
Around Omaha
- Dig deeper into the city’s plans to demolish the downtown library, erect a new Mutual of Omaha headquarters and build a streetcar line. Mayor Jean Stothert is excited — but many constituents are not.
- A lawsuit in which a man says his constitutional rights were violated when a Sarpy County sheriff’s deputy shot him with a pepper ball while watching a protest will move forward on two of four claims.
- The Nebraska Humane Society finds itself spread thin.
- A disability rights trial is scheduled for late March in the Douglas County Court.
Around Nebraska
- The Nebraska Public Power District will pay $2.5 million to the family of Kenny Angel, who died when the Spencer Dam fell and flooded the family’s property.
- Latest in the Legislature: A bill to cut down the time allowed for early and mail-in voting meets resistance, a proposal to keep the income tax break for school property taxes moves forward, and Sen. Steve Lathrop of Omaha introduces a criminal justice reform bill. Take a deeper dive into the bill, LB 920, by clicking here.
- The Grand Island Public Schools teachers union says the district is shorting the pay of some teachers.
- Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring — and one of his most noteworthy opinions had to do with abortion in Nebraska, according to CNN.
- The Midwest’s wealth gap is widening.
- The state’s top drug threat is methamphetamine, according to a coalition of law enforcement agencies.
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