Radical Left-wing activism continues to run out of control at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln (UNL). The University’s administration continues to turn a blind eye, instead of dealing honestly with the illicit behavior of its own faculty members. The unhinged behavior of the faculty will continue to worsen until University President, Hank Bounds, and Chancellor, Ronnie Green, are finally forced to deal with it.

Certain events unfolded last week in Lincoln, linking a Left-wing, activist professor at UNL to illegal behavior. While it should be needless for me to have to say that any kind of deviant or illicit behavior is inappropriate for a university professor, the University’s administration doesn’t seem to care. Meanwhile, the reputation of the University of Nebraska – Lincoln continues to slide into the cesspool of radical, Left-wing political activism, including illicit acts of vandalism.

On February 20th Patricia A. Wonch-Hill was arrested and ticketed for three counts of vandalism. Hill is an assistant research professor of Sociology at UNL. Hill was ticketed for putting googly eyes on two of U.S. Rep. Jeff Fortenberry’s campaign signs and using a piece of tape to change the “o” in his name to an “a”, insinuating that his name refers to human flatulence. She was also ticketed for putting fake blood and “Betsy Riot” stickers on the front door of Sen. Deb Fischer’s office. According to the Lincoln Police Department Hill’s fingerprints were found at all three locations; thus, linking her to these three crimes.

This was not the first time Patricia A. Wonch-Hill has been charged with an illegal act of vandalism, though. Last year Hill was found guilty in a Virginia court for spraying fake blood on the house of Chris Cox, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association. While in Virginia Hill also harassed Cox’s wife by passing out anti-gun pamphlets in front of her place of business.

Patricia A. Wonch-Hill also took over as president of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) one year ago after ousting former president, Donna Duffner, who served for only one month, in order to censure UNL for terminating Courtney Lawton, the graduate teaching assistant who harassed Kaitlyn Mullen. UNL has remained on the AAUP’s list of censured universities since May 2018.

In the world outside of academia employees are expected to represent well the business they work for. Illegal behavior is not tolerated because it tarnishes the reputation of the company. I expect no less from our flagship university. As a land grant university, Patricia A. Wonch-Hill does not just represent the university who signs her paychecks, she also represents the State of Nebraska.

In response to Hill’s arrest last week by the Lincoln Police Department, University of Nebraska spokesman, Leslie Reed, said in a written statement that the University does not “condone vandalism” and that the situation is “…a personal legal matter based on actions of a faculty member on their own time, and they will have to take accountability for their actions based on the outcome of the legal process.” In other words, “We don’t want to deal with it.”

When our Founding Father, Abraham Baldwin, a man of high moral character who signed the U.S. Constitution, founded the College of Georgia in 1785, which later became the University of Georgia, he wrote in the school’s original charter that “…civil order should be the result of choice and not of necessity…” By saying this, he did not mean that civility is always a matter of personal choice; instead, he meant that when civility is the result of good moral character, it does not have to be regulated or coerced. Unfortunately, the lack of action by the administration at UNL to confront the behavior of its own faculty continues to reduce civility to a matter of necessity, rather than choice. Unfortunately, UNL will never restore a sense of civility among its own faculty until it is finally forced to do so.

Patricia A. Wonch-Hill

2011 arrest in Lincoln County, NE for DUI

This week I will have public hearings on three of my bills. Today I would like to introduce you to those bills and present my reasons for introducing them.

On February 19 I will have a public hearing on LB161. This is a bill to eliminate the Learning Community. The Learning Community offers early childhood education, family engagement, and educational preparation programs to children and families in Douglas and Sarpy counties. Although the Learning Community does not directly affect folks living in Nebraska’s Panhandle, it has become a scourge in Douglas and Sarpy counties with a vision to expand across Nebraska.

The Learning Community has lost sight of its purpose and has devolved into an organization in search of a mission. The Learning Community’s board has abandoned its original purpose, they have started their own private foundation, they have wasted tax-payers dollars, and they have inadvertently driven private businesses and charity organizations out of Omaha’s inner city neighborhoods. For these reasons and more, the Learning Community needs to be terminated and replaced with a better program with proven results.

On February 21 I will have a public hearing on LB386. LB386 is a bill to correct the relationship between taxes levied and cash reserves. The bill will cap the cash reserves of local units of government with tax asking authority at fifty percent of their annual operating budget.

The reason for this bill is to prevent the abuse of cash reserves. Some local units of government have abused their tax asking authority by accumulating egregious amounts of cash reserves at the expense of the tax-payers. This bill will prevent this kind of abuse from recurring in the future. There simply is no reason why any local unit of government with tax asking authority needs cash reserves in excess of fifty percent of their annual operating budget.

On February 21 I will have another hearing on LB483. LB483 is my priority bill for 2019. The bill will change the way agricultural land gets valuated for property tax purposes. LB483 will change agricultural land valuations from the current market based system to a productivity based system.

LB483 is needed because the current market based system has never valuated agricultural land in a fair and equitable way. In most cases the current market based system valuates agricultural land upon one percent of sales in the county. Oftentimes hunting groups or other special interest groups will pay exorbitant prices for land which drives up agricultural land values across the county. The result has been that agricultural land valuations have risen beyond the level where many landowners can continue to farm or ranch in Nebraska.

LB483 will change the way we value agricultural land to a productivity based system. The bill will tie agricultural land valuations to the soil productivity ratings provided by the National Resources Conservation Service. The bill will also create the Agricultural Land Valuation Board, which will be charged with the task of setting the discount rate and creating a manual for county assessors to use when valuating agricultural land.

This week I will have public hearings on two bills in the Legislature’s Transportation Committee. The hearings on both bills will occur on February 12. The ideas for these two bills came to me from constituents living in Legislative District 47. So, today I would like to introduce you to the basic content of these two bills.

The first bill is LB371. LB371 is a bill which will allow Nebraskans to operate their all-terrain vehicles (ATV’s) on Nebraska’s highways and roadways. Current law forbids Nebraskans from crossing State highways with two or more lanes of traffic with their ATV. In order to cross a four-lane divided highway the owner or operator of an ATV must load the vehicle onto a trailer or into the back of a pick-up truck, cross the highway, and then unload the ATV. This is ridiculous!

Therefore, my bill will allow the owner or operator of an ATV to cross a four-lane divided highway or to drive on a four-lane divided highway. Farmers and ranchers use ATV’s to fix fences, to herd cattle, and to check on their fields. Using an ATV to accomplish these kinds of tasks is often more practical than using a pick-up truck, but current law forbids a farmer or rancher from traveling from one field to another on a two-lane State highway. Therefore, my bill would change the law to allow farmers and ranchers to use their ATV’s on these kinds of roads.

The second bill that will get a public hearing is LB612. LB612 is a bill which will allow the loved ones of those who have lost a family member in a tragic accident on a Nebraska roadway to memorialize the deceased person with a special kind of road sign. The pain and heartache of losing a loved one in a tragic accident is difficult to relate to until it happens to you. Therefore, these memorial road signs will help the surviving family members to grieve their loss.

LB612 will direct the Department of Transportation to erect memorial road signs to commemorate the deceased person by the request of surviving family members. Members of the deceased person’s family may fill out an application at the Department of Motor Vehicles and pay the required fee in order to memorialize their loved one near the location of the accident for a period of ten years. After ten years the family members may re-apply and pay the required fee to extend the memorial for another ten years.

The memorial signs shall resemble those currently being used in Lancaster County. The signs shall be triangular in shape and colored blue. The name as well as a picture of the deceased person would be displayed on the sign. Each roadside memorial sign would also include one of four safe driving slogans. These slogans would be: “Please Drive Safely,” “Seat Belts Save Lives,” “Watch for Bicyclists,” and, “Don’t Drink and Drive.”

The bill prohibits memorial signs to be erected for any deceased person who died on a Nebraska roadway with a blood alcohol content level at or above the legal limit.

On Thursday, February 7 the Legislature’s Revenue Committee will hold a public hearing on my resolution for a Constitutional Amendment on property tax relief. Property tax relief has been my number one priority ever since I came to the Legislature. As I’ve talked with people all across the State, it is evident and clear that no single issue matters more to Nebraskans than property tax relief.

My resolution for a Constitutional Amendment for property tax relief will allow all Nebraska property owners to claim a thirty-five percent credit or refund of their property tax bill on their Nebraska State Income Tax Return. Even if you have no income, but you pay property taxes, you will be able to file a Nebraska State Income Tax Return in order to claim your refund.

My resolution for a Constitutional Amendment for Property tax relief is known in the Legislature as LR3CA. The public hearing will be held at 1:30 p.m. in Room 1524 at the State Capitol. Those wishing to testify should come early, sign the register, and fill out the green sheet in the hearing room. If you cannot make the long drive to Lincoln, letters and e-mails of support for the resolution can be sent to Sen. Linehan, Chair of the Revenue Committee, so long as they are received before 5:00 p.m. on February 6. Please be sure to state in your letter or e-mail that you want your comments to be put in the public record.

A citizen-led petition drive has been circulating around Nebraska, containing the same language as LR3CA. Please make it a point to sign the petition when it comes to your area. If the Legislature refuses to pass LR3CA, then Nebraska’s second Legislative House will speak up. Nebraska’s second Legislative House is the people of Nebraska. Nebraskans need property tax relief regardless of whether or not the Legislature has the guts to pass my resolution.

On another note, last week the Revenue Committee held a public hearing on my bill, LB372. LB372 is an agricultural land valuation bill, but it is not the one that will change our valuation system over to an income based approach. LB372 is a necessary bill because it corrects a problem in the way the Property Assessment Division currently values agricultural land. LB372 sets the stage for LB483, which is my larger bill to change agricultural land valuations over to an income based approach.

One of the problems with the way agricultural land currently gets valued relates to the soil data that the Property Assessment Division applies to dryland cropland, irrigated cropland, and grassland. Currently, the Property Assessment Division misapplies dryland cropland soil data from an index provided by Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) to irrigated cropland and to grassland. This practice by the Property Assessment Division causes County Assessors to value agricultural land inaccurately.

Because of this practice, the Property Assessment Division has been valuing agricultural land inaccurately. Instead of the current practice, the Property Assessment Division ought to apply soil data provided by the NRCS appropriately. In other words, NRCS soil data for irrigated cropland ought to be applied to irrigated cropland, and NRCS soil data for grassland ought to be applied to grassland. Instead, the Property Assessment Division only uses soil data for dryland cropland, and this practice skews valuations for irrigated cropland and grassland.

Therefore, my bill, LB372, fixes this problem. The bill requires the Property Assessment Division to apply the appropriate NRCS soil data to whatever kind of agricultural land is being assessed, and this fix will help to make agricultural land valuations more accurate and fair.

January 23rd was the last day to introduce new bills in the Nebraska Legislature. Overall, it was a very active start to the new Biennium. A total of 739 bills were introduced this year, which is the most since 2005. I contributed my fair share this year by introducing thirteen bills and one resolution for a Constitutional Amendment for property tax relief.

The new committee assignments have also been set. This time around I will be serving on the Appropriations Committee along with Sen. John Stinner of Gering. Because the Appropriations Committee meets five days per week, I am unable to serve on another Standing Committee. So, I will no longer be serving on the Education Committee or on the Health and Human Services Committee.

Special Committees are a different story. I will continue to chair the Building Maintenance Committee, which is a Special Committee of the Nebraska Legislature. The Building Maintenance Committee does not have regular meeting times during the Legislative Session; instead, the committee is required by State Statute to meet at least four times during the year.

The Legislature approved the rules within the first ten working days, avoiding the stalemate of two years ago. Senators will need all the time they can muster this year in order press through all of the new bills. Nevertheless, the one rule change I believe needed to pass, but did not, was a rule change introduced by Sen. Groene to eliminate secret ballots when voting for committee chairs. I believe each constituent deserves to see how his or her Senator voted on these committee chair assignments. Secret ballots undermine the need for transparency in government.

Last Tuesday we had a public hearing on my bill LB73, a bill to put the National Motto in our K-12 public schools. Few turned out to testify at the hearing because of a severe winter storm which swept over Lincoln that day. Nevertheless, the bill now rests in the hands of the Education Committee.

The other public hearing which got a lot of attention last week was Lincoln’s Sen. Anna Wishart’s priority bill, LB110. LB110 is a bill to adopt the medical cannabis act. The bill has a lot of support in the Legislature, including thirteen co-sponsors. The bill includes a state regulatory scheme to regulate, promote, inspect, authorize, and license the use of marijuana. However, there remain some very serious problems with the bill.

The bottom line is that the State of Nebraska cannot run ahead of the federal government when it comes to legalizing medical cannabis. The Supremacy Clause of Article VI in the U.S. Constitution says that federal laws trump all state laws. Marijuana remains an illegal drug under the federal Controlled Substances Act. Accordingly, there can be no acceptable medical use of marijuana until the drug is removed from the federal government’s list of banned substances. Consequently, LB110 cannot pass constitutional muster because it seeks to undermine the Controlled Substances Act of the federal government. Should this bill ever become law, the courts would necessarily have to strike it down as unconstitutional. I’m afraid Sen. Anna Wishart has wasted her priority bill on an unconstitutional piece of legislation.

Religious liberty seemed to be the theme that dominated Nebraska politics last week. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution begins with these words: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” Many of us tend to remember the first part of the amendment but forget the latter part about prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Similarly, Section 4 of the Nebraska State Constitution ends with the following statement: “Religion, morality, and knowledge, however, being essential to good government, it shall be the duty of the Legislature to pass suitable laws to protect every religious denomination in the peaceful enjoyment of its own mode of public worship, and to encourage schools and the means of instruction.”

On Tuesday, January 14, Governor Pete Ricketts held a proclamation signing ceremony, where he declared Wednesday, January 16, as Religious Freedom Day in Nebraska. Religious Freedom day is celebrated nationally on January 16 because that day commemorates the anniversary of the 1786 passage of the Virginia State Statute on Religious Freedom. Gov. Ricketts was flanked at the signing ceremony by a variety of faith leaders as well as a group of school children from a local Catholic school.

On Wednesday, January 16, U.S. Senator, Ben Sasse won Senate approval of a resolution to reject objections raised by Sen. Kamala Harris of California and Sen. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii concerning the appointment of Brian Buescher to a U.S. District Court. Harris and Hirono had objected to the appointment on the basis that Buescher is a member of the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic organization which opposes abortion and same-sex marriage. Sasse reminded these two Democratic Senators through his resolution that the U.S. Constitution states explicitly in Article VI that, “…no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”

The fact of the matter is that religious bigotry is a growing problem in America today and attempts are even being made to corrupt the youth of America. For instance, in March DC Comics plans to release a new comic strip called “Second Coming.” DC’s new comic strip will depict Jesus as a superhero who has to return to earth in order learn how to become the “true messiah.” Art Ayris, who is the publisher of Kingstone Comics, the largest Christian Comics publisher in the world, has called DC’s new comic strip blasphemous because it undermines the deity of Jesus Christ by reducing him down to a Superman-like superhero. To be sure, reducing Jesus down to a fictional comic book character is something Sen. Ernie Chambers would certainly be proud of.

There should be little wonder why religious bigotry continues to gain traction in America, especially when school districts live in constant fear of posting something as secular and as mundane as our national motto, “In God We Trust.” According to the courts, “In God We Trust,” is not even a religious statement. For instance, in 1970 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Aronov v. United States that “It is quite obvious that the National Motto and the slogan on our coinage and currency, ‘In God We Trust’ has nothing whatsoever to do with the establishment of religion. Its use is of patriotic or ceremonial character and bears no resemblance to a government sponsorship of a religious exercise.”

For these reasons and more, the first bill I introduced this year in the Nebraska Legislature was LB73, a bill to require our public schools to prominently display our National Motto. The public hearing on this bill has been set for Tuesday, January 22. I believe it is time to return our National Motto to our schools.

Capitol Visitor Center, Washington, D.C.

Let the Legislating begin! The new biennial session of the Nebraska State Legislature began on Wednesday, January 9. That day began with some pomp and circumstance as 13 new senators were sworn into office. Then, the honeymoon ended abruptly as we turned our focus to committee chairs. This year experience and expertise played a more significant role when voting on committee chairs. Consequently, neither of the two major political parties dominates the other when it comes to these committee chairs.

Thursday, January 10, marked the first day to introduce bills. Senators will have until January 23 to introduce new bills. Nevertheless, 138 bills were introduced on that first day. Some of the more controversial bills that were introduced that day include one to legalize medical marijuana and one to give judges the authority to seize guns from those deemed to be mentally incompetent to own a firearm.

The first piece of legislation that I introduced on that day was a resolution for a constitutional amendment for property tax relief. This resolution has the same wording as the citizen-led ballot initiative which is now circulating around the state. This constitutional amendment will allow all Nebraska property owners to claim 35 percent of their property tax bill as a credit or a refund on their Nebraska State income tax return. Because high property taxes are the number one issue dogging all Nebraskans, especially those living in Western Nebraska, I was proud to introduce this resolution as my first piece of legislation going into the 2019-2020 biennial session.

Besides my resolution for a constitutional amendment for property tax relief, I also introduced one other bill that first day. The other bill that I introduced was a bill to put the National Motto on display in every public school in Nebraska. The time has come for us to put God back into our schools. This bill simply states that schools need to put a poster with the national motto, “In God We Trust,” in every classroom or in another place, such as the school cafeteria, where all students will be able to read it on a daily basis. The bill should cost the State no money, because private individuals and businesses will be allowed to pay for the posters, thus, defraying any costs to the schools. Moreover, any school needing a poster can simply print one online or get a copy from my office. That bill also states that the Nebraska Attorney General will defend any school who gets sued by a group seeking to remove the posters from our schools.

On Friday, January 11, I introduced a bill to eliminate the Learning Community and I held a news conference in the rotunda of the Capitol following that day’s session to explain why I introduced the bill. The Learning Community is a State funded and State mandated program to help poor and disadvantaged children in the Omaha metropolitan area succeed academically. At least, that is what it started out to be more than ten years ago. The Learning Community has abandoned its original purpose and has expanded into areas well beyond its original scope and purpose. In short, it has devolved into an organization in search of a mission. Meanwhile, they waste millions of dollars on programs with no proven track record for success, and last year they started a foundation with no defined purpose, no regular members, and no elected members. The foundation’s programs and expenditures require no approval from the Learning Community’s board, nor are there any mechanism set in place to guarantee transparency to the public. Their meetings are not open to the public, nor do they require a public notice, nor do they even require an agenda. The foundation does not adhere to public records laws, nor have they disclosed how they intend to spend their money. It is wrong for Nebraskans to be funding a secretive foundation with no public accountability whatsoever; therefore, I believe the time has come to put an end to this revenue-wasting monstrosity.

Laura McCormick

On the last day of 2018 the Legislature’s Planning Committee released its Final Report covering the 2017-2018 Biennium. The report received the unanimous support of its committee members, but contained some very bad news about the State’s financial status. In short, the report warned that the State’s cash reserves, also known as the Rainy-Day Fund, have been depleted down to a dangerous level. The conclusion of the report was that the Legislature needs to restore the Rainy-Day Fund to two times an average month’s revenue over the course of the next two biennial budgets.

According to the Planning Committee’s report: “During the past two biennial budgets cash reserves were approximately halved, from approximately $700,000,000 to $300,000,000. Although the reserves are intended to serve the function of a shock absorber smoothing out the fiscal road in tough times, this dramatic halving occurred during a time of reasonably normal economic conditions. Simply put, the draw down on reserves meant expenses were not cut enough or revenues were not raised enough. In either case, the trend is most disturbing, and should it be permitted to continue, a fiscal crisis will ensue.”

The Planning Committee’s Final Report did not tell me anything I did not already know. In May of 2017 I held a press conference where I suggested that the Legislature cut $250,000,000 from its budget in order to make ends meet. The Appropriations Committee did not take my advice, and State revenues fell short of their projected goal by 232,000,000. Had the Appropriations Committee made the appropriate adjustments to the budget, the Final Report of the Legislature’s Planning Committee would not have contained such a dire warning of a looming fiscal crisis.

The State Legislature will now have to begin the new legislative session in a huge financial bind. Because voters approved Medicaid Expansion in November, legislators will be searching for a way to pay for it without dipping into the State’s Rainy-Day Fund. Moreover, the most pressing need facing Nebraskans is the need for property tax relief, which can only result in lower revenues for the State. We can now add to this financial burden the Final Report of the Legislature’s Planning Committee which directs the State to replenish its cash reserves by some $450,000,000 over the course of the next four years.

Make no mistake about it, there will be some in the Legislature who will want to raise your taxes. They will look at raising your sales taxes (including taxes on Internet sales), your gasoline taxes, your cigarette taxes and even your State income taxes as a way to generate more revenue for the State. However, I have said many times before, and so I will say it again: Nebraska does not have a revenue problem; we have a spending problem. We got into this mess by spending too much money, so the only way out of it will be to reduce spending. Because very few Nebraskans can actually afford a tax hike, why should we raise taxes to pay for the past mistakes of the Legislature? As long as the Legislature continues to spend money like a drunken sailor, I will find it difficult to support any bill which comes with a hefty fiscal note.

Unless State revenues can somehow magically increase, the next two years should be about reducing the size of our state government, not increasing it. Unfortunately, the make-up of the Legislature continues to slide in the direction of fiscal irresponsibility. As the population of socialists from Eastern Nebraska continues to increase in the Legislature over and against the fiscal conservatives from Western and Central Nebraska, the prospects of ever restoring our cash reserves or balancing our budget without dipping into our Rainy-Day fund becomes ever-increasingly hopeless. Unless the Legislature can somehow figure things out, the Planning Committee’s stern warning of a looming fiscal crisis remains an approaching reality for the State. In fact, many, including me, would say that day has already arrived.

Now that the New Year has finally arrived, it is safe to say that this is the calm before the storm. The new biennium Session is scheduled to begin on January 9, so the political fireworks are about to begin. There will be several hotly contested bills that the State Legislature will have to grapple with this year, including such things as legalizing medical marijuana, so this week I would like to point out what some of the more important issues will be so that you will know what to watch for in the days ahead.

The first item to be settled will be the rules. This is easier said than done. The Legislature will most likely adopt the rules from the previous session in order to conduct business until a new set of rules can be approved. During the last biennium session, the Legislature argued over the rules for the first month, essentially shortening the longer 90 session into a 60 session, making it very difficult to pass non-priority bills and to pass a budget. This year we hope to have a much shorter debate over the rules, so that we can have more time to conduct the business of the State and to get more things done.

Running immediately out of the chute will be those seeking to chair the various committees of the Legislature. This year I will serve again on the Committee on Committees. The Committee on Committees decides who serves on each committee. Chairmanships, however, are determined differently. Any Senator can apply to become the chair of a committee, but they must first garner a majority vote of their peers in the Legislature. The vote is taken by way of a secret ballot on the chamber floor, so nobody knows how each Senator voted. The secret ballot is one of those rules I would like to change. I believe the public has a right to know how their Senator voted on these various chairmanships. Nevertheless, I will seek to maintain my current position as Chair of the Building Maintenance Committee, which is categorized as a Special Committee of the Legislature.

This year we will have 90 days to conduct the State’s business and to pass a budget. However, because the voters approved Medicaid Expansion last November, the Legislature will have to figure out a way to pay for the added expenses. Because the State’s cash reserves have been dangerously depleted, the Legislature will be forced to either raise taxes or to cut spending (or do both). A fight will necessarily ensue over raising taxes, which the Governor has vowed to veto, and also over which programs or departments to cut. I believe the only sensible way to balance the budget is to make appropriate cuts. Raising taxes only gives legislators more of other peoples’ hard-earned money to spend Willy Nilly.

Added to the stress of having to work out a budget will be the public’s need for property tax relief, which I have vowed to set as my number one priority again this year. I will introduce a Constitutional Amendment to give every property owner a 35 percent credit or refund of their property tax bill on their State Income Tax Return. Needless to say, this will surely liven the debate over how the State spends your hard-earned tax dollars. If legislators don’t want to listen to me, then they will be forced to hear from the voters in 2020. If all things go according to our plan, a similar citizen-led initiative will appear on the 2020 ballot, allowing the people to override the lack of support or indecisiveness of the Legislature. Moreover, if Gov. Ricketts really wants property tax relief, as he says he does, then let him begin by supporting our Constitutional Amendment for property tax relief.

Finally, farmers and ranchers desperately need a new way of valuing their agricultural land for tax purposes. Therefore, I will introduce new legislation this year to change the way we value agricultural land from the current market based system to a productivity based system. This will be my best attempt yet at making this transition. This year I hope to have the Governor’s support in making this change. With God’s help, I believe we can make this change become a reality this year!

Earlier this month Nebraska State Senators Adam Morfeld and Anna Wishart, both from Lincoln, launched a new petition drive to legalize medical marijuana in our state. Instead of waiting to see the full effects of recreational marijuana use in Colorado, they presume that history will be on their side. But, just like what happened in Colorado, medical marijuana is not the end game in this long political fight.

What we already know about Colorado’s love for weed has not been good for that state. For instance, among teens age 12-17 marijuana use has risen by 39 percent, and traffic fatalities involving users have also dramatically climbed. From 2007-2012 traffic fatalities increased by 100 percent among those testing positive for the drug. Emergency room visits related to marijuana use also increased 57 percent from 2011 to 2013. Therefore, I reject the argument that marijuana usage, whether it be for medical reasons or for recreational reasons, bears no social consequences.

Marijuana remains an illegal drug. The marijuana plant remains on the federal government’s list of controlled substances. Colorado’s Amendment 64 has done nothing to legalize marijuana. Those who grow, manufacture, and dispense the product continue to do so in violation of federal laws. So, purchasing marijuana at a Colorado dispensary and bringing it across the state line into Nebraska remains a crime, and for this reason our jails near the Colorado border remain full of those charged with federal drug trafficking.

Colorado’s drug habit affects Nebraska in some rather debilitating ways. Because Colorado dispensaries located near the border sell to Nebraskans, Western Nebraska ends up paying the price for Colorado’s drug habit. For instance, Nebraskans often end up paying for the incarceration, the rehabilitation, and the welfare benefits of Colorado residents as well as our own residents who purchase the drug in Colorado; meanwhile, Colorado benefits from revenue generated from taxes placed on the sale of the marijuana. For these reasons and more, Nebraska Attorney General, Doug Peterson, has filed a lawsuit against the State of Colorado.

Common sense shows that using marijuana is just a bad choice for anyone to make. Many employers, for example, understand the harmful effects of marijuana’s use on the job, so they have begun testing for the drug during the hiring process and randomly thereafter. Colorado’s marijuana dispensaries mean that there are now fewer qualified job applicants living in Western Nebraska than there were just a few years ago.

When President Trump signed the farm bill last Thursday, he took hemp off the federal government’s list of controlled substances. Marijuana remains on that list of controlled substances. Hemp is a cousin of the marijuana plant, and is used to make a variety of products from rope to lotions. Cannabidiol or CBD, which can be derived from either the hemp plant or the marijuana plant, must have hemp-derived THC levels below three percent in order to be legal by federal standards, making it impractical for use as a recreational drug. However, CBD remains prohibited by Nebraska’s laws.

Nebraska’s Attorney General issued a memo on November 16, 2018 reminding state law enforcement agencies that CBD remains illegal in Nebraska. According to the memo CBD continues to be included in Nebraska’s Uniform Controlled Substances Act’s legal definition of “marijuana.” Only two exceptions exist to the state statute. The first exception allows UNMC to study the drug until October 2019. The second exception allows for the sale of CBD oil, which has been approved by the FDA. But, according to Chris Peterson, an investigator with the Lincoln and Lancaster County Narcotics Task Force, CBD oil has never been approved by the FDA. Peterson also told KLKN news in Lincoln that the product is “not as safe as it is being purported.” Therefore, my purpose in writing today is to remind Nebraskans that both marijuana and hemp remain prohibited substances by Nebraska State Statutes.