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Prospect of Nebraska property tax ballot initiative ‘intriguing’

The inability of the Nebraska legislature to provide meaningful property tax relief has some ag groups looking at other options.

One of those is a property tax ballot initiative campaign which proposes to give taxpayers a 35 percent rebate on their property taxes. Nebraska Cattlemen’s chief lobbyist Laura Field tells Brownfield her group has not taken a position on the initiative idea, but they are looking at it.

“I think it’s very intriguing. I think getting a refund on your income taxes for property tax paid intrigues a lot of people,” Field says. “We’re going to stay tuned and listen and keep getting some information about it—and continue to proceed with a legislative solution, if we can find one, that can get 33 votes.”

State Senator Tom Brewer of Gordon supports the idea of a property tax ballot initiative.

“I think it’s the only way to go right now,” Brewer says. “All we’re going to do is get talk on property tax relief. They want to drag it out year after year. I’ve had my fill of promises that were never fulfilled by people within the (legislative) body.”

Paul Von Behren of Fremont heads up TRUE Nebraskans, the group leading the campaign. Von Behren says the process of collecting the 100,000 signatures needed to put the constitutional amendment on the 2020 election ballot is just getting underway. But he’s confident they will be successful.

“Everybody has been waiting to see what Lincoln has done. But right now, in place, we have about 200 circulators. We’ve got enough petitions out for 35,000 signatures and we just printed another 20,000,” Von Behren says. “So we’re not declaring victory, but with over a year to go, the organization is in place and our structure in place, we feel actually fairly comfortable that we can get this done.”

Field says if the group has success in gathering signatures, it could send a message to state legislators when they meet again in January of 2020.

“Having those signatures and having the threat of a ballot initiative looming really does put a little bit of pressure on the legislature,” she says.

Brownfield spoke with Field, Brewer and Von Behren at the midyear meeting of Nebraska Cattlemen in Columbus.