Daily Minute: Post office still in play for convention center; city seeks homeless shelter proposals; committee would oversee watchdogs

Post office still in play as convention site

A decision on a Lincoln convention center site, which was promised by the end of the year, is on hold while Assemble Lincoln waits for final information from federal officials on the Post Office building in the Haymarket, one of the three finalists.

Conversations with federal officials have continued since Assemble Lincoln, the group tasked with picking the best location and overseeing the development of a downtown convention center, narrowed the sites to three finalists.

And Gov. Jim Pillen has been a leader in those negotiations, said state Sen. Eliot Bostar, chairman of Assemble Lincoln.

“We’re waiting on some things from the Postal Service we were hoping would have come in by now,” Bostar said.

City looking at low-barrier homeless shelter

The city and county plan to release a request for information in January to see what providers would be interested in running a low-barrier homeless shelter for people who can't or won't go to the People's City Mission, something homeless advocates have said for years is a need.

While the mission's role is "critically important," and it sees nearly 80% of people experiencing homelessness, it can't meet everyone's needs, those advocates say. The low-barrier shelter would have fewer requirements and meet people where they are, they say, making sure they are safe and have shelter.

Some advocates say the mission's plans to build a new family shelter, which will more than double the shelter capacity, isn't needed and could actually draw more homeless people to Lincoln.

The mission's Pastor Tom Barber disagrees, saying the city needs the shelter space, not for chronically homeless, but for Lincoln families who are in crisis and now have nowhere to go.

Committee would oversee state watchdogs

In a move meant to resolve constitutional concerns raised by Nebraska's attorney general last year, state lawmakers will seek to establish a permanent oversight committee next year to supervise the Legislature's watchdogs tasked with investigating the state’s troubled prison and child welfare systems.

The plan to establish the new committee was unveiled at an annual gathering of lawmakers

by Speaker John Arch and legislative staffers. It comes more than a year after Attorney General Mike Hilgers suggested the watchdogs, formally known as the Office of the Inspectors General, were unconstitutional in a legal opinion.

Though Hilgers' opinion was nonbinding, Nebraska's Departments of Correctional Services and Health and Human Services almost immediately shut off access the inspectors general had to agency facilities and records, leaving the Legislature without oversight of the agencies for six months.

That’s it for Monday, Dec. 16. Stay in the know with Lincoln’s longest-standing news source at JournalStar.com and we will see you back here tomorrow.