- Underrepresentation drove the event. A community advocate said North Omaha residents — particularly African Americans — were largely absent from candidate campaign messaging, which motivated the neighborhood association to create a direct line of access between voters and candidates.
- Law enforcement leadership is a top concern. Neighbors said the county attorney and sheriff races, though lower-profile, have an outsized impact on daily life in North Omaha — and voters want more awareness of and accountability over those offices.
- Two incumbents were absent the forum. Governor Jim Pillen and Attorney General Mike Hilgers, both running for re-election, were not on the candidate list.
NORTH OMAHA, Neb. — The Minne Lusa Neighborhood Association hosted an open forum Monday at Florence City Hall for voters to hear from candidates running for office in Nebraska and speak with them one-on-one.
A community advocate said the event was born out of a frustration with how North Omaha residents — particularly African Americans — have been represented in campaign messaging.
"I was just monitoring campaign pages and I was listening to commercials and often times there was a complete lack of representation of North Omaha residents especially African Americans," said community advocate, La'Von Stennis-Williams
Neighbors who attended shared that leadership in law enforcement is top of mind for many.
"A lot of races get more attention than county attorney and sheriff but people don't realize how critical the decisions they make impact our daily life. So it's important to be aware of who these people are and the power that they hold and what we can do to regulate them at the voting booth." said police reform advocate, D'Shawn Cunningham.
The candidate lineup included the race for CD-2, governor, and a dozen other races.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Lynne Walz told the crowd she has been listening to neighbors and what they want is to be heard.
"We took those priorities and we added them up and we took the top ten, education, healthcare, affordability, housing, economic development, property taxes and decided that those were going to be our priorities and that's what I'm going to run on."
Two high-profile names not on the list were Governor Jim Pillen and Attorney General Mike Hilgers, each running for re-election.
Dan Osborn, who is running for U.S. Senate, was also on the list but was not present when his name was called.
Election Day is Tuesday, November 3.
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