The 105th Nebraska Legislature, Second Session, adjourned sine die April 18. To balance the state budget, Governor Ricketts introduced across-the-board cuts resulting in early childhood programs receiving a 2% cut for FY2018-2019 and a 4% cut the following year. Here's our session-end report detailing specific bills impacting early childhood this session.
Nebraska’s Corrections system has been the subject of urgent discussion in the Legislature given its insufficient facilities, prison rioting and workforce instability. Reducing state funding for Sixpence and other quality early childhood programs represents a very small savings to taxpayers in the larger scheme of things. If even a few young children at risk eventually drift into the Corrections system, it will be too late to ask ourselves if those savings were worth it.
Senators open the short, 60-day session of the 105th Nebraska Legislature facing a $200 million budget shortfall.
The first session of Nebraska's 105th Legislature adjourned Sine Die on May 23, Senators tackled many important issues and introduced nearly 700 bills, but the session was dominated by efforts to achieve a balanced budget despite significant revenue shortfalls. See our report on bills we identified as high-priority during this legislative session.
Nebraska senators introduced nearly 700 bills in the first 10 days of the current legislative session. Of those, we’ve identified six as priority bills and 90 others that have the potential to impact the earliest years of a child’s life.
The Nebraska Legislature convened the first session of the 105th Legislature yesterday. Senator Jim Scheer was elected Speaker, replacing Senator Galen Hadley whose term ended in December due to term limits.
Senator Kathy Campbell continues our blog series by term-limited senators looking back over their eight years in the Nebraska Legislature. Thank you for your service to Nebraska Senator Campbell.
This is part of a series of blog posts by Nebraska's term-limited senators. We thank them for their dedication and service to Nebraska. In this post, Senator Tanya Cook looks back on her eight years representing District 13.
This is the first in a series of blog posts by Nebraska's term-limited senators. We thank them for their dedication and service to Nebraska. In this post, Senator Beau McCoy looks back at his eight years representing District 39.
Our Legislative Highlights report summarizes bills affecting the early learning and development of our state's youngest learners.
Appropriations Committee Chair Mello sees tremendous opportunity for policymakers to improve the lives of Nebraska's children and families while continuing to build on our state’s overall economic momentum.
Balancing a wide variety of public interests and with great bipartisan support, the Nebraska Legislature again recognized the critical importance of children’s early years prior to adjourning the 2015 legislative session on May 29. Of preeminent importance to First Five Nebraska is public policy that recognizes the development of the brain in the early years literally shapes the learning capacity for the rest of a child’s life. Here's a summary of our highest priority bills from the 2015 legislative session.