The Giving wheel keeps turning – Sowing seeds of philanthropy

May 17, 2017 leoadambiga Leave a comment

Omaha’s known for being a giving place. The philanthropic community, whether foundations, corporations, nonprofit charitable clearinghouses, the Chamber of Commerce, the City of Omaha or individuals. repeatedly steps up to identify and address needs. My Reader (www.thereader.com) cover story in the May 2017 issue sheds some light on how the giving community comes to make some of its individual and collecive decisions about where and how many dollars go.

The Giving wheel keeps turning

Sowing seeds of philanthropy

©by Leo Adam Biga

Appears in the May 2017 issue of The Reader (www.thereader.com)

Omaha charitable giving turns on a funding wheel of corporate, foundation and individual donors of all levels. There are also funding conduits or facilitators.

This city with its high concentration of millionaires, one certifiable billionaire and large corporate and family foundations is widely heralded for its generosity. Omaha’s no different than any other city though in relying on giving to fill gaps. Philanthropy fills the gulf between what nonprofits may generate and what they get from public (government) funding sources.

The Reader recently interviewed three local leaders intimately involved in the fabric of Omaha giving for insight into how philanthropy gets activated here.

Annually, organizations seek support for ongoing needs ranging from services, programs, events and activities to operating expenses. Special needs may also arise, such as capital construction projects or larger-scale civic endeavors, that require special asks.

The giving sector works collaboratively to identify and address persistent and emerging community-wide needs. Corporate, foundation, civic and other leaders convene to analyze and delegate where resources should go. This vetting and ranking explains why some efforts get funded and others don’t or why some programs are supported at higher levels than others. Curating simply prioritizes some things over others.

Different players on the giving wheel may have their own funding missions or targets but still join others in supporting special initiatives, campaigns or projects that require more collective impact.

All these efforts measure what kind of city Omaha is. Giving shapes the physical and intangible landscape – from infrastructure, skyline, parks and other amenities to health, vitality, livability and compassion.

Everyone agrees no one organization or philanthropist can make much of a difference alone. It’s in the giving power of many that real change can occur.

The Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce works with the giving community to fulfill its goals. Prosper Omaha (2014-2018) is the latest funding program for the Chamber’s economic development partnership. President-CEO David Brown said, “We have a bifurcated agenda to provide services to our 3,200 business members and to figure out ways to grow and improve the community. Development and growth assumes if we can make it a better and growing community our member firms will benefit and be able to hire more people – and there’s a great spinoff benefit from that.

“We believe we should be a catalyst organization always thinking about ways we can improve the community at large, which again makes it a better place to live, work and play. We do that by not just working independently of others but in most cases collaborating with other organizations.”

David Brown

Examples of the Chamber’s catalytic work include working with community partners to create Careerockit, a week-long event in April that exposed 10,000-plus area students to thousands of career opportunities, and to get Omaha designated a TechHire Community, which adds the city to a national network receiving support for helping overlooked and underrepresented populations start technology careers. The Chamber also partnered to develop The Kitchen Council, a food startup incubator that gives members access to a fully-licensed commercial kitchen and other resources to lower barriers of entry and to spur entrepreneurship.

When the Chamber throws its weight behind something, ripples usually happen.

“We get a lot done in large measure because we collaborate with people who have the authority to get things done,” Brown said. “Our public advocacy work is really important for us to be able to cause change to happen. Frankly, the Chamber cannot pass a zoning ordinance but we can encourage other people to do so.

We can’t fix roads, but we can encourage the city or state administration to do so. Our role can only be effective if we can convene people who have similar goals in mind and can figure out a path forward to solving a problem or addressing a challenge.

“We are always thinking about what’s the next change that should happen. Then the next logical question is, who’s responsible for seeing that that change occurs

and how can we build a collaborative process to bring all the people interested in this issue to the table and actually cause that change to occur.”

The Chamber’s involved in things, he said, “that might surprise folks,” such as supporting education reform, investing in talent development and the retainment of young professionals to address the brain drain issue,” along with community-economic-entrepreneurship development. “We also worry about infrastructure. So transportation, especially the discussion about mass transit, is something we’re involved in.”

On a big picture scale, the Chamber engages in strategic planning.

“Right now we’re going through a Strategic Foresight process. We’ve hired economist Rebecca Ryan from Next Generation Consulting as a Futurist-in Residence. She’s helping us think about what the future of Omaha, particularly from an economic perspective, could be 20 years from now. We’ve asked as partners the Urban League of Nebraska and the United Way of the Midlands to be with us in this. We’re all thinking about what not only the economy needs to look like but what disruptions would happen if that economy were to come to fruition or what disruptions might keep us from accomplishing the kind of future we’re looking for.”

United Way executive director Shawna Forsberg said, “Much to the Chamber’s credit they’re not just looking at it from a business perspective. They’ve invited representation from the human services and inclusivity sides. It’s very thoughtfully run. Numerous stakeholders and influences are being brought to the table during this process so that it is a community weighing in on what needs to happen.”

Part of Ryan’s futurist work is spent with various local nonprofit boards and planning committees teaching them strategic planning tools.

“We’re doing some capacity building for the other partners we have in the community who need to be able to think about the future as well,” Brown said.

Helping nonprofits be sustainable is a focus of the Omaha Community Foundation, whose Nonprofit Capacity Building program’s 24-month curriculum is designed to strengthen organizational and leadership capacity needs. Ten area nonprofits are chosen each year to participate. Forty nine organizations have gone through the program. Currently, 20 organizations are in the program (10 in their first year and 10 in their second year).

Shawna Forsberg

Education is a core focus of the foundation, the United Way and the Chamber.

“I think education is the base for the kind of development we’re going to have to see in the future,” Brown said. “We’ve got to make sure our kids, whether the most affluent or the least affluent, whether in North Omaha, West Omaha, Council Bluffs or Sarpy County, are getting the best education they can get. We have a community with about 3 percent unemployment and yet we know there are pockets of higher unemployment. What causes that higher unemployment isn’t lack of jobs in many cases, it’s lack of preparedness, strong education or a high school diploma.

“There are some extenuating circumstances, such as lack of transportation, that keep people from being an active part of the workforce and we’ve got to mitigate those in some way or another. If we don’t, companies won’t find the people they need here and will look somewhere else. We’ve got to get as many people ready to work as possible in the areas where we know people can be hired and earn a great wage. So, education and transportation are things we’re paying a lot of attention to. Mass transit system improvement is pervasive in all of our conversations.”

Alleviating the high poverty that persists relates back to education and workforce development, Brown said.

United Way’s Shawna Forsberg said, “For people living in poverty it’s not just one thing that’s going to fix it. Typically, there’s multiple things that need to be addressed.” She said responding to complex issues means” being consistent but also flexible and nimble enough ” to adapt as needed. “We’re blessed that we have really strong networks and we work with so many different programs and agencies that it lends itself to really a community-wide understanding of where opportunities can arise.”

She said agencies like hers recognize the “need for more qualified individuals to hit the workforce.” “We want to work in concert with those who can provide those unique opportunities.”

Meanwhile, the state’s budget deficit has cut into public education, services and programs. Possible federal cuts to arts and human services funding loom large.

“It’s a very interesting time politically trying to understand what’s going to be coming regarding funding sources for many programs vital in the community,” Forsberg said. “It’s something we’re watching very carefully. It’s why advocacy and public policy is something we have to be involved with also.”

Omaha Community Foundation executive director Sara Boyd said, “There are resource constraints today because of budget challenges at the state and federal levels that affect the sector at large and changes the dynamics of what funding might look like. What is the affect of that on some of our more vulnerable populations? There are some people who are already vulnerable we don’t want to find in even worse situations. What does that mean for how we think about the work we do and how we invest as a community? Because of the uncertainty of some of the changes that may occur, it’s difficult sometimes to place a bet on where to invest. I don’t think there are answers yet.”

Forsberg said United Way’s historic mission is to “help those neighbors that need assistance” through a “safety net of services.” She added, “United Way will never depart from providing funding for critical programs to help people in dire straits, whether it be food security, safe housing, access to health care, escaping domestic violence. That is core to what we do.”

An example of United Way tracking and responding to such needs, Forsberg said, is its Financial Stability Work Task Force. “It identified a group of people being lost through the cracks called Opportune Youth – 16 to 24 year-olds either not working or not in school. There was a myriad of organizations working with these individuals but it wasn’t a coordinated effort. Now we have 30 different agencies at the table doing essential intake. We’re partnering with Nebraska Children and Families Foundation and leveraging the work of Project Everlast to extend that work into new areas because people can end up in this category in multiple ways.”

The resulting pilot Alliance program launches June 1.

Forsberg said, “A systems approach is crucial because you’ve got to meet the kids where they’re at but then figure out what you can do get them in a different trajectory. That may be helping ensure they get additional school but also connecting them to a financially stable job and making sure they have the support they need to be successful in that. That can’t be one program – it has to be a multitude of programs.”

United Way works across the community on education.

“The Chamber helped us convene a group conversation with superintendents from across the community,” Forsberg said, “We took a really take a hard look at how you measure whether a kid is progressing and what not-for-profit support could assist school systems with.

“Where they really need help is in literacy and ensuring kids stay in school, and so those are the areas in which we’re investing. Instead of looking at just graduation rates we’re looking at ninth grade attainment. That’s a critical pivot point for kids if they’re going to get through school in a successful manner. When they hit high school the supports are less and so to wait until their senior year it’s almost too late. It’s critical we give it earlier to identify a kid that needs some extra support.”

Forsberg said intervention can mean mentoring support but also building awareness within school systems and families to keep kids in classrooms.

“We’re going to measure progress, not only investments United Way is making but as a community how we’re doing in these areas and bring that to light.”

Sara Boyd

The Community Foundation’s Sara Boyd said the local Adolescent Health Project led by the Women’s Fund of Omaha, with support from her foundation and other players is another example of “a broader focus” with more partners at the table.” “It’s not one foundation, nonprofit, individual driving that work and there’s some intentionality in the strategies being invested there. There’s work in juvenile justice, on the public service side, on the philanthropic side, on the nonprofit side and people coming to a common table to try and drive that.”

Input from many sources is crucial, Boyd said, but even then solutions can be elusive.

“The challenge is these are really tricky issues, so even when there’s focused attention, energy and investment there’s still stumbling blocks along the way and it doesn’t move quickly.”

North Omaha redevelopment is unfolding at an historic rate and the giving community is investing heavily there. The Chamber’s North Omaha Development Strategy spurred the North Omaha Village Revitalization Plan now being realized. Philanthropic dollars are pouring in to support efforts by the Empowerment Network, 75 North, Metro Community College and others.

Boyd said what’s happening there is evidence of how “when conversations come together sometimes there’s synergy that can create momentum.” “I do really like the energy and the amount of real interest and attention focused on North Omaha. It would be awesome to see a tipping point. I guess i don’t exactly know where that lies. To me it would be huge success to say not only are we seeing this accumulation of impressive dollars, but also a tidal wave coming behind that of all these other amazing things addressing what the people of North Omaha want that community to be for them.”

She cautioned, “I’m not naive to think there aren’t some structural issues as a community we will need to wrestle with in order to maximize some of these investments made there that affect more deeply the lives of people who live in North Omaha.”

Boys said whatever the project, nothing happens in isolation. She feels funders are ever more attuned to “the relationship between it all.”

“Something we continue to work at collectively as a community is looking at projects not just as coincidentally being in the same area but how do they they relate to and complement one another.”

Boyd said her foundation’s “mission is to inspire giving to create a thriving community for all.” “If you grow giving you have the opportunity to strengthen nonprofits and to have more people participating potentially or at greater levels and you then have an opportunity to bring people together because of that increased engagement and participation.”

United Way takes a systemic view as well.

“We have been in the community for 94 years and the needs over that time have evolved,” Forsberg said. “We represent a large donor base. Part of our responsibility is to read that and have a community-wide perspective and understand where we can invest that’s really going to be meaningful. We see ourselves as convener, collaborator, information-aggregator. We really are trying to bring thought leaders in the community together to address these issues. It takes a system.

“It means being honest and transparent about what’s going well and what isn’t as a community and trying to figure out the best ways to address that. It’s recognizing it’s never going to be one organization or one funder that’s going to be able to tackle this on their own. It’s very much a collaborative effort across the community.”

That approach has recently become more formalized.

“In 2012 a very robust strategic planning process initiated by some strong leaders in our community really drove United Way to take a harder look at how we did our investment. We initiated a community assessment in partnership with the Omaha Community Foundation and the Iowa West Foundation. ConAgra Foods stepped in for Phase II of it. It took a neighborhood-level look at where the greatest needs were.”

That assessment led to United Way’s 2025 goals.

By 2025, United Way aims to support the delivery of two million-plus services addressing basic needs of people living in or at risk of poverty through a more integrated, coordinated, precise and measurable system of basic needs supports.

Forsberg said, “We pulled together task forces. Part of their focus was looking at who was doing what in these various areas. Based upon input from stakeholders and others in the community we discerned where we could make the greatest difference in supporting things like basic needs (for food, shelter).

Metrics are key to the approach.

“With support from the Sherwood Foundation and the Weitz Family Foundation we’ve implemented an analytics and performance team to ensure we’re being efficient with that send and not just looking at it from an individual program-level but at the whole system. That’s allowed us to take best practices in analyzing whether or not the way you’re investing is driving the change you hope to make. What we’ve found is it helps programs we support improve and it gives them more of an understanding of whether the impact they hope to drive is also being accomplished.”

Forsberg said, “We learned we definitely need to provide those solves but we also need to get into prevention. If you don’t have a full tummy, it’s really hard to do well in the classroom. But we also know it’s important we help people change the trajectory for themselves. Two areas identified are educational support and preparing people to enter the workforce.”

Shaping strategic community goals in partnership with givers is part of the Chamber’s mission, said Brown. Everything the Chamber does, he said, is measured.

“We incorporate most of the public and private foundations executive directors and staff into all of our strategic planning processes. We’ve invited them to be involved in all of our Strategic Foresight work. On the futurist side, they’ve been involved in our discussions of our economic development strategy and as issues come up in the community we find ourselves working on those projects together, too It’s not unusual for the Chamber and several of the foundations and other nonprofit groups to sit around the table with business leaders talking about how to solve a community problem.

“The philanthropic community also tends to be funders of some programs and activities we do. We’ve been successful in finding those places we have in common and producing something the foundations help fund.”

The Chamber’s David Brown said collaboration comes with the territory but Omaha does it to an unusual degree.

“A lot of collaboration happens in this community between philanthropists and businesses and the not-for-profit world to see what projects should move forward and which ones maybe not. I think Omaha has collaboration in its DNA. I rarely seen an organization stand up and say we are going to work on this project by ourselves and not seek input or not be involved in a strategic discussion about whether it has merit or not.

“When a project doesn’t work out, it’s usually because collaboration and communication hasn’t occurred at the normal level. I think we accomplish more together and that seems to be a common thread I see with most of my colleagues in this community whether on the business side or the not-for-profit side.”

OCF’s Boyd said working with partners like the Chamber and United Way helps the foundation “learn what role we can play.” She explained, “We’re placing some bets on areas where we think, given our history and skills, we might be able to add some value in partnership with things going on in the community.”

She said the discussions arising from collaborative meetings help narrow the focus on what the pressing needs are and where best the foundation can help. Another way the foundation gauges what’s happening is through the grant application process for its Fund for Omaha, “We see over the period of a couple grant cycles patterns and changes in requests for funding that give us a temperature read on some things moving and changing in the community and what that might mean. It might be emerging needs or gaps of service.”

On behalf of donors the foundation has granted $1.5 billion to nonprofits since 1982. In 2016, its donors granted $149 million. Its own Fund for Omaha granted $294,176 in 2016. As of the end of last year, the foundation’s assets number just over $1 billion.

The foundation’s desire to broaden its work and better measure community needs helped lead to the birth of The Landscape project – a public, data-driven reflection of the community across six areas of community life:

Health

Neighborhoods

Safety

Transportation

Workforce

Education

Those markers largely came out of the community perception or assessment study that OCF did with United Way and Iowa West Foundation.

“There are likely other areas over time we will add to The Landscape,” Boyd said.

Landscape information gleaned from experts and residents are available online to anyone.

“We wanted more people to participate in some of that thinking and we wanted more people to be able to iterate it,” Boyd said, “so having something more publicly available and opening that up for feedback can help those of us who interact on personal levels with different partners and residents in the community.”

“We’re looking more and more at how we align with some of these issues now spotlighted in The Landscape to try to reach out in new partnerships and new ways. We have a donor base that is community-broad, many of whom are plugging into some of these issues themselves, and we may be able to serve them better in their giving if we’re focusing our resources.”

Greater impact is the ultimate goal.

“We’re hoping the project will assist in bringing some of our philanthropy to another level by infusing more of that curation with the voice of the community – personal stories that add a greater dimension to our understanding. It’s not to say by any means the work of the foundation and The Landscape is going to be the thing that leads to change. It has to be efforts we all pursue. This just happens to be our particular part we feel we can play in conversation and interaction with all of the other people invested in moving these issues forward in our community.”

She and her colleagues are trying to find ways to get millennials to donate. The foundation’s found success doing that through its Omaha Gives campaign.

Increasingly, Boyd said, “we work to be an organization more inclusive of lots of different people and interests in the community,””I think we’re continuing to build different relationships and find new ways to partner with people who care and want to invest resources.”

Boyd, Forsberg and Brown are aware Omaha’s legendary giving is generational. While wealth will change hands, they say local philanthropists have been mindful creating instruments to ensure future giving.

Who’s Going to Pay? Before and After the Affordable Care Act

March 16, 2017 leoadambiga Leave a comment

There’s nothing like getting current, though it’s hard to do when you write for a monthly. Still, in this cover story I wrote for the March 2017 issue of The Reader (http://www.thereader.com) I think I mostly managed to stay relevant to the topic of health care coverage in America, the forces pushing and pulling for and against the Affordable Care Act and what the ACA has meant in terms of gains and what its repeal and replacement would mean in losses. For the piece I spoke to local professionals on the provider and insurer sides of the equation for their take on how we got here and where we might be heading. The story went to press with us knowing Congress was working to repeal and replace Obamacare, though no one knew what that entailed, and then just about the time our story got published that plan was unveiled. As you know by now, the proposed new plan was met with disdain from all quarters, especially consumer rights groups and elected officials, even conservative Republicans, who heard loud and clear from constituents that they they oppose the called for cuts that would cause many people to lose insurance. As the push back continues, town halls and debates ensue, and presumably negotiations, revisions and compromises will get made. Meanwhile, America still can’t get its health care system to work equitably and efficiently.

Who’s Going to Pay? Before & After the Affordable Care Act

©by Leo Adam Biga

Appearing in the March 2017 issue of The Reader ((http://www.thereader.com)

One accident, one illness could be catastrophic. Not just medically, but also financially.

Families stood to lose almost everything in medical bankruptcies when health insurance companies rejected those with pre-existing conditions and capped their policies with lifetime limits.

Uncovered costs helped health care expenditures soar, more than tripling in the last 20 years according to the federal National Health Spending Report. In 2015, the federal government was the largest payer of health care, covering 37% of the total cost through its two programs Medicaid and Medicare.

The curve was starting to bend.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, health insurance costs increased 63% from 2001 to 2006 and 31% from 2006 to 2011. That number dropped to 20% from 2011 to 2016.

Part of the reason was the Affordable Care Act and a landmark shift in how health care was being offered. Through a series of tax increases targeting high-income earners, the ACA was able to fund experiments in in- novation while subsidizing the cost of bringing almost 30 million Americans into the health insurance system.

With the end of Obamacare at the top of the national conversation, The Reader talked to the major stakeholders about life before and potentially after the Affordable Care Act.

It’s not just the $2 billion in federal revenues Nebraska passed up for health insurance, or the 275,000 Nebraskans with pre-existing conditions that could be denied health insurance, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. It’s not even the estimated 165,000 Nebraskans that would lose health insurance, an increase of 111% of the uninsured, according to the Economic Policy Institute, leading to almost 3,000 jobs lost and $400 million in federal health care dollars gone that we subsidize.

It’s also about the way we take care of each other.

Quality of Health Care Over Quantity

America treating healthcare as a commodity helps explain its high delivery and coverage expense. Characterized by historic lack of incentives to drive prices down, providers and insurers dictate terms to consumers. Subsidies to assist low income patients who can’t pay out of pocket get passed along to other consumers. But affording care and its coverage is a burden even for the middle classes.

Amid runaway costs and coverage gaps, America’s clunkily moving from a volume to a value-based system as part of long overdue healthcare reform. The Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010 after contentious bipartisan debate. The statute’s full roll-out began in 2014.

Nebraska Medicine CEO Daniel DeBehnke said, “The tipping point that brought the ACA forward is really the unsustainable growth in our country’s healthcare costs.”

The calculus of people not being able to afford care translates into real life implications. Untreated chronic diseases worsen without treatment. Early diagnoses are missed absent annual physicals or wellness checks.

Championed by President Barack Obama, who promised reform in his campaign, the ACA’s enacted consumer protections and mea- sures holding providers account- able for delivering value.

Nebraska Methodist Health System CFO Jeff Francis said organizations like his have “con- tracts and monies at risk for hit- ting certain quality items, not just with Medicare, but with some of our commercial insurers as well, Five or ten years from now,” he added, “we’ll probably have more at risk financially from a quality and outcome standpoint. Recent federal legislation changed the way physicians get paid by CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services). Starting in 2019 they’re having potential penalties depending on whether they’re hitting certain quality metrics or not.”

He said the stick of such punitive measures works.

A new Standard in American Health Care

Aspects of Obamacare, such as the individual mandate and public health exchanges, have detractors. Federal lawsuits challenging it have failed. But its intact survival is in jeopardy today. A chief critic is President Donald Trump, who with the Republican controlled Congress vowed to repeal and replace, though that’s proving more daunting in reality than rhetoric. On February 16, GOP leaders shared a replacement plan with tax credits for buy- ing insurance and incentives for opening healthcare savings accounts, but no details for funding the plan or its projected impact on the insured and uninsured.

Debehnke said, “I don’t think there’s any question, regardless of where you land politically, there are components of the current ACA that require tweaking. Even Democrats will tell you it wasn’t exactly perfect – nobody said it was going to be perfect. It was understood there were going to need to be changes as things move along.”

There’s widespread consensus about the benefits accruing from the ACA. New subsidies allowed millions more people nationwide and tens of thousands more in Nebraska to be insured, in some cases getting care they deferred or delayed. Insurers cannot deny coverage for pre- existing conditions or cancel coverage when someone gets sick. Plans must cover essential care and wellness visits. Adult children can remain on their parents’ insurance until age 26.

Francis said, “A lot of good things have come out of this. We’re focusing on well- ness, we have fewer uninsured, we’re having better outcomes for patients. I think there’s satisfaction with the improvements. I just think there’s disagreement with how it’s occurring or being done.”

“You can’t believe the difference it’s made by setting minimum standards for health insurance,” said One World Community Health Chief Medical Officer Kristine McVea, “so that things like child immunizations and mammograms are covered.”

Since the ACA’s adoption, uninsured 18-to 24-year-olds in Nebraska dropped from 25.5 percent in 2009 to 12.4 percent in 2015, according to the Kids Count in Nebraska Report.

McVea said, “At One World people get assistance in enrolling for health insurance. Counselors guide them through the market- place. People are really becoming more savvy shoppers. Improved health literacy has been a result of this process, you can really compare for the very first time apples to apples in terms of different plans. That has been a tremendous boon to clients.”

Not everyone included – Nebraska drops the Kick- back

Healthcare disparities still exist though. In Omaha 24% of adults living below the poverty line

lack health coverage while 3% of adults with medium to high in- come are uninsured. Some 36% of Hispanic adults, 15% of black adults and 5% of white adults are uninsured in the metro, ac- cording to numbers reported by The landscape, a project of the Omaha Community Foundation.

McVea said, “The poorest of the poor are not eligible for the marketplace at all because that part of the Affordable Care Act carved them out thinking states would cover them with Medicaid. Well, Nebraska’s elected not to expand Medicaid, so there’s this whole gap of people not insured. Then there’s prob- ably another tier who do get assistance through the marketplace, but considering the economic pressures they’re under, even with the assistance, it still falls outside their reach to get good healthcare.”

The Kids Count Report found 64 percent of uninsured Nebraska children are low-in- come — likely eligible for but not enrolled in Medicaid or Children’s Health Insurance program (CHIP).

Past Nebraska Medical Association president Rowen Zettermen said, “In Nebraska we have somewhere in the neighborhood of 60,000 to 90,000 uninsured people that would have otherwise been eligible for Medicaid expansion. you find the highest percentage uninsured rates in rural counties. We still have 20 some million uninsured in this country. A number may have insurance but they’re underinsured for their various conditions. Ideally, everybody should be able to establish a healthcare proposition with their physician, nurse practitioner or physician’s assistant to access care whenever they need it.”

Then there are federal DSH monies to fund Medicaid expansion the state foregoes because the legislature’s voted against expansion. Gov. Pete Ricketts opposes it

as well. Disproportionate Share Hospital payments are subsidies paid by the federal government to hospitals serving a high percentage of uninsured patients. Nebraska hospitals write off uncompensated care cost while getting no money back for it.

Zetterman said, “We could expand Medic- aid and take advantage of the roughly $2 to $2.5 billion that’s failed to come into the state. It would have paid salaries for more people in physicians offices and a variety of things that would be taxed and bring in more revenue.”

DeBehnke of Nebraska Medicine said, “Being a large hospital health system that takes all comers, we have a Medicaid percentage of our business. We would be better off in a Medicaid expanded state. We would like to see more coverage for the working poor. That’s what Medicaid expansion is – providing coverage to the working poor. Those who don’t currently qualify for it would under an expansion.”

Proposed federal community block grants could expand coverage. DeBehnke cautioned, “We just have to be sure there’s good control around how those dollars are used and they actually go for healthcare coverage. Expanding coverage to all people is really the key.”

Nebraska State Senator Adam Morfield is the sponsor of lB 441, which would expand Medicaid in Nebraska. The bill is scheduled for a March 8 Health and Human Services Committee hearing.

The care-coverage-income gap may be more widespread than thought. Kids Count Report findings estimate 18.5 percent of Nebraskans are one emergency away from financial crisis.

Preventative Care is Long-Term Savings

Having coverage when you need it is a relief. Insurance also motivates people to get check-ups that can catch things before they turn crisis.

“A woman having symptoms for some time didn’t have any insurance and she waited

before she sought care,” McVea said. “By the time she came to us for diagnosis she already had a fairly advanced stage of colon cancer. She’s undergone chemo- therapy and surgery and is now living with a colostomy. That didn’t have to happen. We see things like that every day – people who’ve let their diabetes and other things go to where they have coronary artery dis- ease, and that’s not reversible. We’re trying to get them back to the path of health with treatments, but they’ve lost that opportunity to maintain a high quality of health.”

Zetterman said, “There’s good data to show patients with cancer who don’t have insurance tend to arrive with more advanced disease at the time of initial discovery because they come late to seek care.”

That pent-up need is expressed more often, McVea said, as “people have insurance for the first time or for the first time in a long time.”

“We’ve seen a lot of people come in as new patients saying, ‘I know I should have come in a long time ago, and I’ve just been putting it off.’ Many are middle-aged. They’ve been putting off chronic health conditions or screening tests or other things for years. We see people come in with diabetes or high blood pressure that’s out of control and within three months we get them to a point where everything’s in control, they’re feeling better, they have more energy, they’re feeling good about their health. We’ve maybe given them advice about diet and exercise and ways they can keep themselves healthy.”

More positive outcomes are prevalent across the healthcare spectrum.

“I would say overall the average patient is having a better experience and outcome now than they were five years ago,” Nebraska Methodist’s Jeff Francis said.

One World’s CEO, Andrea Skolkin, said, “We’ve been able to reach more people living on limited income so our services have been able to expand both in terms

of numbers of patients we care for as well as types of services and locations.” One World opened two new satellite clinics with help from ACA generated monies. “As we’ve opened new clinics we’ve seen a number of people that had never been seen or delayed being seen with very complex

medical and sometimes mental health issues – and it’s more costly. We grew from about nine or ten percent of patients with insurance to close to 15 per- cent. For newly insured patients it’s meant some peace of mind.”

Fewer insured people, Higher Costs

She and her community health center peers favor more afford- able coverage to increase the numbers of those insured.

Zetterman said high premiums and co-pays present obstacles that would be lessened if everybody got covered. “The financial burden on the individual patient and family for health- care right now is too high.”

DeBehnke said, “A lot of the

burdens of those premiums in terms of high deductibles and other things have been shifted to families. There has to be some degree of subsidization if we’re going to make this all work. Regardless of where we land with this, the financial burden on the individual patient and family for health- care right now is too high.”

For the poor, the last resort for care continues to be the ER.

“If you’re uninsured the one place you can go in this country is to the emergency room of a hospital because the laws say you cannot turn anyone away from there,” said Zetterman. “As a consequence the uninsured make use of the ER because it guarantees they’ll get cared for – at least at that moment. The ER is the most expensive place to go for things that could otherwise be handled in a healthcare office.”

Zetterman said America’s handling of its social contract and safety net means “we cost shift in the healthcare environment to pay for things.” “In Nebraska, where we didn’t expand Medicaid,” he said, “we cost shift from private insurance and healthcare providers to people who have private insurance. They help pay for the uninsured-underinsured. We’ve estimated that to be well over a billion dollars. We can’t control costs reliably until everybody is in the system with some kind of a paid healthcare benefit. That can include all the current federal and state programs as well as commercial insurance that’s out there.

“Once we no longer cost shift to pay for healthcare we can begin to address the questions where are we spending our money and why are we spending it in those areas. Then we have a chance to control the growth of healthcare costs.”

Skolkin said, “A lot of hands in the pot helps add to the cost. There’s a lot of system inefficiencies, particularly in billing and credentialing, that could be made a lot of easier. That would save resources.”

DeBhenke said, “As the healthcare industry, we have not been engaged to the degree we need to be to actually decrease overall cost of care because frankly from a pure financial standpoint it’s not been in our best interest. The health systems, providers and other organizations have to really get be- hind this whole idea of providing value, of decreasing overall total cost of care while improving outcomes for patients. That’s got to work in parallel with legislative and subsidization levels at the federal level.”

He said until there’s more buy-in from “young invincibles” – 20-somethings in good health – to broaden or balance the risk pool and thus reduce payouts, costs will be a problem.

“Certainly the pricing needs to be attractive to those individuals to broaden the pool. And frankly the benefits associated with products on the exchange need to be attractive so those individuals feel comfort- able and actually want to have coverage. Those least likely to go to the marketplace and buy individual health insurance plans are exactly the people we want to do that to broaden the pool. Healthy individuals that don’t utilize healthcare much soften the financial blow.”

Repeal Without replace is A mess, Why not repair?

The ACA’s meant adjustments from all healthcare stakeholders. Opponents have resisted it from the start and that fight continues. In early January the Republican-led Senate began reviewing ACA to try and garner enough votes to repeal it through the budgetary reconciliation legislative process.

“Unfortunately President Trump has focused on what he’s going to take away without have a plan in place,” said Kristine McVea, “I think that’s been harmful. There’s a lot of fear and uncertainty among our patients. These are people who struggled without health insurance who finally got a chance at taking care of their health and are now very afraid of the possibility that’s all going to be taken away. We hear this every day from people coming into the marketplace and coming into see us for care, I think the capricious statements made by this administration have fueled that.”

More recently, talk of flat-out repeal has given way to amend or modify in acknowledgment of the gains made under ACA and the difficulty of dismantling its far-reaching, interrelated tentacles, absent a ready-to-implement replacement. The political fallout of taking away or weaken- ing protection people have come to rely on would be severe.

“Once leadership has really started to

dig into what it would mean to repeal this outright and try to replace it they’re finding it is not a simple thing to do and the health and coverage of millions of people are at stake,” said James Goddard, an attorney with the public advocacy group Nebraska Appleseed. “So things are slowing down with the recognition they need to be careful with this, and of course they do.

“I think the change in the way it’s being discussed is a reflection of the reality that this is a dramatic thing you’re discussing altering and they need to do it the right way. Much of the ACA hangs together and one thing relies on another and if you start pulling pieces of it apart, you have the potential for the whole thing to fall down.”

Zetterman said he and fellow physicians favor a cautionary approach.

“Most of us would say the Affordable Care Act should be maintained and improved. There are dangers in taking it away and replacing it because it’s now in so many different places.”

Nebraska Appleseed attorney Molly McCleery said total repeal would affect many. “Initial Congressional Budget Office projections show 18 million people would lose coverage, and then in the out years, 32 million would lose coverage – both private and public. The Urban Institute’s state-by- state impact study found 200,000-plus Nebraskans with a pre-existing condition would be impacted if that consumer protection would be taken away.”

Jeff Francis said, “The new ‘r’ word I’m hearing is repair. The consensus seems to be to keep what’s popular and working and change what’s not.”

EDITOR’S NOTE: Details of the recently proposed GOP replacement had not been released as of this printing.

Daniel DeBehnke said of the current climate, “I think it’s extremely confusing because it’s complicated. It’s like a balloon – you poke in one area and something bulges out in another. I think people are frustrated, and rightly so, they pay a lot for healthcare. It’s not just as simple as I-pay- a-lot-for-my-healthcare, ACA is bad, let’s get rid of it.’ There are layers of complexity. We may not like exactly how things are funded or how some components are dealt with. We may not agree totally with all the tactics to get there, but at the end of the day we’ve got more people covered.

I don’t think anybody has the appetite to change that back.

“We just have to figure out how to incrementally lessen the financial burden while maintaining the real goal – more people covered and providing value for the money being spent.”

He said the best course of action now for providers is to “just take really good care of patents and decrease unnecessary utilization and duplication of services,” add- ing, “It’s what everybody wants anyway.”

Fixing the marketplace

Meanwhile, on the insurers’ side, some carriers have left public health exchanges after incurring major losses. This state’s largest healthcare insurer, Blue Cross Blue Shield, opted out of the volatile marketplace.

“Since we started selling on the ACA marketplace we’ve lost approximately $140 million,” executive vice president Steve Grandfield said. “We have a responsibility to all our members to remain stable and secure, and that responsibility was at risk

if we had continued to sustain losses. The public marketplace is unstable, which has driven increased costs and decreased com- petition and consumer choice. The higher premiums go, the more likely people, especially healthy people, drop their coverage. That means the majority of people remain- ing on ACA plans are sick, with increasingly higher claims, which drives premiums up even further.”

He cited instances of people gaming the system by buying plans when they need care, then dropping them when they longer need it.

Granfield said Blue Cross supports a well modulated ACA overhaul.

“It’s important to put in place a smooth transition. We would like to see regula- tory authority for insurance returned to the states, including rate review and benefit design and closing the coverage loopholes that lead to higher consumer costs.”

He has a long wish-list of other changes he wants made.

The leaders of two major Nebraska health provider systems say they haven’t seen any impact from the BCBS defection because there are many other insurers and products on the market. The executives were not surprised by the move given the fluid healthcare field.

Nebraska Methodist’s Jeff Francis said, “There were a lot of unknowns. I think it takes several years through the insurance cycle to be able to correct those kinds of unknowns, especially the way the federal government handles the bidding and setting of rates That’s why you won’t see craziness or changes in the rates in the years to come because they now have several years of experience with this new population and they’re then able to price accordingly.”

Daniel DeBehnke of Nebraska Medicine said, “Regardless of what happens in Washington, if the exchanges are kept in place there will be some changes made either in the pricing or pool that will help organizations like Blue Cross perhaps get back in that business.”

Quality Health Care Starts with Collaboration

Collaboration is key for containing costs in a system of competing interests. More U.S. healthcare decisions are happening outside silos.

Francis said, “A big change in the last 10 years is opportunities to work more collaboratively. In the past it would have been much more stand-alone. Now the hospitals and physicians are working more closely. Nebraska Methodist is part of an account- able care organization – Nebraska Health Network, along with Nebraska Medicine and Fremont Health. We recognize the importance of learning better practices from each other so we can pass that along to make healthcare better for the community and for employers paying for their employees insurance.”

One result, he said, is “less antibiotics pre- scribed by our family doctors at Nebraska Medicine and Methodist Physicians Clinic.”

Of Dreamers and doers, and one nation indivisible under…

February 21, 2017 leoadambiga Leave a comment

This is one of two stories I did for The Reader’s (www.thereader.com) February 2017 cover package whose headlines read “Resettlement in America Takes a Village” and” Immigration: Refugees Reunite and Resettle; Fighting for Dreamers.” The story shared in this post is about DREAMers receiving DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) benefits and what losing those privileges would mean if they were withdrawn.

Of Dreamers and doers, and one nation indivisible under…

DACA youth and supporters hope protections are retained

©by Leo Adam Biga

Originally appeared in the February 2017 issue of The Reader (http://thereader.com/)

Lucia Pedroza

Debra Kaplan

With immigration reform caught in the gap of a divided U.S. Congress, the long-proposed DREAM Act never got passed. In 2012 President Barack Obama issued an executive order creating the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program as a temporary stop-gap giving young students who grew up here protections against removal and permits to work, allowing many to obtain drivers licenses and other basic privileges.

Conservative Nebraska officially opposed DACA. Then-Gov.Dave Heineman blocked issuing drivers licenses (Nebraska was the only state), welfare or other public benefits to DACA-eligible youth. Gov. Pete Ricketts continued the stand. But a broad coalition of rural and urban Nebraskans spanning party lines and ages, along with faith, law enforcement and business leaders – the Bible, Badge and Business coalition – along with such organizations as Justice for Our Neighbors Nebraska, Heartland Workers Center and Nebraska Appleseed, successfully advocated for legislation granting DREAMers drivers licenses and professional-commercial licenses.

The state legislature twice overturned governor vetoes to preserve these bills as law.

While never a panacea, DACA provided DREAMers and supporters hope that real, permanent immigration reform might follow. However, President Donald Trump made campaign promises to repeal DACA and crack down on undocumented immigrants. With his administration only weeks old, no one knows if or when he’ll end DACA and thus undo everything attained.

DREAMer Alejandra Ayotitla Cortez, a senior psychology student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, is one of about 3,275 DACA recipients in Nebraska. As more young people age into DACA, that number will grow as long as the program continues, She echoes other recipients in saying, “Right now we are facing a lot of uncertainty. As much as I wish I knew what was going to happen with the program, it’s very hard to predict, and that’s what makes it harder. We’re in this limbo place. Obviously, if it does end, that would have a lot of negative consequences. Right now we are trying to focus on working with our representatives at the federal level to try to draft legislation that would protect the program.”

She was part of a contingent of DREAMers who met with Nebraska Congressional leaders in the nation’s capitol in January.

A coalition of Nebraska supporters signed a public letter to Nebraska members of Congress urging them to endorse DACA’s continuation on the grounds it allows aspirational young people like Alejandra the ability to reach their potential. The argument is that the work they do, the commerce they create, the taxes they pay strengthen, not deplete America. Recently proposed federal legislation called the BRIDGE Act would provide some safeguards in the event DACA isn’t renewed or until more lasting immigration reform emerges.

Nebraska Restaurant Association executive director Jim Partington said at a recent press conference in Lincoln announcing the letter, “There is no logical objection to anything about supporting these youths who were brought here at a very young age, have been educated in our school systems, and are now ready to go out into the work force and contribute to our economy and our society.”

Ayotitla Cortez also spoke at the conference. She previously testified before state senators.

“It’s important for us to share our stories so that we can show that DREAMers are here, we’re contributing, we’re doing the best we can to serve our communities,” she said.

Former DREAMer Lucy Aguilar, a University of Nebraska at Omaha student, advocated for DREAMers’ rights through Young Nebraskans in Action (YNA), a program of Heartland Workers Center (HWC).

She’s since gained permanent residency status. She stands by what she said two years ago: “I don’t think DACA-recipients should be tied to immigration policies or immigration terminology because we’re a much different thing. I know my status and it’s definitely not breaking the law in any sense. I’m here just like everybody else trying to make something out of my life, trying to accomplish goals — in my case trying to open a business and be successful in that.”

She supports DREAMers retaining their DACA protections.

HWC Senior Organizer Lucia Pedroza, who supervises YNA, said the issue’s catalyzed young people to participate and raise their collective voice and take collective action. Coalescing support for the bills that gave DREAMers licenses was a case in point.

“Young people started organizing themselves after coming to meetings and learning more about the legislative process and the issues in their community,” Pedroza said. “They knew what they had to do. They started organizing students and teachers at South High School. They were able to speak up for the bills and proposals.

“I’ve seen some who were afraid to speak up and share their own stories a few years ago now speaking their truth and working with us at the center. I’ve seen them grow and want to share their interest and passion with other young people. It’s a cool thing. They’re not just wanting to stay on the sidelines and complain, they want to do something more. They understand it’s not going to be just about them, they can’t do it alone, they need to have community support.”

Pedroza said YNA’s grassroots work “impacted the effort statewide in support of DACA.”

She and others make a pragmatic, do-the-right-thing, make-good-policy case for DREAMers being given pathways to full participation. Ayotitla Cortez uses herself as an example of how DACA impacts lives.

“As soon as I enrolled at UNL I started working at a daycare center at the university thanks to the work permit DACA provides. That was the first job I ever had. It helped me to support myself and paid for my living expenses and some of my school expenses. That was a great opportunity. Then my sophomore year I got the opportunity to work as a service assistant in the Nebraska Center for Research on Children, Youth, Families and Schools.

“Now I work at El Centro de las Americas — a non-profit that serves mainly the Latino Community. I’m the coordinator of the Adult Education Program. Helping my community is my main way of giving back some of what has been given to me.”

She wishes opponents would look past fears and stereotypes.

“I guess some people have a hard time seeing the human side or the social contributions DACA has provided. We’re working and putting money into city, state, federal revenues.”

Then there are myths that need overturning.

“As DACA-recipients we have to pay $485 every two years to renew our work permit, so it is something we are paying for, we’re not just getting it for free. If you multiply that by the nation’s 700,000 DACA-recipients, then that is bringing in money and helping the economy of every state. It’s creating jobs because we’re working, spending and some of us are even starting businesses.”

Pedroza said, “It’s about families and the well-being of human beings and giving opportunities to people who work hard and contribute as equally as citizens of the United States.”

Justice for Our Neighbors (JFON) Executive Director Emiliano Lerda feels the issue found enough support to buck the governor in the “very diverse coalition pushing for these changes,” adding, “you had strong, traditionally conservative and Republican-leaning organizations advocating side by side with what are traditionally known as more progressive organizations. This truly is a bipartisan issue that unfortunately has been utilized by politicians to galvanize a certain segment of the population for political support. But the vast aspects of this issue affect people across the aisles equally and the solutions will come from across the aisles from people who understand the economic impact and benefits of immigrants and the economic disaster we could face if we don’t have access to immigrant labor.”

Charles Shane Ellison, JFON deputy executive director-legal director, said it’s a win-win for everyone as employers benefit from DREAMers’ labor and DREAMers’ income boosts the economy. Then there’s the advanced degrees DREAMers earn, the expertise they practice, the services they provide, the products they produce, et cetera.

For Ellison, it’s also an issue of fairness and of undoing an overly broad application of law.

“Many of my clients who qualify for DACA came as babies. They don’t know any other country other than the United States. The law’s very unforgiving. It doesn’t make allowances for the fact they didn’t have any control over entering the country without status. These kids found themselves growing up blocked out of any opportunities to obtain work, to achieve dreams, so DACA was huge because it was this breakthrough, finally saying you can come out of the shadow and participate in the workforce towards your dreams in the only country you’ve known.

“Though inadequate and imperfect, it’s difficult to overstate the importance of what DACA’s meant to these young people.”

For St. Paul United Methodist Church (Lincoln) senior pastor David Lux, embracing DREAMers is about social justice.

“They live here and are part of our communities and have been for years. This is their home. Regardless of legal documentation they’re human beings worthy of fairness and a chance. They also contribute a lot to our communities and add to their richness.”

Besides, Pedroza said, with small population Nebraska struggling to retain young talent and America ever aging, the state and nation can’t afford to lose its best and brightest of child-rearing age.

Not everyone eligible for DACA applies for it.

Ellison said, “Nationally, 700,000 have been granted DACA since the program’s inception, I believe initial estimates of those eligible were well over a million. There’s a number of factors why only 700,000 applied. Some people are very risk averse, other people are not. Those who are risk averse, [do they] feel like paying fees to apply for a program soon to be done away with or potentially done away with, in addition to giving the government your private information they would need to apprehend you and seek your removal, [that] is not a very good bargain. So they’re not interested or willing to apply for it even if they qualify.

“A lot depends on the individual facts of the case. If a person’s already on immigration’s radar, they’re not really giving up much by applying.

“If they’re not on immigration’s radar, by applying with the potential the program will be done away with, they are taking some risk.

“I’ve actually been surprised by how many people want to apply, even post-election, who say, ‘I still want to renew my application because I feel like it’s worth a shot. If I don’t apply, I know I won’t get it. If I do apply, maybe President Trump will change his mind or something else will happen.’ It just shows how desperate folks were before DACA.”

Ellison added, “Certainly among my greatest concerns is that DACA will be done away and not be replaced with any kind of protection … that in addition to lack of compassion in immigration enforcement that tears families apart and disrupts communities.”

JFON urges recipients to prepare for DACA’s demise.

“We want folks to get plugged in with counsel so they can analyze what are their rights in any defenses they may have,” Ellison said. “If DACA is done away with, that’s going to be really important. We want people to know there are certain constitutional legal protections they may have and other forms of relief they may pursue that exist in law as opposed to policy. While the President can change immigration policy by doing away with the program, which is just an executive memoranda, he does not have the authority to unilaterally undue the law.

“There may be legal protections that exist for some DACA youth they don’t know about until they consult with an attorney. We provide referrals for the Nebraska Legal Immigration assistance hotline.”

Meanwhile, Pedroza, a Guatemalan immigrant, finds solace in the confederacy of common interests around the issue, such as the Bible, Badge and Business coalition that’s championed DACA. These coalitions signal to her America may not be as divided as the media portrays, but she concedes more consensus building is needed.

“What keeps me motivated is knowing for a fact we can do better to be a more welcoming community, state and nation and that we can work together to improve the quality of life for underserved people. Not everyone will see the same things I see, but we don’t have to have one way of doing things. The more collective and different perspectives we can add to the larger vision, the more impact we can have.”

With DACA up in the air and the path of immigration reform anybody’s guess, Pedroza hopes for bridges to dreams, not walls to exclusion.

“I have two children and I really care about their future. I want them to know there is something that can be done when you work with community members and elected officials. We can have dialogue. We don’t have to be on the defensive or offensive all the time. We need to have that space to negotiate in, and it’s possible. I think the national rhetoric doesn’t help. A lot of times, not everybody is open-minded or familiar with the other side of the story. That’s something we have to deal with. We’re not going to convince everybody. Not everybody’s going to see the issue the same way. But we can’t give up. We have to work with what we have and to do what we can do.”

She senses however things play out, DREAMers and supporters have started a movement that won’t go away.

“One thing we can do is help people empower themselves, so that they can continue to work for those solutions and look for other options. A lot of times as immigrant communities we feel powerless and so we don’t try to be a part of that change for our community.

“But that collective power really makes people feel they can do something. It can be like a domino effect where one thing leads to something bigger or we inspire people to get involved.”

Being seen and heard is a start.

Visit jfon-ne.org, http://www.heartlandworkerscenter.org, neappleseed.org.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The new administration issued its first immigration orders as we went to press. Local groups, especially the ones mentioned in this story, are organizing now to respond to changes in enforcement priorities that threaten to tear apart families and lives without any review process while diverting resources away from deporting the worst criminals. Stay tuned to them at the links at the end of this story and follow-up coverage in our sister publication El Perico and online at TheReader.com.

Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.

immigration

by Leo Adam Biga

Dick Holland remembered for generous giving and warm friendship that improved organizations and lives

February 8, 2017 leoadambiga Leave a comment

Dick Holland remembered for generous giving and warm friendship that improved organizations and lives

Free-spirited entrepreneur gave with his heart and mind

Philanthropist’s gifts raised Omaha arts, culture, education health and public policy sectors

©by Leo Adam Biga

Originally appeared in the 2017 Metro Magazine Giving Guide & Event Book (https://issuu.com/metmago/docs/thegivingguideandeventbook2017)

Entrepreneur and philanthropist Richard D. Holland lived life large. Not in an ostentatious sense. He was too Midwest modest for that. Rather he lived out loud in a make-the-most-of-every-moment way that endeared him to many.

The Omaha native fit loads of living into his 95 years. A Unitarian and a liberal, he wore his beliefs on his sleeve and was unapologetic about it.

This benevolent, bellowing, love-to-laugh and make-you-laugh mover and shaker got much done in his hometown. He was considered a builder who contributed to Omaha’s physical and cultural landscape through the public structures and quality of life enhancements his giving helped build.

The University of Nebraska at Omaha graduate first gained traction as an advertising whiz handling elite accounts through his own agency. He later entered the public sphere as a funder of major health, education and arts projects, public policy initiatives and political campaigns through his Holland Foundation. The art of persuasion he learned as a Mad Man era ad exec helped him coalesce support for things he put his heart and money behind.

The making of the man

As a young entrepreneur he sowed his adventurous oats by trying bookmaking, ice house hawking, door-to-door selling and riding the rails. He served in the U.S. Army chemical corps during World War II. He pitched for the University of Omaha baseball team. The world was his oyster and learning about it became a lifetime passion. The voracious reader accumulated a home library thick with biographies. He subscribed to and absorbed dozens of magazines ranging from science to sports to the arts. He read at least four newspapers daily.

He found an inquisitive soulmate in his wife Mary, with whom he helped raise four children: Dean, Barbara, Nancy and Mary Ann or “Andy” Holland, who said her playful father enjoyed a strong relationship with her mother that stood the test of time.

“Marriages are full of all kinds of things happening,” she said,

“and my parents were very committed to the marriage and very loyal to each other. It was a good marriage.”

The couple were together six decades before Mary preceded Dick in death in 2006. Perhaps their greatest trial came when their son Dean was killed in an auto accident.

“It was horrible,” Andy said. “I think that’s the first time I ever saw my dad cry. It was a terrible loss for my parents. It hit them very hard. It was a very difficult time.”

While no one ever really gets over losing a son or wife, nothing kept Holland down for long. He was too irrepressible for that. Despite tragedies and setbacks, he always rallied. He rarely met a day he didn’t welcome.

“He was always very forward thinking,” Andy said. “He never dwelt on the past. He would have wanted to go on living forever. I don’t know many people that feel that way. He never got tired of living because he was just interested in everything. It wasn’t really until the very end he decided, well, I’ve got to go.”

Soulmate

He and Mary were a matched set but, Andy said, “they were pretty different.” “My mother was much more outgoing. My dad appeared outgoing but where you’d have to drag my mom out of a party, my dad would have his little social fix and then be ready to go. I think my dad was more the intellectual. My mother went more with her feelings. But they did complement each other in a lot of ways. They made decisions together.”

Former University of Nebraska Medical Center chancellor Harold Maurer feels a portrait of the couple on display at the Holland Performing Arts Center captures their bond. The painting “Opening Night 2005” by Debra Joy Groesser shows the pair seated intimately together at the center’s grand opening.

“The painting depicts the strong interdependence between Mary and Dick,” Maurer said. “She has her head on his shoulder. It’s such a warm, wonderful feeling – which is what they personified in life. They were marvelous together. They seemed to agree on everything they undertook. They completed each other’s sentences they were so close.”

Holland Children’s Movement and Holland Children’s Center director John Cavanaugh said of the couple, “Mary was protective of him. He was so open, you know. Anybody could call him up and ask him for money (his number was publicly listed). Mary was a little more skeptical of the world out there and protected him from his own vulnerabilities. They were a perfect team together and the Holland Center is a perfect memorial to both of them.”

Andy Holland said her mom’s death “was very devastating” for her father. “They were married 58 years and they had a wonderful time together, especially the last 20 years. He missed her very much and he was very sad about it. Somebody told me after my mom’s death he would probably follow her shortly, but he didn’t. My dad was an extremely resilient man. He picked himself up and moved on because that’s just how he lived. He was just always looking forward, acquiring new ideas, doing new things and finding new friends. It wasn’t that he didn’t love her but he wanted to live life – he didn’t want to just exist.”

UNMC Chancellor Harold M. Maurer, M.D., left, and his wife, Beverly, with Richard Holland at a Nebraskans For Research luncheon to honor Holland for his efforts to advance research in the state.

A thirst for knowledge and getting things done

Nothing engaged him more than good conversation. He hosted a regular confab known as the Saturday Morning Gang. A faithful participant, author-essayist Rick Dooling, described it as “a cross between a literary salon and five old guys in a booth at the local diner,” adding, “Always fascinating banter with Dick as the maestro.” UNMC physician Dan Schaefer, retired film editor Mike Hill and photographer Pat Drickey completed the group.

Drickey said, “We would discuss the week’s events, including politics, art openings, movies, books we were reading and interesting stories from the New Yorker or the New York Times. Others made an appearance, like John Cavanaugh. Dick was very engaging and had a contagious laugh. Occasionally, he’d break out with his call of the loon. Thinking about it still brings a smile to my face. I think what Dick enjoyed about our company was the fact we were pretty much all down-to-earth native Omahans who’d reached the top of our professions.”

The Gang continues meeting. The group has an urn containing Holland’s ashes as a way of keeping his presence near.

His last few years Holland found a new companion in Marian Leary who gave him added reason to live.

He stayed connected to the people dearest to him, including Cavanaugh, an old friend who worked closely with Holland.

“I really miss the daily conversations I had with him,” Cavanaugh said. “He was just every day an inspiration in terms of things that needed to be done to mainly improve the lives of poor people in our community and across the country. We continue that work of improving early childhood care – a passion of his. Expanding access to quality care is a big part of our commitment. He was just a delight to have as a friend. He was a regular for Sunday dinner at our house. That was something he greatly enjoyed and we miss him tremendously.”

Following Holland’s August death a flood of tributes appeared. Recurring themes referred to his boundless generosity, caring, curiosity, intelligence, sense of humor and penchant for taking stands and speaking his mind.

Telling it like it is

His many admirers included daughter Andy Holland.

“He was courageous about speaking his mind and speaking out against things he thought wrong – no matter what it might have cost him. He was just never afraid to stick his neck out even when there could have been negative consequences to him. I know that’s relatively easy to do when you’ve got millions, but back in the 1950s he began an organization – Omahans for Common Sense – to counter McCarthyism. At the time he was a young man trying to build a business and had a wife and small children, so I think that was a very brave thing to do.”

Early Buffett Childhood Institute executive director Sam Meisels remembers Holland as “utterly unafraid,” adding, “He was such a strong and staunch defender of those things he felt right. He wanted to understand and he had an opinion. Anyone who knew him knew he wanted to share that opinion, and he always did. The critical thing was to hear him out because he did have a lot to say and there was a lot to be learned from him.”

Harold Maurer worked with Holland on several UNMC projects the philanthropist supported. Maurer recalled a particularly controversial area of research that he needed someone to champion and Holland jumped right into the fray.

“We were engaged in embryonic stem cell research early on

and we were getting killed by the press,” Maurer said. “I went to (then-Omaha World-Herald publisher) John Gottschalk and said, ‘John, I’m getting killed in the newspaper, what should I do?’ and he said, ‘Hal, you’ll hemorrhage for awhile but you’ll be okay.’ I spoke with (philanthropist) Mike Yanney and said, ‘I’ve got to know if the community supports what I’m doing or not,’ and he organized a breakfast I’ll never forget in his office with all the community leaders there, including Dick Holland.

“I asked them, ‘What do you think we should do?’ and someone said, ‘I think you should continue because we do not want to be last in Nebraska.’ I said, ‘Great, that’s the point. Now I’d like to ask one of you to head the development of an initiative to advocate this. They asked, ‘Who do you want?’ and I said, ‘Dick Holland.’ And Dick didn’t say not me or this or that, he said, ‘Sure, I’d be glad to take it on.’ That’s typical Dick Holland – willing to go to battle for the right things. He even came up with the name Nebraskans for Life Saving Cures.”

Holland didn’t stop there.

“He showed up at a very tense (University of Nebraska) Board of Regents meeting when that subject came up,” Maurer said. “Those opposed and those for the research were there. Dick came and spoke before the board on behalf of the research and I think that had a major impact on their decision.

“I miss his willingness to speak up about taboo subjects in Nebraska. I miss his advocacy for things that were right.”

Maurer recalled a time when he and John Niemann, senior vice president of the University of Nebraska Foundation, visited Holland at his home.

“We went to ask him for a gift for the cancer center. He knew why we were there, and he got up and said, ‘Excuse me, I’ve got to go to the bathroom.’ He left for the bathroom, came back and without a word from us he said, ‘Okay, I’m going to give you’ his amount of money.’ And that was it – without any kind of instigation from us at all. John Niemann and I looked at each other disbelievingly. He was that kind of person.”

As recipients of Holland’s gifts attest, “he took a personal interest in things and it was important for him to trust you – that was a big factor in his giving,” Maurer said.

Then there was his brazenness. A favorite hangout was the Happy Hollow Club, where Holland delighted enlivening the staid place. Maurer recalled, “Once, the leaders of an effort to recall the mayor were sitting at a table and he went over to them and said in a loud voice, ‘Oh, here’s a table full of fools.’ and walked on. Often, Warren Buffett would be in the corner by himself or with some dignitary. This one time, everybody’s quiet, they don’t want to bother him, so Dick gets up in the middle of the room and hollers, ‘Hey, Warren, how you doing?’ and that got the whole place stirred up.”

“Yeah, that’s the kind of thing he would do – he had a lot of chutzpah,” Andy Holland said of her father.

Not much surprised Andy about her old man but she said the general public probably didn’t know “he loved to cuss.” “He always swore a lot,” she said. “I mean, we all grew up with it, so it was no big deal. The grandkids were all a little shocked by it.

They were like, ‘Hey, Mom, you know what poppa said?'”

A caring heart for the less fortunate

He could be profane or profound but was above all compassionate. His passing left a gap in the local giving community. Those who benefited from that generosity appreciated how he targeted his wealth to support things he felt would make the greatest impact. He was renowned for getting others to give, too.

“He was so admired in the community that he just had to ask people to participate and they did, at whatever level he wanted them to,” Maurer said.

“He inspired a lot of other people to become more involved in creating a great community,” Andy said.

“He was a great man who was unique in every way. Just an unequaled kind of guy with a marvelous mind and such clarity of purpose,” said Maurer. “He did a lot for the Medical Center in terms of supporting the cancer center, stem cell research and a number of other activities as well. He was a founder of the Nebraska Coalition for Life Saving Cures and its president until he passed away.”

Holland exemplified the work ethic and resilience of the Greatest Generation by becoming a self-made man. Leavened by the Great Depression, he knew the value of a dollar and the gulf between haves and have-nots. Thus, he established the Holland Children’s Movement and Holland Children’s Center to study avenues for alleviating poverty and giving all children a good start in life. For him, the need for universal early childhood education was a social justice issue of utmost importance.

He found a noted ally and kindred spirit in Buffett Early Childhood Institute leader Sam Meisels.

“We talked about children and services to children and what the state and federal government could do to help children and families,” Meisels said. “We were certainly on the same wavelength there. He found it very hard to tolerate that any child’s potential was ignored or lost or not fulfilled. He always wanted to give everybody the best chance possible, and that’s how I feel, too. So we had a lot to talk about on that.”

Meisels recalled an event that highlighted Holland at his best.

“We had a symposium on the UNO campus with the Aspen Institute. On the stage I had three or four billionaires sitting next to me and the former governor of the state of Massachusetts. The moderator was the CEO of the Aspen Institute, who’s the former CEO of Time Magazine. There were questions from the audience and Dick raised his hand and he basically castigated everyone on that stage for not thinking hard enough about the fact children growing up in poverty need more than what we offered and considered. He made it very clear he thought we had missed the boat. He let us all have it. Well, that was a very Dick thing to do. He just never would hide his thoughts or pull his punches – and that was very foreign to people there.”

Holland backed his bluster with facts and action. Meisels admired him for doing his homework.

“He was absolutely very informed and when he didn’t know something he wanted me to send him articles to read. He wanted to know who to talk to in order to get the best information. He recognized when he didn’t understand and needed to know more and he wanted to do something about it.”

Omaha Performing Arts executive director Joan Squires said Holland was generous not only with his money but with his time and expertise.

“Dick was a great resource to go through a plan. He not only wanted to know artistically what we were doing but he knew the financials inside and out and he had a great in-depth working knowledge of how the organization operated. He actively participated in our board meetings, offered really great advice and was committed the entire time I had the opportunity to know him, which was 15 years.

“To be that vibrant and engaged and active was really a gift to all of us.”

Similarly, Meisels believes the totality of Holland’s contributions are what set him apart.

“He made a huge difference,” Meisels said. “You see it all around the city. Then there’s places you don’t know where to look even and if you know what he was committed to, there he is, too. He made a difference to everybody who came in contact with him personally. Not everyone loved him. Not everyone even liked him, I suspect. But those of us who were lucky enough to have a friendship with him, will never forget him.”

A social justice advocate

Just as he fought for children’s rights, Holland worked to repeal the death penalty in Nebraska and to raise the state’s minimum wage. He also backed many Democratic Party candidates.

John Cavanaugh knew his heart and mind as well as anyone.

“In the last 10-12 years we basically talked two or three times a day almost every day,” he said. “We worked very closely on public policy initiatives he was very passionate about. He was a terrific communicator and an inspirational voice and he would just go all out. A real goer and doer. He was still writing op-ed and letters to the editor at over 90 years old and still engaging in the political process, supporting candidates and causes.

“He was very strong in supporting the repeal of the death penalty in Nebraska. Up until his own death that was something he was proud the Nebraska Legislature had done and was supportive of the ballot effort to retain the repeal.”

Nothing though stirred Holland as much as early childhood and Cavanaugh said his friend play a key role in a major victory.

“Four years ago Nebraska reversed its position on providing prenatal care for undocumented pregnant women. Dick took up that cause and I worked with him in the Legislature to get that reinstated. It took the Legislature to pass legislation and then to override Governor Heineman’s veto. Dick was a driving force behind that effort and just felt passionately every child needed a chance to have a healthy start in life that begins with prenatal care. So we’re now one of six states in the country who provide publicly funded prenatal care for every expectant mother.”

Leveling the playing field for jobs and earnings also found Holland leading Nebraska to take progressive action.

“He spearheaded the effort to raise the minimum wage in Nebraska from $7.25 to $9. He did that as the primary funder for a ballot initiative that passed by over 60 percent – projecting Nebraska into one of the highest paying minimum wage states in the country, adding probably more than $250 million to the income of low income Nebraskans ” Cavanaugh said.

“After that passage a number of major national chains raised their own internal wage, so it had a huge ripple effect. He felt very strongly income inequality and the fact people work full-time and aren’t able to support their families was a critical issue of our time. He was very personally committed to addressing that, so we now have in Nebraska the lowest unemployment in the country and among the highest minimum wage.”

Making a difference

Andy Holland said her father “was very proud of some of the impact he was able to be a part of in education and in helping families and children in poverty.” “He really wanted to make this a better place because he loved Omaha,” she said. “He lived here his whole life and wanted to make a difference here.”

Even after he found professional success and substantial wealth, Holland never forgot the values of his solid middle class upbringing. He also never lost the common touch with every day folks of whom he considered himself a most fortunate son.

Far from an all work and no play bore, Holland appreciated the finer things, especially the arts, and his giving reflected that. In making the lead gift for the Holland Performing Arts Center and contributing to the Orpheum Theatrer refurbishing he helped expand and enhance Omaha’s live arts scene.

OPA’s Joan Squires said the Holland Center actually fulfilled a long-held dream of the philanthropist’s to gift the city with a special venue.

“He had been committed to helping develop a performing arts center years before and the process never really got started until he and Mary were introduced by John Gottschalk to Sue Morris from Heritage Services. With their lead gift and John’s leadership all of this happened. Dick remained engaged, involved and passionate about our institution and the community from the time I first met him to the end of his life.

“One of the most meaningful things he said was that the Holland Center so far surpassed his expectations, He knew it would be beneficial for Omaha and the region but I think he did not understand the breadth and scope of what we would be able to accomplish. It really transformed the arts community here. He said, ‘I will always love it forever and it can only get better.’ It exemplified who he was – he just wanted to make this place a better community for everybody. And I know he took great pride in that and in how his and Mary’s philanthropic support and leadership encouraged others to join them and all of it came to fruition.”

Squires said both Dick and Mary were “very involved” in the design and construction process and she was “grateful” Mary had a year to enjoy the finished facility before she passed.

Despite their accomplishments, the Hollands remained humble.

“They were low profile, they were not looking for the spotlight, they just felt they were so fortune to have these gifts to share with others,” Squires said. “It really was never about recognition – it was about having a world-class performing arts center for Omaha.”

Andy Holland said her father enjoyed raising the city’s cultural profile.

“He was very proud of the impact he had on the arts in our community because of the tremendous difference it made,”

Holland is gifted a hockey jersey with his name on it during a parade outside his home, held in appreciation for his donation toward Baxter Arena.
Durango greets Holland at the parade.
Holland is recognized during Baxter Arena’s dedication ceremony.
Holland and Chancellor John Christensen share a moment during an early childhood education event held by the Aspen Institute and the Buffett Early Childhood Institute.

Enriching lives

Squires appreciated Holland the man, not just the philanthropist. “From the day I met Dick Holland I knew he was an extraordinary person,” she said of her dear friend.

She and her late husband Tom were struck, as others were, by his voracious reading habits.

“Tom and I would get him a book for his birthday or the holidays because what else could you get for him. We had to scramble to find something he hadn’t read that might be of interest, and it could be wide-ranging, on so many topics. We would comb the New York Times Best Sellers List to find just the right book. It was usually nonfiction, current events or historical and things he was engaged in. One of the books I gave him was about the Wright brothers and he read it cover to cover and loved it, because he just had to know how things worked.”

Heritage Services president Sue Morris worked with Holland on several brick and mortar projects he contributed to.

“Dick knew that facilities inspire excellence,” Morris said.

Even though he was a UNO alum she was “blown away” when he made the lead gift for the Baxter Arena – a sports facility. “Honestly, I think he got a kick out of doing something “different” and he was especially pleased the community ice rink was named Holland Ice. We didn’t know how to thank Dick for his generosity and he was beginning to be restricted in his trips, so we brought a parade to his home with the UNO marching band, the hockey players, convertibles with pretty ladies. He laughed and laughed and laughed. No plaque or crystal bowl or sign could have meant more to Dick than his very own parade.”

Just as Squires got close to Holland, so did Morris, and like everyone else who knew him, they miss his friendship.

“My life has been enriched in so many ways by Dick Holland. I miss him,” said Morris.

She and Squires said they will remember Holland always looking expectantly to the next step, the next phase, the next project and getting impatient if things didn’t move fast enough.

Following the old lion’s death a private memorial celebrating his life was held at the venue that meant more to him than any other bearing his name, the Holland Performing Arts Center.

Andy Holland said, “The final thing that closed out the memorial service was an opera duet with two sopranos called “The Flower Song” from the opera Lakme. It’s a beautiful song.”

That night she and some close friends of her father’s remembered the man they all loved.

“I was very touched by how many people really loved him. We had an awful lot of grown men crying. There were a few people we asked to say a few words and they just couldn’t.”

Rather than feel she had to share her father with others, Holland said, “I always thought my father enjoyed his life so much that I felt there was plenty of him to go around.”

Of that night, she said, “It was a wonderful tribute to him – I just thought it was perfect. My dad would have loved it.”

Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.

_________________________________________________

“He was always very forward thinking. He never dwelt on the past.. He would have wanted to go on living forever. I don’t know many people that feel that way. He never got tired of living because he was just interested in everything. It wasn’t really until the very end he decided, well, I’ve got to go.”

“He was courageous about speaking his mind and speaking out against things he thought wrong – no matter what it might have cost him. He was just never afraid to stick his neck out even when there could have been negative consequences to him.”

“He really wanted to make this a better place because he loved Omaha, He lived here his whole life and wanted to make a difference here.”

“I was very touched by how many people really loved him.”

(Quotes by Andy Holland)

_ _ _

“He was just every day an inspiration in terms of things that needed to be done to mainly improve the lives of poor people in our community and across the country.”

He was a terrific communicator and an inspirational voice and he would just go all out. A real goer and doer. He was still writing op-ed and letters to the editor at over 90 years old and still engaging in the political process, supporting candidates and causes.”

(Quotes by John Cavanaugh)

_ _ _

“He made a huge difference. You see it all around the city. Then there’s places you don’t know where to look even and if you know what he was committed to, there he is, too. He made a difference to everybody who came in contact with him personally. Not everyone loved him. Not everyone even liked him, I suspect. But those of us who were lucky enough to have a friendship with him, will never forget him.”

(Quote by Sam Meisels)

_ _ _

“I miss his willingness to speak up about taboo subjects in Nebraska. I miss his advocacy for things that were right.”

(Quote by Harold Maurer)

” … he just wanted to make this place a better community for everybody. And I know he took great pride in that and in how his and Mary’s philanthropic support and leadership encouraged others to join them and all of it came to fruition.”

(Quote by Joan Squires)

_ _ _

“Dick knew that facilities inspire excellence.”

“We didn’t know how to thank Dick for his generosity (for making the lead gift for the University of Nebraska at Omaha’s Baxter Arena) and he was beginning to be restricted in his trips, so we brought a parade to his home with the UNO marching band, the hockey players, convertibles with pretty ladies. He laughed and laughed and laughed. No plaque or crystal bowl or sign could have meant more to Dick than his very own parade.”

(Quotes by Sue Morris)

Atticus Finch-Barack Obama give way to Bob Ewell-Donald Trump in this post-“To Kill a Mockingbird” world

January 24, 2017 leoadambiga 1 comment

Hot Movie Takes – Atticus Finch-Barack Obama give way to Bob Ewell-Donald Trump

©by Leo Adam Biga

Author of “Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film”

In this 57th anniversary year of the debut of Harper Lee’s 1960 novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” and the 55th anniversary of the 1962 film adaptation’s release, I reflect on some sobering truths taken from that classic, much beloved story. Truths reflective of today’s American civil-societal-political landscape.

The irony is that the story’s revered figure of Atticus Finch, a fictional white Southern lawyer who represents so many universally admired qualities, found his most direct expression in this nation’s first black president, Barack Obama. The comparison was obvious and Obama’s admiration for what Atticus embodies was made evident when in his farewell address he quoted something that fictional character utters in the book and film. Obama said, “If our democracy is to work in this increasingly diverse nation, each one of us needs to try to heed the advice of a great character in American fiction, Atticus Finch: ‘You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.'”

Associated Press

Yes, Atticus turns out to have racist leanings in the long-delayed sequel “Go Set a Watchman” but that’s hardly surprising given the time and place he came from. None of us are free of sin or fault. Good principles and actions don’t require perfection. The revelation that Atticus attended KKK meetings and opposed integration while still defending a black man accused of a rape he didn’t commit is simply acknowledgement of how complex race is and how far as a nation we have to go in addressing it. In his farewell speech Obama told blacks to learn the struggles of other minority groups and he admonished whites to acknowledge the stain of this country’s earlier generations are not gone. When minority groups “voice discontent,” he said. “they’re not just engaging in reverse racism or practicing political correctness; that when they wage peaceful protest, they’re not demanding special treatment, but the equal treatment our Founders promised.”

During his two terms the diplomatic, gentlemanly Obama championed social justice and opposed infringements on freedom and equality. Like Atticus, he walked the walk of virtue and idealism, of fair play and public service, and he extended his hand to the equivalents of Boo Radley and Tom Robinson in our midst. Though Obama had considerable support within the Democratic party and even more broadly throughout the nation and world, he was repeatedly criticized and stonewalled by the Republican controlled Congress. Many of us surmised this was due to the gridlock of entrenched, unwieldy party politics grinding the tried and true American system of across-the-aisles idealogical compromise to a halt. Racism may have been the bigger issue in play. The recent election revealed how reviled Obama is by a sizable segment of the American populace whose elected representatives are some combination of Republican, conservative and fundamentalist. Not every Obama detractor and Trump supporter is an out and out racist but it’s true about enough of them to show a clear pattern.

Trump’s angry man campaign was filled with bigoted, misogynistic, nationalistic rhetoric that put big business and capitalism ahead of human rights, civil rights, women’s rights, social safety nets and environmental protections. He referred to harsh law and order crack downs on those deemed to be disloyal dissidents and enemies of the state. He threatened closing borders and deporting undocumented millions. He connoted militarism with nationalism, patriotism and Christian values. In his first few days in office he seems hell-bent on following through on his alarming agenda.

All of this has gave permission to white supremacists and other hate mongers to react violently against people of color and different origins, to disrespectfully treat women, to ignore clear and present danger realities such as global warming and to override the will of the people by renewing projects that history tells us will deface and pollute precious lands and waters.

Donald Trump.getty

It is as if Barry Goldwater, George Wallace, Ross Perot and Rudy Giuliani have somehow been melded together in the amoral heart of Trump. Just when America needs an Atticus Finch in its top leadership position, we now have someone who seemingly speaks more to the Bob Ewells of the world than to those of us who believe in the better angels of a more perfect union.

Instead of a voice of calm reason, considered compassion, resolute peace and sincere unity, we have a strident, histrionic voice of acrimony and division who speaks for the supposed moral majority and special interests of privileged white males. In movie-movie terms, I am reminded of the Franklin Schaffner adaptation of Gore Vida’s “The Best Man.” where the choice for a presidential nominee came down to a reactionary opportunist played by Cliff Robertson and a thoughtful, progressive essayed by Henry Fonda. It is unfortunate that Trump did not face anyone like the statesmen Fonda portrayed in “Young Mr. Lincoln,” “Advise and Consent,” “The Best Man” and “Fail Safe” or the socially conscious Everymen he played in “The Grapes of Wrath,” “The Oxbow Incident” and “12 Angry Men.” Hillary Clinton embodied some of these same ideals, but America just wasn’t ready for her or for a woman like her as President.

How unfortunate, too, that there isn’t someone like the noble Atticus Finch or other figures of high character that Gregory Peck played (“Twelve O’Clock High,” “The Big Country,” “Captan Newman M.D.”) to lead us.

Then again, we had our Atticus Finch situated in the most powerful post in the world and a chunk of this nation rejected him and what he espoused. Obama even sounded a lot like Atticus when he called on people who want a more perfect union to not merely be bystanders but to be participants: “Show up, dive in, stay at it…Presuming a reservoir of goodness in others can be a risk, and there will be times when the process disappoints you. But for those of us fortunate enough to have been a part of this work, to see it up close, let me tell you, it can energize and inspire. And more often than not, your faith in America — and in Americans — will be confirmed.”

For all its enduring popularity, “To Kill a Mockingbird” still only speaks to those willing to learn its lessons. Too many Americans, I’m afraid, are still unprepared to accept The Other represented by Boo Radley and Tom Robinson. Even in 2017 the notion of embracing all people, regardless of color, ethnicity, religion, socioeconomic status, physical-mental capability, is still too radical for a whole lot of folks to follow. These are the very same things Christians are called to do by 2,000 year-old teachings. Yet many bristle at the core idea of loving their fellow man even though this is the basis and essence for the very organized religions they’re baptized in and purport to believe.

To Kill a Mockingbird. Atticus Finch, Scout, Boo Radley... Just riveting, these relationships, these people.:

All of which tells us we are one hot mess of a nation. There’s nothing new about that, it’s just that events of the past few years make it easier to see things for how they really are. The cloak of civility and cooperation has been lifted. Maybe it’s a good thing the hate is there for the viewing and not all concealed or dressed up as something else. Now that it’s out in the open, at least we know who and what we’re dealing with moving forward.

We need all the Atticus Finch’s and Harper Lees amongst us to stand up and be counted lest the Boo Radleys and Tom Robinsons continue to be oppressed. The conspiracy of hearts who love what “To Kill a Mockingbird” and works like it teach about tolerance and love need to raise their voices against injustice. If this book and film that have touched so many can lead to social action, then their collective impact will be far greater than all the sales, box-office receipts and rentals they’ve earned over these last six decades.

1950s Cinema: An under-appreciated decade of film and ferment

January 24, 2017 leoadambiga 1 comment

1950s Cinema: An under-appreciated decade of film and ferment

©by Leo Adam Biga

Author of Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film

I am amused by the persistent myth that 1950s America was somehow this sterile time capsule when the mass consumer population became lulled into a kind of stupor that made them numb or oblivious to reality. Or that it’s a decade when nothing much happened compared, say, to the 1960s. Nothing could be further from the truth.

To portray the ’50s as a big bore or big nothing is as inaccurate as purporting that everyone in the ’60s was active in the counterculture movement, protesting in the streets, experimenting with drugs, et cetera, when in reality relatively very few people did those things. When it comes to social phenomena, most people are observers, not participants. But that’s not to say they’re unaffected by those same forces. They very much are.

The movies of any decade offer a somewhat reliable reflection of whatever is on the minds and in the hearts of artists and audiences during that time frame. The caveat to this is that you will inevitably find what you’re looking for if you examine any decade with a certain predisposition or agenda.

Sure, there was a lot of purely escapist fare released in the ’50s courtesy the glorified soap operas, big studio musicals, sword and sandal epics and romantic comedies that filled screens. But there were also many pictures dredging up the fears, anxieties, neuroses and complexes over any number of social-political topics. Groundbreaking troubled youth pics, film noir classics, anti-war movies, socially conscious westerns and psychological science fiction flicks were among the genre films to take on sensitive subjects.

The ’50s was full of conflicting social, cultural, political, upheaval and the best film artists mirrored those currents in their work, if not overtly than metaphorically.

The canvas was even richer and deeper when considering the Hollywood films of auteurs like Ford, Kazan, Mann, Zinnemann, Boetticher, Hitchcock in combination with the best foreign films of that decade. The neo-Realists of italy, Bergman in Sweden, Kurosawa in Japan, Wajda in Poland, Ray in India, Bunuel in Mexico and Spain and the French New Wave vanguard of Godard and Truffaut took cinema to new heights of form and meaning.

Here is only a partial sampling of the very real issues that either became full-out movie fodder or that informed dramatic plot-points and throughlines in ’50s-era films:

Rock ‘n’ roll’s advent

The Cold War

McCarthyism

The Black List

Civil rights

The Korean War

The Military Industrial Complex

The Iron Curtain

The Space Race

Suburbia

Television

The Baby Boom

The Mob

The Beat Movement

Folk music

Films as disparate as “”The Blackboard Jungle” (Richard Brooks) “Rebel Without a Cause” (Nicholas Ray) and “East of Eden” (Elia Kazan) capture the youth angst Zeitgeist wave.

“Pickup on South Street” (Samuel Fuller) “High Noon” (Fred Zinnemann) “Stalag 17” (Billy Wilder) “On the Waterfront” (Elia Kazan), “Touch of Evil” (Orson Welles) pand “12 Angry Men” pose the ethical dilemma of choosing to remain silent in the face of corruption or risking everything to stand up for the greater good.

Alexander MacKendrick’s adaptation of Clifford Odets’ “Sweet Smell of Success” presents the moral quagmire that comes with be willing to do anything to get ahead.

Everything from the films of Douglas Sirk (“Imitation of Life,” “The Tarnished Angels,” “Written on the Wind,” “All That Heaven Allows,” “Magnificent Obsession,” “There’s Always Tomorrow”) to Fred Zinnemann’s “From Here to Eternity,” Robert Wise’s “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” Don Siegel’s “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” Joshua Logan’s “Picnic” and Mark Robson’s “Peyton Place” juxtapose the dull, cold routine of conformity with the hot desires of the human heart.

Elia Kazan’s “A Face in the Crowd” offers a prescient view of the mass media and general public raising a figure to a position of influence out of all proportion to their gifts and then bringing him down to a terrible fall.

“The Steel Helmet” (Sam Fuller) “Attack” (Robert Aldrich), “Paths of Glory” (Stanley Kubrick) “Men in War” (Anthony Mann) and “The Bridge on the River Kwai” (David Lean) show the cruel futility of war.

“No Way Out” (Joe Mankiewicz) “The Searchers” (John Ford), “Giant,” “The Big Country” (William Wyler) and “Odds Against Tomorrow” (Robert Wise) depict the poisonous evil of bigotry.

“South Pacific” and “Sayonara” (Joshua Logan), “The King and I” (Walter Lang), “House of Bamboo” (Sam Fuller) and “The World of Suzie Wong” (Richard Quine) examine race within the arc of interracial relationships that play out in larger contexts.

“Baby Doll” (Elia Kazan), “Anatomy of a Murder” (Otto Preminger), “Some Like it Hot” and “The Apartment” deal maturely with sexual subject matter.

George Cukor’s “Born Yesterday,” Robert Wise’s “Executive Suite” and Nunnally Johnson’s “The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit” critiqued American consumerism.

Billy Wilder’s “Sunset Boulevsrd,” Joseph Lewis’ “Gun Crazy,” Anthony Mann’s “Winchester 73,””Elia Kazan’s A Streetcar Named Desire,” Mann’s “The Furies,” Fritz Lang’s “Clash by Night,” MGM’s “Forbidden Planet,” Budd Boetticher’s “The Man from Laramie,”Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rear Window” “Vertigo” and “Psycho” Budd Boeticher’s “Ride Lonesome” and “Comanche Station,” Sam Fuller’s “Forty Guns”are among a great number of films from that decade that delve into Freudian themes.

The ’50s even produced an unapologetic and uncompromising art film, Charles Laughton’s “The Night of the Hunter,” that broaches all kinds of sensitive subjects through audacious use of symbolism and allegory. This masterfully crafted black and white film plays as a fairy tale with its dark themes, evil villain, innocent children in peril and episodes of magic realism. The whole film operates on the level of a fevered dream-state or trance that’s triggered and ended by trauma.

So, don’t ever fall for the notion the ’50s represented a blank slate, cinematically or otherwise. Its screen stirrings are replete with potent content, context and subtext that will make your head spin or at least make you think twice about this supposedly banal, complacent and complicit decade. Yes, there was conformity and consumerism, but when hasn’t there been since the 1920s? But the masses were far from moving in lockstep and thinking alike. Diversity, division and rebellion were present. So were the nascent civil rights, black power and feminist movements. It just took the 1960s for it to more fully come to the surface.

100 Greatest Movies of the 1950s

A list of the 100 greatest movies of the 1950s compiled by Digital Dream Door.

Source: digitaldreamdoor.com · Added by Ilsa Lund

3,339 users · 74,821 views

Avg. score: 29 of 100 (29%)

Required scores: 1, 10, 18, 31, 47

How many have you seen?

Seven Samurai (1954)

Rotten Tomatoes®

100%

On the Waterfront (1954)

Vertigo (1958)

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)

Rotten Tomatoes®

94%

The Seventh Seal (1957)

Rotten Tomatoes®

94%

Sunset Boulevard (1950)

Rear Window (1954)

Rashomon (1950)

All About Eve (1950)

Singin’ in the Rain (1952)

Rotten Tomatoes®

100%

Some Like It Hot (1959)

Rotten Tomatoes®

96%

North by Northwest (1959)

Tokyo Story (1953)

Touch of Evil (1958)

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

Rotten Tomatoes®

98%

Diabolique

Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Rotten Tomatoes®

96%

The African Queen (1951)

12 Angry Men (1957)

La Strada (1954)

Ben-Hur (1959)

Wild Strawberries (1957)

The Searchers (1956)

High Noon (1952)

The Night of the Hunter (1955)

Shane (1953)

The 400 Blows (1959)

The Ten Commandments

Ikiru (1952)

Rotten Tomatoes®

100%

Strangers on a Train (1951)

Rotten Tomatoes®

98%

Kiss Me Deadly (1955)

Rotten Tomatoes®

97%

From Here to Eternity (1953)

Rotten Tomatoes®

89%

Mr. Hulot’s Holiday

A Christmas Carol

Rififi (1955)

Rotten Tomatoes®

93%

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

Roman Holiday (1953)

Old Yeller (1957)

Early Summer (1951)

Anatomy of a Murder (1959)

Rotten Tomatoes®

100%

Page 1 of 3

Categories: Cinema, Film, Hollywood, Movies, Social Justice, society, Writing Tags: 1950s Cinema, 1950s Films, Cinema, Film, Hollywood, Movies

Leonard Thiessen social justice triptych deserves wider audience

January 21, 2017 leoadambiga Leave a comment

There is a compelling social justice triptych by the late great Nebraska artist Leonard Thiessen that should be more widely seen. Every year around Black History Month I encourage folks to visit the worship space that houses the piece for the express purpose of taking in the powerful images and ideas expressed in the work. The piece is called “Crucifixion” and it can be found affixed to a wall just inside the sanctuary at Church of the Resurrection, a small but mighty Episcopal faith community at 3004 Belvedere Boulevard directly across the street from Miller Park and just northwest of 30th and Kansas. The blended congregation is a mix of African-Americans, Caucasians and Africans.

The Thiessen work is not like anything you’d expect to find there or in any worhsip place for that matter. “Crucifixon” juxtaposes jarring, disturbing scenes of lynching, gas attacks, warmaking, want, industrialization and propoganda with the crucified Christ. Passages drawn from scripture proffer warnings about sins against our fellow man and being led astray by false prophets. These abnomitions are leavened by promises of recknoning and salvation. Thiessen created the triptych many decades ago but it is still relevant today in its rumination on things that instill fear and conflict in the hearts and minds of human beings and that cause us to look to a redemptive Higher Power for mercy and justice.

The words that appear at the bottom of the panels read:

“In time of peace, men suffer from drouth and want. Fear not, for I am with thee. I will bring they seed from the Earth.”

“They are made with machines, slaves of other machines. Be strong, fear not, your God will come with recompense.”

“Other men incite them to persecution and destruction. Keep ye judgment and do justice for my salvation is near.”

“From all sides their faith is confused and confounded. Behold, I create new heavens and a new Earth and the former shall not be remembered.”

The artist created “Crucifixion” in memory of his aunt, Wilhemina Berg, who was a member of the former St. John’s Church before it merged with St. Philip”s to create Church of the Resurrection, The work is an example of Thiessen’s ability to employ and transform classical forms into modern interpretations. The piece is regarded as one of Thiessen’s most important.

In an interview shortly after his retirement, Thiessen said he had worked to “break down the idea that the arts were the prerogative of the elite. Nowadays the arts, like boating, skiing, tennis and wines, are all for the person in the street.”

Thiessen spoke four languages and was particularly known for his wit, often trying to slip puns past his editors at the Omaha World-Herald, for whom he was an art critic. Over the years, he taught at many area institutions, including Creighton, UNL and UNO.

He is classified as belonging to the period as the First Nebraskans, an era in Nebraska’s art history from 1901 to 1950 when the various forms of modernism were flourishing.

His vision and passion for the arts in Nebraska laid an influential foundation.

A good way to see the triptych and get a sense for the church where it’s displayed is to attend a service there. The 10 a.m. Sunday service is an intimate experience animated by the choir most Sundays and the guest band ReLeaseT the third Sunday of the month. On Feb. 26 come to Soul Food Sunday for some great eats. But whenever you come, make sure you see the triptych.

Link to the Church of the Resurrection website here:

http://coromaha.episcopal-ne.org/

Link here to a Museum of Nebraska Art page devoted to Thiessen:

https://mona.unk.edu/collection/thiessen.shtml

Here is an extended bio of the artist copied from the MONA page:

Leonard Thiessen was born and raised in Omaha, Nebraska. His family was small and his paternal ancestry had roots to the Swedish and German pioneer settlers of Grand Island, Nebraska. For a very short time, the family lived in Grand Island where, as a boy, Thiessen was employed in the mail department of The Grand Island Independent newspaper. His parents, Charles Leonard Thiessen and Jean Louise Berg Thiessen, together with his mother’s favorite sister Wilhemina, were all involved in various creative endeavors and had a profound influence on Leonard’s development. His father worked in the printing industry and introduced the young Leonard to the trade. Jean was a talented self-taught artist in her own right who produced on-edge felt mosaics that are fine examples of early 20th century fiber art. (MONA has seven pieces of her work in its collection.) The Thiessens were involved in Omaha’s music, dance, and theater groups and deeply connected to the neighborhood Episcopal Church. They were not wealthy but had many friends in the community and had an impressive social calendar.

Thiessen attended Omaha’s Miller Park Public School and St. John’s Protestant School and graduated from Central High School in 1919. His school years were privileged with experiences that helped to foster his development as an artist. While in high school, he decided to follow formal study in the visual arts and began to draw cartoons and illustrations for the school newspaper. During his teen years, he worked as an office assistant for an architectural firm in downtown Omaha, a job that offered a perk that proved helpful to his future employment. During his free time, Leonard would sit and read the collection of architectural books found in the office. After graduation he worked for the Omaha Bureau of Advertising and Engineering editing illustrations and photographs for an agricultural livestock catalog.

He attended the University of Omaha (now University of Nebraska at Omaha) for three semesters in 1921 and 1922 studying journalism and fine arts and producing illustrations and graphic layouts for the University newspaper The Gateway. During this time, he worked as a gallery assistant for the Art Institute of Omaha which was located on the top floor of the old public library building designed by Thomas Kimball. Thiessen became disillusioned with the University’s conservative art courses and left Omaha to continue his studies in the School of Fine Arts at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln from 1925 to 1926. He was not interested in “serious painting” and majored primarily in design and architecture. His professors were the artists Dwight Kirsch, Louise Mundy, Francis Martin (a contemporary of the portraitist J. Laurie Wallace), and Emily Burchard Moore. In the 1920s, Lincoln, Nebraska was an incredibly fervent environment. Some of Thiessen’s circle of friends and classmates included artists as well as writers and intellectuals among them Katherine “Kady” Faulkner, Louise Austin (who had studied in Munich with Hans Hoffman), Mari Sandoz, Weldon Kees, Loren Eiseley, and Dorothy Thomas. In the late 1920s, Thiessen pursued a highly successful commercial career as an interior designer and decorator with several design and architectural firms in Lincoln and Omaha. Additionally, he did freelance work and began to receive commissions as a mural painter. Later he studied at the museums of New York City, Boston, and Miami with his Aunt Wilhemina.

In 1929, while on a trip to Paris, Thiessen learned of the stock market crash in the United States and decided to stay in Europe. He enrolled at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris where he studied drawing and painting for one summer and later moved to London to study at the Heatherly School of Art. While in London, Thiessen studied wood engraving and graphics. In 1932, he applied and was accepted at the Swedish Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm and studied with Otto Skold who later became the director of the National Museum at Stockholm. At the Academy, Thiessen studied the classical manner, graphic arts, and the traditional forms of fresco and mural painting. He described himself as a “designer of interiors and mural painter in the Middle West, U.S.” Taking several short breaks in between his studies to return to the United States, he finally received his diploma in 1938. While in Sweden, Thiessen made a trip to Tallin, Estonia, to sketch the local architecture.

After returning to the United States in the late 1930s, he found that demand for interior decorators had fallen with the depression. He used his charm and talent to persuade the editors of the Omaha World-Herald and the Lincoln Journal Star to allow him to write an arts review column. He became the Omaha World-Herald’s first art critic and his now legendary column first appeared in 1939 and continued on and off for the next 30 years.

He had exhibitions at Morrill Hall, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, in 1938 and Omaha’s Joslyn Art Museum in 1940. He also resumed his friendships with artist Milton Wolsky and Alysen Flynn. Later he accepted a position in Des Moines as Iowa’s State Director of the Federal Artists and Writers Program of the Works Projects Administration in 1941. The program employed 300 people and Leonard supervised over 100 individuals in eight departments. Thiessen left Iowa in 1942 to join the Army and was officially promoted to the Office of Intelligence in 1944. Because of his training in architectural design and graphic arts, Thiessen was particularly suited for the position of draftsman in the intelligence department. He studied and made reports of pertinent visual data, maps, and serial photos during the war. He was stationed in Kettering, England, the place that would become the subject of many of his works on paper.

In the 1950s, Thiessen made another trip to London, returning to the United States to serve two years as director of the Herbert Memorial Institute of Art in Augusta, Georgia. In the 1960s, Thiessen took several other trips to Europe and returned to Nebraska where he immediately continued his involvement with the Omaha World-Herald, the Joslyn Art Museum and the Sheldon Museum of Art on the campus of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. By this time he was recognized as the authority on Nebraska’s developing art history and served as editor of the catalogue, Nebraska Art Today, by Mildred Goosman, curator at the Joslyn Art Museum published in 1967. He was instrumental in the establishment of the Nebraska Arts Council becoming its first Executive Secretary (a position now known as Executive Director) from 1966 to 1975. In addition, he taught classes at Isabella Threlkeld’s studio in Omaha for eight years. He became a close friend and professional colleague of the professors at Kearney State College (now University of Nebraska Kearney) and encouraged the establishment of the Nebraska Art Collection in the 1970s. He served on the board of the Museum of Nebraska Art for over ten years and was one of its founding members. In 1972 Thiessen received an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Creighton University and was honored with the first Governor’s Arts Award in 1978. His work can be found at Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha; Sheldon Museum of Art, Lincoln; Kansas Wesleyan University, Salina; the Alfred East Gallery, Kettering, England; the Herbert Memorial Institute of Art, Augusta, Georgia; and in many private collections

Thiessen lived in Omaha, Nebraska, for most of his adult life. He eventually converted two upstairs rooms of the now famous house on Stone Avenue for his studio. Artwork dominated both floors, much of it his own. Thiessen remained a bachelor his entire life, and had an amazing number of friends and colleagues from the various Nebraska arts communities. He was respected by many prominent Nebraska artists who honored him by making him the subject of their work including Kent Bellows, Bill Farmer, Larry Ferguson, Frances Kraft, Paul Otero, John Pusey, and John Thein.

Leonard Thiessen died March 27, 1989.

The Museum of Nebraska Arts holds 109 works by Leonard Thiessen in addition to archival material.

Researched and written by Josephine Martins, 2002

NOTE: Biographical information was derived from a variety of sources, including unpublished biographical notes by William Wallis, 2001, a recorded interview with Thiessen by Gary Zaruba, 1983 and compilations by COR member Keith Winton.

Categories: Art, Artists, Church of the Resurrection, Leonard Thiessen, North Omaha, Omaha, Race, Religion, Social Justice, War, Writing Tags: Art, Artist, Church of the Resurrection, Leonard Thiessen, Museum of Nebraska Art, North Omaha, Omaha, Social Justice

Older Entries

Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film

Check out my brand new Facebook page & Like it–
Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film
https://www.facebook.com/AlexanderPayneExpert/

The work-in-progress page is devoted to my acclaimed book about the Oscar-winning filmmaker and his work.

“This is without question the single best study of Alexander Payne’s films, as well as the filmmaker himself and his filmmaking process. In charting the first two decades of Payne’s remarkable career, Leo Adam Biga pieces together an indelible portrait of an independent American artist, and one that’s conveyed largely in the filmmaker’s own words. This is an invaluable contribution to film history and criticism – and a sheer pleasure to read as well.” –Thomas Schatz, Film scholar and author (The Genius of the System)

The book sells for $25.95.

Available through Barnes & Noble, on Amazon, for Kindle and at other bookstores and gift shops nationwide.

Purchase it at–https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MRORX1U?ref_=k4w_oembed_c1Anr6bJdAagnj&tag=kpembed-20&linkCode=kpd

You can also order signed copies by emailing the author at leo32158@cox.net.

Mini-Profile

leoadambiga

Author-journalist-blogger Leo Adam Biga resides in his hometown of Omaha, Nebraska. He writes newspaper-magazine stories about people, their passions, and their magnificent obsessions. He's the author of the books "Crossing Bridges: A Priest's Uplifting Life Among the Downtrodden," "Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film" (a compilation of his journalism about the acclaimed filmmaker) "Open Wide" a biography of Mark Manhart. Biga co-edited "Memories of the Jewish Midwest: Mom and Pop Grocery Stores." His popular blog, Leo Adam Biga's My Inside Stories at leoadambiga.com, is an online gallery of his work. The blog feeds into his Facebook page, My Inside Stories, as well as his Twitter, Google, LinkedIn, Tumblr, About.Me and other social media platform pages.