Should Seng run again?
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By DEENA WINTER / Lincoln Journal Star
It’s a few minutes before 8 in the morning, and the doors to KLIN are locked, so the mayor waits in the rain, sitting alone in her silver Blazer.
In front of her, workers are tearing apart the city’s main drag so it can be widened, as she directed.
Mayor Coleen Seng is here for a monthly radio show with host Dwight Lane, who calls himself a lovable right-wing wacko. Seng calls herself a progressive centrist.
Over the next hour, between ubiquitous commercials, they’ll talk city issues and take calls.
The right-wingers are lighting up the phone lines today, Lane warns the mayor.
She smiles. “That’s OK.”
Her staffers may shield her from nasty e-mails, but she’s learned from 16 years on the City Council and three as mayor to deal with tough crowds and angry callers.
She has notes in front of her and her chief of staff to her left, but when the calls come in she’s on her own.
Russ, Tony, Don, John and John all challenge her proposal to ban concealed weapons in Lincoln.
Tim asks why she hasn’t fired her fire chief for not living up to promises made when his department took over the city’s ambulance service.
Terry wants to talk about Wal-Mart, which Seng prevented from building a supercenter in northeast Lincoln.
She firmly defends her positions but is respectful, saying, “thank you for your comments,” or “I understand your point of view.”
During a late break, Lane decides to stop taking calls and let Seng talk about the city budget. He is apologetic about his callers’ feistiness.
“Why are people so surly?” he wonders out loud.
But callers to Lane’s conservative talk show aren’t the only people questioning Seng’s performance as mayor.
Dissension in the ranks
While much of the state’s attention is on the upcoming primary election, a political battle is brewing in Lincoln: a debate among Democrats over whether Seng should run for another term next year.
Some want her to step aside for someone they think has a better chance of winning — namely Sen. Chris Beutler, who will leave the Legislature in January because of term limits.
Why would Democrats want the incumbent mayor of the state’s second-largest city to step aside?
They don’t think she can win a second term.
A recent campaign spending report indicates Seng spent $13,125 on polling late last year. Sources familiar with the September poll say the results indicated she wouldn’t fare well in a matchup with City Councilman Ken Svoboda, who plans to run for mayor.
One source, who did not want to be identified, said they polled a Seng-Svoboda matchup and a Beutler-Svoboda matchup. The source said Svoboda clobbered Seng in the polling but would not comment on the results of the Beutler-Svoboda matchup. People also were surveyed on a hypothetical Seng-Beutler race. The source declined to talk about the result of that pairing.
The poll put Seng’s job approval rating at 41 percent. That means of those polled, 41 percent said they thought she was doing an “excellent or good” job and 58 percent said she was doing a “fair or poor” job. Only 2 percent were undecided.
Those kinds of numbers are not good, but not insurmountable, political consultant Phil Young said.
“Anything below 50 is considered to be a problem,” he said, “however, this kind of number can change rapidly depending on the activity surrounding the office, especially when it’s an executive position like mayor, governor, president.”
But an officeholder with a job approval rating of 41 percent mid-term has work to do, and if they’re not willing to do that work, “that’s what they call a one-termer,” Young said.
The mayor doesn’t appear ready to throw in the towel.
“I don’t know that there’s any reason I shouldn’t run,” she said last week.
Seng wouldn’t comment on Beutler’s interest in her job. But he did.
“I am interested,” the longtime Lincoln senator said. “I’m exploring it very seriously.”
Beutler said he has discussed the possibility of running with Seng from time to time, including recently.
Asked how her decision will affect his, it was Beutler’s turn to decline comment.
Other Democrats make similarly awkward comments when interviewed about Seng. Ask whether she should run for re-election and long pauses ensue. Words are chosen carefully. If at all.
Some think she listens too much, solicits too much input and takes too long to make a decision. City Councilman Dan Marvin, however, sees her listening skills as a strength.
“I think in a democracy, you kinda have to listen to people,” he said. “Dictatorships, you don’t.”
Several prominent local Democrats were reluctant to discuss Seng’s job performance, and three would talk only off the record for fear of repercussions for criticizing a fellow Democrat.
None of the four Democrats on the City Council offered an unqualified endorsement of her performance. None said she should run again; they said it’s up to her.
Councilman Jonathan Cook said he and Seng have had a good working relationship on issues that are important to him.
“I don’t know that I can go beyond that,” said Cook, who has been mentioned as a possible mayoral candidate but says it’s too early to discuss. “I try to focus on the things I’m trying to do for my constituents rather than judging how the mayor is doing.”
The election is a year away, but decisions are being made now so candidates can begin raising money and rousing supporters. The campaign could cost $150,000 to $350,000.
If both Seng and Beutler decide to run, the Democratic Party likely would remain neutral, Lancaster County Chairman Kevin Bernadt said.
He credits Seng with helping create jobs, protecting the city’s core and floating visionary ideas like a new arena and downtown high-rise.
“She’s just a fantastic woman,” he said.
Normally, the party would support the incumbent’s re-election, he said, “but we all love and adore Senator Beutler. He would be just a tremendous mayor.”
“They both have been heavy-hitters within the Democratic Party for years,” he said. “It might be healthy for the party and city to have choices.”
Bernadt has heard talk that Seng should bow out gracefully. He attributes some of that to her nontraditional leadership style but also to age and gender bias. Seng turned 70 this year.
“I think people have this perverted idea (that a mayor has to be a) strong white man in a suit,” he said. “As a guy with a young daughter, I think we need to break those barriers.”
Republicans, meanwhile, are just enjoying the show.
“We’ll let them settle their own internal squabbles,” said Mark Fahleson, county GOP chairman. “It doesn’t really matter because I think the next mayor will be a Republican.”
What’s up with Wesely?
A little more than three years ago, then-Mayor Don Wesely summoned longtime political ally Seng to tell her he wouldn’t run for a second term as mayor and ask if she’d be interested.
Today, he shows up for an interview to talk about Mayor Seng’s tenure with five pages of fact sheets and highlights of his own four years in office, including approval of the Antelope Valley Project, securing federal money to begin south and east beltways, building Haymarket Park and adopting impact fees.
Wesely launches into a lecture about the types of leaders described by James Barber in his book, “Presidential Character.” “Active positive,” a leader motivated by accomplishments and influenced less by public opinion, describes him and former Mayor Helen Boosalis, he says.
“Passive positive,” a leader who is more reactive and interested in pleasing people, Wesely says, describes Seng and former Mayor Mike Johanns.
Neither is necessarily better, he says. It depends upon what the electorate wants.
Wesely says he’s not interested in being mayor again; he’s just trying to provide a little history.
In his view, the city was ready for an activist mayor when he arrived on the scene. By the end of his term, Lincoln was ready to slow down and catch its breath, he says, and Seng has given it a chance to do that.
He avoids discussing what he thinks of the job she is doing, suggesting it’s bad form for politicians to criticize their successors.
Seng is “consensus-driven,” he says, but contentious issues don’t always lend themselves to consensus. At some point, Wesely says, the mayor must make a decision.
“I think she’s starting to feel more comfortable in the role as mayor. She was more hesitant to lead at first.”
Behind the scenes
After four quick meetings with staffers about concealed weapons, a civic plaza, pesky bugs in the Capitol Beach area and ambulance reform, Seng has a few minutes to herself.
The midges were last on the agenda, and she carries a map charting complaints about the buggers to a double-door closet near her desk that houses shelves and shelves of thick files labeled with everything from Antelope Valley to Stevens Creek.
She has two Antelope Valley files, No. 8 and 9 — each 4 or 5 inches thick — in the oversized filing cabinet. She keeps the others at home.
She’s been working on that public works project for a long time, and the fruit of her labor is finally becoming visible to the average Lincoln resident.
She files the midge map under health.
“When someone with the city can’t find something, they come to me,” she says.
She has about 15 minutes before her next appointment, so she digs into the never-ending pile of reading material.
“Everyone always mails everything to the mayor,” she says, smiling.
She has a long list of things to mail herself: a birthday card for her former public works director, a card to a woman recently diagnosed with cancer, thank-you cards to lawmakers.
Some things get tossed and others handed off, but one particular document gets careful inspection: Seng reads the City Council packet three times every week.
The 16-year council veteran can’t seem to get it out of her blood. She watches the City Council meetings every Monday on a TV in her office while doing paperwork.
“I figure I ought to,” she says.
When her late husband, Darrel, was a planning commissioner, they would drive by sites on the commission’s agenda on Sundays.
Even though she’s lived in Lincoln for more than 40 years, Seng still sometimes drives to the scenes of controversial projects. And when public works has an informational meeting on a project, she’s there.
Her staffers say she puts in longer hours than they do, often working from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. and attending more events or working in the office on weekends. She seems to thrive on the constant stream of ribbon-cuttings, groundbreakings and speeches.
“I thoroughly enjoy it,” she says. “I just love it.”
An only child, she learned about community service from her parents while growing up in Fremont. Her dad was a welder and her mom was always organizing something.
“You’d never quit working,” she says. “You just always worked.”
When she ran for mayor, jobs were her top priority. She says she’s delivered, citing state labor statistics that show the city has gained more than 2,000 jobs over the past year. She did it, she says, by using tax increment financing more aggressively than ever in Lincoln’s history. She hopes to add more jobs with the help of an 800-acre industrial park created in northwest Lincoln.
She’s also proud that Lincoln was able to secure $1.1 million in extra street construction money from the Legislature this year.
A new trunk sewer system will open up the 52-square-mile Stevens Creek basin east of Lincoln for development.
And something is finally being done about a thorn in Lincoln’s side: the corner at 48th and O streets soon will be teeming with new businesses.
‘I always figure everybody deserves to have the mayor come’
This afternoon, Seng’s scheduler, Debbie Engstrom, squeezes in a meeting shortly before 4 to go over the following day’s agenda.
There’s a Habitat for Humanity event, a graduation, and the Kiwanis want her to talk about concealed weapons.
“Who’s gonna write that?” she asks.
“Diane or Rick,” Engstrom responds, referring to two staffers.
On the horizon: a Danish Sisterhood event that seems to interest Seng, but it’s the same day as the Mayor’s Run and a parade in Bethany.
“It’ll be a changing-the-clothes (day),” Seng says.
The day before, a Sunday, she changed clothes four times as she went from church to a sporting event to a formal event and back home.
She tries to attend every event to which she’s invited.
“I always figure everybody deserves to have the mayor come to their event,” she explains.
It’s part of her leadership philosophy. “Servant leadership,” she says, means bringing people together for a common purpose, trying to do what’s right, trying not to put self-interest first.
Serving as mayor is just another way to serve the community — to take care of it, in her words.
Almost universally, she is described as a consensus-builder.
“It’s not the commander type of leader,” she says. “I believe it takes more skill to work in consensus-building.”
Even Seng admits it is both her strength and weakness. Some people don’t understand what it is to be a servant leader, she says.
Former Mayor Boosalis may not call it servant leadership, but she knows the importance of reaching out to people.
“People need to feel that they’re part of government,” says Boosalis, 86, who was Lincoln’s mayor from 1975 to 1983. Like Seng, she put in 16 years on the City Council first. And like Seng, she was active in neighborhood groups.
Seng and her late husband helped convince Boosalis to run for mayor. Seng worked on all Boosalis’ campaigns and counts her as a role model.
Boosalis thinks Seng is doing a good job, that she has vision, knows the issues and has the courage to take unpopular stances.
Few would argue about Seng’s integrity. Even the man who wants her job, Svoboda, says she has the highest moral standards and is a good role model for women wanting to go into politics.
“She’s a very strong spiritual woman — something I put a great deal of value in,” he says. “Had I gotten to know her quite some time ago, I would consider her a good friend.”
But city employees sometimes talk to him about their difficulty getting through aides to discuss issues with the mayor. And, he says, Seng doesn’t always make her vision and priorities clear to the council and city employees.
“I don’t know that being a strong council member is always a prerequisite for being a good leader,” Svoboda says.
Former mayors like Wesely left no doubt where they stood and would lobby the council when necessary, he says.
Sometimes even Seng’s staff is surprised to learn she’s opposed to a given project. Exhibit A: Seng’s planning department worked with a developer to put a Wal-Mart Supercenter in northeast Lincoln only to have her threaten a veto right before it went before the council.
Corrie Kielty was an aide to Wesely and then Seng until she left the mayor’s office in March 2005. Kielty, who is now married to Wesely, says he was a micromanager and perfectionist while Seng delegates more and allows people to do the jobs in which they have expertise.
Mark Bowen has served as chief of staff for both, and while Seng has given him much more authority over her staff and cabinet than
Wesely did, Kielty says. nobody should think he’s pulling the strings in the Seng administration.
Says Kielty: “She makes policy decisions.”
Seng isn’t a slick politician and isn’t inclined to listen to political handlers who might want her to wear more makeup or change her hairstyle, Kielty says. She is who she is.
And she has served exactly as the kind of mayor she promised to be: a consensus-builder.
“I will always be a fan of Coleen,” Kielty says. “She has dedicated herself to public service. How could you not admire that?”
However, some say her determination to do what she thinks is right, even in the face of opposition, is the same force driving her to ignore her poll numbers and forge on.
Learning from the past
As Seng leaves the radio station after an hour of calls from surly listeners, she steers clear of a gouge in the curb.
Last June, she stumbled over the same spot and broke her arm.
She won’t make that mistake again.
Reach Deena Winter at 473-2642 or dwinter@journalstar.com.
Coleen Seng
Born: Feb. 8, 1936, Council Bluffs, Iowa.
Childhood: In Fremont, where her parents owned a welding, machine shop and repair business.
Education: Nebraska Wesleyan University, where she was First Student Head Resident and graduated in 1958 with Bachelor of Arts degrees in political science and sociology.
Girl Scouts: Became a Brownie in 1942; worked for Girl Scouts in Saginaw, Mich., 1958-1960, and in LIncoln, 1961-1962. Past president of Homestead Girl Scout Council and continues to be involved in Girl Scout fund-raising activities.
Career: Director of community ministries, First United Methodist Church in Lincoln, 1977-1997.
Public service: Lincoln City Council representing northeast district, 1987-2003; mayor, May 6, 2003-present.
Family: Three children, three grandchildren; husband Darrel died in 1993.
Source: Mayor’s Web site
Accomplishments
* Created 800-acre industrial park near Interstate 80 and Northwest 48th Street.
* Fought for street construction money state motor vehicle tax. Lincoln is expected to receive about $1.1 million in new money.
* Construction on Stevens Creek trunk sewer line, opening up 52-square-mile basin east of Lincoln to development.
* The most aggressive use of tax-increment financing in city’s history.
* A gain of more than 2,000 jobs over last year, according to state labor records.
* Implemented 17 changes recommended by a consultant who examined the city’s planning and permitting process. More are in the pipeline.
* First presidential earmark for Antelope Valley funds.
Failures
* Proposal to sell K Street power plant building to developers to convert to condos fizzled out, but she’s still hoping the idea’s time will come.
* Proposal to clear a downtown block of four businesses and sell it to hotel developer John Q. Hammons fizzled out, too, but the city continues to work to find alternative locations near the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Quotes
“I thoroughly enjoy it. I just love it.” — Coleen Seng, on being mayor
“I’ve never gotten the sense from Coleen that she is lobbying me on an issue. I’ve never felt pressured, not that I want pressure, but there’s times when I just would like to know what position she’s going to take on an issue.” — City Councilman Ken Svoboda, who plans to run for mayor next year
“On the issues important to me, we’ve had a good working relationship ... I don’t know that I can go beyond that. I try to focus on the things I’m trying to do for my constituents rather than judging how the mayor is doing.” — Councilman Jonathan Cook, Democrat
“She’s been around the block and she’s seen what works and what doesn’t work.” — Councilwoman Patte Newman, Democrat
“I’ve worked with 60 to 70 candidates and she’s the most centered. Coleen Seng knows who she is and what she is and never wavers from that.” — former political consultant Rick Hoppe, now an aide to Seng
“There are people who want the job and there are people who love the city. I think she’s completely dedicated and loyal to Lincoln.” — Councilwoman Robin Eschliman, Republican
“Typically the more candidates you have, the healthier the party but I think it’s a reflection, in this case ... (that) not a lot of people are real pleased with the way it’s gone.” — Jessica Moenning, executive director of the Nebraska Republican Party
“The mayor’s never called me in an yelled at me... Wesely had a temper. He was more emotional.” — Councilwoman Annette McRoy, Democrat
“She’s just a fantastic woman.” — Kevin Bernadt, chairman, Lancaster County Democratic Party
“We all love and adore Senator Beutler.” — Kevin Bernadt, chairman, Lancaster County Democratic Party
“I think she’s starting to feel more confident in the role as mayor. She was more hesitant to lead at first.” — Former Mayor Don Wesely
“She’s the same in private as in public.” — Seng aide Ann Harrell
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