Several factors help bring down jail bond vote

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BY JEAN ORTIZ / Lincoln Journal Star

Barbara van den Berg wasn’t confused, but she can understand how that could happen.

Wording on bond issues can be difficult to decipher, said the Lincoln woman who deliberately voted no on Lancaster County’s request to issue up to $65 million in bonds to pay for a new jail. The bonds would have been repaid over 26 years.

Her reasons were varied, but among them was her hope the vote would send a message to county commissioners.

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“Maybe this is just a strong way of saying we don’t want this,” she said.

Van den Berg was among the nearly 54 percent of voters in Tuesday’s primary to reject the measure, according to unofficial results.

But the results will not halt plans to build a 664-bed jail at Southwest 40th and West O streets, say county commissioners who are keeping to pre-election promises of moving ahead. It may mean higher interest rates and a shorter repayment period, they have said.

That’s fine by van den Berg, who doesn’t want to burden future generations with the expense, which she believes is unwarranted anyhow.

“The only way people understand how ludicrous and ridiculous this is if it comes out of their pockets now,” she said.

On Wednesday, community members and members of the Lancaster County Board of Commissioners alike pointed to confusion and voters who don’t like the plans for a new jail among the likely reasons the bond issue failed.

Commissioners decided long ago a new jail was a certainty, but they haven’t decided how to pay for it. They imposed a $65 million cap and sought approval Tuesday to finance bond repayment over 26 years, believing it gave property taxpayers the best scenario.

A new jail is going to get financed anyway, so it might as well be under the best terms, said J.P. Caruso, a history and political science teacher at Lincoln High School, who said he voted in favor of the bonds.

“It didn’t strike me as unreasonable,” he said.

Primary elections typically draw the most educated voters, so it’s surprising if people were confused, he said.

He pointed to the lack of a campaign as a leading factor in the defeat, but said the sluggish economy probably didn’t help.

Commissioners said state law prohibited them from campaigning, although they were able to meet with community groups to explain the ballot question and the consequences.

Still, confusion likely played a role, said Kyle Fischer, the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce’s public policy specialist.

“There were voters out there who really believed they were voting against the jail,” he said.

The chamber, which last week made its support of the bond issue public, tried to reach its members with not only its opinion but an explanation of what the county was asking, Fischer said.

“Like every organization we don’t control our members,” he said. “We gave them that information and let them make up their mind.”

The Lincoln Independent Business Association also reached out to its members, said Coby Mach, the group’s executive director.

In Mach’s opinion, county commissioners did a pretty good job of getting the message out, but it looks like it didn’t reach enough people. He wonders if more time would have changed the outcome.

County Board Chairman Bob Workman, who led the effort in February to put the issue on the ballot, doesn’t think so.

If he had his druthers, he’d put it on the ballot again, though. He’s heard of other counties that have done that and won approval.

But the Lancaster County Board can’t afford to wait because construction is set for early next year.

Workman said he recognized that some constituents were trying to send a message with their vote on Tuesday, but that doesn’t lessen the board’s responsibility to provide an adequate jail.

Maybe voters might consider sending their messages to the state, which deemed the county’s jail insufficient, or to the judicial system that makes the decisions about who goes to jail and for how long, he said.

Now, the County Board is left to decide how it wants to pay for the jail, with options including issuing 10-year bonds or financing it through a long-term lease with the Public Building Commission. Workman said he can only promise the board will attempt to secure the most favorable rates for taxpayers.

With commissioners expecting to move swiftly, business leaders like Fischer and Mach plan to keep tabs with a goal of holding property tax increases in check.

“Our goal is that the financing plan is advantageous to citizens of Lancaster County, and that is the County Board’s task now,” said Fischer.

Reach Jean Ortiz at 473-7107 or jortiz@journalstar.com.