In way too many small Nebraska towns, there aren’t enough eyes watching the taxpayer cookie jar.
And, again and again, a trusted small town employee is reaching into it and grabbing those cookies.
Seventeen times in the past decade — 17 times! — a city clerk has stolen from a different Nebraska small town. And that’s just the clerks we know about, the ones who are getting caught. Others are surely getting away with it, since the state of Nebraska’s very permissive waiver system allows hundreds of small towns to skip doing a full financial audit every year.
New FFP fellow Addie Costello (who attends the University of Texas, but don’t hold that against her) with the story of what happens when a small town’s cookies go missing, and why it keeps happening over and over again.
The Kim Conundrum: Of those 17 towns who have had money stolen, I feel the crummiest for Pilger. You might remember that, eight years ago this week, Pilger was ripped apart by two deadly tornadoes. What you likely don’t remember is that, in the wake of that tornado, the longtime city clerk — the woman who had emerged as a hero of the recovery — was caught sending $700,000 of the town’s money to a bunch of suspicious places, much of it to a dude in Cambodia.
The residents of Pilger sure haven’t forgotten. Crack FFP reporter Natalia Alamdari went to town and waded into this story of small-town betrayal, and an enduring small-town mystery.
Scottsbluff, here we come: Wellllll, here FFP comes. I’m not gonna be there due to a prior engagement. But the rest of the full-time FFP staff — Exec director Matt Wynn, who thinks he deserves a Pulitzer for writing last week’s newsletter, and reporters Yanqi Xu and Natalia Alamdari — will be rolling into town on Tuesday. They will come ready to listen to residents’ hopes and dreams for their hometowns, and get some good story ideas. If you live in the area and wanna learn more, here’s a nice story the Scottsbluff Star-Herald did on our upcoming event.
Send us your shirt/tote/mug photos!: We’re doing a cool thing for the 4th of July this year, a celebration of our favorite amendment, the First Amendment. We would love your help. Send us a photo of yourself or your loved one or your pet wearing a Flatwater Free Press t-shirt, holding an FFP tote bag or drinking coffee or whiskey (but only after 5 p.m.) out of your FFP mug. And, if you are so moved, send us a sentence on why you support journalism!
You can email ‘em to us at [email protected] or simply by hitting reply to this here newsletter. Thank you for your help in celebrating Independence Day the Flatwater Free Press way.
Oh, and if you don’t have any FFP swag yet…clicky click click.
See you next week,
—Matthew Hansen, Executive Editor
Here’s what we’re into this week: News from around Nebraska
Every week we like to share great Nebraska journalism, no matter who made it. Here’s what caught our eye this week:
- Sobering story out of Lincoln. The Journal Star’s Zach Hammack reports that 1 in 6 Lincoln public school students are now “chronically absent” from school. Excused absences from school, unexcused absences and tardiness are way up.
- The chances went way up this week that Nebraska voters will vote this year on whether to allow medical marijuana. KETV Channel 7’s David Earl explains.
- One more story from Lincoln, as it was a busy news week in that city. What is a Fairness Ordinance, and why did the Lincoln City Council abandon an attempt to make one happen in the Star City? Read or listen as Nebraska Public Media’s Jackie Ourada interviews people on both sides of the debate.
