Nebraska’s workforce challenges will be among several topics on the agenda for OpenSky Policy Institute’s 2023 Fall Policy Symposium, your opportunity to gather with Nebraska’s key thinkers and policy leaders to discuss major policy issues before the next legislative session.
Registration is now open for the Symposium to be held Tuesday, Oct. 24, from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Nebraska Innovation Campus, 2021 Transformation Drive in Lincoln. Check-in starts at 8 a.m.
Tickets are $25 (free for senators, legislative staff and the media), and scholarships are available.
This year’s symposium will feature a keynote presentation by Professor Timothy Nelson of Princeton University from his new book, “The Injustice of Place: Uncovering the Legacy of Poverty in America,” with groundbreaking research showing the concentration of deep poverty in specific rural areas with complex histories of resource extraction. In this research, Nebraska and the Upper Midwest emerge as regions of opportunity for children and families to advance out of poverty and into the middle class.
Nelson will discuss why counties in the Upper Midwest have less poverty, longer life expectancies and greater chances for children, and how Nebraska can continue to offer “the good life” to everyone, with concrete policy recommendations emerging from this in-depth investigation into poverty and advantage across the U.S.
As a special offer, the first 100 people who register will receive a free copy of Nelson’s new book.
The symposium will also feature panel discussions on:
- Nebraska land valuation practices and ways to balance the property tax base across agricultural, commercial and residential property owners to ensure sustainable and equitable revenues for local governments.
- The efficiency of fines and fees as a revenue source for local governments, who pays them and how tax policy decisions factor in.
- A data-based overview of demographic and economic trends driving Nebraska’s workforce challenges and solutions that can enable new Americans to participate more fully in growing the state’s economy.
Contact Luke Sutton at lsutton@openskypolicy.org or 402-438-0382 for more information about the symposium including information about scholarships.