Mayor Ewing Sucks
Running a Roach Motel
Omaha Mayor John Ewing and his staff spend too much time paying attention to Facebook feelings instead of confronting reality.
First was the inclusion of DEI in the budget descriptions. This was a fine time to moderate, but instead, a guileless Council refused to do so. Ewing missed his first chance to unify Omaha.
Now, it is the encampments. The Mayor had again a chance to prove leadership. Who has the right to encamp on public land? No one, unless it is a camping site. When a proposal came forth to remove encampments off public land, Ewing actually told an audience he would veto it (https://www.wowt.com/2025/10/21/omaha-mayor-john-ewing-threatens-first-veto-over-homelessness-ordinance/).
Next, Ewing attempted to address the housing shortage by using “streetcar” funds for housing (https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2025/07/31/omaha-mayor-urges-single-largest-investment-in-affordable-housing-with-help-from-streetcar/). Yet, Metropolitan Utility District is still resisting the costs of doing the streetcar despite supposed prior agreements (https://mayors-office.cityofomaha.org/city-news/641-streetcar-funding-agreement-protects-m-u-d-customers). Other news outlets have noticed MUD is confronted with rising costs associated with the streetcar (https://www.herelosangeles.com/omaha-streetcar-project-disruptions/ and https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2024/06/18/price-jumps-for-modern-day-streetcar-project-in-nebraskas-largest-city/). Ewing should have directed funds to MUD to do the utility work required for the streetcar, but no dice there.
The Omaha sinkhole in downtown is still a problem. The City under Ewing still trying to address the problem (https://mayors-office.cityofomaha.org/city-news/755-city-provides-update-on-sinkhole). But apparently, the issue is not being addressed and Mayor Ewing’s administration is stressing out over the matter, as they blocked someone on Facebook and are now being sued over it (https://www.ketv.com/article/omaha-mayor-john-ewing-free-speech-sinkhole-lawsuit/69034160).
There is also the very slow pace of construction at the Crossroads dirt field. The project (https://valleycorp.com/project/the-crossroads/) is ambitious but they just filed their first building permit (https://growomaha.com/project/building-permit-issued-for-crossroads-project/)! I hope they will be working through the winter! Some say the project will be complete in 2028. That is a long time to wait. You would think Ewing would try to boost the development faster, but there is no sign of this.
For these reasons, Ewing is running a roach motel. The worst people come into Omaha to panhandle and get the welcome mat from Omaha residents, while everyone else gets pushed out. This is why families leave. Sad.
Too many cities have already gone this route. There is more than enough experience with these decisions to know their certain outcomes. At this point, the chaos is intentional.
This describes most large U.S. cities — they’re rotting into third-world hellholes under the same kind of ‘leadership’ as Ewing. These same people live behind gates with round-the-clock security, yet have the gall to tell the rest of us to sit down, shut up, and pay up. If, or rather when the socialist candidate is elected in NYC, that city will likely become the poster child for this decay — the model of how to ruin a city and a civilization while pretending to save it.