Midlands Business Journal November 15, 2019 Vol. 45 No. 46 issue

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Lincoln Business Journal — inside NOVEMBER 15, 2019

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VOL. 45 NO. 46

Reinke plant to rollout upgraded systems for global market

by Richard D. Brown

9 Pups Dog Food serves up safe, healthy dog food in metro. – Page 2

e rat rpo rity o C ecu S

Authentication beyond passwords is needed to secure company information.

– Page 3

Nebraska-based Reinke Manufacturing, a 65-year-old family-owned manufacturer of center pivot and lateral move irrigation equipment, is readying the roll-out of two new patent-pending irrigation systems that President/CEO Chris Roth said will further solidify his firm’s position as the world’s largest privately-held provider of such technology.

“Our primary product is a huge part of the global solution,” Roth said, citing a United Nations project that said the world’s population will increase from 7 billion to 9 billion over the next 30 years and that food production will need to be upped by 70%.

“The emphasis is going to be on producing more food, on less land and using less water in doing so,” he added.

Roth, a business and accounting graduate of University of Nebraska-Lincoln who has led Reinke for a decade, said sales increased by about 10% in the fiscal year ending Continued on page 7.

President and CEO Chris Roth … Patent-pending irrigation systems help solidify standing in global market. (photo courtesy of Reinke)

HTI secures growth with improved automation, new sales approach

by Michelle Leach

Partnering with investors boosts startups.

– Page 25

HTI Plastics may employ around 25 fewer people than it did 20 years ago, but the manufacturer has tripled its output during that time, and from its expanded technology- and technical talent-rich Lincoln facility.

“A lot of companies over the last 10 years, with low unemployment, have struggled to make sure they’re giving employees the best

tools to make them the most productive and to be able to maintain them,” said President Troy Just.

“We’ve put in a conscious effort of truly training and developing employees, making sure they have more internal opportunities to where we’re promoting from within and not having to go outside to find the resources … Because of our training and Continued on page 10.

At MBJ’s 18th Annual 40 Under 40 Awards … From left, Young Entrepreneur of the Year Colin Nabity, founder and CEO of LeverageRX, and Woman of Distinction Cella Quinn.

18th annual 40 Under 40 Awards event showcases women, honors MBJ founder

by Tiffany Brazda

President Troy Just … Recent expansion and remodel project reflect investments in training to retain technical talent, gain efficiencies and boost productivity.

While in its 18th year, 40 Under 40 hit a new milestone, tipping the scale to honoring 31 women among those 40.

The luncheon took place Nov. 8 at Embassy Suites Omaha-La Vista with a crowd nearing 600.

Top awards went to Colin Nabity, founder and CEO of LeverageRX and Breeze, who

received the Young Entrepreneur of the Year award and Cella Quinn, who was named Woman of Distinction.

Unique to this year, Midlands Business Journal honored late founder Bob Hoig with a video presentation featuring Greater Omaha business leaders sharing memories of Hoig and his impact on the business Continued on page 8.

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

9 Pups Dog Food serves up safe, healthy dog food in metro

by Gabby Christensen

With more than 25 years of culinary experience under his belt, dog lover and national executive chef Dan Benigno set out to establish 9 Pups Dog Food in 2018 as a way to utilize his expertise to provide safe and healthy meal options for pups.

9 Pups Dog Food Phone: 720-318-4542 Email: 9pupsdogfood@gmail.com Founded: 2018 Service: dog food made using 100% human grade consumable ingredients to provide safe and healthy options for canines Employees: 1 Goal: to establish monthly subscription box and become available in local stores Facebook: https://www.facebook. com/9pupsdogfood/ Website: http://www.9pupsdogfood.com

After conducting extensive research and speaking with various nutritionists, he started blending dog food for his own dog and a few years later, he realized there was a strong demand for alternative dog food in the area,

Owner Dan Benigno … Specializing in gourmet dog food niche with human grade ingredients.

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Esther Carrillo Executive Coordinator, Women’s Center for Advancement Hometown: Plains, Kansas. Education: I earned my AA in Business and I am currently working on my Bachelors in Multidisciplinary Studies at University of Nebraska at Omaha.

which prompted the business.

He said the dog food is made with all-natural ingredients and does not include byproducts, gluten, soy or corn.

There are various flavor profiles, including Indian Samosa, Asian stir-fry, and Italian herb, which each include special ingredients that assist with relieving a variety of different ailments, such as autoimmune disorders, dental hygiene, digestion and anxiety.

As a starting point, Benigno said all meals include brown rice and quinoa as well as a variety of fruits, vegetables, seeds, coconut oil and local honey.

Blends also differ depending on the season.

Currently, a Thanksgiving blend is available, which incorporates turkey, sweet potatoes, green beans, cranberries and pumpkin.

He also creates custom blends for those who inquire.

For Benigno, food safety is paramount.

“I adhere to restaurant food safety standards for humans and apply these to my dog food,” he said. “This reduces the risk of any recalls, while also helping dogs with severe digestion issues.”

According to Benigno, many people are realizing the importance of knowing what goes into their dog’s food, especially in light of recent recalls.

“I would hate to lose my best friend because of something I gave him for dinner,” he said. “Knowing what you put into your pet’s food and knowing exactly what the ingredients are helps pet owners be more responsible caregivers.”

While marketing has proved to be a more difficult aspect of business ownership, Benigno said he’s worked to grow the company’s presence through the use of social media and Continued on page 10.

Midlands Business Journal Established in 1975

Founded by Robert Hoig

How I got into the business: After working in medical billing, I wanted to be part of an organization that was improving our community. That is when I joined the team at the WCA. Accomplishments or milestones: The WCA supported me in my goal to obtain my high school diploma. Since then I have received my Associates in Business and am currently working on completing my Bachelors in Multidisciplinary Studies with a primary concentration in Nonprofit Administration and secondary concentrations in Political Science and Business.

First job: Burger King.

Biggest career break: My biggest break was joining the WCA team!

The toughest part of the job: Our en-

tire team is passionate about our work and providing the best innovative services for our clients, which while invigorating, frequently means our individual team members stretch themselves to cover all aspects of our programs. Our work is rewarding, but tiring.

The best advice I have received: Invest in your education.

About my family: My partner, David, our son, Jahaziel (9), and our three dogs: Reba, Rain, and Rajah.

Something else I’d like to accomplish: My Master’s degree in Organizational Leadership and completing Dave Ramsey’s Baby Steps!

Book I finished reading recently: “Crucial Conversations” – a game changer for me.

How my business will change in the next decade: As we look into our future at the WCA, we know that technology will be a game changer. Our clients face countless barriers to seeking services and even though we’ve broken down several of those barriers already, I believe technology will help us continue to break down more barriers for survivors.

Mentor who has helped the most in my career: Amy Richardson, the President

& CEO of the WCA has been a dedicated mentor to me as I continue in my career. The most impactful way she has supported me was encouraging me to get my education and to be the best version of myself.

Outside interests: I foster dogs for Little White Dog Rescue (LWDR), Nebraska Humane Society (NHS), and volunteer to coach and serve on the board of Ralston Youth Sports and Papillion Rec. Pet peeves: In my practice of mindfulness and kindness for others, and myself I choose not to say I have pet peeves. However, I do avoid rush hour traffic.

Favorite vacation spot: Mexico, my second home.

Other careers I would like to try: I am very happy where I am, but I am also interested in: real estate development & project management, event planning, risk management, moving to a farm to start my own rescue. The possibilities are endless.

Favorite cause or charity: Ending violence against women (WCA), Animal rescue (LWDR & NHS), and Immigration reform (Omaha Area Sanctuary Network).

Favorite app: A meditation app, Insight Timer.

Interested in being featured in the Business Minute? Email news@mbj.com for more information.

ADMINISTRATION VP OF OPERATIONS, Andrea “Andee” Hoig

EDITORIAL EDITOR & VICE PRESIDENT OF NEWS, Tiffany Brazda EDITORIAL ASSISTANT, Savannah Behrends STAFF WRITER, Becky McCarville

ADVERTISING ADVERTISING CONSULTANT, Julie Whitehead OFFICE OFFICE ASSISTANT, Rosemary Gregurich BOOKKEEPING/LEGAL NOTICES, Beth Grube

(402) 330-1760 Zane D. Randall (1925-2006) Co-founder LeAnne M. Iwan (1932-1986) First News Editor

The Midlands Business Journal (ISSN 0194-4525) is published weekly plus one by MBJ Inc. and is available for $2.00 per individual copy or $75 per year. Editorial offices are 1324 S. 119th St., Omaha, NE 68144. Periodical postage paid at Omaha NE POSTMASTER; Send address changes to Midlands Business Journal, 1324 S. 119th St., Omaha, NE 68144. All submissions to the Midlands Business Journal become the property of the Midlands Business Journal and will not be returned.

Written permission must be obtained from Midlands Business Journal and MBJ, Inc., to post any of our stories or other published materials on a website. Under no circumstances, because of spamming potential and other issues, will permission be granted to transmit our stories by email.

-The Publisher.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

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Corporate Security A section prepared by the staff of the Midlands Business Journal

November 15, 2019

Authentication beyond passwords is needed to secure company information

by Gabby Christensen

Passwords are no longer enough to protect critical company information, experts say.

As security breaches remain on the rise, Chris Vilim, president of CoreTech, said the most common method of expanding security and access to data is two-factor authentication or multi-factor authentication.

“The biggest changes and advancements in MFA have been the type of tokens you can use as a second identifying factor,” Vilim said. “Instead of having a key-fob generate a new code LaMagna-Reiter to type each time you log in, the standard now tends to be using an app on your cell phone where you can approve or deny access to a system with one touch on a push-notification.”

Additionally, he said there are now fingerprint readers, retina scans, or small USB drives that you can plug into a computer.

“Biometric tokens can be used as an additional form of identification in MFA,” Vilim said. “However, singularly using Apple’s Face ID or Microsoft’s facial recognition features simply makes it easier for the user to log-in.”

Vilim said even long passwords are becoming less secure, so using a password in addition to another key makes a system or application much more secure and more difficult to gain unauthorized access to.

“It’s important to keep in mind that breaches can happen to anyone in any business,” he said.

Robert LaMagna-Reiter, chief information security officer at First National Technology Solutions, said a multi-factor authentication is highly recommended by FNTS. LaMagna-Reiter said newer methods, such as contextual authentication, have also gained momentum.

“Think of contextual authentication being how you do something, like typing in your password,” he said. “Think firmness, pauses, amount of average mistakes, typing speed, the way you provide an answer and your tone when responding to questions.”

According to LaMagna-Reiter, there has been an upward trend in utilizing SMS messages as a second factor; however, SMS-based MFA is one of the most insecure methods.

He said security measures are not sometimes necessary, they’re always necessary.

“Passwords alone are not enough for systems that protect sensitive information,”

Chris Vilim, president at CoreTech.

LaMagna-Reiter said. “MFA is affordable, high and critical sensitive data.” simple to implement and easy to use. In several Tyler Fiene, director of operations at Dice instances, regulations or compliance require- Communications, said all company information ments mandate that MFA be used. At FNTS, is important to each company, but some inforwe recommend that at a minimum, it should be mation is much more important than others. used for all administrative access to systems, as “A company’s loss of trade secrets, their well as access to systems that contain medium, ‘secret sauce,’ can mean the end of a company’s

existence,” Fiene said. “So, it’s wise for all companies to understand the value of their data, and take appropriate steps to protect it.”

Fiene said the more critical the information is, the more in-depth the authentication needs to be to protect it.

“Pre-shared keys or passwords are the most basic and easy to implement, but also the least secure,” he said.

“Implementing stronger authentication, like two-factor, biometric and transaction level authentication, can improve your security but also require more time Fiene and money to implement and manage.”

On the high end, Fiene said network access control (NAC) systems can be incredibly granular in security.

“Think of it like this, you can restrict access to critical information from a single person, from a single computer or device, from a single location, at a single point in time, for a specific purpose,” Fiene said. “Companies that don’t protect their critical data are subject to legal action, loss of revenue, bad publicity and fines.”

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal • Corporate Security

Firms offer data protection, education opportunities on security threats

by Michelle Leach

Securing assets is every business’s business, to outsmart varied threats with evolving technologies and policies.

“Many of the trends that are old are still new,” said Metropolitan Community College Cybersecurity Instructor Gary Sparks.

“Phishing is still 91% of the time the first attack leading to a breach. Businesses who have a relationship with businesses in the European Union will have to comply with the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation); however, California is pushing for similar regulations in their state.”

Sparks said companies today allow “bring your own device,” which challenges device security, and presents potentially malicious info that can compromise the business.

“The Metropolitan Community College Cybersecurity Center is a National Security Agency National Center for Cyber Defense Education and offers courses, public awareness presentations and has partnered with the Better Business Bureau to promote awareness,” he said, referencing its Oct. 31 Cybersecurity Awareness Seminar for businesses and the public on

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network and mobile security.

Additionally, Sparks noted 2 million-plus job openings globally in cybersecurity. Citing National CyberWatch Center and National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Cyberseek.org, he said there are more than 300,000 openings in the U.S. and 2,000-plus open positions in Nebraska.

“MCC is seeing a high interest in cybersecurity students,” he said.

“Identity is the new perimeter,” said Optiv’s Cyber Operations Senior Manager in Nebraska, Ben Radcliff.

“The 2013 Target breach, which resulted in the loss of over 70 million credit card records, was made possible by weakly managed credentials used by a third-party HVAC contractor,” he said. “Phishing attacks target employees and third-party systems users in an attempt to either gain administrative credentials directly or obtain otherwise fairly benign credentials in an attempt to move laterally across an organization’s infrastructure.”

While phishing campaigns have traditionally been relatively easy to spot with the help of some security awareness training, Radcliff said, artificial intelligence-generated “deep fakes” and attackers leveraging Adware networks can potentially fool even savvy users into providing personal information.

“While companies have realized substantial cost savings by utilizing third-party cloud services in recent years, failure

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to properly segregate customer data and high-risk applications has led to an influx of cross-site scripting and script injection attack vectors,” he said. “With a proliferation of unsecure wireless protocols driven by the internet of things (IoT), attackers can leverage a wide variety of unexpected devices, from multi-function printers to smart refrigerators, to exfiltrate sensitive data.”

Radcliff further noted that the primary objective of attackers has shifted from “cash to data.”

“Patient health records are now more valuable to the black market than credit card numbers, and any data that might be used to impersonate an individual is valuable to a would-be attacker,” he said.

“This means any organization that stores or transacts in client data must focus their risk management program and strategy on where data lives; where it is stored, where it is input, and where it leaves the organization’s hands.”

Leveraging almost 30 years in business, Omaha Security Camera’s Greg Van Scoyk said the latest trend seems to be remote accessibility of all systems with handheld functionality.

“Liability is also a primary concern, which has taken a traditional camera or intrusion system and given it a completely different perspective in design and implementation,” he said. “Business owners want to be able to look in on employees, lock and unlock doors, audit Continued on next page.

Corporate Security •

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

5

Education opportunities on security threats Continued from prededing page. when employees came and went, adjust building systems like HVAC, lighting — all from their mobile device or from a remote location without having to travel across town — anything that allows them to manage their business while on the move.”

Owners and operators, he said, are no longer chained down to their offices, brick and mortar locations, or schedules.

“This technology frees an owner up to do all the other daily tasks they need to accomplish in a given day,” Van Scoyk said.

Alongside fellow business partner Lesley Dewey, Van Scoyk indicated Omaha Security Cameras has seen technology catch up with the likes of higher-speed internet connections and higher-res cameras.

“Our primary focus is on commercial and agricultural CCTV and access control; however, we do have a team of experts providing distributed video and sound, conference room technologies, smart home control, intrusion systems, vehicle and asset tracking, video and alarm monitoring,” he said. “Integration in the key word here. Too often, we see multiple vendors implemented in a building and in the end the owner finds himself with a Rolodex full of contacts for various systems and a phone full of apps to run each.”

Van Scoyk highlighted backwards-compatible systems that integrate with current systems, partly to accommodate future growth, and systems catering to each client’s needs.

Sparks highlighted how all users should realize the cybersecurity habits they have at home and follow them to the workplace.

“So, it is important for users to use solid cybersecurity practices in their personal life,” he said. “Anyone who is in a non-technical field such as any business or medical professional who are looking to increase their knowledge in cybersecurity would benefit from MCC’s class INFO 2805 (Network and Information Security Basics).”

He said the class helps learners identify social engineering, physical security issues, and how to identify sensitive information that should be protected.

Radcliff referred to Optiv’s Advanced Fusion Center, which identifies anomalous behavior that might not be detected by traditional system logs’ alerting methods.

So, businesses are aware of suspicious activity before attackers establish a path to extract data.

Since not every organization is a large enterprise with a 24/7 security operations center or identity governance team, he said Optiv’s ‘as-a-service’ and managed security services offerings scale with the size of our clients, bringing enterprise-class security to small and medium-sized organizations.

“Additionally, Optiv’s risk management and advisory services can help organizations of all sizes create actionable security objectives and longer-term program roadmaps to deliver scalable and robust security strategies for clients of any size,” Radcliff said.

Neal Josten, senior manager of business development at OneSource.

Drug, background checks faster, more customized

by Dwain Hebda

Candidate background checks and drug screenings have advanced to become much more precise and customizable. This gives employers far more flexibility than in the past.

“Drug testing has expanded exponentially,” said Neal Josten, vice president of business development for OneSource. “The five-panel drug test used to be the gold standard and now we’re seeing clients want to do a 10-panel drug test.

And, we’re seeing health care facilities requiring up to 13 or 14 drugs that they’re searching for.

“We partner with an organization that helps us create customizable drug test solutions, where our clients can pick the drugs they want to have

searched. We can compile that to create the test that they are looking for and get them results quickly.”

Josten said gaining the information is one thing, assessing it is another. The tight labor market is forcing many companies to reassess what in an applicant’s background disqualifies them from being considered.

“A lot of it depends on the industry,” he said.

“You’re still going to have organizations that work with children or senior populations that are still going to have strict policies. But you also see organizations tying a person’s record to the nexus of the job. Should someone with a DUI Continued on next page.

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal • Corporate Security

Developing a thorough safety plan helps to keep workplace safe

by Gabby Christensen

No matter how rare an emergency might be, safety experts say business owners should be prepared for all types of crisis situations.

Dustin Talacko, owner of Talacko Safety Solutions, said companies are starting to execute a yearly SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis to aid in their strategic safety planning.

Within this analyTalacko sis, businesses evaluate the highest likelihood of emergencies that may hit the facility.

Additionally, he said it is absolutely paramount that companies begin to strategically plan for higher risk threats, even if these threats are lower frequency.

“In strategic safety planning, being proactive instead of reactive can be the difference between life or death for employees,” he said.

According to Talacko, businesses are also starting to implement life-saving medical equipment that will help bridge the gap between the time of injury and the time that paramedics can enter a scene.

“Planning is the most important part of preparing for a potential emergency,” he said.

“Companies, just like emergency managers in the public sector, have goals to always prevent injury and loss of life by creating a systematic response to a given emergency.

Companies are beginning to plan and prepare

just like emergency managers.”

Elayne Saejung, director of emergency management at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, said it is challenging to plan

Saejung Dwornicki for every threat or hazard that could impact a business, which is why it is important to use what is known as an “all-hazards” approach to planning.

Saejung said this approach considers capabilities needed for any emergency response, like notification or organization of your emergency response team.

“Once you have a basic all-hazards emergency operations plan, businesses can target planning efforts for specific hazards,” she said.

Saejung said the hazards with the highest impact will likely take the highest priority for planning.

Once a plan is in place, employers should train their employees and practice the plan so they know what to do during an emergency.

“Preparing for emergencies can save lives and businesses,” Saejung said. “When companies know their risks, they can mitigate the impacts and plan for a faster,

more efficient emergency response. Preparing for emergencies can help protect your employees and your business from adverse effects.”

Stash Dwornicki, safety consultant/ trainer at the National Safety Council - Nebraska, said addressing workplace safety and being prepared for emergencies is vitally important.

“Poor safety programs and lack of preparedness can lead to more injuries, higher turnover rates and lower employee morale, and potentially even loss of life in disaster or emergency situations,” Dwornicki said.

He said more and more companies are updating their emergency action plans to include workplace violence and other specific emergency situations in addition to just fire

and tornado plans.

“Some companies are training all employees on workplace violence, or alternatively just safety committees and foreman/ managers,” Dwornicki said.

He said the companies that are addressing workplace violence head-on focus on prevention and early warning sign detection, in addition to “run-hide-fight” active shooter training.

“In addressing all possible emergency situations, companies are beginning to look at these potential catastrophes through a risk-management lens,” Dwornicki said.

“They identify their potential risks, rank them according to potential impact and probability and formulate plans and procedures accordingly.”

Drug, background checks faster, more customized Continued from preceding page. drive a bus? No, but can somebody with a DUI work for a construction company that’s helping dig a ditch, if they’re not operating machinery? Yeah, absolutely.”

The industry is not only seeing technological advancements in the lab, but enhanced information gathering as well, said Jimmy Waters, director of operations for 3rd Degree Screening.

“We have the technology that’s connected into the police booking stations,” he said. “So, if you have an employee who gets arrested last night and you’re monitoring them for criminal activity, you’re going to know the next day that they were arrested.

“You can monitor somebody based on name and date of birth. We also have really cool technology that will take the employee’s picture you have on file of them and put it into a monitoring queue.

Not only are you monitoring for arrest by name and date of birth, you’re going to be monitoring for facial recognition as well.”

And, just like with drug tests, clients are looking for more detail out of a candidate’s background information.

“We’re seeing more and more clients requesting a lot more in-depth checking of all the counties and jurisdictions a person

has lived in and worked in and went to school in,” Waters said. “[Employers are] really trying to get a full picture.”

Finally, advancements have made it easier for companies from an operational perspective.

“I’ve been in this arena for a couple of decades,” said Shirley Tingley, administrative director with Caring Senior Service.

“Back in the day, you used to have to get a form signed, fax it to Lincoln and wait anywhere from two days to three weeks for that to come back, because everybody hiring in the state sent it to one number.

Now it’s all done online and [turnaround] is typically three days to a week which really enables a quicker hire.”

Tingley said drug testing — both pre-employment and the random checks the company conducts during an employee’s tenure — have also become more streamlined.

“Previously we would do a urine cup at the office and you could only test for five drugs,” she said. “As you contract that out, you can customize the test to the complaint or the cause, especially if you’re drug testing for cause. If opioids were stolen from the home you can absolutely say I need to test for those, or something along those lines.”

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Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

7

Reinke plant to rollout upgraded systems for global market Continued from page 1.

CNC engineering and the use of robotics. The on Sept. 30. In the 2018 fiscal year the increase program, initially in the Deshler schools, is was only 5%. now expanding into the Thayer Central district.

“If we can get the trade situation under “The message we’re giving the students is control I’m confident we can hit 10% again in ‘I can make a career of this,’” Roth said.

2020,” he said.

With sponsorship from Reinke, the robotics Reinke, with about 500 employees, oper- club from Deshler won the statewide competiates one of the state’s largest manufacturing tion and traveled to Detroit. plants on a 90-acre site Last year, Educaat 5225 Reinke Road Reinke tional Service Unit 5 in Deshler, Nebraska. Phone: 402-357-7251 in Beatrice partnered Employment has in- Address: 1040 Road 5300, Deshler, with Reinke to equip creased by nearly 20% Neb. 68340 (world headquarters) a mobile unit with over the past decade Services: privately-held manufacturer of laboratory supplies with many of the new center pivot and lateral move irrigation and three-dimensional positions in manufac- systems printing simulation, turing and engineering. Founded: 1954 by Richard Reinke and the vehicle is travBut that also gives Employees: 500 eling statewide. the global company One-year goal: Releasing two new pat“Students are findits No. 1 challenge: ent-pending irrigation systems to make ing advanced manucontinuing to find good farmers more competitive in a global facturing with the use quality skilled workers. market. of computers and roTo that end, Reinke Website: www.reinke.com bots to be a pretty cool has redoubled its efthing,” Roth said. forts on several fronts to train Nebraskans for He said of equal importance is a one-year the workers it needs. director of irrigation technology program, One example is a welding program Reinke which offers graduates a one-year certificate. started about 12 years ago in partnership with The partnership, with the Nebraska Colthe Deshler Public Schools. The initiative has lege of Technical Agriculture, in Curtis, expanded to three other school districts and enables students with scholarship help to its adult education component has expanded learn the basics of irrigation technology to include the use of Southeast Community and then return to their hometown to enter College facilities. the workforce.

Roth said two years ago Governor Pete Reinke donated the equipment used in the Ricketts led an effort with Reinke, and others, instruction. to use state funds to target junior high and midEquipment manufactured in Nebraska is dle school students with basic introduction of sold via Reinke’s network of about 250 inde-

pendent dealers in the U.S. Earlier this year, Reinke opened a new parts distribution center in Tifton, Georgia, which Southeast territory manager Mike Mills said cuts the time to get parts to dealers “from days to hours.”

“There’s a lot about this region that’s working for us,” he added. “The geography in relation to our dealers, as well as our ability to be able to work with shipping and freight companies to reach the vast majority of our customer base is of the utmost importance.”

Roth quotes former President John Kennedy who in the early ‘60s praised farmers for facing continued challenges with optimism: “The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale and pays the freight on both.”

Therefore, Roth said anything that can add efficiency to farming is likely to be welcomed.

Within the last 12 months Reinke has rolled out RPM Connect, a main control panel that helps growers stay one step ahead through remote control technology. Its main panel offers basic controls without a touchscreen — reducing the overall cost of the device.

Reinke has gained industry-wide recognition for pioneering — more than 10 years ago — the use of GPS technology that has been since refined to control end-guns and swing on corners and perform lateral moves.

“We’re now rolling out additional products related to GPS that will make water application the best in the industry,” Roth said.

He said Reinke's longevity and continued growth can be attributed to its four owners — all of who farm — and the increase of its engineering department that has grown to 30. Electrical engineers have been especially important to the product innovation.

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

From left, Audrey Dobbe, North End Teleservices President and CEO Carmen Tapio and Greater Omaha Chamber President David Brown.

From left, Lance Schneider, Jamie Blanchard Schneider, Shannon Hilaire and Michelle Milner.

18th annual 40 Under 40 Awards event showcases women, honors MBJ founder Continued from page 1. community.

The event was sponsored by Northwest Bank and UNO College of Business Administration as Platinum sponsors; Gold

level sponsors included Valmont, Lockton Cos. and Motion Content House; Silver sponsors included ICAN, Children’s Hospital & Medical Center, Omaha Performing Arts, CBRE, Scoular, N&M Brokerage

Services and McGill Law. Upon accepting her award, Cella Quinn, who has led a career in financial services, gave event attendees a glimpse into the tough path she took as a woman in the field.

She also noted that businesses being in support of programs such as 40 Under 40 help give recognition to employees.

“As an employer, your support for 40 Under 40 tells your employees that you have their back,” Quinn said.

She further went on to commend the 40 winners.

“Thanks to not only who you are, but for what you do,” Quinn said.

Colin Nabity accepted the Young Entrepreneur of the Year award with the reminder that a team makes a business succeed, despite the owner often getting the recognition.

His business partner was responsible for creating a fully online software program for LeverageRX and Nabity’s wife supported him on the way to putting all in to a startup shortly after they were married.

“It’s so easy to get caught up in ‘this is my name, this is what I do and this is who I work for,’ and I think it is the biggest trap

for young professionals to tie our identity to our jobs and careers when we have so much more potential to make meaningful impact outside of where we work and what we do,” Nabity said.

He left attendees with the challenge of figuring out what they can do to make Omaha a better place.

Andee Hoig, daughter of Bob Hoig reminded attendees that over the years, the concept of 40 Under 40 has expanded greatly, far more than when Bob Hoig first started the awards, and the Greater Omaha community will continue to produce empowering professionals.

The 2019 class of 40 Under 40 winners join 720 recipients to date. Winners are: Jennifer Anderson, Children’s Hospital & Medical Center; Crystal Archer, PJ Morgan Real Estate; Whitney Baker, MENTOR Nebraska; Lisa Barton, Makovicka Physical Therapy; Jamie Blanchard Schneider, American Heart Association; Dana Burkey, Midwest Laboratories; Courtney Callaway, Prime Choice Insurance; Michelle Diaz, Immanuel Communities; Dr. Stephanie Dredge, Green Hills Area Education Agency; Continued on next page.

2019

From left, Lindsey Hasenjager, Andy Gassman, Melanie Krings and winner Laurie Matthews Tullius.

From left, Wendy Townley, 40 Under 40 winner Allison Schorr Zach and Lindsey Spehn.

From left, Lanette Nabity, Steve Nabity, Colin Nabity, Summer Nabity, Cody Leach and Erica Wassinger.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

From left, Elizebeth Murphy, Tom Heinemann and Tony Dukes.

40 Under 40 Awards

anca Harley, Greater Omaha Chamber; Jamie Hopkins, Carson Group; Zachory Klebba, LEO A DALY; Elizabeth Kraemer, Continued from preceding page.

Laura Essay, Dvorak Law Group, LLC; University of Nebraska Foundation; Jenny Cameron Gales, Jacobs Engineering; Bi- Kruger, Iowa Western Community College; Marco Kpeglo LeRoc, Marco Leroc & Company; Laurie Matthews Tullius, UNO/Nebraska Business Development Center; Jodie McGill, McGill Law, PC, LLO/ Nebraska Collaborative Center; Kellee Mikuls, CBRE; Shawntea Moheiser, ITS Healthcare, LLC; Kristopher Montgomery, McCarthy Building Companies; Stephanie Moss, Stephanie Moss Salon and Skincare; Emily O’Connor, Lockwood Development; Kari O’Neill Potts, Valmont Industries, Inc.; Erin Pogge, N & M Brokerage Services, LLC; Sara Porter, Heartland Properties; Andrea Purdy, Omaha Performing Arts; Lynn Schneider, Emspace + Northwest Bank’s John Bothof and ALH Publications’ Lovgren; Allison Schorr Andee Hoig.

Zach, ICAN; Kristen

Marge Welch, left, and 40 Under 40 winner Jenny Kruger.

9

From left, winners Cameron Gales, Karine Sokpoh, Bianca Harley and Marco LeRoc. Seda Kampfe, The Scoular Company; Cortney Sells, The Firm Advisors, LLC; Jeff Skalberg, NoteWorthy; Karine Sokpoh, Sokpoh Law Group; Jeff Spiehs, Omaha-Council Bluffs Metropolitan Area Planning Agency; Carolyn

Sutton, Carolyn Sutton PR; Bentley Swan, Swan Development; Brandy Wallar, New Visions Homeless Services; Meaghan Walls, Assistology, LLC; Scott Yahnke Omaha Home for Boys.

40 Under 40 winner Scott Yahnke with Ali Yahnke.

From left, Matthew Moheiser, 40 Under 40 winner Shawntea Moheiser and Alyssa Moheiser.

10

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

HTI secures growth with improved automation, new sales approach Continued from page 1. our efficiencies, we’ve been able to reduce our work staff.”

Just further noted, historically, companies like HTI Plastics, which specializes in injection-molded plastic products from its 5120 NW 38th St. campus, can compete with “pretty much everybody in the world, except for on labor.”

“We’re very heavy into automation and streamlining systems with automation,” he said. “We’ve done a great job. Twenty years ago, we had 120 people. Now we’re down to 95, but we’ve actually tripled in size.”

Even more recently, in 2016, Just told the Midlands Business Journal that it employed 102 people.

“We’re heavy on maintenance and technical people, not production,” he said.

“The next phase is automating training and operators and making them ‘technical,’ so they can run the automation.”

These employees may command higher

salaries, but the overhead is managed. comprehensive training program. We have a HTI’s investment in training is fur- training program and training manager, and ther illustrated in its facility’s expansion developed a training room that’s state-ofand remodel, which began in 2018 on the the-art … We’re really elevating our training heels of mpany Geist’s sale to Ohio-based capabilities with that.”

Vertiv. HTI has been a member of the PCE Just also noted the company launched a [Plastics Companies Enterprises] family new approach to sales. since 1995.

“The salesperson was very ‘product-speJust noted the roughly 80,000-square- cific,’” he said. “At the beginning of this foot facility got a year, we doubled our boost from the ex- HTI Plastics sales staff and we pansion of the PCE Phone: 402-470-2600 went regional.” office, as well as the Address: 5120 NW 38th St., Lincoln By that, Just readdition of a training 68524 ferred to sales profesroom (PCE staff re- Services: manufacturer of injecsionals as focusing on located following the tion-molded plastics products specific geographic Founded: 1985 by Dick Heinke Vertiv acquisition). areas (i.e. Midwest, T h e c o m p a n y Employees: around 95 Southwest, Northwrapped the project Website: www.htiplastic.com east). in October.

“In the past, we’d “It’s probably about a 30-person training have a person from Lincoln fly to the East room,” Just said of project “highlights.” Coast and they’d go see a sporting goods “One of the things we started was a more manufacturer,” he said. “But they weren’t

seeing other companies that use plastic.

We were missing opportunities because we focused on a specific industry.”

Its approach to industry-specific business further represents a factor that has driven its growth through the years.

“The sporting goods industry has been good, but we’re trying to keep that as a modest part of the business,” he said. “It’s a very volatile market. It can be very up and very down and, unfortunately, it’s very political.”

In fact, Just estimates the industry is down by 50% since 2016; likewise, he indicated pharmaceuticals and food packaging are robust.

“No segment of the business can be more than 30%,” he said of HTI’s diverse background and focus. “Over the last 25 years, that’s been very good for us, being able to ride these ebbs and flows.”

As it relates to pharma, M&A characterizes much of the industry.

“Some companies have been purchased twice in one year,” Just said. “We had three customers who all merged into one company … we’re able to work through those challenges and some good things come out of that. It’s a very fastmoving industry.”

Just reinforced how its sales and marketing efforts have been completely revamped over the last two years.

“We’re seeing great payoffs,” he said.

“Our engineering is our strength and what we ride behind. We help our customers develop and improve products, and we continue to have some of the best equipment in the industry. If you don’t have great equipment, you can’t produce great product.”

Just said some of its machines have been running for 20 to 25 years.

“And they’re producing like they did 20 years ago,” he said. “The investment in our company is key, and that’s the employees, equipment, and the facility.”

9 Pups Dog Food Continued from page 2.

“Pup-Up” shops.

Recently, he’s also received some opportunities to work more with animal rescues.

“Individuals who wish to donate to rescues often come to me to ask for help because these animals are malnourished and are especially in need of food that is more beneficial for them,” he said. “I’m always happy to help with these requests and I understand how critical it is that these dogs receive quality, safe food.”

One day, Benigno said he hopes to be available in local stores. He’s also considering a box subscription service that would be delivered to customers monthly for added convenience.

Over the years, he’s always loved cooking for people, but as it turns out, cooking for dogs is just as enjoyable.

“It’s so rewarding that I can make dogs happy,” Benigno said. “I love hearing from customers who say their dogs couldn’t eat fast enough or that their pet’s health has improved. I also like aligning myself with others who care about what they feed their best friends and want to make sure their pets live both happy and healthy lives.”

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

11

Von Maur is out to prove traditional department stores aren’t dead

by Lauren Zumbach

The first thing Griselda Mata noticed about Orland Square Mall’s newest store was that it felt like a bit of a throwback.

“It’s like Nordstrom or Marshall Field’s, or Carson’s back Retail in the day,” said Mata, 49, of Burbank, Ill., strolling through the shoe department to the sound of live music from a pianist near the escalator.

It was Mata’s first visit to the new Von Maur store in Orland Park, the Davenport, Iowa-based retailers’ fifth location in the Chicago area. She’d come to the mall to SUPER CROSSWORD

Answers on page 12.

make a return at another retailer before deciding to check out the store, which replaced a shuttered Carson’s.

“I’m going to have to come back and shop,” she said.

A new department store is an unusual find at today’s malls. Times have been trying even for storied brands like Barneys New York, Sears and Carson’s parent BonTon Stores, which all sought bankruptcy protection within the past two years. Sears is a fraction of its former size, with just six remaining department stores in Illinois, one of which the company plans to close.

YOU AND ME BOTH

Carson’s shut down all stores last year and, with its brand under new ownership, now exists as an online store with a lone bricks-and-mortar location in Evergreen Park, Ill. Barneys announced closing sales at its remaining stores earlier this week.

Retailers have collectively closed hundreds of stores while trying to reinvent those that remain. Department stores are experimenting with everything from selling secondhand apparel to scaled-down city locations that stock no merchandise but offer services like online order pickup and stylist appointments.

In that context, Von Maur is an outlier.

Nevertheless, Von Maur President Jim von Maur said the company is seeing growth with its more traditional approach.

Employees are trained to help customers find the right outfit and contact them after a purchase to make sure they’re happy with it. There’s a counter on the second floor where shoppers can have gifts wrapped, free of charge, and check coats and packages. Small signs on tables displaying apparel encourage shoppers to touch the merchandise, but the company avoids big signs promoting brands or lastchance deals, even when items are on sale, preferring a cleaner look. Women’s shoes on clearance are stocked in a room next to the main shoe department.

“It’s the way department stores used to be, but with a lot of updates,” Von Maur said.

The retailer aims to have the look and service of an upscale department store and merchandise not found at many other retailers, like U.K. apparel brands Joules, Fat Face and Mint Velvet, but with prices accessible to a wider range of customers, said Melody Wright, Von Maur’s chief operating officer.

“We are for everyone,” she said.

Compared with their larger counterparts, some regional chains like Von Maur have fared relatively well, retail analysts said. They benefit from strong customer loyalty thanks to the focus on service and stores that don’t have to be “one-sizefits-all across the country,” said Marshal Cohen, retail analyst at market research firm NPD Group.

Von Maur, with 35 stores in 15 states including seven in Illinois, has been “a little more measured with their growth, and they seem to be really in tune with creating a premier experience for customers,” said Gabriella Santaniello, president and founder of retail research firm A-Line Partners.

Bernice Wilkins, 70, of Dolton, said she is a longtime customer of Von Maur’s Lombard store but was happy to see one open closer to home.

“I like the layout, the people are great and the shoes are excellent,” she said while browsing a rack of winter coats.

The company also has benefited from rivals’ closures, which brought opportunities to expand. When Von Maur agreed to open in the 130,000-square-foot former Carson’s and invest $25 million in renovations, the village of Orland Park and other taxing bodies provided a package of tax incentives worth up to $8.5 million.

Von Maur says its approach is working.

The company is privately held and does not report earnings. Sales at existing Von Maur stores have been growing in the

mid- to upper-single digits in recent years, growth that “has allowed us to remain confident in our approach,” Wright said.

The company has opened one or two Von Maur department stores a year and also is adding shops under its Dry Goods brand, which sells women’s apparel and accessories.

Part of the reason Von Maur has been able to stick to the traditional department store approach is the fact that the company remains family-owned, Wright said.

“If you’re public, you’re forced to make decisions only for the short term. We can make decisions that cost more today, knowing there will be benefits in the long term,” she said.

At publicly held department store Nordstrom, members of the founding family who remain involved as company leaders and significant stakeholders tried to take the company private to pursue a turnaround with less scrutiny from public markets in 2017, but the family and a special board committee couldn’t reach a deal. Family members later presented another plan that would have boosted their stake in the company from 31% to a little more than 50% but decided not to move forward, the company said in a regulatory filing last month.

Von Maur isn’t the only privately held regional department store chain that appears to be growing while sticking with a traditional approach, said Candace Corlett, president of consulting firm WSL Strategic Retail. She pointed to companies like Boscov’s, with 49 East Coast stores, and Bealls, with more than 70 stores in Florida.

“Not having to report margins and profits gives you license to be the merchant you want to be, instead of the merchant you need to be,” she said.

It’s not all traditional. The Orland Park store has a fitting room with a videochat system that lets a bridal party, for instance, try on dresses with people who can’t attend in person.

Online sales have been growing by a percentage in the double digits, according to Wright. She declined to say how much of Von Maur’s business comes from online sales, but said it’s lower than some rivals.

The company didn’t want online growth to come at the expense of its focus on stores, she said.

“It’s an important part of the business, but it’s a complement to the stores,” she said.

Corlett questioned whether the “genteel” approach would appeal to younger shoppers who don’t remember department stores’ heyday, but noted that the company’s long history suggested it had adapted to changing times before.

“There just might be something to say for the family’s passion for being a merchant in the community,” she said.

And even as online shopping has grown, there are still plenty of people who want to shop in stores, Cohen said.

“They are the old-fashioned guard, but you still have half the population that’s very comfortable doing it that way, and you might have a new generation discovering a new world of shopping,” he said. ©2019 Chicago Tribune Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

For boomers reframing aging, age-proofing a home won’t come cheap

by Sharon Jayson

Chris and Dennis Cavner, in their early 70s, are preparing to move less than two blocks away into a 2,720-square-foot, ranchstyle house they bought this year. But first a renovation is underway, taking the 45-yearold property all the way back tRends to its studs. When the work is completed, these baby boomers are confident the move will land them in their forever home.

“We wanted to find a house that we could live in literally for the rest of our lives,” he said. “We were looking specifically for a one-story house — and one that had a flat lot, to age in place.”

Aging in place is a major financial commitment, one that may be at odds with retirees’ plans to downsize their lives and budgets and squirrel away cash in anticipation of rising health care costs. The Cavners are rebuilding this house — assessed at $700,000 around the time of the sale — from a shell.

The updates will easily cost $300,000 in the hot Austin market.

Leaving nothing to chance, the Cavners are making a number of modifications they might never need. For instance, neither uses a wheelchair, but contractors are making all doorways 3 feet wide for accessibility throughout — just in case. The master bath roll-in shower, flat and rimless, will provide room to maneuver and the master bath vanity

is also at wheelchair-accessible height. Kitchen drawers, rather than cabinets, will allow easy access in a wheelchair. The Cavners are closely watching details of the renovation, but it wasn’t a hard decision.

For some seniors, aging in place might amount to simple home modifications, such as adding shower grab bars and handrails or replacing a standard toilet with one that sits taller. But many seniors anticipate a financial crunch as they try to plan for their future on a fixed income, uncertain their savings and retirement funds will last.

With an average 10,000 people a day turning 65, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the 65-and-older segment of the population is the nation’s fastest-growing: By 2050, almost one-quarter of Americans will be at least 65. A host of surveys conducted over the past decade show that older adults overwhelmingly want to age in their homes. Two in 5 U.S. homeowners are baby boomers, according to a 2018 report released from Fannie Mae. But for many people, aging at home isn’t in the cards. Abbe Will, associate project director of the Remodeling Futures Program at the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, said that many houses aren’t suited to “aging in place.”

“Currently, a lot do not have single-floor living — especially in certain parts of the country. There are lots of stairs and multistory

How to keep an audience awake during your next PowerPoint

by Liz Reyer

Q: I often present to groups and have received feedback that my PowerPoint slides are dry (actually, the word “boring” was used).

I agree but don’t know what to do to get more creative.

—Philipp, 56, WoRkplace strategy team analyst A: It is all about the story and designing slides that support the messages you need to communicate.

Let’s imagine that you are presenting a strategic option to your executive team. You will have some standard topics to cover, say, the business issue, some supporting data, the options you considered, and your recommendation.

This could be a recipe for tedium. But it doesn’t need to be.

Far too many presentations rely on paragraph-length bullets and detailed charts and tables. We are going to move away from that.

Start by developing your basic story line: We face Problem X, we have Options 1, 2, and 3, and we picked Option 2. Here’s the Happy Ending!

You could make a movie with this core narrative. So, have some fun as you think about the message you need to send.

A good story has conflict. Define the essence of conflict in your situation. Environmental shift? Competitive threat? Internal rivalries?

Then play around with finding analogies, for example, in nature, human dynamics or other sources.

You can, and even should, be a little silly at this stage. You will have time to dial it back.

But honestly, if you are talking about a competitive threat, wouldn’t you rather listen

to a voice-over on a powerful image of lions confronting prey in the jungle than see wordy bullets on a page?

Plus, the strength of your image will help cement attendees’ recall.

You will also need to communicate supporting data. Again, go for impact.

How often have you seen a full table of numbers on a screen with the two relevant figures circled? Ever ask yourself why all the other clutter was there, distracting from the message?

Instead, think visual. For example, you may want to say “with Option 2, revenue will go from $x million to $xx million.” On screen, show just these two figures with an arrow driving up, showing the impact of Option 2. Shout your message!

Worried that people will miss having the details? That is what appendices are for. You can also provide a pre-read that is at a more granular level of detail.

This is a big shift, especially upping your game on the visual side. Spend time watching TED talks.

Your goal will be to absorb how visuals support the messages. Also search online for powerful presentations and look at resources on design.

You might also enjoy moving beyond PowerPoint to open new graphic options.

It will require practice, as your emphasis will be on you as the center point, not dry visuals.

Bottom line, create a strong story through pictures, and add words and numbers to emphasize your points. ©2019 Star Tribune (Minneapolis) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

homes when land is more valuable,” she said.

And “many households and homeowners don’t necessarily have the funds to do aging in place.”

Home modifications and costs vary widely — starting with those simple safety features in the bathroom or lever doorknobs throughout the house — to more extensive changes, such as widening doorways to accommodate wheelchairs, replacing kitchen cabinets with drawers or lowering light switches to wheelchair height. Will said simple retrofits, such as grab bars and railings, “could be several hundred dollars,” but a “whole bathroom remodel would be in the thousands or tens of thousands.”

And a lot of people won’t have the money for extensive modifications. A new survey of 1,000 people age 65 and older by the California-based nonprofit SCAN (formerly the Senior Care Action Network) found 80% of respondents were concerned about their ability to age in place. The driver appears to be financial: About 60% said they have less than $10,000 in savings (including investments and retirement plans), while 28% reported minimal or no retirement savings.

A study in the journal Health Affairs published this spring illustrates the shaky situation for middle-class aging adults who can’t afford modifications to stay at home but who have too much money to qualify for federal housing assistance. Over the next decade, the researchers expect the number of middle-income seniors 75 and older to more than double to over 14 million. And, of that group, more than half (54%) won’t have the assets they will need to cover the projected average yearly cost of $60,000 for assisted living and other out-of-pocket medical costs.

“We don’t know what’s coming down the pipeline as we age,” said sociologist Deborah Thorne of the University of Idaho in Moscow, Idaho, lead author of a study that found skyrocketing bankruptcy rates among those 65 and older.

The research, to be published in the journal Sociological Inquiry, finds the share of older Americans filing for bankruptcy has never been higher, with a filing rate increase of more than 200% from 1991 to 2016 among those 65 and older: “And bankrupt households are more likely than ever to be headed by a senior — the% of older bankrupt filers has increased almost 500% since 1991,” the study found.

James Gaines, an economist with the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University, attributes the increase “to the labor market and employment downsizing and letting older people go first. It can force them into retirement whether they’re ready for it or not. Retirement income may not be enough to carry their debts, and they don’t have enough savings.”

“The leading edge of baby boomers has not hit 75 yet,” said Jennifer Molinsky, whose work at the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University focuses on housing for older adults. “When you think about the next five, 10 or 15 years when they’re in their 80s, you’re really going to see the needs shift.”

Because disability rates will rise with chronic illnesses and conditions, requiring more assistance, Molinsky said, communities need to think more about transportation for seniors, as well as “different kinds of housing than we have now.”

Don and Lynn Dille, both 75, built their Continued on page 22.

SUPER CROSSWORD PUZZLE ANSWERS

Puzzle on page 11.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

13

Vanguard cut fees, this time on 15 S&P and Russell index-based ETFs

by Erin Arvedlund

Just when you thought ETF expenses couldn’t go any lower, Malvern-based investment giant Vanguard has slashed expense ratios on 15 S&P and Russell index-based ETFs, according to its latest annual reports.

While assets in the investing 15 ETFs grew over the funds’ fiscal year, which ended Aug. 31, expenses fell. Some of the annual expenses dropped by hundredths of one percentage point, known as basis points.

For example, the S&P Smallcap 600 ETF’s expense ratio — the amount investors pay Vanguard annually to manage the fund — fell from 0.15% of assets to 0.10% in the latest year. Assets in the fund fell from $1.1 billion to $991 million.

Lower fees are good for investors because they can lead to much bigger returns over the long term.

“Vanguard typically is able to cut expenses by one or two, and sometimes three, basis points over the course of a year. But cuts of four to five basis points are very, very rare,” said Dan Wiener, who co-edits the Adviser Investments newsletter for Vanguard investors.

So, how did Vanguard manage to cut fees again?

“My guess is that they were able to renegotiate their licensing agreements with S&P and Russell, allowing them to cut costs dramatically,” said Wiener. “Lower expense ratios accrue directly to investors’ bottom lines. This is just another shot fired in the fee wars that continue to rage in the ETF industry.”

The late Jack Bogle, founder of Vanguard Group, popularized index funds and was a fierce advocate of low-fee investing.

He argued that few active managers could outperform the broader stock market and that fees were a drag on performance. Thanks in part to American investors’ shift to passive investing in index funds after the financial crisis, Vanguard now manages over $5 trillion in assets.

If you’re interested in finding fees and expense ratios for Vanguard index funds or ETFs you own, these are available through the firm’s annual reports, available online at https://personal.vanguard.com/us/litfulfillment/ELFReports?categoryCd=PRRP&subcategoryCd=ETRP&view=default. Check under “Financial Highlights” for the ratio of expenses to average net assets.

Vanguard eliminated ETF commissions on its brokerage platform and lowered Admiral share minimums last year.

“However, it is premature to report any expense ratio reductions at this time,” said spokesperson Freddy Martino in an email.

Vanguard funds and ETFs all have a fiscal year-end reporting period that falls within a six-month period ranging from August through January. Per industry regulations, each fund must file an annual report within 60 days and a prospectus within 120 days of the fiscal year end. The pattern repeats for September, October, November, December, and January fiscal year ends.

“The prospectus figure is the expense ratio of record, due to the fact that they may change between the time of the annual report filing and the subsequent prospectus filing,”

Trump expected to delay tariffs on imported European vehicles

by Jenny Leonard and Shawn Donnan

The Trump administration may punt on a decision on whether to slap tariffs on European automobiles as efforts of German automakers to highlight their new investments have helped in the talks, people famileconomy iar with the White House deliberations said.

In May, President Donald Trump gave himself a deadline of mid-November to decide whether to impose levies on cars and auto parts from the European Union. The EU threatened to retaliate with tariffs on $39 billion of American goods if the president carried out his threat.

Trump is expected to extend the deadline

again, according to people familiar with the plans, but the president has not yet made a final decision.

The White House declined to comment.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, in an interview with Bloomberg TV earlier this month, signaled that a postponement was likely.

“Our hope is that the negotiations we’ve been having with individual companies about their capital investment plans will bear enough fruit that it may not be necessary to put the 232 fully into effect, may not even be necessary to put it partly in effect,” said Ross, referring to the national security investigation under Section 232 of a 1962 trade law.

More than 30 non-union workers will lose jobs at U.S. Steel Iron Range operations

by Dee DePass

Citing market headwinds, U.S. Steel will lay off up to 40 nonunion workers at its Minntac and Keetac taconite plants on Minnesota’s Iron Range, officials said.

The news comes a week after disappointing third-quarter economy results and three weeks after Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel idled one of its Minntac production lines in Mountain Iron in response to changing market conditions and softer demand for flat rolled and tubular steel.

Minntac and Keetac have about 2,200 workers combined at their mine and iron pelletizing plants in Mountain Iron and Keewatin, Minn. Fewer than 40 workers are expected to be affected by the layoffs, local officials said. Company officials would not disclose exact numbers.

U.S. Steel spokeswoman Amanda Malkowskion said via e-mail that the decision to lay off workers came as the company puts in place a new operating structure it announced last month.

“Leaders examined organizational structures, work performed and spending to find opportunities to more efficiently execute our strategy,” U.S. Steel said in a statement. “At the same time, we’ve been battling challenging market conditions, which means we need to truly become a leaner, more efficient organization faster. … Unfortunately, this was a necessary step in the execution of our strategy.”

The layoffs are the latest indication that industry conditions are again changing for

Vanguard’s Martino said. “The bottom line is you will see the funds listed report their expense ratios in December.”

Charles Schwab last month cut fees to zero for all trades on its online brokerage platform. Other brokerages soon matched Schwab, with Fidelity announcing its own plan to zero commissions on stock trades.

(Fidelity had already cut fees on more than 500 ETFs this year.)

What caused the shift? Schwab said it was a matter of when, not if, the industry and competitors would move to zero fees on trades, so they opted to jump first.

But it was Vanguard last summer that cut fees on 1,800 ETFs, starting the fee war. ©2019 The Philadelphia Inquirer Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

the iron ore and steelmaking industries.

Iron ore and its associated “taconite” ore pellets or “hot-briquetted iron” are key ingredients to making steel. Minnesota’s Iron Range in the northeast pocket of the state is home to six mines and taconite plants.

Steel’s newest downturn comes less than five years since the last global collapse, which beyond market conditions was also caused by swells of underpriced imports mostly from China but also from South Korea, India, Brazil and England.

During the 2014 and 2016 downturn roughly 2,000 Minnesota iron workers were laid off until idled factories or production lines began reopening in 2016 and recalled workers.

Today, sagging steel prices and slowing growth in China, Europe and global auto markets are pinching industry growth.

U.S. Steel lost $84 million during the third quarter of 2019, compared with a profit of $291 million realized for the same quarter one year ago.

Tony Barrett, a retired economics professor at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, said that U.S. Steel’s blues stem from the cyclical swings normally experienced by the iron and steel industry.

“Taconite production depends on the demand for steel. With the U.S. economy slowing in 2018 and 2019 there has just been a weakening in the demand for steel,” he said. “The whole world has been kind of sluggish, and steel goes hand in hand with the overall economy. The economy

is slowing and so the demand for infrastructure … and steel is going down. That means the demand for our taconite also goes down.”

Barrett emphasized that layoffs at Minntac and Keetac are small and not indicative of any regional collapse.

“It’s just that we had our steel tariffs.

We had the tax cut and a nice rebound in 2018. You could say we had a sugar high and now we are back down to our 1.5% (GDP) growth,” he said. ©2019 Star Tribune (Minneapolis) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Trump won’t impose the tariffs, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung recently. A 25% U.S. levy on foreign cars would add 10,000 euros ($11,000) to the sticker price of EU vehicles imported into the country, according to the Brussels-based European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm.

Last year, Trump infuriated European leaders by declaring American imports of steel and aluminum a security threat and imposing levies of 25% and 10%, respectively, on shipments from around the world, including the EU. That prompted the bloc to retaliate with tariffs on American goods such as Harley-Davidson Inc. motorcycles, Levi Strauss & Co. jeans and bourbon whiskey.

U.S. tariffs on European cars and auto parts would mark a significant escalation of trans-Atlantic tensions because the value of EU automotive exports to the American market is about 10 times greater than that of the bloc’s steel and aluminum exports combined. As a result, European retaliatory duties would target a bigger amount of U.S. exports to Europe.

The Trump administration has reached separate agreements with other foreign auto-producing nations like Mexico, Canada and Japan to prevent the U.S. from imposing tariffs on their imported vehicles. ©2019 Bloomberg News Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

14

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

LEGAL NOTICES MBJ legal notice instructions The following are some guidelines to consider when posting legal notices with the Midlands Business Journal: 1. Submit a written notice in either Microsoft Word or as a PDF document to Beth Grube at legals@mbj.com, fax to 402-758-9315 or mail: 1324 S. 119th St. Omaha, NE 68144.

For trade names, submit a copy of approved (bar code in upper right hand corner) Application For Registration of Trade Name from the Secretary of State to the same email address. Please include your billing address and the desired duration you’d like your notice to run (trade names run for only one week).

2. You will receive a confirmation and price quote. Legal notices, except for trade names, are charged per line. The flat fee for a trade name is $50.

Payment options are cash or check.

3. Deadline is 5 p.m. Tuesday for a notice to start publishing that Friday.

4. All costs include fees to file the notice with the Secretary of State and/or any appropriate courts.

5. You will receive a paid invoice copy and a courtesy proof of the notice the first week it runs and a copy of the affidavit filed with the courts the last week.

GROSS & WELCH, P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 2120 South 72 Street, Suite 1500 Omaha, Nebraska 68124 NOTICE OF DISSOLUTION OF Roman Marble Products, Inc. Roman Marble Products, Inc., a Nebraska corporation, has filed Articles of Dissolution with the Nebraska Secretary of State and said corporation is in the process of voluntary dissolution which was authorized on October 22, 2019. The proposal to dissolve was duly approved by the shareholders in the manner required by the Nebraska Model Business Corporation Act and by the articles of incorporation.

The terms and conditions of such dissolution are, in general, that all debts and obligations of the corporation are to be fully paid and satisfied and adequate provisions are to be made for Shelley M. Block, President, to wind up and liquidate the corporation’s business and affairs. The corporation has no remaining assets as of the date of publication.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION of CJ Insurance Group Notice is hereby given that CJ Insurance Group, a Nebraska Limited Liability Company, has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with its initial agent for service of process as Colin Kastrick, and with its initial designated office at 3015 N 90th Street, Suite 3, Omaha, NE 68134.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF WELLNESS FOR LIFE, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Wellness For Life, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the company is 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68114.

The registered agent of the company is DDLG Business Services, Inc. and the registered address of the company is 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68114.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 RUSSELL S. DAUB, Attorney 2800 South 110th Court, Suite 1 Omaha, Nebraska 68144-4818 NOTICE OF RESTATED ARTICLES OF AMENDMENT TO THE ARTICLES OF INCORPORATION OF DESTINY THEATRE, INC. Notice is hereby given of the Restated Amendment of the Articles of Incorporation of DESTINY THEATRE, INC, to change its name to DESTINY THEATER, INC. First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF PREMIER NAIL BAR, LLC Notice is hereby given that Premier Nail Bar, LLC (the "Company"), has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The Designated Office Address of the Company is 14903 S. 23rd St., Bellevue NE 68123.

The Registered Agent of the Company is Steven P. Ahlf, 11590 West Dodge Road, Suite 1, Omaha, NE 68154.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is given that NEST PROGRAMMING, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska with the following registered agent and registered office: Francisco Rivera at 6330 Ruggles St. Omaha, NE 68104. The general nature of the Company's business is to engage in any lawful business permitted under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The company was organized on September 27, 2019, and it shall continue in perpetuity unless sooner terminated in accordance with the terms of its operating agreement. In general, the Company's business is to be managed by its primary member Francisco Rivera in accordance with the Company's operating agreement.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given that Reverie Photo & Film, a Nebraska Limited Liability Company, has been organized under the laws of the state of Nebraska, with its initial designated office at 3115 N 47th Ave, Omaha, NE 68104. The initial agent for service of process of the Company is Jessica B Tworek, 3115 N 47th Ave, Omaha, NE 68104.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019

STEVEN G. RANUM, Attorney CROKER, HUCK, KASHER, DEWITT, ANDERSON & GONDERINGER, L.L.C. 2120 S. 72nd Street, Suite 1200 Omaha, Nebraska 68124 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF BULLDOG SOLUTIONS LLC The name of the limited liability company is Bulldog Solutions LLC. The address of the initial designated office is 2522 Edward Babe Gomez Avenue, Omaha, NE 68107. The name and address of the initial agent for service of process is Steven G. Ranum, 2120 South 72nd Street, Suite 1200, Omaha, NE 68124.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 RICHARD L. ANDERSON, Attorney C R O K E R , H U C K , K A S H E R , D E W I T T, A N D E R S O N & GONDERINGER, L.L.C. 2120 S. 72ND STREET, SUITE 1200 OMAHA, NEBRASKA 68124 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF DRLB 78, LLC The name of the limited liability company is DRLB 78, LLC. The address of the initial designated office is 2120 South 72nd Street, Suite 1200, Omaha, NE 68124. The name and address of the initial agent for service of process is Richard L. Anderson, 2120 South 72nd Street, Suite 1200, Omaha, NE 68124.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 MARTIN P. PELSTER, Attorney C R O K E R , H U C K , K A S H E R , D E W I T T, A N D E R S O N & GONDERINGER, L.L.C. 2120 S. 72ND STREET, SUITE 1200 OMAHA, NEBRASKA 68124 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF GRETNALAKE, LLC The name of the limited liability company is GRETNALAKE, LLC. The address of the initial designated office is 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137. The name and address of the initial agent for service of process is John Hughes, 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 MARTIN P. PELSTER, Attorney C R O K E R , H U C K , K A S H E R , D E W I T T, A N D E R S O N & GONDERINGER, L.L.C. 2120 S. 72ND STREET, SUITE 1200 OMAHA, NEBRASKA 68124 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF MDC GILES PARTNERS, LLC The name of the limited liability company is MDC GILES PARTNERS, LLC. The address of the initial designated office is 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137. The name and address of the initial agent for service of process is John Hughes, 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 MARTIN P. PELSTER, Attorney C R O K E R , H U C K , K A S H E R , D E W I T T, A N D E R S O N & GONDERINGER, L.L.C. 2120 S. 72ND STREET, SUITE 1200 OMAHA, NEBRASKA 68124 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF 192&370, LLC The name of the limited liability company is 192&370, LLC. The address of the initial designated office is 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137. The name and address of the initial agent for service of process is John Hughes, 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 MARTIN P. PELSTER, Attorney C R O K E R , H U C K , K A S H E R , D E W I T T, A N D E R S O N & GONDERINGER, L.L.C. 2120 S. 72ND STREET, SUITE 1200 OMAHA, NEBRASKA 68124 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF MDC GRETNA, LLC The name of the limited liability company is MDC GRETNA, LLC. The address of the initial designated office is 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137. The name and address of the initial agent for service of process is John Hughes, 11550 I Street, Suite 200, Omaha, NE 68137.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF TANNERSGRILL, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that TANNERSGRILL, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The Designated Office Address of the Company is 15505 Ruggles Street, #106, Omaha, Nebraska 68116. The Registered Agent of the Company is DDLG Business Services, Inc., 9500 W. Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF WOODSONIA-MOTB-D, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Woodsonia-MOTB-D, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The Designated Office Address of the Company is 17007 Marcy Street, Suite 2, Omaha, Nebraska 68118. The Registered Agent of the Company is Drew Snyder, 17007 Marcy Street, Suite 2, Omaha, Nebraska 68118.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019

ANDREW J. HUBER, Attorney LAMSON, DUGAN and MURRAY, LLP 10306 Regency Parkway Drive Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3743 NOTICE OF THE ORGANIZATION OF RH Consulting, LLC Notice is hereby given of the formation of a limited liability company under the laws of the State of Nebraska, and that the name of the limited liability company is RH Consulting, LLC. The name and address of the registered agent and office is LDM Business Services, Inc, 10306 Regency Parkway Drive, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The general nature of the business to be transacted is all lawful business. The company commenced existence on October 22, 2019 and shall have perpetual duration. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by the Members, as prescribed by the Operating Agreement.

LDM Business Services, Inc., Organize First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 DANIEL C. PAULEY, Attorney LAMSON, DUGAN and MURRAY, LLP 10306 Regency Parkway Drive Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3743 NOTICE OF THE ORGANIZATION OF TEAMLEE, LLC Notice is hereby given of the formation of a limited liability company under the laws of the State of Nebraska, and that the name of the limited liability company is TeamLee, LLC. The name and address of the registered agent and office is LDM Business Services, Inc, 10306 Regency Parkway Drive, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The general nature of the business to be transacted is all lawful business. The company commenced existence on October 28, 2019 and shall have perpetual duration. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by the Members, as prescribed by the Operating Agreement.

LDM Business Services, Inc., Organizer First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 MATTHEW T. PAYNE, Attorney PANSING HOGAN ERNST & BACHMAN LLP 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3728 N O T I C E O F A M E N D M E N T T O T H E A RT I C L E S O F INCORPORATION OF LINHART CONSTRUCTION, INC. Notice is hereby given that the Articles of Incorporation of Linhart Construction, Inc., a Nebraska corporation, have been amended to provide for Class A Voting Common Stock and Class B Nonvoting Common Stock. The Articles of Amendment to the Articles of Incorporation of the Corporation were filed with the Nebraska Secretary of State on October 23, 2019.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF CAMBROOKS PROPERTIES, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Cambrooks Properties, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 613 North 204th Avenue Circle, Elkhorn, Nebraska 68022. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The limited liability company commenced business on October 22, 2019.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 RADLEY E. CLEMENS, Attorney 5717 North 127th Street Omaha, Nebraska 68164 LEGAL NOTICE In the County Court of Douglas County, Nebraska. PR19-1350 Estate of Joseph J. Welter, III, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on October 4, 2019, in the County Court of Douglas County, Nebraska, William D. Welter 1st, whose address is 22935 N. 68th St., Scottsdale, Arizona, 85251, was informally appointed by the Registrar asPersonal Representative of the estate.

Creditors of this estate must file their claims with this Court, located at Courtroom No. 30, Third Floor, Probate Division, Douglas County Hall of Justice, 17th & Farnam Streets, Omaha, NE 68183, on or before January 15, 2019 or be forever barred.

KELLY J. GOLDEN Clerk of the County Court First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF AJOJ, LLC The name of the Company is AJOJ, LLC. The Designated Office of the Company is: 8834 Washington Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68127. The Registered Agent and Office of the Company is: Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. This limited liability company commenced business on October 25, 2019.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION of Wish Granted Notice is hereby given that Wish Granted, a Nebraska Limited Liability Company, has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with its initial agent for service of process as Colin Kastrick, and with its initial designated office at 2949 N 56th Street, Omaha, NE 68104.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • LEGAL NOTICES NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF BJR MILLARD, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that BJR Millard, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 14406 Harrison Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68138. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The limited liability company commenced business on July 18, 2019.

First publication October 25, 2019, final November 15, 2019

DENNIS P. LEE, Attorney LEE LAW OFFICE 2433 South 130th Circle, Suite 300 P.O. Box 45947 Omaha, Nebraska 68145 NOTICE OF SUIT TO: BERNARD E. BYARS, 5821 N. 100th Plz. Apt 10, Omaha NE 68134, you are hereby notified that on September 13, 2019, Credit Acceptance Corporation filed a suit against you in the Douglas County Court at docket CI19-20334, the object in prayer of which was to secure a judgment against you in the amount of $5,855.10, together with court costs, interest and attorney's fees as allowed by law. Unless you file your Answer with the Douglas County Court on or before the 16th day of December, 2019, the Petition against you will be considered as true and judgment will be entered against you accordingly.

First publication October 25, 2019, final November 15, 2019 DANIEL C. PAULEY, Attorney LAMSON, DUGAN and MURRAY, LLP 10306 Regency Parkway Drive Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3743 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF A LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY TAKE NOTICE that Go Time Logistics, LLC, has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The address of the designated office is 814 South Pine Street, Hastings, NE 68901. The company is organized to engage in and do any lawful act concerning any and all lawful business for which a limited liability company may be organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The company commenced on October 18, 2019, and its existence is perpetual. The company will be managed by its members.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 ERICKSON l SEDERSTROM, P.C., Attorneys 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF BEAM PROPERTIES, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Beam Properties, LLC, a Nebraska limited liability company (the “Company”), has been duly organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with its designated office located at 7866 Lakeview Street, Ralston, Nebraska 68127 and designating its registered agent as Erickson & Sederstrom, P.C. a limited liability organization with its registered office at 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 JOHN Q. BACHMAN, Attorney PANSING HOGAN ERNST & BACHMAN LLP 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3728 NOTICE OF INCORPORATION OF WESTBURY CREEK HOMEOWNERS ASSOCIATION Notice is hereby given of the incorporation of Westbury Creek Homeowners Association under the laws of the State of Nebraska as follows: 1. The name of the Corporation is Westbury Creek Homeowners Association.

2. The Corporation is a mutual benefit corporation.

3. The name of the Corporation’s initial registered agent is John Q. Bachman and the address of the initial registered office is 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

4. The names and street addresses of the incorporators are: Gerald L. Torczon, 11205 South 150th Street, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68138 Jeffery S. Torczon, 11205 South 150th Street, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68138 5. The Corporation will have members.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 LEGACY DESIGN STRATEGIES 9859 South 168th Avenue Omaha, NE 68136 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION 1. The name of the Limited Liability Company is PLAN WELL, LLC 2. The address of the designated office of the company is 9859 South 168thAvenue, Omaha, NE 68136.

3. The purpose for which the company is organized is to engage in any and all business which is lawful under the Uniform Limited Liability Company Act of the State of Nebraska.

4. The company commenced its existence on October 22, 2019, and the period of duration of the Company shall be perpetual.

5. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by its Members in accordance with the company’s operating agreement.

Andrew C. Sigerson, P.C., L.L.O. First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019

JOHN Q. BACHMAN, Attorney PANSING HOGAN ERNST & BACHMAN LLP 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3728 NOTICE OF INCORPORATION OF WESTBURY FARM HOMEOWNERS ASSOCIATION Notice is hereby given of the incorporation of Westbury Farm Homeowners Association under the laws of the State of Nebraska as follows: 1. The name of the Corporation is Westbury Farm Homeowners Association.

2. The Corporation is a mutual benefit corporation.

3. The name of the Corporation’s initial registered agent is John Q. Bachman and the address of the initial registered office is 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

4. The names and street addresses of the incorporators are: Gerald L. Torczon, 11205 South 150th Street, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68138 Jeffery S. Torczon, 11205 South 150th Street, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68138 5. The Corporation will have members.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 ERICKSON l SEDERSTROM, P.C., Attorneys 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF DISSOLUTION OF JAMES G. MORGAN, D.D.S., M.S., M.D., ORAL AND MAXILLOFACIAL SURGERY, P.C. James G. Morgan, D.D.S., M.S., M.D., Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, P.C., a Nebraska professional corporation, filed Articles of Dissolution on October 28, 2019, with the Nebraska Secretary of State’s Office. The terms of the dissolution provide for the payment of liabilities of the corporation and the distribution of any remaining assets. James G. Morgan, as President, is to manage the corporate affairs relating to the dissolution of the Corporation. Any Corporation assets will be distributed in accordance with the Corporation’s plan of dissolution and it has no known liabilities.

The Corporation requests that persons with claims against it present them in accordance with this notice. Any claimant shall send notice of a claim to the Corporation to the above address. A claim against James G. Morgan, D.D.S., M.S., M.D., Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, P.C. will be barred unless a proceeding to enforce the claim is commenced within three (3) years after the publication of this notice.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 MARY E. VANDENACK, Attorney VANDENACK WEAVER LLC 17007 Marcy Street, Suite 3 Omaha, Nebraska 68118 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF ADVANCED PAIN SOLUTIONS LLC Notice is hereby given that ADVANCED PAIN SOLUTIONS LLC has been organized as a limited liability company under the Nebraska Uniform Limited Liability Company Act. The address of the initial designated office of the company is 1023 Creighton Rd., Papillion, NE 68046. The agent for service of process for the Company is VW Agents, LLC located at 17007 Marcy Street, Suite 3, Omaha, NE 68118.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 ABRAHAMS KASLOW & CASSMAN LLP, Attorneys 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF DISSOLUTION Heracles and Red Hawk, LLC (the “Company”), a Nebraska limited liability company, has been dissolved. Persons having claims against the Company shall present them in writing, with the details of any such claim, to Gerald P. Melchior, Jr., at 105 South 9th Street, Suite 804, Omaha, Nebraska 68102. A claim against the Company is barred unless an action to enforce the claim is commenced within five years after the third publication of this notice.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 ABRAHAMS KASLOW & CASSMAN LLP, Attorneys 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Mr. Picnic, LLC has been organized as a limited liability company under the Nebraska Uniform Limited Liability Company Act. The street and mailing address of the initial designated office of the company is 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The name and street and mailing address of the initial registered agent of the company for service of process are Thomas J. Malicki, Abrahams Kaslow & Cassman LLP, 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 KELLOGG & PALZER, P.C. 10828 Old Mill Road, Suite 6 Omaha, Nebraska 68154-2647 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION 1. The name of the Company is MARK BUSH HOLDINGS, LLC. 2. The street address of the initial designated office is 4929 North 117th Circle, Omaha, NE, 68164. The registered agent is Mark Bush and the Registered Agent's address is 4929 N. 117th Circle, Omaha, NE 68164.

3. The general nature of the Company is a holding company.

4. The Company commenced on October 30, 2019 and shall have perpetual existence.

5. The affairs of the Company are to be conducted by Members, the President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, and such other officers as the Members shall determine.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019

15

TIEDEMAN, LYNCH, KAMPFE, McVAY & RESPELIERS, Attorneys 6910 Pacific Street, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68106-1045 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given that LEELO BUILDING, LLC, has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska with its designated office at 6910 Pacific Street, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68106. The general nature of the business is to engage in any lawful business for which a limited liability company may be organized. The limited liability company was formed on October 29, 2019, and shall have perpetual existence. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by its Members.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF MILLENNIAL IMPACT SIX, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Millennial Impact Six, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The Designated Office Address of the Company is 17330 W Center Road, Suite 110-179, Omaha, Nebraska 68130. The Registered Agent of the Company is Allyn Elizabeth Johnson, 17330 West Center Rd, Suite 110-179, Omaha, Nebraska 68130.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 LEGACY DESIGN STRATEGIES 9859 South 168th Avenue Omaha, NE 68136 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION 1. The name of the Limited Liability Company is NEBRASKA STREET APARTMENTS, LLC 2. The address of the designated office of the company is 1229 Nebraska Street, Blair, NE 68008.

3. The purpose for which the company is organized is to engage in any and all business which is lawful under the Uniform Limited Liability Company Act of the State of Nebraska.

4. The company commenced its existence on October 7, 2019, and the period of duration of the Company shall be perpetual.

5. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by its Members in accordance with the company’s operating agreement.

Andrew C. Sigerson, P.C., L.L.O. First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 IN THE DISTRICT COURT FOR DOUGLAS COUNTY NEBRASKA NOTICE TO DEFENDANTS TO: All Persons Having or Claiming Any Interest in the Following Described Property: All of Lots 1 and 2, Block 9, except the North 47.0 feet of said Lot 1 and the East 12-5/8’ of the North 47.0 feet of said Lot 2, lying in Improvement Association Addition, as surveyed, platted and recorded in Douglas County, Nebraska, Real Names Unknown.

You are hereby notified that on the 7th day of November, 2019, Plaintiff, Vincentini Plumbing, Inc., f/d/b/a V & V Construction, Inc., a Nebraska corporation, filed a Complaint in the District Court of Douglas County, Nebraska against you and each of you in Case No. CI19-8726, the object and prayer of said Complaint being to obtain a decree of the Court quieting the title of said Plaintiff in and to: All of Lots 1 and 2, Block 9, except the North 47.0 feet of said Lot 1 and the East 12-5/8’ of the North 47.0 feet of said Lot 2, lying in Improvement Association Addition, as surveyed, platted and recorded in Douglas County, Nebraska.

The Complaint further prays that you and each of you be forever barred from having or claiming any right, title, interest or ownership in and to said real estate or any part thereof, and for such other and further relief as equity requires.

You and each of you are hereby notified that you are required to answer said Complaint on or before the 29th day of December, 2019.

VINCENTINI PLUMBING, INC., f/d/b/a V & V CONSTRUCTION, INC., A Nebraska Corp., By: Mark S. Dickhute #17586, 955 No. Adams St., Suite 1, Papillion, Nebraska 68046 Email:dickhutelaw@gmail.com Tel: 402-614-4060 First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF CEI INVESTORS, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that CEI Investors, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The limited liability company commenced business on October 30, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF BOOKSPLUS, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that BooksPLUS, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 10830 Old Mill Road, Omaha, Nebraska 68154. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The limited liability company commenced business on October 30, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019

16

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

LEGAL NOTICES NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF AUTHENTIC IMAGES PHOTOGRAPHY, L.L.C. NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that AUTHENTIC IMAGES PHOTOGRAPHY, L.L.C., is organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with a designated and regis¬tered office at 5910 North 167th Plaza, Omaha, Nebraska 68116. The affairs of the company are to be conducted by the manager and registered officer, STACY D. THORNE. The Limited Liability Company is organized to transact any and all business, and perform services of every kind and nature whatsoever, which are not inconsistent with law. The Limited Liability Company commenced on October 23, 2019, and shall have perpetual existence.

STACY D. THORNE, Organizational Member, 5910 North 167th Plaza, Omaha, NE 68116 First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF AMENDMENT AND RESTATEMENT OF THE ARTICLES OF INCORPORATION OF PEITZMEIER DEMOLITION AND CONCRETE CUTTING, INC. NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Articles of Incorporation of Peitzmeier Demolition and Concrete Cutting, Inc., a Nebraska corporation, were amended and restated on October 28, 2019, in their entirety as follows: Article 1 states the name of the Corporation is Peitzmeier Demolition and Concrete Cutting, Inc. Article 2 states the purpose.

Article 3 states the number of shares the Corporation is authorized to issue is 100,000 shares of Class A Voting Common Stock and 900,000 shares of Class B Nonvoting Common Stock, each having a par value of $0.01 per share.

Article 4 states the registered agent is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124.

Article 5 states the Corporation shall have perpetual existence.

Article 6 states the provisions relating to amending the Articles and Bylaws.

Article 7 states that provisions relating to director liability.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF RICKY’S UPSTAIRS, LLC The name of the Company is Ricky’s Upstairs, LLC. The Designated Office of the Company is: 1108 South 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68124.

The Registered Agent and Office of the Company is: Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124.

This limited liability company commenced business on October 29, 2019.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 N O T I C E O F A M E N D M E N T T O T H E A RT I C L E S O F INCORPORATION OF MORRISSEY ENGINEERING, INC. Notice is hereby given that the Articles of Amendment to the Articles of Incorporation of Morrissey Engineering, Inc., a Nebraska corporation, were filed with the Nebraska Secretary of State on October 30, 2019, to amend Article II as follows: The number of shares the Corporation is authorized to issue is 100,000 shares of Class A Voting Common Stock and 900,000 shares of Class B Nonvoting Common Stock, each having a par value of $0.01 per share. Article III was revoked in its entirety.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given that TAM DUC REALTY, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The address of the Company’s designated office is 1910 S 44th Street Omaha, Suite 101, NE 68108, and the name of the registered agent at such address is Tran & Associates Law, LLC. The general nature of the business is any legal and lawful activity allowed pursuant to the Nebraska Limited Liability Company Act and the laws of the State of Nebraska and elsewhere. The Company commenced business on 08/15/2019 and shall have perpetual existence. The affairs of the Company are to be managed by its managers.

Khanh Tran, Member First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 HUSCH BLACKWELL LLP, Attorneys 13330 California Street, Suite 200 Omaha, Nebraska 68154 NOTICE OF DISSOLUTION NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN of the voluntary dissolution of JASPER STONE EMPIRE PARK II LLC, as of October 16, 2019. Any person having a claim, whether known or unknown, against the Company is requested to present such claim in writing to the Company at the following address: c/o Curt Hofer, 16820 Frances Street, Suite 206, Omaha, NE 68130. The claim must be in writing, must be sent by mail to the address set forth above, and must set forth the name, address and telephone number of the claimant, a detailed description and amount of the claim, the date of occurrence of the claim and any tangible evidence to support the claim that is available to the claimant. Unless sooner barred by any other statute limiting actions, any claim against the Company is barred if an action to enforce the claim is not commenced within five years after the publication date of the third required notice.

First publication October 25, 2019, final November 8, 2019

KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF AKSARBEN MORTGAGE, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Aksarben Mortgage, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 20740 Rawhide Road, Elkhorn, Nebraska 68022. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The limited liability company commenced business on November 1, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 DEAN F. SUING, Attorney GOVIER, KATSKEE, SUING & MAXELL, PC, LLO 10404 Essex Court, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 LEGAL NOTICE In the County Court of Douglas County, Nebraska. PR19-1647 Estate of Barbara Burke, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on October 25, 2019, in the County Court of Douglas County, Nebraska, Thomas A. Dudycha, whose address is 224 East Riverview Drive, Blair, NE 68008, was informally appointed Personal Representative of the estate.

Creditors of this estate must file their claims with this Court, located at Courtroom No. 30, Third Floor, Probate Division, Douglas County Hall of Justice, 17th & Farnam Streets, Omaha, NE 68183, on or before January 2, 2019 or be forever barred.

CARROL L. MILLS Registrar First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 JUDITH A. WELLS, Attorney 1603 Farnam Street Omaha, Nebraska 68102 LEGAL NOTICE In the County Court of Douglas County, Nebraska. PR19-1471 Estate of STEPHEN POPE, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on October 23, 2019, in the County Court of Douglas County, Nebraska, Fredrick Popew, Sr., 5315 Larimore Avenue, Omaha, Nebraska 68104, was appointed by the court as Personal Representative of the estate.

Creditors of this estate must file their claims with this Court, located at Courtroom No. 30, Third Floor, Probate Division, Douglas County Hall of Justice, 17th & Farnam Streets, Omaha, NE 68183, on or before January 2, 2019 or be forever barred.

KELLY J. GOLDEN Clerk of the County Court First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 ERICKSON l SEDERSTROM, P.C., Attorneys 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF MERT56, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Mert56, LLC, a Nebraska limited liability company (the “Company”), has been duly organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with its designated office located at 7735 North Irvington Road, Omaha, Nebraska 68122 and designating its registered agent as Erickson & Sederstrom P.C. a limited liability organization with its registered office at 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF GC RESIDENTIAL REAL ESTATE , LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that GC Residential Real Estate, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The Designated Office Address of the Company is 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The Registered Agent of the Company is DDLG Business Services, Inc., 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF MLB PROPERTIES, LLC Notice is hereby given that MLB Properties, LLC (the "Company"), has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The Designated Office Address of the Company is 2615 Geri Drive, Bellevue, NE 68147.

The Registered Agent of the Company is Steven P. Ahlf, 11590 West Dodge Road,. Suite 1, Omaha, NE 68154.

First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 TIEDEMAN, LYNCH, KAMPFE, McVAY & RESPELIERS, Attorneys 6910 Pacific Street, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68106-1045 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given that LEELO DINING, LLC, has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska with its designated office at 6910 Pacific Street, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68106. The general nature of the business is to engage in any lawful business for which a limited liability company may be organized. The limited liability company was formed on October 28, 2019, and shall have perpetual existence. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by its Members.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019

NOTICE OF DEFAULT You are hereby notified that Ramon Barragon, as Trustor executed and delivered to Robert M. Zuber, Trustee, a Deed of Trust (DOT) where Trustor conveyed the following real property: The North ½ of Lot 14 Block 9 Kountze 4th Addition SUPP, an Addition to the City of Omaha, as Surveyed, Platted, and Recorded in Douglas County Nebraska as security for repayment of a loan which the Trustor obtained from C & S Rentals, LLC, beneficiary of said DOT recorded on January 11, 2008 in the Register of Deeds office of Douglas County Nebraska as Instrument No. 2008003223.

Jamie Martinez and Leonel Martinez then purchased the aforementioned real property from Trustor and assumed all responsibilities, obligations, duties, and indebtedness of the DOT and the Promissory Note associated with the DOT as shown and recorded in the Register of Deeds office of Douglas County Nebraska as Instrument No. 2009089672. C & S Rentals, LLC then assigned all its right, title, and beneficial interest in the DOT to Flying Horse, LLC as shown and recorded on January 11, 2017 in Register of Deeds office of Douglas County Nebraska as Instrument No. 2017002934.

C & S Rentals, LLC also assigned the Note associated with the DOT to Flying Horse, LLC. Eric T. Dworak is successor Trustee, pursuant to a Substitution of Trustee filed on October 4, 2019 in the Register of Deeds office of Douglas County Nebraska as Instrument No. 2019084266.

You are further notified a breach of the obligation for which the trust property was conveyed as security has occurred. The nature of the breach of the obligation secured by the DOT is the failure of the Trustor(s) to pay the Note secured by said DOT when due. The Beneficiary has elected to declare the entire amount of the Promissory Note remaining unpaid, together with any interest due, which is secured by the DOT, herein, due and payable at once.

If the breach is not cured within the statutory timeframe allowed for under the Nebraska Trust Deeds Act (Neb. Rev. Stat. §§ 76-1001 to 76-1018), the Beneficiary has elected to sell the Trustor's interest in the property and the proceeds thereof to be distributed, all in the manner provided for in the Nebraska Trust Deeds Act. Pursuant to the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, you are hereby notified that unless you contact the undersigned within thirty days after receipt of this notice to dispute the validity of this debt or any portion thereof, this debt will be assumed to be valid. Further, if you notify the undersigned in writing within the same thirty day period that you dispute this debt, or any portion thereof, the undersigned will obtain and send you verification of the debt. Also, if you request in writing within the same thirty day period, the undersigned will provide you with the name and address of the original creditor, if different from the current creditor. THE FORGOING NOTICE IS FROM A DEBT COLLECTOR ATTEMPTING TO COLLECT A DEBT. ANY INFORMATION OBTAINED WILL BE USED FOR THAT PURPOSE. Dated this 30 day of October, 2019.

By: Eric T. Dworak, Trustee Eric T. Dworak, Attorney at law, NSBA#26564 For Tran & Associates Law, LLC, 1910 S. 44 ST, Suite 101, Omaha, NE 68105, 402.885.9919, eric.dworak@tranlg.com First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF VOLANT BUILDING GROUP, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Volant Building Group, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The Designated Office Address of the Company is 222 S. 15th Street, Suite 1404S, Omaha, Nebraska 68102. The Registered Agent of the Company is DDLG Business Services, Inc., 9500 W. Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 JOHN Q. BACHMAN, Attorney PANSING HOGAN ERNST & BACHMAN LLP 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3728 NOTICE OF INCORPORATION OF WESTBURY FARM VILLAS ASSOCIATION Notice is hereby given of the incorporation of Westbury Farm Villas Association under the laws of the State of Nebraska as follows: 1. The name of the Corporation is Westbury Farm Villas Association.

2. The Corporation is a mutual benefit corporation.

3. The name of the Corporation’s initial registered agent is John Q. Bachman and the address of the initial registered office is 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

4. The names and street addresses of the incorporators are: Gerald L. Torczon, 11205 South 150th Street, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68138 Jeffery S. Torczon, 11205 South 150th Street, Suite 100, Omaha, NE 68138 5. The Corporation will have members.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF HOOKS SOLO, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that HOOKS SOLO, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The Designated Office Address of the Company is 19102 Q Street, Suite 110-114, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The Registered Agent of the Company is DDLG Business Services, Inc., 9500 W. Dodge Road, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • LEGAL NOTICES LISA ROTHSCHADL, Attorney ZIESER & ROTHSCHADL LAW P.O. Box 476 Tyndall, South Dakota 57066-0476 LEGAL NOTICE In the County Court of Bon Homme, South Dakota. PR19-16 Estate of Michael John Sykora, Deceased Notice is given that on the 15th day of October, 2019, Robert Schafer, whose address is 6026 Decatur Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68104 was appointed personal representative of the estate of Michael John Sykora.

Creditor of decedent must file their claims within four months after the date of the first publication of this notice or their claims may be barred.

Claims may be filed with the personal representative or may be filed with the clerk, and a copy of the claim mailed to the personal representative.

Dated this 15 day of October, 2019.

Robert Schafer, 6026 Decatur Street, Omaha, NE 68104 Heather Humphrey, Bon Homme Clerk of Courts, P.O. Box 6, Tyndall, SD 57066, (605) 589-4215 First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF WAITT OPTUM, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Waitt Optum, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 1125 S 103rd Street, Suite 425, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O, 1125 S 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The Certificate of Organization was filed with the Nebraska Secretary of State on November 1, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF CROSSON CLASSIC CARS, LLC The name of the Company is Crosson Classic Cars, LLC. The Designated Office of the Company is: 1625 North 136th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68154. The Registered Agent and Office of the Company is: Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. This limited liability company commenced business on November 4, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF GP MED SUPPLY, LLC The name of the Company is GP Med Supply, LLC. The Designated Office of the Company is: 9006 Ohio Street, Suite 1, Omaha, Nebraska 68134. The Registered Agent and Office of the Company is: Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124.

This limited liability company commenced business on November 5, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF LAWN ARMOR, LLC Notice is hereby given that LAWN ARMOR, LLC (the "Company"), has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The Designated Office Address of the Company is 6308 N. 153rd St., Omaha, NE 68116.

The Registered Agent of the Company is Steven P. Ahlf, 11590 West Dodge Road,. Suite 1, Omaha, NE 68154.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 ABRAHAMS KASLOW & CASSMAN LLP, Attorneys 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Hidden Roots Healing LLC has been organized as a limited liability company under the Nebraska Uniform Limited Liability Company Act. The street and mailing address of the initial designated office of the company is 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The name and street and mailing address of the initial registered agent of the company for service of process are Randall C. Hanson, Abrahams Kaslow & Cassman LLP, 8712 West Dodge Road, Suite 300, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The company is organized to render the professional service of mental health therapy as a mental health practitioner requiring licensure under the laws of the state of Nebraska, and to render other related services as may be ancillary thereto.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 APPLICATION FOR REGISTRATION OF TRADE NAME Trade Name to be registered is: Nebraska Tech Collaborative Name of Applicant: Knights of Ak-sar-ben Foundation Address: 7101 Mercy Road, Suite 320, Omaha, NE 68106 Applicant is a nonprofit corporation If other than an Individual, state under whose laws entity was formed: Nebraska Date of first use of name in Nebraska: upon filing General nature of business: to promote high-tech workers in the State of Nebraska ALEXANDER J. WOLF Signature of Applicant or Legal Representative November 15, 2019

NOTICE OF INCORPORATION OF A TO Z CLEANING, INC. NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that A TO Z CLEANING, INC., is incorporated under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with a registered office at 2030 North 101st Circle, Omaha, Nebraska 68134. The registered agent is BAN IBRAHEEM. The general nature of the business is to operate a general cleaning business, to own, operate and perform services of every kind and nature whatsoever, which are not inconsistent with law, which are necessary, suitable, proper, convenient or expedient to the operation of a general cleaning business. The authorized capital stock is $10,000.00, consisting of 10,000 shares of stock having a par value of $1.00 each, which stock shall be paid for wholly or partly by cash, by labor, by personal property and by real property. The corporation became a corporate body on August 29, 2019, and shall have perpetual existence. The affairs of the corporation are to be conducted by a Board of Directors, the number of directors to be provided in the By-Laws, and the officers shall be a President, Vice-President, Secretary and Treasurer, and such other officers as shall be designated in the By-Laws.

ANTHONY L. GROSS, Incorporator CATHERINE L. WHITE, Incorporator 3018 South 87th Street, Omaha, NE 68124 First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 NOTICE OF INCORPORATION OF PHARMAFIT USA, INC. NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that PHARMAFIT USA, INC., is incorporated under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with a registered office at 15902 Bancroft Court, Apt. #1137, Omaha, Nebraska 68130. The registered agent is MOHAMAD JAMAL DOUDI. The general nature of the business is to operate a general vitamin supplement sales business, to own, operate and perform services of every kind and nature whatsoever, which are not inconsistent with law, which are necessary, suitable, proper, convenient or expedient to the operation of a general vitamin supplement sales business. The authorized capital stock is $10,000.00, consisting of 10,000 shares of stock having a par value of $1.00 each, which stock shall be paid for wholly or partly by cash, by labor, by personal property and by real property. The corporation became a corporate body on October 5, 2019, and shall have perpetual existence. The affairs of the corporation are to be conducted by a Board of Directors, the number of directors to be provided in the By-Laws, and the officers shall be a President, Vice-President, Secretary and Treasurer, and such other officers as shall be designated in the By-Laws.

ANTHONY L. GROSS, Incorporator CATHERINE L. WHITE, Incorporator 3018 South 87th Street, Omaha, NE 68124 First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 AMANDA M. BARRON, Attorney P.O. Box 597 Fremont, Nebraska 68026 LEGAL NOTICE TO THE DEFENDANT(s), ANITA J MACKINS & ADRIAN T MACKINS You are hereby notified that Credit Bureau Services, Inc., a corporation, filed its complaint in the County Court of DOUGLAS County, Nebraska on 07/10/2019 on Case Number CI19-15849, the object and prayer of which is to recover the sum of $193.99, plus interest, attorney fees and court costs.

You are required to answer the complaint of the Plaintiff on or before 12/22/2019 or the allegations in said complaint will be taken as true and judgment entered accordingly.

CREDIT BUREAU SERVICES, INC., A CORPORATION First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 AMANDA M. BARRON, Attorney P.O. Box 597 Fremont, Nebraska 68026 LEGAL NOTICE TO THE DEFENDANT(s), ROBERT F PTACEK You are hereby notified that Credit Bureau Services, Inc., a corporation, filed its complaint in the County Court of DOUGLAS County, Nebraska on 08/21/2019 on Case Number CI19-19174, the object and prayer of which is to recover the sum of $446.82, plus interest, attorney fees and court costs.

You are required to answer the complaint of the Plaintiff on or before 12/22/2019 or the allegations in said complaint will be taken as true and judgment entered accordingly.

CREDIT BUREAU SERVICES, INC., A CORPORATION First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 AMANDA M. BARRON, Attorney P.O. Box 597 Fremont, Nebraska 68026 LEGAL NOTICE TO THE DEFENDANT(s), THOMAS O MEINEN You are hereby notified that Credit Bureau Services, Inc., a corporation, filed its complaint in the County Court of DOUGLAS County, Nebraska on 07/22/2019 on Case Number CI19-16646, the object and prayer of which is to recover the sum of $292.52, plus interest, attorney fees and court costs.

You are required to answer the complaint of the Plaintiff on or before 12/22/2019 or the allegations in said complaint will be taken as true and judgment entered accordingly.

CREDIT BUREAU SERVICES, INC., A CORPORATION First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 AMANDA M. BARRON, Attorney P.O. Box 597 Fremont, Nebraska 68026 LEGAL NOTICE TO THE DEFENDANT(s), BRANDON M THOMAS You are hereby notified that Credit Bureau Services, Inc., a corporation, filed its complaint in the County Court of DOUGLAS County, Nebraska on 08/08/2019 on Case Number CI19-17832, the object and prayer of which is to recover the sum of $469.00, plus interest, attorney fees and court costs.

You are required to answer the complaint of the Plaintiff on or before 12/29/2019 or the allegations in said complaint will be taken as true and judgment entered accordingly.

CREDIT BUREAU SERVICES, INC., A CORPORATION First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019

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ERICKSON l SEDERSTROM, P.C., Attorneys 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF INCORPORATION Corporate Name: The Alec Bohm Foundation Type of Corporation: Public Benefit Registered Agent: Erickson & Sederstrom P.C. a limited liability organization Registered Office: 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114 Members: Corporation will not have Members.

Incorporator: Daniel I. Dittman, 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114 First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 WHITMORE LAW OFFICE LLC 7602 Pacific Street, Suite 200 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF INCORPORATION A M Westroads, Inc., whose registered agent is Syed Ghalib Ali and registered office is 809 S. 70th Plaza, Apt. 9, Omaha, Nebraska 68106, was formed on November 4, 2019 to engage in any lawful business. The corporation has authorized 1,000 shares of capital stock.

Thomas E. Whitmore, Incorporator First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 NOTICE OF CERTIFICATE OF ORGANIZATION OF Shaddai Company, LLC A Nebraska Limited Liability Company Notice is hereby given that Shaddai Company, LLC, has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The initial designated office of the company in the state of Nebraska is 3815 N 12th Street Lincoln NE 68521. The name and address of the registered agent is AF Bookkeeping Services, Inc, 11811 I Street, STE 204, Omaha, NE 68137. The Certificate of Organization was filed with the State of Nebraska on October 29, 2019.

Luis Hong, Organizer First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 WHITMORE LAW OFFICE LLC 7602 Pacific Street, Suite 200 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given that Whippourwill, L.L.C. (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the Company is 5605 S. 126th Circle, Omaha, Nebraska 68137.

The registered agent of the Company is Holly Colling, 5605 S. 126th Circle, Omaha, Nebraska 68137. The Company was formed on November 4, 2019.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF MOELLER CONSULTING, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Moeller Consulting, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The Designated Office Address of the Company is 6109 S. 102nd Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68127. The Registered Agent of the Company is Rodney Moeller, 6109 South 102nd Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68127.

First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION of a Limited Liability Company Notice is hereby given the registration with the Nebraska Secretary of state’s office of LFM Construction, LLC under the laws of the State of Nebraska as follows: The name of the company is LFM Construction, LLC. Registered agent and office of LFM Construction, LLC at 4161 S 60th Street, Omaha, NE 68117. Initial members: Luis Fernando Mendez Alvarez. General nature of the business is to transact any and all lawful business for which limited liability companies are allowed by statute. The LLC was organized on November 2019 for the perpetual duration and is managed by its members.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF THOMPSON SILVER SPUR LODGE, LLC The name of the Company is Thompson Silver Spur Lodge, LLC. The Designated Office of the Company is: 9102 North 225th Street, Elkhorn, Nebraska 68022. The Registered Agent and Office of the Company is: Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O., 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. This limited liability company commenced business on November 5, 2019.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 BRENT M. KUHN, Attorney 900 South 75th Street, Suite B Omaha, Nebraska 68114 APPLICATION FOR REGISTRATION OF TRADE NAME Trade Name to be registered is: Aksarben Bat & Critter Removal Name of Applicant: Priority Termite and Pest Control, Inc. Address: 3021 N. 93rd Street.

Omaha Nebraska 68134 Applicant is a Corporation If other than an Individual, state under whose laws entity was formed: Nebraska Date of first use of name in Nebraska: September 23, 2019 General nature of business: Pest Control BRENT M. KUHN Signature of Applicant or Legal Representative November 15, 2019

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

LEGAL NOTICES KOLEY JESSEN P.C., L.L.O., Attorneys 1125 South 103rd Street, Suite 800, One Pacific Place Omaha, Nebraska 68124-1079 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF WAITT PLYMOUTH, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Waitt Plymouth, LLC has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the limited liability company is 1125 S 103rd Street, Suite 425, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The registered agent and office of the limited liability company is Koley Jessen P.C., L.L.O, 1125 S 103rd Street, Suite 800, Omaha, Nebraska 68124. The Certificate of Organization was filed with the Nebraska Secretary of State on November 7, 2019.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 WHITMORE LAW OFFICE LLC 7602 Pacific Street, Suite 200 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given that Interiors by MW, L.L.C. (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The designated office of the Company is 8210 Decatur Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

The registered agent of the Company is Meghan Wetterstrom, 8210 Decatur Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68114. The Company was formed on November 6, 2019.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 ROBERT J. KMIECIK, Attorney STINSON LLP 1299 Farnam Street, Suite 1500 Omaha, Nebraska 68102-1818 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF Milan Laser Detroit Novi, LLC Notice is hereby given that a Nebraska limited liability company named Milan Laser Detroit Novi, LLC (the “Company”) was formed under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The street and mailing address of the initial designated office of the Company is 17645 Wright Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68130 and the Company’s initial agent for service of process at such address is Abe Schumacher.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 ROBERT J. KMIECIK, Attorney STINSON LLP 1299 Farnam Street, Suite 1500 Omaha, Nebraska 68102-1818 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF Milan Laser Detroit Sterling Heights, LLC Notice is hereby given that a Nebraska limited liability company named Milan Laser Detroit Sterling Heights, LLC (the “Company”) was formed under the laws of the State of Nebraska. The street and mailing address of the initial designated office of the Company is 17645 Wright Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68130 and the Company’s initial agent for service of process at such address is Abe Schumacher.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF AMENDMENT NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Certificate of Organization of NW Omaha Kiddie Academy, LLC has been amended to change the name of the limited liability company to NW Omaha KA, LLC. First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF GCP II 900 C75, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that GCP II 900 C75, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The designated office address of the Company is 10340 North 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68122. The name and address of the registered agent of the Company is Zachary A. Wiegert, 10340 North 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68122.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF GCP II 1000 C75, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that GCP II 1000 C75, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The designated office address of the Company is 10340 North 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68122. The name and address of the registered agent of the Company is Zachary A. Wiegert, 10340 North 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68122.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 Notice of Non-Discriminatory Clause Heartland School does not discriminate on the basis of race/ethnicity, color, national origin, religion, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, disability, age, genetic information, citizenship status or economic status, or veteran status, in the administration of any of its employment, educational programs, admissions policies, scholarship and loan programs, athletics, recreational, and other school-administered programs. Questions and/or concerns may be directed to Ms. Mary Quiroz; 5731 S 108th St.; Omaha, NE 68137 First publication November 15, 2019, final November 22, 2019

DVORAK LAW GROUP LLC 9500 West Dodge Road, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF GCP II 1100 C75, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that GCP II 1100 C75, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The designated office address of the Company is 10340 North 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68122. The name and address of the registered agent of the Company is Zachary A. Wiegert, 10340 North 84th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68122.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 ANGELA MADATHIL, Attorney Goosmann Law Firm 17838 Burke St., Suite 250 Omaha, Nebraska 68118 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION The name of the limited liability company is JCE Apparel LLC. The initial designated and registered office is 6541 Russell Emmett Ct., Papillion, NE 68133. The registered agent is Angela Madathil, c/o Goosmann Law Firm, PLC, 17838 Burke St., Suite 250, Omaha, NE, 68118. The general nature of the business to be transacted is any and all lawful business for which a limited liability company may be organized under the Nebraska Uniform Limited Liability Company Act including owning property, and owning/operating day care centers. The Company commenced on November 7, 2019, and its duration is perpetual. The affairs of the Company will be conducted by its Officers.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 RUSSELL J. KREIKEMEIER, Attorney KREIKEMEIER LAW OFFICES 126 East Grove Street West Point, Nebraska 68788 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION Notice is hereby given of the organization of Stavas Medical Imaging, LLC, with its registered office address at 126 East Grove, West Point, Nebraska 68788 and its principal office location in Omaha, Nebraska. The purpose or purposes for which this Company is formed is to specialize in diagnosing injuries and diseases using medical imaging procedures such as X-Ray, Computed Tomography (CT), Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), nuclear medicine, Positron Emission Tomography (PET) and ultrasound; from body imaging to diagnostic radiology, mammography, to molecular medicine/imaging, interventional radiology procedures and medical consulting. The Company will conduct any other matter(s) including the transaction of all or any lawful business or engagement in any commercial venture permitted by the Nebraska Limited Liability Company Act, as amended, and all other applicable law. The initial capital of the Company has been contributed and evidence of membership in the Company will be issued by the Management Board. The Company commenced doing business on November 6, 2019, and shall have perpetual existence. The affairs of the Company shall be conducted by a Management Board and such other Officers and Managers as may be provided for in the Operating Agreement of the Company.

DATED the 11th day of November, 2019 First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 BENJAMIN J. PICK, Attorney PANSING HOGAN ERNST & BACHMAN LLP 10250 Regency Circle, Suite 300 Omaha, Nebraska 68114-3728 NOTICE OF AMENDMENT TO THE CERTIFICATE OF ORGANIZATION OF TRAN TEC, LLC Notice is hereby given that pursuant to the applicable provisions of the Nebraska Limited Liability Company Act, the Certificate of Organization of Tran Tec, LLC, a Nebraska limited liability company (the “Company”) has been amended to change the name of the Company to Tran-Tec, LLC. The Amended Certificate of Organization was filed with the Secretary of State of the State of Nebraska on November 8, 2019. In all other respects, the Certificate of Organization remains unchanged.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 NOTICE OF PUBLICATION TO: RODNEY WILSON Jr You are hereby notified that on 06/13/19, the Plaintiff Credit Management Services, Inc., filed a Complaint in the COUNTY Court of DOUGLAS County, Nebraska, against you shown as Case Number CI19 13104 . The object and prayer of which is a judgment in the amount of 500.00, plus court costs, pre-judgment interest and attorney fees, if applicable.

The Complaint prays that judgment be entered against you. You are hereby notified that you must answer the Complaint on or before 01/05/20 at the COUNTY court of DOUGLAS County, OMAHA Nebraska.

Edwina Heise #25377 P.O. Box 1512, Grand Island, NE 68802, (308)398-3801 Attorney for Plaintiff First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 ERICKSON l SEDERSTROM, P.C., Attorneys 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100 Omaha, Nebraska 68114 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF TWIN ADVISERS, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Twin Advisers, LLC, a Nebraska limited liability company (the “Company”), has been duly organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska, with its designated office at 331 Village Point Plaza, Omaha, Nebraska 68118 and designating its registered agent as Erickson & Sederstrom, P.C. a limited liability organization with its registered office at 10330 Regency Parkway Drive, Suite 100, Omaha, Nebraska 68114.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019

STATE OF NEBRASKA PARDOLE BOARD HEARINGS NOTICE A total of 153 cases will be heard by the Board in November, 2019. The following case(s) sentenced in Douglas County will be seen by the Board of Parole.

November 18, 2019 – 8:30 a.m. Nebraska State Penitentiary, Lincoln, Nebraska Loyd, Amos 64687 Robbery Chard, Randy 69419 Robbery (2 counts), Use Deadly Weap to Commit Fel Mejia, Adam 81063 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug, Theft by Receiving Stolen Prop Hotz, Jeffery 82078 Terroristic Threats, Theft by Receiving Stolen Prop, Aslt Peac Ofcr/DCS Emp 2nd Dgr Moten-Roddy, Steveaun 82644 Assault 2nd Degree, Escape Lewis, Herman 85325 Forgery 2nd Degree (2 counts), Pos of Frgd Inst $300 or More (2 counts), Theft, Theft by Deception Pegues, Isaiah 86658 Robbery (2 counts) Webster, Tyler 86708 Robbery (2 counts) Timm, Adam 87943 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I Gregory, Bryant 88383 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I, Terroristic Threats Contreras Carrillo, Juventino 89303 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I Bird, Andrew 210020 Burglary, Criminal Mischief, Forgery 1st Degree, Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I, Pos Cntrl Sub Except Marijuana, Theft by Receiving Stolen Prop Watts, William 89025 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug O’Neal, Kaliph 88313 Robbery (3 counts) November 20, 2019 – 8:30 a.m. Community Correctional Center - Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska Cooper, John 58121 Robbery, Use Deadly Weap to Commit Fel Moss, Robert 70880 Criminal Impersonation, Theft by Receiving Stolen Prop (4 counts) Gamble, Randale 81815 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug Collins, Steven 86316 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug Cornell, Nickolas 88027 Robbery (2 counts), Theft by Unlwfl Taking or Disp (2 counts) Fernen, Kenneth 88158 Operate Motor Veh/Avoid Arrest, Theft by Receiving Stolen Prop, Theft by Unlwfl Taking or Disp, Viol of Financial Trans Device Coleman, David 88437 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I Carbullido, Anne 99473 Tax Violation (2 counts), Theft by Deception (2 counts), Finlan, Megan 99570 Child Abuse (5 counts) Bey, Tamara 99846 Accessory to a Felony, Pos Cntrl Sub Except Marijuana Larry, Kim 392017 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I November 21, 2019 – 9:30 a.m. Community Correctional Center - Omaha, Omaha, Nebraska Davis, Darius 71794 Domestic Assault McDougald, Keith 73967 Pos of Over 1 Lb. of Marijuana, Sexual Assault 1st Degree Perkins, Ramel 80904 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug Loucks, Wyatt 81784 Arson 1st Degree Nyuon, Potur 85206 Terroristic Threats (2 counts), Use Deadly Weap to Commit Fel Bauer, Stephen 86396 Child Abuse (5 counts) Hill, Patrick 87304 Assault 1st Degree Goos, Tristan 87358 Robbery Durand, Tracy 87183 Theft by Shoplifting Barfield, Clinton 62131 Murder 2nd Degree, Use Deadly Weap to Commit Fel Gray, Kevin 81160 Accessory to a Felony, Carry/Poss Concealed Weapon, Robbery (2 counts) November 22, 2019 – 9:30 a.m. Omaha Correctional Center, Omaha, Nebraska Driver, Lashawn 83240 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I (2 counts) Jennings, Ryan 86509 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug, Poss/Receive Stolen Firearm Werner, Kyle 88186 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I Watson, Ronnell 88775 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I Armand, Juan 88812 Robbery Hall, Jason 89094 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I November 25, 2019 – 9:30 a.m. Tecumseh State Correctional Institution, Tecumseh, Nebraska Richart, Jason 72669 Sexual Assult of Child 1st Deg Williams, Brandon 76771 Robbery (2 counts) Himes, Zachary 83609 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug, Trans/Poss Machine/Short Gun Brammer, Anthony 83803 Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug November 25, 2019 – 1:00 p.m. Lincoln Correctional Center, Lincoln, Nebraska Strickland, Robert 63259 Assault 1st Degree, Robbery, Use Deadly Weap to Commit Fel Clark, Justin 210177 Theft by Unlwfl Taking or Disp November 27, 2019 – 9:30 a.m. Nebraska Correctional Center for Women, York, Nebraska Allen, Angelique 99402 Pos Cntrl Sub Except Marijuana Fichter, Tara 392084 Viol of Financial Trans Device November 27, 2019 – 12:30 p.m. Community Correctional Center Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska Magallanes, Alberto 74728 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I (2 counts), Tax Violation (2 counts) Smith, Sidney 82209 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I, Pos Cntrl Sub Except Marijuana. Poss Deadly Weap by Felon/Fug O’Brien, Dylan 85555 Burglary Serrano, Hector 88939 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I Pardon, Timothy 89696 Manu/Dist/Del/Disp or Poss W/I, Tax Violation Williams, Lonnie 210141 Driving Under Revoked License (2 counts) ROSALYN COTTON, CHAIR NEBRASKA BOARD OF PAROLE November 15, 2019

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • LEGAL NOTICES LEGACY DESIGN STRATEGIES 9859 South 168th Avenue Omaha, NE 68136 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION 1. The name of the Limited Liability Company is HERMAN APARTMENTS, LLC 2. The address of the designated office of the company is 105 West 5th Street, Herman, NE 68029.

3. The purpose for which the company is organized is to engage in any and all business which is lawful under the Uniform Limited Liability Company Act of the State of Nebraska.

4. The company commenced its existence on October 7, 2019, and the period of duration of the Company shall be perpetual.

5. The affairs of the company shall be conducted by its Members in accordance with the company’s operating agreement.

Andrew C. Sigerson, P.C., L.L.O. First publication November 1, 2019, final November 15, 2019 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF JC LAWN AND LANDSCAPING, LLC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that JC Lawn and Landscaping, LLC (the “Company”) has been organized under the laws of the State of Nebraska.

The Designated Office Address of the Company is 10313 Fowler Avenue, Omaha, Nebraska 68134. The Registered Agent of the Company is Jamie Florian, 10313 Fowler Ave, Omaha, Nebraska 68134.

First publication November 15, 2019, final November 29, 2019 ALLAN M. ZIEBARTH, Attorney 1702 South 10 Street, Suite 2 Omaha, Nebraska 68108 NOTICE OF ORGANIZATION OF AGAPE COUNSELING, LLC Designated Office: 1702 S. 10 St., Suite 2, Omaha, NE 68108 Initial Agent/Address For Service: Allan M. Ziebarth/1702 S. 10 St., Suite 2, Omaha, NE 68108 First publication November 8, 2019, final November 22, 2019

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19

Funerals are going green: Biodegradable caskets, water-based cremation.

by Abdel Jimenez

Seven years ago Jack Davenport, co-owner of Davenport Family Funeral Homes and Crematory, was approached with what seemed to be an unusual request.

A family trying to grant the last wishes of a loved one wanted the body buried in a biotRends degradable casket to allow for natural decomposition.

Davenport, 53, was able to accommodate the family, and in the process launched a new line of business that caters to environmentally conscious families. His firm now offers biodegradable caskets and shrouds, which are typically a linen cloth used to wrap the body of the deceased.

“I do this because the environmental, green movement is growing,” Davenport said. “Some families don’t want cremation. They want a burial … their mentality is that what comes from the earth will have to return back to it.”

Green burials aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions caused by cremations and toxic chemicals used for embalming a body. And as consumers become more conscious about the products and services they use, Illinois funeral homes are ramping up their green burial services to a small but growing client base interested in reducing their carbon footprint, even in death.

Several funeral homes in the state offer services in which the body is buried in the ground in biodegradable materials like willow, seagrass or bamboo. Other green options include biodegradable urns and a water-based alternative to cremation called alkaline hydrolysis.

According to a 2019 survey from the National Funeral Directors Association, less than 20% of funeral homes across the country performed green funeral services in the past year. And some funeral homes are limited by state laws in what they can offer. But demand for green funeral services is growing, so much so that the funeral directors group now offers a green funeral practice certificate.

Davenport, who has funeral homes in the Chicago suburbs of Barrington, Lake Zurich and Crystal Lake, Ill., said his firm has performed about eight green burials so far this year.

“By and large it’s a request by the deceased,” Davenport said. “It’s something that’s preplanned by families.”

Proximity has helped Davenport in his effort to offer green burials. Davenport said his funeral homes are only a few miles away from Windridge Memorial Park and Nature Sanctuary, a cemetery in Cary, Ill., that has a nature trail dedicated to natural burials.

The 48-acre cemetery has been offering natural burial sites along the trail for a number of years, Windridge family service manager Kelly Lawyer said. The cemetery is plotting an additional 400 natural gravesites at a different location on the property, Lawyer said.

Illinois state law does not require bodies to be buried in caskets, although cemeteries typically require gravesites to have some type of reinforced concrete box — either a vault or a grave liner — to keep the ground level and prevent settling. A handful of cemeteries are willing to waive the vault requirement and allow natural burials, at least on a portion of their properties.

It’s unclear exactly how many many Illinois cemeteries reserve sections for natural burials, but Lawyer said she knows of at least four, including one in Springfield and another in Vernon Hills, Ill. Marion Friel, owner of Green Burials of Love in Chicago, said she also uses Windridge for green burials, a service she has been offering since 2010.

Last year Friel helped Cheryl Barnes, of Chicago, set up a green burial for her 66-year-old sister, who died of uterine cancer on Dec. 28. Barnes said she was able to honor her sister’s last request, which was “to be put in a bag and then be put in the ground under a tree.”

Barnes said her sister was wrapped in a light shroud and buried next to a tree near a hill at the Windridge

nature trail.

“I thought I had to settle for a second-rate of what my sister wanted,” Barnes said. “But I was able to give my sister exactly what she wanted.”

The overall cost to Barnes was about $6,000, with the majority of the expenses coming from the burial, she said.

According to the funeral directors group, the cost of a traditional funeral service and a burial can go up to $9,000 for the entire service. Green burials tend to be less expensive because the process removes embalming chemicals and vaults to allow the body to naturally decay.

But additional services like the ceremony can sometimes offset any savings, Friel said.

The availability of green burial options varies by state and locality.

Traci Macz, owner of Irvin Macz and Day Macz Funeral Homes in Sandoval, Ill., doesn’t offer natural burials yet. Macz said she’s been working with local leaders to reserve a section in the city-operated Sandoval Cemetery for green burials. Currently, she educates families about other green options available to them like less harmful embalming fluids or biodegradable urns.

“For us, having two young sons, we have to set the bar and educate consumers on what is available to them,” Macz said. “That why it was important for us to get the green funeral practice certificate from the National Funeral Directors Association.”

Jimmy Olson, owner of Olson Funeral Home and Cremation Service in Sheboygan, Wis., said state law wouldn’t allow his funeral home to accommodate a family’s request to perform alkaline hydrolysis, a water-based cremation process that breaks down the body to liquid and bone using water and either sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide.

The relatively new process is sometimes referred to as flameless cremation, resomation and aquamation.

“It’s so new. We are all trying to find a way to explain it and offer it to consumers,” Kurt Soffee, a funeral home director in Murray, Utah and a spokesman for the national funeral directors group, said of the process.

Several states, like Wisconsin, do not yet permit alkaline hydrolysis. Olson said he found a funeral home in Minnesota that was able to accommodate the family’s request.

“I’ve spent the last year working with (Wisconsin) state Sen. Patty Schachtner to pass a bill that will allow for alkaline hydrolysis,” Olson said.

Although Illinois has allowed alkaline hydrolysis since 2012, only a handful of funeral homes have the equipment to perform it.

Matt Baskerville, who owns four funeral homes under the names Reeves and Baskerville in Illinois, said he began offering the service to clients shortly after it became legal in the state.

Baskerville, who refers to the process as flameless cremation, said it’s a much greener option because it does not burn fossil fuels or release emissions. The funeral home charges about $3,000 for alkaline hydrolysis, which is a little more than cremation services because the firm has to use another company to perform the process, Baskerville said.

“I think there are so many different forms of green funerals. Many shades of green,” Baskerville said. “A natural funeral can involve no harmful embalming products or using biodegradable caskets, or it can also include purchasing locally owned flowers. People are more conscious of this today.”

Barnes, who visited her sister’s gravesite a couple of weeks ago at the Windridge cemetery, said she hopes more people will consider the greener options.

“My sister, at the time, she did not want to be embalmed or put in a box,” Barnes said. “I hope people realize all they’re doing is putting chemicals into the ground when the body is filled with embalming fluids.” ©2019 Chicago Tribune Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

20

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

UPCOMING

SECTIONS

IN THE MIDLANDS BUSINESS JOURNAL

NOVEMBER 22

ARCHITECTURE

WOMEN IN BUSINESS NOVEMBER 29

Lorem ipsum

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS

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CONVENTIONS, MEETINGS & TRADESHOWS

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You may email us your insertion orders directly, or fax them to us at (402) 758-9315. We will acknowledge receiving your instructions.

REGIONAL LANDSCAPES

Briefs…

Bright Health has began offering individual and family plans to Nebraskans statewide as well as offering Medicare Advantage plans in the greater Omaha area in 2020. Bright Health developed its plans in collaboration with Nebraska Health Network, an Accountable Care Organization whose network includes the Methodist Health System and Nebraska Medicine-Nebraska Medical Center. The company has received regulatory approval from the Nebraska Department of Insurance and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to offer health plans during this fall’s open enrollment period.

At the conclusion of the Nebraska State Bar Association’s Annual Meeting in October, it was decided that Steve Mattoon will accept the gavel from outgoing NSBA President J. Scott Paul. Mattoon, of Sidney, will succeed J. Scott Paul as president-elect and will serve as NSBA president from October 2019 to October 2020. Mattoon is a partner with Matzke, Mattoon, Martens & Strommen, L.L.C. His representation in the oil and gas industry includes title opinion examinations in more than 20 counties in Western and Southwestern Nebraska, both for drilling purposes and for division order purposes, and extensive practice before the Nebraska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

Access Systems has been recognized by CRN, a brand of The Channel Company, as a 2019 Triple Crowd Award winner. CRN Triple Crown Award winners rank among the largest IT solution providers in North America in terms of revenue on the Solution Provider 500 list. It is also among the fastest-growing organizations in the channel today on the Fast Growth 150 list and has made the Tech Elite 250 list by receiving the highest-level certifications from leading vendors. Now in its sixth year, the Triple Crown Award is awarded to the top solution providers in North America based on revenue, growth, and technical expertise.

OCI’s new headquarters is complete and the company has officially opened. Located at 4221 North 203rd Street, the 65,000 square foot, three-story building will be the first multitenant Class A office structure in the Elkhorn area. The building will include a covered parking garage and a top floor deck overlooking the Indian Creek Golf Course. OCI’s 56 employees will occupy the second floor and a portion of the third. Also moving into OCI’s building will be independent mutual fund service provider, Ultimus Fund Solutions. Ultimus employs over 750 professionals in the financial services industry.

Health care notes…

The University of Nebraska Medical Center is seeking women living with breast cancer to participate in a study exploring physical activity’s relationship with cancer and cognition. Participants will be randomized to an exercise group or a usual care group. Women in the exercise group will participate in a 12-week exercise program consisting of exercise sessions with a fitness trainer three times per week.

All participants will be asked to complete two testing visits and a set of questionnaires before the study begins and again three months later.

Participants will also be invited to complete a brain MRI at UNMC, but this is not required for participation in the study.

Caring for a loved one with dementia can be overwhelming — physically, mentally, socially and financially. Researchers at the University of Nebraska Medical Center and University of California San Francisco recently published

a study in a major medical journal that found those with dementia had a 73% increased use of the emergency room if their caregivers suffered from depression. Among the 663 caregivers 84 had depression when the study started.

Emergency room use was higher among those whose caregivers had depression, versus those who did not have depression.

Education notes…

The University of Nebraska at Omaha’s competitive flight team placed third overall at the National Intercollegiate Flying Association’s Region VI Safety and Flight Evaluation Conference competition. This marks the 11th consecutive year that UNO has qualified. Last year, the Flying Mavs placed ninth overall at the national competition. All members of the Flying Mavs are students in UNO’s Aviation Institute.

The University of Nebraska Medical Center Alumni Association announced recipients of its annual awards. Recipients include: College of Medicine: Peter Whitted, Distinguished Alumnus Award; Kelly Caverzagie, Dedication to Student Excellence Award; and Sheritta Strong, Early Career Achievement Award. College of Nursing: Lynne Buchanan, Distinguished Alumnus Award; Michelle Young, Nursing Excellence Award; and LaDonna Tworek, Honorary Alumnus Award. College of Pharmacy: Gary Stroy, Distinguished Alumnus Award. Graduate Studies Program Alumni: Gary Sieck, Distinguished Alumnus Award; Christine Cutucache, Early Career Achievement Award; and David Crouse, Honorary Alumnus Award.

College of Dentistry: Charles (Fritz) Craft, Distinguished Service Award; Eugene Keller, D.D.S., Alumni Achievement Award; Jennifer Kallio, Honorary Life Membership; and Henry St. Germain, Jr., Outstanding Educator Award.

Metropolitan Community College is bringing Science On a Sphere to Omaha, an interactive experience that will make science come to life for visitors. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Science On a Sphere is six feet in diameter and features weather patterns, animal migrations, ocean temperatures, the surface of Mars and many other educational displays. The College will host an unveiling on Dec. 7. MCC’s Science On a Sphere will be permanently located at MCC North Express. MCC Continuing Education will begin offering classes featuring Science On a Sphere in December as part of its winter course lineup. The noncredit classes will focus on weather, space exploration, climate change, bird migrations and more.

Activities of Nonprofits…

In celebration of the 25th anniversary, The Iowa Women’s Foundation has awarded a total of $100,000 to 11 organizations across the state to fund Core Grant programs for 2020, raising the total granted to nearly $1 million. IWF works to improve the lives of Iowa’s women and girls. Grants are awarded to projects that focus primarily on serving the needs and aspirations of women and girls.

To this end, six specific areas have been identified: employment, childcare, housing, education/training, transportation, and mentoring. Programs must address one or more of the barriers to be considered for a grant.

Oxbow Animal Health announced the recipients of its 2019 Oxbow Animal Health Rescue Grants. The 10 recipient organizations will receive funding and donations totaling nearly $25,000 for a variety of Continued on next page.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

21

REGIONAL LANDSCAPES Continued from preceding page. projects and programs that benefit the welfare of small animals throughout the United States and Canada. The 2019 recipients are: Toronto Humane Society, The Rabbit Haven, The Raptor Trust, Minnesota Pocket Pet Rescue, Bunnies and Beyond, Inc., Arizona Animal Welfare League, Inc., Second Chance Wildlife Center, Hops-A-Lot Rabbit Rescue, Central Missouri Humane Society, and The Bunny Bunch.

Metro Omaha Tobacco Action Coalition named Lucia J. Rodriguez-Alvizo its new coalition coordinator. As MOTAC’s Coalition Coordinator, Rodriguez-Alvizo is responsible for ensuring successful implementation of MOTAC’s work to reduce tobacco use and prevent and reduce the use of other harmful nicotine products. She will also participate in the public education, prevention and public policy efforts related to the health and economic consequences in the Omaha area. Raised in Omaha, Rodriguez-Alvizo graduated from Omaha South High Magnet School, received her bachelor’s degree in health administration and policy from Creighton University, and earned her Master of Public Health from the University of Washington.

Arts and Events…

The Community Health Endowment of Lincoln is hosting a talk on Vaping – A New Public Health Threat on Nov. 19 at 2 p.m. The use of electronic cigarettes — also known as vaping — is in the news nearly

every day. Learn more about what vaping looks like in Lincoln, hear a personal story about e-cigarette addiction, and find out what you can do to help the community. This talk is presented in partnership with the Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department.

Creighton University will host two lectures focusing on two overlooked chapters in the history of U.S. - Mexican relations during International Education Week, Nov. 18 through Nov. 22. The lectures are free and open to the public. The first lecture on Nov. 19 is presented by Francisco Balderrama, Ph.D., and Christine Valenciana, Ph.D., and is titled “From Research to Social Justice: Expulsion of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans during the Great Depression.” The lecture will take place from 5:30 p.m. to 7:15 p.m. in the Harper Center auditorium. A book signing will follow. Balderrama is professor emeritus of American History and Chicano Studies at California State University, Los Angeles, and the co-author of Decade of Betrayal: Mexican Repatriation in the 1930s.

Creighton University will host two lectures focusing on two overlooked chapters in the history of U.S. - Mexican relations during International Education Week, Nov. 18 through Nov. 22. The lectures are free and open to the public. On Nov. 20 from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m., Amy Greenberg, Ph.D., will present “A Wicked War: The 1846 U.S. Invasion of Mexico” in the Skutt Student Center Ballroom. A book signing will follow.

Bemis Center for Contemporary

report discusses how prepared Nebraska’s private business owners say they are for transitioning their businesses to next-generation owners, risk factors impacting the potential salability issues and insights that current owners can use to improve their individual exit success probability. The presentation is free. The Omaha event will be held Nov. 21 from 3 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Omaha Marriott at the Capitol District.

The Durham Museum will host its annual fundraiser, Sentimental Journey, on Nov. 22. The theme of this year’s event is Sentimental Journey: Coming Together and it will celebrate the museum’s efforts to bring the community together through exhibitions, programs, events and education. The event will begin at 6 p.m. with a cocktail and hors d’oeuvres reception, followed by dinner in front of The Durham’s Christmas tree in the Suzanne and Walter Scott Great Hall.

Proceeds will benefit exhibition and educational programming at The Durham Museum.

For more information on sponsoring a table or purchasing tickets, please contact The Durham Museum.

75% of all drug users are employed.* Are you covered?

[Drug Testing] Drug testing includes urine, hair,

MEETINGS AND SEMINARS Tuesday, Nov. 19 The Business Ethics Alliance is hosting its Fall Mind Candy Dialouge on Should Omaha Businesses Care? An Immigration Conversation from 7:10 a.m. to 8:45 a.m. at Temple Israel. Questions include: does immigration matter if your business doesn’t employ immigrants; what is the ecomonic impact immigrants have on our community; how do the different ways to immigrate effect how businesses see imigrants; and what are the ethical immigration questions businesses face? Registration is avalible online.

The Greater Omaha Chamber is hosting the Economic Outlook Luncheon from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Embassy Suites Omaha - La Vista. This year’s luncheon will include discussion on the overall business climate, economic performance, emerging trends, attitudes toward future growth and how it all compares to other businesses within the Greater Omaha area, and throughout the nation will satisfy your appetite for relevant information, performance data and perceptions. The keynote speech will be given by Amy Liu, vice president and director of the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings and the Adeline M. and Alfred I. Johnson Chair in Urban and Metropolitan Policy.

The Heartland Women’s Network is hosting its November luncheon from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at The Amazing Pizza Machine. Angela Chaney, creative writer and partner at Pixel Fire Marketing, will be presenting new ways to approach engagement. Registration is available online.

The Greater Omaha Chamber and the Advance Southwest Iowa Corporation have teamed up for a Meet-and-Greet at Kitchen Council from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.

President and CEO of the Greater Omaha

Arts invites the public to the opening and reception of Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens: Look, it’s daybreak, dear, time to sing and Jillian Mayer: TIMESHARE on Nov. 20 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. The free event will include the artists speaking about their respective exhibitions starting at 6:30 p.m. The exhibitions are on view through February 15, 2020.

Heartland Family Service is honoring four families and a family advocate from the Omaha metro area on Nov. 21 at Happy Hollow Club as part of its 37th “Salute to Families” program. This occasion is particularly special because it is being held during National Family Week. This year’s “Salute to Families” honorees are: Leadership — Tonia & Ray Aranza; Community Service — Melissa & Matthew Graves; Challenged & Successful — Grace & Nicole Burns; Commitment to Family — Kate Mahern & Gary Fischer; and Family Advocate — Diane Cochran.

The Exit Planning Institute completed its statewide survey of the Nebraska business community and will reveal the results via its State of Owner Readiness Report. The

Chamber, David G. Brown and Executive Director of Advance Southwest Iowa Corporation, Paula Hazlewood invite guests to relax, have a snack and discuss how the two organizations can better serve you.

Wednesday, Nov. 20 SBDC Iowa, Iowa Western Community College and the Council Bluffs Chamber of Commerce have teamed up for a workshop called Click & Mortar from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at IWCC. This workshop is for anyone that has a brick and mortar business. With online technologies, it is getting imperative that brick and mortar businesses consider additional ways to generate income.

The workshop will talk about integrating the brick and mortar model with new models including eCommerce, social media selling, pop up shops, markets, etc.

The Accounting & Financial Women’s Alliance Omaha Chapter is hosting its Fall CPE Seminar from 7:30 a.m. to 12 p.m. at the Courtyard at Marriott Omaha in Aksarben Village. The economy session will focus on the impacts of trade disputes and tariffs on the economy. The ethics session will connect ethics to fraud by tying it to the fraud triangle.

Learn how to identify questionable behavior and fraud, and understand the ethical ramifications of being a “whistle blower”.

Registration for the seminar is online.

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• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

Helping veterans launch startups: ‘There’s a level of resilience that a lot of people in the military have

by Corilyn Shropshire

Ask Navy veteran-turned-entrepreneur Todd Connor to describe the experience of leaving military service and his answer goes something like this: Imagine you are a successful lawyer in Seattle, and then your career ends on a entRepReneuRs Friday. By Monday you’re living in San Antonio and can have any career you want, except being a lawyer. Figure it out.

Pretty disorienting, yes? About 200,000 newly minted veterans confront that reality each year, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs.

While leaving their personal and professional network behind can be a struggle for veterans, Connor, 41, believes the upside is that vets have a unique skill set that makes them natural entrepreneurs: discipline, leadership, expertise in team-building, making do with limited resources, an ability to solve problems on the fly and resilience, he said.

What they often lack, however, are the networks and capital to get their ideas off the ground.

“It’s not a talent gap, it’s not a capacity gap, but a network gap,” said Connor, founder and CEO of Bunker Labs, a national nonprofit for veterans, based in Chicago.

Data shows he’s correct: A November 2018 study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found that while veterans are more likely to be self-employed, there’s been a noted decline in veteran entrepreneurial activity. That’s despite the fact that there’s evidence many new veterans — 20% to 25% of those just coming out of the military — want to run their own business, according to the study.

Policymakers need to pay attention to whether veterans are having a harder time accessing financing and support to launch their businesses, the study recommended.

Its authors said while statistics on veterans’ access to capital are limited, “The data, for the first time, provide substantial evidence that veteran-owned businesses face greater difficulty in accepting capital relative to nonveteran-owned businesses.”

Connor, who spent four years in the

Navy before his exit in 2004, in 2014 launched Bunker Labs, which has grown to 28 chapters across the country with the mission of helping vets and their families launch and grow their own businesses.

Bunker’s strategy is to connect vets with the training, funding, mentoring and networking needed to pursue their goals, through online and in-person events, corporate sponsorships and partnerships. Its roster of vet entrepreneurs is diverse: 26% female, 18% black and 20% Latino.

Since Bunker’s launch, startups participating in its program have raised more than $80 million in capital and created more than 1,900 jobs, according to its most recent annual report.

“If we can unlock their (veterans’) potential, we can have profound economic impact on this country that’s much bigger than the vet community,” Connor said.

The Tribune talked to three Chicago-based veterans who’ve recently started their own businesses and sought assistance from the nonprofit. Here are their stories: Mindfulness expert It took Schmid Etienne two years to realize he’d been traumatized by the weeks he spent in New Orleans in 2005 as an Army National Guardsman patrolling the streets, passing out food and cleaning up debris in the weeks after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the city.

For Etienne, 37, it was a smell that sent his mind hurtling back to the devastation and suffering he’d seen. At a summer barbecue, smelling marinated beef thrown on a grill, he had a flashback to the front door of a pungent, flood-ravaged home of a survivor who refused to leave her house for fear of losing it.

Schmid Etienne is co-founder of R.E.S.S.E.T., a company that teaches people how to manage stress and anxiety.

Schmid is a veteran of the Army National Guard who suffered from PTSD after serving in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

After more than 10 years, several jobs, and hours of psychotherapy and training, Etienne has turned that trauma into what he calls his life’s work — a business that

Age-proofing a home won’t come cheap Continued from page 12.

Austin home with the intention of staying there for a long time. After living in California, Virginia and elsewhere in Texas, they moved to Austin in 2012 and, within a year, began drawing plans with an architect for an energy-efficient home to age in place.

Their home was featured this summer in Austin’s annual Cool House Tour for its design making the most of natural light, cross-ventilation and solar panels, as well as wider-than-normal doorways and level floors for a wheelchair.

One key feature of the construction acknowledges that they might need live-in help down the road to avoid long-term nursing care. Just as the Cavners may convert a bedroom and bath on the opposite side of their new home into caregiver quarters, the Dilles constructed a second floor above their detached garage that could easily convert into living space.

“We think having a separate apartment where we could have a caretaker or part-

time help to maintain our property makes us able to stay where we’d like to be and be independent,” said Don Dille, who retired from the federal government.

But, as adults consider whether to plunge ahead with simple modifications or undertake more extensive renovations, there are always unknowns.

Cavner, an investment adviser and co-founder of a new health care startup, said he believes what they’re spending to renovate the house for the years ahead will prove a sound investment. “The modifications we’re making are not going to make it less desirable. It will feel more spacious.”

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a national health policy news service. It is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation which is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente. ©2019 Kaiser Health News Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

aims to teach people to use their senses to manage their trauma, stress and anxiety and achieve a sense of mindfulness.

In 2017, he co-founded R.E.S.S.E.T. Studio — the name stands for Reduce Environmental Stimuli (for) Self Evaluation Technique — after extensive entrepreneurial coaching at Bunker Labs.

Etienne said he wasn’t looking necessarily for money, but for support and guidance on building and running a business.

R.E.S.S.E.T. regularly conducts stress management seminars at law firms, and Etienne and business partner Lauren Ruckheim are pursuing universities, therapeutic practices and other corporate clients. The business has also designed a card deck people can use to help reset their mind.

Bunker Labs has helped Etienne polish his marketing strategy and his dream client list.

“We got the chance to sit down with different mentors and go through the idea,” he said. “And the good thing about it is was everyone had a military mindset, so we talked directly. It wasn’t ‘Oh my God, we’re going to protect your feelings,’ it was all coming out of a space of love, like ‘I care for your business. I want to see your business succeed.’”

Yoga instructor Army veteran Melissa Leger said she found her people when she joined Bunker Labs last year to help get her Chicago-based yoga instruction company, Mindful Yoga Chicago, up and running.

Years before, while living in Florida, Leger left a job in finance to open yoga studios, because the rat race had just gotten to be too much. “I was doing what I was supposed to do … in the corporate world. … I got super depressed,” she said. “I was having a tough time making it through the day.”

But after successfully operating two yoga studios, the stress and lack of worklife balance returned.

When Leger and her husband moved to Chicago in 2018, she took a year off to figure out what she was going to do.

She worked part-time at the Park District, she said, and decided to partner with institutions to offer accessible, affordable yoga classes for beginners, the less limber and those who couldn’t afford fancy yoga studios.

“I found there were different ways to build a community and teach people yoga without having all the extra stuff that comes with running a studio,” she said.

Alix Hildal, 28, left, instructs a Mindful Yoga Chicago class at Sheil Community Center Park in Lake View on Nov. 6, 2019.

She is one of the instructors that are part of veteran Melissa Leger’s yoga instruction company started through Bunker Labs.

Weekly meetings with other veteran entrepreneurs at Bunker Labs last year helped Leger make connections. Now she’s helping other veterans who come to Bunker, sharing her business expertise and networking with like-minded people.

“There’s a level of resilience that a lot of people in the military have, which is great for running your own business, because it’s not easy,” she said.

Fitness proponent Air Force vet Jeff Branham’s relationship with Bunker Labs started with him on the other side of the table. A few weeks into starting his job as a consultant at Deloitte in 2015, Branham worked with Connor to expand Bunker Labs beyond Chicago.

Branham, 36, always had entrepreneurial ambitions, and it was Connor who encouraged him. “I just had to find the right idea that I’m passionate enough about so I could grow it,” he said.

A longtime competitive athlete, Branham said he found it difficult to keep up his workout routine on a consultant’s schedule.

“People would stay up super late. Dinner and drinks, that’s the way people would network,” said Branham, who left the Air Force in 2013.

While still at Deloitte, he offered to build wellness sessions into client conferences — carving out time in the morning dedicated to shared workouts. He’d line up the gym — finding a spinning studio or another fitness studio and send out a sign-up list. It caught on, and he decided to launch a business, MyFitlink, a fitness concierge service that works with companies to turn networking and corporate team-building and leadership events into fitness gatherings, shedding suits, ties and heels for workout gear and smoothies.

Branham works in the tech sector during the day and as a “nightime CEO” at MyFitlink.

Joining Bunker Labs’ community has been meaningful, Branham said. “The ability to say anything and ask for what you need in a veteran network is palpable, because a lot of times, other people won’t understand,” he said. ©2019 Chicago Tribune Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

When ‘just being yourself’ doesn’t come naturally

by Liz Reyer

Q: I hate it when people tell me to “just be yourself” when I’m uncomfortable. I’m just not sure what that means because I feel like I’m someone different WoRkplace in different parts of my life. How do I figure out who my authentic self is?

-Mari, 31, project manager A: This is a deep question that is worth the effort it’ll take you to think through.

First it’ll help to get your nerves out of the way. There are surely times when you feel more at ease than at others. Use this as your baseline.

What are you doing at these times? Think about who you’re with (or if you’re by your-

self), the activity you’re doing, and where you are.

Notice your emotions in these moments.

How would you describe the positive feelings you have?

Finally, how does feeling at ease show up in your body?

Conversely, what are your emotional and physical manifestations of tension or anxiety?

Emotionally, you may be feeling any of a host of emotions. Physically, you may clench your jaw or limit your breathing.

By mirroring your good feelings and paying attention to your emotional and physical responses to stress, you can help open the door Continued on page 24.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

A section prepared by the staff of the Midlands Business Journal

23

Women in Business A section prepared by the staff of the Midlands Business Journal

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Architecture overview • Environmentally conscious design Renovations and rebuilding • New building tech • AIA Nebraska Omaha’s changing landscape • Career outlook • Interior design trends

Women in Business overview • Leadership Female entrepreneurs • CEOs, senior executives Emphasis on culture • Area educational institutions

Issue Date:November 22 • Ad Deadline:November 14

Issue Date:November 22 • Ad Deadline:November 14

Mergers & Acquisitions A section prepared by the staff of the Midlands Business Journal

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Conventions, Meetings & Trade Shows

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Mergers & Acquisitions • Business partners • All about deals Acquiring technology assets • Business after an M&A

Convention • Exhibit/booth dispay • Budgeting • Venue • Marketing Interactive experiences • Environmental responsibility • Inclusivity

Issue Date:November 29 • Ad Deadline:November 21

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24

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

A tough row to hoe as farmers age: Young ones can’t buy land

by Adam Belz

Kristin Pearson is that rarest of breeds: a young farmer in Minnesota on the cusp of buying land.

The 31-year-old grows organic vegetables on a few acres near Rochester and wants to buy land near Lake City. It agRicultuRe hasn’t been easy.

To get the loans she needs, she must rent out most of the acres she hopes to buy to the current farmer. And her boyfriend, who has a full-time job, must sell his house. Even with all that, her application could still be denied.

“It feels like an uphill battle,” Pearson said. “But between my boyfriend’s salary, the business growing over the next couple of years, and renting the land to the current farmer, we’ll cover the mortgage on the land. On paper I think we meet all the criteria.”

Farmers and the people who own farmland in America are aging, but they and their heirs are consolidating their grip on the nation’s arable land. And it’s nearly impossible for a beginning farmer to buy land.

To start with, land is scarce, prices are high and it’s difficult to know when acres become available. Marketing is more often by word of mouth rather than conventional listing.

“We don’t make new farmland,” said Thom Petersen, Minnesota’s commissioner of agriculture. “In fact we lose farmland every day, so it’s a real challenge.”

Meanwhile, trusts keep farmland with families even after a farmer dies. New farmers must also contend with the high costs of farm equipment.

Compared with other states, Minnesota does a lot to assist beginning farmers. The state offers a tax credit of up to $32,000 to buy land or other assets, low-interest loans through the Rural Finance Authority and subsidies for financial management education.

Yet only 6% of Minnesota farmland is owned by people under 35, Petersen said. Even buying a modest plot of land is excruciatingly difficult, as Pearson has discovered.

Pearson, who grew up in Rochester, got the “bug” for growing food in college. She worked at a couple of farms after she graduated, managed a farm in Maine for four years and then returned to Minnesota to start her own farm in 2017.

She rented 4.5 acres north of Rochester

and started Pearson Organics, where she grows more than 50 types of vegetables that she sells directly to consumers through a CSA (community-supported agriculture) program.

She’s built two greenhouses for growing seedlings and a cooler where she stores washed vegetables. On a cool day in late October, she and Jay Acker, her only employee, pried bunches of carrots loose in the soil with a pitchfork and knocked the dirt off before tossing them into buckets. Most of the year’s vegetables had been picked or pulled from the ground by then. Some scallions, lettuce and Brussels sprouts remained.

“We maxed out 4 acres quickly, and now we need more land,” Pearson said. “It’s either move the farm to a large piece of leased land, or just move the farm to somewhere we own, which makes a lot more sense.”

Navigating the maze Earlier this year, Pearson found 100 acres for sale on Zillow near Lake City. She knew from the beginning she wouldn’t be able to make a down payment on the land. She would have to get a loan from the Farm Service Agency (FSA).

“The first thing you have to do to qualify for an FSA loan is be denied by a bank,” Pearson said. “So I called three different banks and just kind of gave them the outline, and they said, ‘Oh, you don’t have $130,000 to put down?

Goodbye.’?”

In late June, she first applied for a loan from the FSA. It turned out that since the land is bare, she had to make plans to build a home on it and

include an estimate in the FSA application. So she hired architects. A new home also requires a well and a septic tank, so soil conservationists had to make sure the land isn’t a wetland.

And since she won’t be able to scale up her farm from 4 acres to 50 in a year, she’ll have to continue to rent the land to the current farmer and gradually take more land for her own operation. That requires a variance from the FSA, which she had to request.

Recently, she was waiting for an estimate on the home she wants to build so she could finalize the FSA application. It looks like the financing will be a joint loan from the FSA and Compeer Financial, she said.

“My project for this afternoon is to print everything I need, so that when I get the estimate back I can file the application immediately,” she said recently.

If everything goes well, the deal will close some time in 2020.

Pearson is buying land with the help of Brett Olson, a farmland access navigator who works for a Minneapolis-based organization called Renewing the Countryside. The group, several government agencies and an ag lender — Compeer Financial — have created a Farmland Access Hub to help beginning farmers think through their business and their borrowing options, then help them find land to buy.

Olson said high land prices are the biggest obstacle for beginning farmers. But there are others. Often, he said, farmland will be sold before anyone knows it’s on the market.

by Carla Fried

smart financial decisions. Intelligence isn’t what’s lacking. We often know the mechanics of what is a good or bad financial strategy. But our decisions are often held hostage by our emotions.

For instance, our fight-or-flight kicks in when stock markets plunge.

Another example: We tend to be overly wedded to what we paid for something. Waiting for an investment that has fallen in value to “just get back to break-even” has a strong emotional pull. But this bias, called anchoring, can keep us from dropping a loser and reinvesting in something with better long-term prospects.

One more: Recency bias could be a lurking risk in your retirement portfolio right now. This is a quirk that makes us overly focused on what we’ve been experiencing lately, like a 10-year bull market for stocks. Your stocks have been doing so well for so long, you – even if only subconsciously – assume the good times will continue. But we know bear markets happen.

That’s an argument for rebalancing your portfolio to make sure you have the right mix of stocks, bonds and cash. When was the last time you did that?

Separate research from Morningstar and Vanguard estimates that a financial adviser’s biggest value-add can be in helping a client navigate the emotional speed bumps that get in the way of reaching long-term goals. Sure, investment advice is important. Tax planning can be a solid win, especially in retirement planning But both studies agreed: The role of adviser as financial shrink/behavioral coach has the biggest potential payoff. In Vanguard’s estimation, a good adviser might be able to boost net performance for a client about 3 percentage points over the long term, with half of that value-add being the result of helping a client steer clear of behavioral biases.

Yet that’s not what individuals think is important. Morningstar recently surveyed nearly

Your financial adviser’s job No. 1: Protect you from yourself There are plenty of good reasons to seek out the help of a financial adviser. Your personal-finance plate is likely quite Financial full: Save for retirement.

Save for emergencies.

Save your sanity when staring at college cost estimates.

A good pro will of course be able to help you sort through your financial life and develop a plan for how best to proceed.

But actually, that’s the easy part. Where an adviser can add the most value is serving as a financial psychologist of sorts. Chances are you’ve heard something about behavioral economics, a field of research that has established how our humanness gets in the way of making

When ‘just being yourself’ doesn’t come naturally Continued from page 22. to just being yourself.

It’s easy — just do a quick body scan to see if you’re holding in anywhere that is making you less comfortable and then release the tension. No one will even know, but it’s a good way to keep your “real self” present. A couple of deep breaths will also help a lot.

Now, on to the authenticity piece. I wonder what it means when you say you’re someone different in different parts of your life. I doubt that you mean that you value different things; it’s likely more tied to how you behave.

Consider the following scenarios.

Imagine you’re going to meet with a new team. If you’re feeling grounded, you’re friendly but taking charge of the agenda as befits your role. But when you’re uncertain, you become tentative and this creates a leadership void.

Or flip it around. When you’re tense, you become aggressive and put people off, while when you’re at ease you create a collaborative

“It just doesn’t come up for sale,” Olson said. “People sell it to their neighbor, or they hear at church that someone’s looking, so it just never hits the open marketplace.”

Auctions require bidders to have large amounts of cash, which beginning farmers don’t have. And many baby boomers are choosing to transfer their land to their children in the form of a trust, which increases the ranks of landlords who don’t farm and may not be connected to farming at all.

Petersen said he’s concerned about corn and soybean production consolidating in the hands of even fewer farmers, because of how difficult it is for anyone but investors or already-large row crop farmers to buy the land.

But he’s encouraged by examples of young farmers — such as Pearson — finding ways to make money by growing specialty crops on smaller plots of land.

Though most don’t own any ground, there are nearly 2,000 more farmers under age 35 in Minnesota than there were in 2012, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

“To get into large-scale corn and soybean production is so financially intensive. If you don’t have a family or an in, that can be very difficult,” Petersen said. “The one thing I’d say gives me a lot of hope is farmers being creative and finding niches. It’s not all doom and gloom.” ©2019 Star Tribune (Minneapolis) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

environment.

So, who are you? Write out responses to the following prompts: • The values that are most important to me are …

• The behaviors I like to exhibit are …

• I have regrets when I …

• I would like my legacy to be …

If you want to break away from words, try making a poster that shows who you are.

Or find music that expresses you. The approach doesn’t matter — clarity of your authentic inner core is the goal.

Then combine it all. Take your inner vision, your insights into your emotional and physical selves, and your actions in various settings and put it all together.

Don’t expect a “one and done” here. This will take time. Go easy on yourself and enjoy the process! ©2019 Star Tribune (Minneapolis) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

700 people and more than 150 advisers and asked them to rank 15 services or attributes of an adviser from least important to most. The list included “can help me maximize returns,” “helps me reach my financial goals,” “has a clear fee structure so I know what I am paying for” and “helps me stay in control of my emotions.”

That last one was ranked dead last. We don’t value a service that research says could be the biggest help. This represented the second biggest disconnect between individuals and advisers in the Morningstar survey, as advisers ranked controlling emotions higher. The biggest gap was about portfolio performance. “Can help me maximize my returns” was ranked fourth-most important by individuals and 14th by advisers.

Those gaps suggest that individuals are looking for help in the wrong places.

A sign of a good adviser is one who doesn’t promise out-sized returns, let alone market-beating returns. An adviser who recommends building a core portfolio that aims to match the market by sticking with low-cost index mutual funds and exchange-traded funds is on the side of reason. Bucketloads of data sliced in a multitude of time frames have shown the odds of “beating the market” are extremely low in major asset classes such as large U.S. stocks and high-quality U.S. bonds. Anyone who insists they can buck those odds is not someone who will likely help you meet your long-term goals.

If you’re working with an adviser, or considering starting, recognize that a really good pro is going to earn his keep (yes, they are mostly men) by helping you stay committed to your strategy in the face of all the emotional tugs that want to pull you in the wrong direction. At the end of the day, helping you maximize your returns is highly dependent on helping you avoid behavioral biases. ©2019 Rate.com News Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

Partnering with investors boosts startups

by David Kubicek

Partnering with organizations that invest capital, expertise, or both, is helping many local entrepreneurs establish and grow their firms.

Dundee Venture Capital invests in high growth technology businesses that are based in traditionally underserved venture markets like Omaha and Lincoln, according to Associate Allie Esch.

The first investment is between $500,000 and $750,000 into a financing round of $1 million or more, and Dundee targets a minority ownership stake of 10% to 15%.

“When investing in technology or tech-enabled businesses, we look for an existing product in the market with happy, engaged customers,” Esch said.

“At the point that we invest, companies are looking to establish product-market fit and rapidly build revenue, usage predictability and defensibility in their market.”

Dundee VC’s highest volume source for investments is referrals from its network, which are from trusted relationships with non-lead venture capitals firms that want to co-invest, later-stage VC firms, entrepreneurs, limited partners and service providers.

“We also find a lot of companies by having our boots on the ground in 20 plus markets across the country,” Esch said.

“One way to approach us is by finding a mutual connection to introduce the company to Dundee VC once there is measurable traction, but we also enjoy a well-crafted, thoughtful cold email.”

NUtech is the technology transfer office for the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) campus and, through an agreement, the Kearney campus.

“Our main purpose is to see University of Nebraska technology transferred from the lab to the marketplace,” Executive Director Brad Roth said. “We patent, copyright and protect by contract technology that’s developed on campus, and we market that technology to firms which will develop it further into products.”

Dr. Brad Roth, president and executive director of NUtech Ventures.

The firms can be existing companies nology or exclusivity to the point where it or new ones started by the faculty, staff would protect what they are investing in or graduate students who developed the the markets they want to develop. technology.

NUtech licenses some technologies “We’ll work with them to make sure nonexclusively, so multiple companies they have a sound plan to take it out, can use them. then we’ll work with them to license the “There’s a lot of technology generated technology, and it becomes essentially a university startup company,” Roth said.

When there’s a new invention on campus, the developers disclose the appropriate information to NUtech, and the office evaluates the technology. As part of that disclosure process, NUtech asks the faculty, staff or grad student developers if they have any interest in starting their own company around their technology.

Startup companies will typically want either complete exclusivity to the tech-

25

on campus,” Roth said. “There are opportunities in our portfolio that aren’t licensed yet. We’re aggressively looking for startup and existing companies that would like to leverage those technologies and partner with us.”

Members of the Nebraska Angels provide funding to startup companies with high-growth potential and offer unique solutions to problems that impact large markets, Executive Director Stephanie Luebbe said.

“Companies need to be led by experienced, knowledgeable teams and have reached some level of paid customer base,” she said. “Angel investors seek opportunities that can allow for a ten times plus return on investment.”

The organization follows National Luebbe Venture Capital Association (NVCA)-style investor documents such as convertible preferred stock investments with a standard set of investor rights. Other items the organization’s investors want to understand include the competition, business model, how much capital is being raised and how it will be used to grow the business and potential exit strategies.

“Founders seeking funding can apply through our website,” Luebbe said. “Required documentation includes a pitch deck, cap table, term sheet — or anticipated term details — historical financials and three to five years pro forma.”

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26

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

In the Spotlight Paid Content LEGAL SERVICES

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Paragon IT Professionals, one of the most experienced IT staffing and software solutions providers in the Midwest, has welcomed Jason Randazzo to their Nebraskabased team.

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Margaret A. Rossiter has joined Fraser Stryker as an associate attorney in their business/ corporate law, insurance defense and litigation practice areas. Ms. Rossiter received her J.D. (cum laude) from Creighton University School of Law and two B.A. degrees from the University of Kansas. She is admitted to practice in Nebraska.

Nonprofit Tabitha, Nebraska’s industryleading Senior Care provider, has promoted Katie Lechner to Chief Operating Officer (COO). Since joining Tabitha in 2015, Lechner has been instrumental in developing and managing employee recruitment, retention and engagement levels along with culture. In addition, Lechner played a major role in creating a new workforce development program that encourages personal growth through continuing education, exploring new career pathways and providing key industry training and workshops.

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Jonathan graduated from Peru State College in May of 2016 with a B.S. in accounting. Jonathan has a driven work ethic and developed his leadership skills while working fulltime at McDonald’s where he attended the management program and became a department manager. Jonathan then moved into the accounting world and has expertise in Non-Profit Audit and Tax Returns, Governmental Auditing and Tax Preparation. Since 1951, O'Donnell, Ficenec, Wills & Ferdig, LLP, has been more than accounting.

They view every client relationship like a partnership and truly believe the firm’s success is a result of the clients' success. They take pride in giving assurance that the professional service a client receives comes from years of advanced training, technical experience and financial acumen and provide the highest quality of personalized auditing, tax, valuation, accounting and consulting services in response to the clients' specific and personal needs.

UNANIMOUS has promoted Rachel Schwindt to the marketing director of the Lincolnbased marketing and communications agency. Rachel joined the UNANIMOUS team in March of 2018 as a senior marketing consultant, leading the team’s efforts in research and communication strategies. During her time as a consultant, she’s led several internal initiatives to refine processes and procedures around the firm’s marketing services. Rachel also continues to seek out ways to create a welcoming and supportive work environment at UNANIMOUS, as she has built a customized onboarding and individual development process to recruit and retain top talent. In her new role, Rachel leads the marketing team and continues to spearhead projects of all sizes and scopes. Rachel holds a BS in business management from Peru State College and an MBA in management from the University of Nebraska at Omaha. She is currently certified in Google Ads search advertising and working towards her certification in Google Ads display advertising and becoming a Facebook Certified Digital Marketing Associate. Trent Wilcox, President of UNANIMOUS, said, “Rachel is a marketing prodigy, a strategic mastermind who is wise beyond her years. She takes time to connect with clients, listen, truly understand their business, and focuses intently on goals. Her ability to conduct thoughtful research, synthesize data, and construct impactful marketing plans is unmatched. As she continues to propel the UNANIMOUS marketing team to new heights, the promotion to Marketing Director made perfect sense. We are so glad to have her on our team!” UNANIMOUS is a Lincoln, Nebraska based agency that assists clients with branding, marketing, and web design. With over 350 active clients across 15 states, the agency is known for its collaborative style and prides itself on rhyme, reason, and results.

Midlands Business Journal • NOVEMBER 15, 2019 •

27

In the Spotlight Paid Content SENIOR CARE

ACCOUNTING SERVICES

ACCOUNTING SERVICES

ENGINEERING

Hired

Admitted

Admitted

Hired

Donn Raymond

Justin Hope

Jess Paisley

Roger M. Helgoth

Global Chief Financial Officer

Partner

Partner

Omaha Branch Manager

Seim Johnson

Seim Johnson

RJN’s Great Plains/ Midwest

Home Instead, Inc.

Home Instead, Inc. is proud to welcome Donn Raymond as Global Chief Financial Officer. He leads a team that oversees all aspects of the company’s financial portfolio and the strategic use of financial and human resources to help the company achieve its vision. As a member of the Executive Leadership Team, he provides leadership in support of Home Instead’s leading position and rapid domestic and international expansion in a dynamic growth industry. Raymond has more than 25 years’ experience in top-level finance and operation positions. The Home Instead Senior Care® network provides personalized care, support and education to help enhance the lives of aging adults and their families. Today, this network is the world's leading provider of in-home care services for seniors, with almost 1,200 independently owned and operated franchises providing 80 million hours of care each year throughout the United States and 13 other countries.

Justin Hope graduated Summa Cum Laude from Midland University and has been with the firm since 2008.

He provides audit, financial reporting, reimbursement and compliance services to entities in the senior living, senior services, healthcare and not-for-profit industries. Justin is also a frequent presenter on accounting and financial reporting topics for not-for-profit and healthcare entities. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) and the Nebraska Society of Certified Public Accountants (NSCPA), serving on the Not-For-Profit Committee of the NSCPA. Justin is also a member of the Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) Nebraska chapter, where he has successfully completed the requirements to be certified as a Fellow. Justin serves as the treasurer for the Board of Directors of the Down Syndrome Alliance of the Midlands as well as treasurer for the Board of Directors of Omaha Rodeo, Inc.

MARKETING

Jess Paisley received his bachelor of science degree in business administration, highest distinction, and master of professional accountancy degree from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and joined Seim Johnson in 2006. Jess specializes in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement consulting, financial reporting processes, and attestation and compliance services to healthcare and governmental units. He is a member of the AICPA, NSCPA and a fellow of the Nebraska chapter of HFMA, where he currently serves as secretary for the Board of Directors. Jess is also active in civic and social organizations, and serves as the treasurer on the Board of Directors of Rabble Mill, a not-forprofit organization that serves at-risk and disadvantaged youth.

NONPROFIT

Promoted

Added

Maddie Keast Account Manager, Content Strategist Anderson Partners

Anderson Partners has promoted Maddie Keast to account manager/ content strategist.

She will be the primary point of contact for several of the agency’s clients, oversee projects between agency teams and help ensure on-time and on-budget execution of deliverables. She will also help oversee the agency’s social media and content marketing efforts, ensure proper online messaging, and work to identify engagement opportunities.

“Maddie has quickly proven herself to be a valuable team member and collaborator in all she does,” said Liz Malmberg, director of account service.

“Her passion and enthusiasm shine through, as well as her commitment to delivering outstanding client service.

We’re so happy to have her on our

team and are excited for her to take this next leap forward.” A graduate of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Keast joined Anderson Partners as an account coordinator and has helped support the flow of client projects and deliverables, while assisting with website content updates, public relations and social marketing efforts.

Jodi Teal Director of Development First Responder Foundation

Jodi joined the foundation in June 2019 and has over 15 years of nonprofit experience.

She earned her degree in Human Resources and Family Science from the University of Nebraska at Omaha and Post baccalaureate Certificate of Paralegal Studies from the College of St. Mary. She completed UNO’s Certificate in Fundraising Management and has served in various business positions including Donor Relations, Grant Writer, Event Manager and Volunteer Coordinator. Jodi is a Certified Equine Specialist in Mental Health and Learning, and is a Certified Therapeutic Riding Instructor, both through the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship International.

Submit your company’s employee announcements to Spotlight@mbj.com

RJN’s Great Plains/ Midwestern footprint expanded with the addition of Roger M. Helgoth, PE, BCEE, FACEC — a heavy hitter in the industry, with 50 years of engineering and leadership experience — as the branch manager for the new Omaha office. Helgoth is a licensed professional civil engineer in Nebraska and Iowa, and an American Academy of Environmental Engineers board-certified environmental engineer.

“I’m honored to be one of the founding members for the Omaha office and I look forward to bringing the quality and excellence that has made RJN a national firm to a host of new clients,” Helgoth said. “I’ve been working in Nebraska and Iowa for the entirety of my career and I will use my extensive knowledge of the region to guide RJN’s Omaha office in the delivery of superb engineering solutions.” RJN President and CEO Jeff Plymale said that it is important to bring in experienced, local talent when expanding the firm’s footprint, and that Roger was a perfect candidate for the task. “A huge factor in our success is our ability to understand challenges that are endemic to the numerous and varied regions we serve,” Plymale said. “I don’t know that we could have hit the nail more squarely on the head when we hired Roger; he knows the region, the people, and his craft like the back of his hand,” said Roger M. Helgoth. David City, Nebraska native, Helgoth has led an esteemed career, holding positions within numerous prestigious organizations, including the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientist, the University of Nebraska Dean of Engineering Advisory Board, College of St. Mary Board of Directors, Nebraska Board of Engineers and Architects, and serving as the chairman of the Education Committee for the National Council of Examiners for Engineers and Surveyors.

28

• NOVEMBER 15, 2019 • Midlands Business Journal

The Lincoln

NOVEMBER 2019

BUSINESS Journal

Vol. 22 No. 11 $2.00

Health & Wellness ...........Page 3 Owner builds landmark Ramos Pizza into national contender.

Accounting .......................Page 5 Page 2

2

• NOVEMBER 2019 • The Lincoln Business Journal

Owner builds landmark Ramos Pizza into national contender

by Dwain Hebda

Ramos Pizza owner Jeff Dodge has grown the local pizza landmark into one of the best-producing independent pizzerias in the nation and recently expanded into a new location, which has accelerated sales even more.

Not bad for a guy who never really wanted to be in the pizza business in the first place.

Ramos Pizza and Busters BBQ Phone: 402-483-5050 Address: 2701 N. 48th Street; 2435 S. 48th Street Service: pizza and BBQ restaurant Employees: 48 Goal: The seminal pizza place returned to where it was founded this year as owner Jeff Dodge opened a second location in the University Place neighborhood not far from Nebraska Wesleyan University. The new restaurant relieves pressure off the south location and helps provide more timely service to north Lincoln delivery orders, which are considerable.

Website: www.ramosandbusters.com

“I graduated with a business degree and I wanted to get into banking, lending, brokerage,” said Dodge. “The job market in ‘91 was so tight, I couldn’t find a big boy job to save my life.”

Dodge was working as a manager of a local Domino’s Pizza location when he decided he would open a Subway sandwich franchise. That deal fell through, but the idea of owning his own restaurant was spinning in his mind.

“While I was working at Domino’s, my supervisor said, ‘Hey, Ramos Pizza’s for sale.

Owner Jeff Dodge … Last year, “Pizza Today” ranked Ramos on its Hot 100 Independent Pizzerias list on the strength of the company’s $2.2 million in sales.

I’m going to buy that.’ I went nuts for him,” he ranked No. 100 on Pizza Today’s Hot 100 Insaid. “I’m like, ‘Yeah, man! That’s my favorite dependent Pizzerias, registered $2.2 million in sales through its then-lone location at 48th Street pizza place.’”

As it turned out, Dodge was the one who and Normal Boulevard.

Earlier this year, Dodge released some of ultimately scooped up the longtime pizza restaurant, adding Buster’s BBQ several years the pressure on the south store, opening a new site at 44th Street and St. Paul Avenue, a stone’s later. With his lineup in place, it was left to simple grit and imagination to survive and that throw from Nebraska Wesleyan University Dodge has done with aplomb. Last year, Ramos where Dodge graduated in 1991.

“That was an act of God,” he said. “We knew we needed to relieve the pressure on the south store’s kitchen, and we do a ton of our delivery way north, like, all the way up to the interstate and all the apartments and housing on the north side of town. I was going to go in about two blocks down, had the blueprints and it just didn’t feel right.”

Dodge’s instincts were spot-on and the new store has been operating at a feverish pace since it opened.

“It’s a little overwhelming, to be honest,” he said. “There’s times during peak hours where you would expect to be busy, and we are, and it’s pushing the kitchen hard. But this kitchen’s got two months’ experience, where the south store kitchen’s got 16 years’ experience.

We just opened the doors and bam! So, this new kitchen crew, they’re learning as fast as they can and they’re getting faster and better every week.”

Even with the growing pains, Ramos Pizza is trending toward $3 million over the next 12 months. But what’s equally satisfying to Dodge is bringing the pizza place back to the neighborhood where it was founded — not far from his new store — and continuing the recipes he fell in love with as a college student.

“Talk about full circle; when I was in the UNL marching band in ‘84, I heard Ramos had opened a second location by UNL because the Wesleyan one was so successful,” he said. “I swear I’m partially responsible for the success, because we heard about this buy-one-get-onefree deal and nobody else delivered except Domino’s in Lincoln.

“I was in the UNL marching band with 400 friends and that store just blew up. We ordered it three or four times a week. I’ve still got check stubs. I’ll bet I ordered Ramos three to five nights a week and had parties in my dorm room.

So, I’ve always loved Ramos. And now, bam, we’re back at Wesleyan.”

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The Lincoln Business Journal • NOVEMBER 2019 •

3

Health & Wellness A section prepared by the staff of the Lincoln Business Journal

November 2019

Lincoln gets high marks for wellness, but challenges remain

by Dwain Hebda

Lincoln has been nationally recognized as a healthy place to live and is intent on keeping it that way. From all corners of the community, enhancing health and wellness is a consistently high priority, say experts.

“Lincoln has, more than many other communities, an extremely collaborative culture that involves public, private and nonprofit organizations,” said Marcia White, program manager with the Community Health Endowment of Lincoln. “For example, the Lincoln Police Department and the Mental Health Association of Nebraska work together on the REAL program to get people who are

experiencing mental health challenges the help they need when involvement with the police is not the best answer.”

Other community initiatives collaborate on providing for immigrants or host round table discussions to help groups share best ideas, White said. These, plus groups’ individual initiatives, such as CHE’s Place Matters Community Mapping Project, reminds people there’s still work to do.

“We have to recognize that inequity exists and work to make sure everyone has an opportunity to start from where they are and get support for living the healthiest life possible,” she said.

The corporate community has a substan-

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tial role to play in improving the health and al entities have proactively sought ways to wellness of the community, said Gail Sutter, reach underserved populations with programexecutive director of the Continuum Employ- ming that challenges conventional thinking. A ee Assistance Program. prime example of this is the Lincoln YMCA, “Continuum EAP’s focus is on which has implemented prooverall employee well-being and grams for residents with various helping employees and their famhealth issues. ily members be healthy, happy and “One of the most evident exproductive,” she said. “We offer amples of how we’ve grown is in short-term counseling and probour prevention and management lem-solving services to address programs,” said J.P. Lauterbach, issues — big and small — that chief operations officer. “In the may be impeding our clients from last four to five years, we have being their best selves.” added several programs that reach Continuum, and entities like a specific targeted population such it, partner with companies to help as Enhance Fitness, specifically Sutter provide essential and expanded geared toward people with arthriservices to employees, services that individ- tis and Delay the Disease, which is geared uals might not be able to access otherwise. specifically to people with Parkinson’s disSutter said she’s seen a groundswell of ease. We also have Livestrong geared toward participation in local companies to provide cancer survivors and then we also have an MS EAP services.

(Multiple Sclerosis) class.

“Lincoln companies we serve are invest“In those classes, staff goes through ed in their employees’ overall well-being and specific training on physical movement — strongly encourage involvement in wellness things such as balance, weight management, and community activities,” she said. “One of strength and functional training — so that if our favorite sayings is, when employees live you are someone with one of those conditions better, companies work better. Our member you can live life better.” companies understand this correlation and Chris Myers, parks operations manager reap the benefits of happier, healthier, more with Lincoln Parks and Recreation, said in engaged employees.” addition to maintaining and expanding faIn concert with this, Lincoln’s recreationContinued on next page.

4

• NOVEMBER 2019 • The Lincoln Business Journal

Retail woes, lack of industrial space drag otherwise rosy development picture

by Dwain Hebda

Lincoln is enjoying brisk commercial development and construction despite a sluggish retail industry and a pronounced lack of industrial space.

“We continue to have a shortage of manufacturing space,” said Robin Eschliman, founder of Eschliman Commercial Real Estate. “I called out to the airport’s Airpark for a client with industrial needs and they were like, we don’t have anything. We have just this one space but you kind of have to share the dock with the next-door neighbor.”

Just the opposite is occurring in the retail sector, which is smarting these days, particularly for national tenants.

“I think the convenient fallback is, ‘Oh it’s internet sales,’ but we started studying that and found only 10% of consumer spending is on the internet. Ninety percent of it is still in-store,” she said. “A lot of it is debt. A lot of these national retail chains got in races with each other to fill up malls and got into a whole lot of debt. Now that debt

is coming due.

“If you weren’t watching your corporate balance and you’re paying too many dividends out to your stockholders and your CEOs, you’re not going to stand up there and say, ‘Sorry. We can’t make our debt payments. We’re going to have to close down because we just didn’t get our debt paid off.’ You’re going to stand up there Eschliman and say, ‘Well, we’ve noticed some impact from internet sales.’ I think it’s about time somebody called it out for what it is.”

As for what areas of the city are attracting the most attention, south Lincoln continues to be an area of great interest, said Scott Richardson, sales associate with NAI FMA Realty.

“Southeast Lincoln garners the most at-

tention for commercial development. Tenants get new, modern spaces and higher concentration of rooftops,” he said. “Long-term,

Richardson Lorenz areas around the planned South Beltway are gaining interest as developers look ahead to bring services where the project will generate traffic numbers.”

Richardson said new developments boast a mix of spaces, all trying to provide convenient access to existing and future residential development. These developments

are following certain design trends to make best use of space.

“In general, businesses are shrinking footprints as technology offers workers to work from home and cost of construction dictates deals,” he said. “A newer trend is office space layouts are swinging back to more conventional-type space concepts with semi-private layouts versus the open office concepts.”

As for the future, Todd Lorenz, commercial real estate broker with PRISM Commercial Real Estate, said there’s much to like about what’s on the horizon. But it’s a view that’s not without its challenges.

“It will be interesting to see how [big box] retailers adapt their business models to adapt to their customers’ expectations and habits,” he said. “The next big thing could be who is best able to adapt their real estate holdings in a positive way to aid in their business plan going forward.

“The trend is in boutique service and retail providers on a small to medium scale, groups small and nimble enough to adapt to the market quickly. I believe low interest rates, new tax code provisions and a good run of economic times has led to new startups and scaling of small businesses to multiple locations.”

Lorenz said costs and challenges notwithstanding, he expects across-the-board growth to continue.

“I am optimistic that the local market will maintain stability among all property classifications,” he said. “Due to construction pricing, I believe redevelopment and repurposing of existing buildings will continue to play a significant part of the market going forward.”

High marks for wellness Continued from preceding page. cilities, attention is also paid to the needs of people who utilize these facilities.

“A few years ago, we started a Crunch and Lunch program where during the summer months we have activities in parks,” he said.

“Kids can come and have a lunchtime meal and get some exercise programming. These kids, who may not have a meal during the summer at lunch because school’s out, now have that and the opportunity to get some exercise as well.

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The Lincoln Business Journal • NOVEMBER 2019 •

5

ACCOUNTING A section prepared by the staff of the Lincoln Business Journal

Accounting firms grapple with new tax law changes

by David Kubicek

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) that went into effect last year was a complete overhaul of the tax system and created the largest tax preparation challenges most CPAs have had in their careers.

“The TCJA was a monumental change in tax preparation,” BMG Partn e r To d d B l o m e said. “The forms are completely different, tax rates are different, deductions are different. The upcoming tax season should be more stable and tolerable than last year now Blome that TCJA has been implemented and most practitioners have a year under their belt.”

BMG recently announced a merger with Strain, Slattery, Barkley & Co, P.C., also of Lincoln, to become effective Jan. 1, 2020. After the merger, it will conduct its practice as BMG Certified Public Accountants, LLP. Rachel Ficek and Ed Bates will join Blome, Sarah Boehle Pool, Trudy Meyer and Jody Decker as partners in the firm.

HBE recently celebrated the first year anniversary of its new 12-person Omaha office, Managing Partner Scott Becker said. Last year the firm, which also has a Norfolk office, merged with Furhrman, Smolsky and Furey, three partners who have remained with HBE and are focused on growing the combined firms.

“We’ve added some additional space in that office so we can continue to grow,” he said. “There’s a large opportunity to grow at that location because some of the key areas we serve are in Omaha.”

One challenge facing accountants is the Supreme Court decision that states can charge sales tax on purchases from out-ofstate sellers, even if the seller doesn’t have

a physical presence in the state. That means potentially more paperwork — collecting sales tax and compliance reporting.

“We’ve also seen an increased pace of mergers of accounting firms, businesses looking for succession plans and opportunities for firms to grow through mergers

Becker Anderson rather than growing organically,” Becker said.

Overall, the outlook for accounting firms is positive.

“A lot depends on agriculture in the state,” Becker said. “Agriculture drives many parts of our economy, even for people who aren’t farmers. With lower tax rates, our clients have been able to take some of their savings and reinvest in their businesses.”

In June, BKD opened an office in Austin, Texas, its 40th location in 18 states, according to Partner James M. Anderson.

The firm also expanded into the Salt Lake City, Utah market, celebrated the one-year anniversary of its expansion into New York City and the 25-year milestone of BKD Capital Advisors, LLC, its investment banking arm.

This year marked the first tax compliance filing season under the new TCJA rules.

“Many planning opportunities that began in 2018 were brought through to finalization in 2019 and will continue into 2020 and beyond as new details and interpretations emerge,” Anderson said. “Even though tax reform is nearly two years old, many important aspects of the new law remain subject to further revision and/or clarification by Treasury and the IRS.” Drafting errors in the original legislation can only be corrected by Congress, which many believe to be impossible as we enter a presidential election year. The combination of these factors is impacting business’ ability to complete long-range tax planning with certainty, and in some

cases, forcing companies to re-evaluate plans for needed capital expansion.

“Rapid changes in technology continue to impact core audit and tax services,” Anderson said. “Recently, up to 20% of new hires by accounting firms are non-account-

November 2019 ing students. Firms are hiring data science and engineering students, among others, and this trend is expected to increase. Artificial intelligence and robotics have yet to replace the need for critical thinking skills in accounting but require firms to continue to evolve in their service offerings to clients, and to focus on delivering value to client relationships.”

6

• NOVEMBER 2019 • The Lincoln Business Journal

Five steps to saving up for a down payment

by Carla Fried

First-time homebuyer wannabes wrongly think they need to make a big 20% down payment. In fact, there are plenty of ways to qualify for a mortgage with a down payment of less than 5%.

That’s more doable, right? If you’ve got your eye on homes Real estate priced in the range of $250,000 or so, you’re talking about needing less than $12,000 for a down payment. In higher-cost areas the $30,000 to $50,000 needed is a bigger ask, but just a few years of determined saving can get the job done.

That’s going to require a strategic down-payment saving plan.

1. Open a savings account at an online bank.

Any money you plan to use within, say, five years or so doesn’t belong in the stock market.

Way too risky. The best place for savings you intend to use for a home down payment in the next few years is a bank savings account. Sure, you aren’t going to get shoot-the-lights returns, but what matters most is that the money stays safe and sound so it’s there when you need it.

But not any old bank. Traditional banks — called brick and mortar — pay lousy rates on savings accounts. They are pretty much betting on lazy clients not noticing. That’s not going to be you. As I’ve reported in more depth, just as safe as traditional banks but offering much better interest rates, are online banks: https://www. rate.com/research/news/internet-savings-banks Tip: If the online savings bank offers a feature where you can “name” your account, give it a name that will motivate and inspire. MyFirstHome. MyYesICanDownPaymentFund.

NoMoreRenting. Whatever floats your boat.

Academic research has shown that when we name accounts, we’re more likely to stay committed to using them for their intended purpose.

2. Make saving automatic. You can link your checking account with your new online savings account, and for no fee set up a monthly transfer from your checking account to your savings account.

Making your down payment saving automatic is the secret to your home buying success.

Rather than relying on your memory to set aside money each month, or talking yourself into staying committed, an automated system will keep you on track.

3. Set a high savings bar for yourself. How much to save each month is, of course, an entirely personal decision. But it’s not just a function of what you earn. The hard truth is that if you are determined to buy a home, you can likely save plenty by being more careful about your spending.

Try this: Right off the top of your head, name a monthly amount you can save in your down payment savings account. Now raise that by 25%. Yep, 25%. Before you decide that’s a deal breaker, spend a few minutes reviewing the past few months of your bank and credit card statements. You’re sure you can’t manage to spend a bit less on certain things? Dining out, the gym membership you’re not using, or perhaps downscaling to a less expensive car with a lower loan payment?

Besides, what tends to happen is that once we make the big step of committing to a monthly savings contribution — be it for a mortgage down payment or a retirement account — we

adjust to having less money in our checking account.

4. Earmark found money for your account.

If you get a raise, bonus or manage to bring in some extra cash with a side gig, make a promise to yourself that you will save at least 50% of your after-tax haul for your home down payment. Or 100%. Having a clear intention for what to do with “extra” money is the key to not frittering it away.

One caveat: If you have high-rate credit card debt, that’s worth tackling hard. It never makes sense to pay high interest and getting your card balances paid off will help you qualify for a mortgage. You can read more of my advice on handling a raise or bonus: https://www.rate.com/

research/news/five-ways-to-make-the-most-ofa-bonus-raise-or-tax-refund 5. Put your goal in writing. Write yourself a contract or letter that spells out what your goal is with this account. Be specific: “I am going to save at least $X a month, and I intend to have enough for a down payment within Y years.” Sign and date it. And keep it nearby.

If you ever find yourself wavering, pull it out and think about how good you felt when you wrote your home buying manifesto. Academic research has shown that sometimes the seemingly simple act of writing something down can be a powerful “pre-commitment” that keeps us focused on goals.

Rate.com/research/news ©2019 Rate.com News Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

LBJ REPRINT ALERT Editor’s note: It has come to our attention that some out-of-state firms are being overly-aggressive in trying to sell reprints of stories published in the Lincoln Business Journal. These companies are not affiliated with LBJ. To order a reprint of a story in the Lincoln Business Journal, you may contact our office at 434-7752.

The Lincoln Business Journal • NOVEMBER 2019 •

7

REGIONAL LANDSCAPES

Briefs…

City Bank & Trust Co. has opened its new Lincoln branch located at 4225 Lucile Drive. To support the expansion, new board of directors and bank leadership have been added to the current team and includes: Breck Collingsworth, board member; Matthew Maude, board member; Mike Ulrich, CFO; Aaron Bell, senior vice president; and Jason Peters, senior vice president.

Performance Aircraft completed its new facility. Inside the facility is an aircraft hangar and roughly 6000 square feet of office space. The new hangar currently houses Performance Aircrafts’ fleet of training aircraft and the office space gives customers access to several training bays, a large classroom, a community area, a flight simulator, and more.

There will be an open house from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Nov. 23.

Lee Orton, president of Orton Management Association, will receive the Ross L. Oliver Award from the National Ground Water Association. Orton was the first executive director of the Nebraska Association of Resources Districts where he successfully managed the merging of 153 local government groups into 24 natural resource districts.

After a decade with NRD, Orton began his private law practice. He became the first executive director of the Nebraska Well Drillers Association where he would be hired by the state government to draft new rules and regulations of well drilling licensure.

The Lincoln Chamber’s Growth & Development Forum focuses on key issues that impact our community’s ability to fund

infrastructure projects. This is an opportunity to stay informed and ask questions regarding initiatives led by both the public and the private sector of Lincoln’s economy. The forum is on Nov. 20 from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. at the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce.

Education notes…

Doane University has established a College of Business to consolidate its business degree programs (undergraduate and graduate) that were previously within the College of Arts & Sciences and the College of Professional Studies. The board of trustees has approved a $1 million investment over the next four to five years supporting faculty, accreditation, and programming for the college.

Doane currently offers four undergraduate business majors (accounting, agribusiness, business administration, economics), five minors and two graduate business programs (Master of Arts in Management and Master of Business Administration).

Health care notes…

Immanuel celebrated a “Season of New” at Clark Jeary with new programming announcements and a new resident-chosen name for the senior living community, Yankee Hill Village. Along with the new name, the community celebrated new life enrichment and new memory support programming; the opening of a new Thrive by Immanuel Wellness Center; newly added health care services to better support assisted living residents; and the welcoming of a new executive chef.

Foster Group is among 2019’s Financial

Times 300 Top Registered Investment Advisors. This is the second consecutive year Foster Group has appeared on this list. More than 3,400 registered investment advisers are invited to apply for a chance to be included on the list, with the list then narrowed down to the final 300.

Tabitha Residences Cove, Harbor and Seagren House received the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living’s Bronze Award — Commitment to Quality distinction. The AHCA/ NCAL National Quality Award Program is a three-step process that encourages continuous learning, development and execution of integrated quality systems. Each step requires a more detailed and comprehensive demonstration of quality integration and performance.

St. Jane de Chantal Long Term Care Services was named a 2019 recipient of the AHCA/NCAL Silver Award– Achievement in Quality. The award encourages applicants to learn and develop effective approaches that help improve performance and health care outcomes. The award is sponsored by the National Quality Award Program, and presented by the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living.

The program honors providers across the nation for demonstrating their commitment to improving quality of care for seniors and persons with disabilities.

The Community Health Endowment of Lincoln and the Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department released Place Matters 3.0, the third edition of a community mapping project that visually displays data related

to health factors and outcomes in Lincoln.

New are maps showing rates of health insurance coverage, adult visits to a doctor for a routine check-up, and youth fitness.

The project previously mapped childhood obesity, but research increasingly indicates that cardiorespiratory fitness is a more powerful predictor of illness or mortality and correlates more strongly with academic performance. Place Matters 3.0 shows that 19 of Lincoln’s 74 census tracts meet the goal that 80% of LPS students pass the Fitnessgram PACER test.

Activities of nonprofits…

The Boys & Girls Clubs of Lincoln/ Lancaster County received an $8,300 grant provided by the Taco Bell Foundation to support more than 2,000 youth in the Lincoln community. The funding will go towards purchasing new equipment, going on field trips, and funding other programs that empower Lincoln’s students to graduate high school and achieve their dreams.

Arts & events…

The Very Vintage Christmas Market is celebrating its 5th anniversary. Shoppers will find booths filled with vintage finds & antiques, rescued junk & salvaged treasures, vintage Christmas & decor, and quality handcrafted & repurposed goods. Extended hours this year include Nov. 29 from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Early Shopping Party.

General admission is $5 and good for the entire event. A non-perishable food donation for the Food Bank of Lincoln merits $1 off admission.

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• NOVEMBER 2019 • The Lincoln Business Journal