HistoricOmaha

Omaha World Herald
Published Sunday June 18, 2006

BY HENRY J. CORDES AND TIM ELFRINK

Seven years ago, a consultant came to Omaha - a practical, hardworking city on the Plains - and told its practical, hardworking people they needed to kick off their shoes and dance a bit.

The city needed “sparkle,” whimsy and to have more fun - for very practical reasons.

Without those qualities, the city would never keep and attract the young, tech-savvy professionals needed to fuel job growth in the new millennium.

In polls and conversations, young Omahans seemed to back the consultant, finding Omaha particularly lacking in big-time concerts and sports, outdoor recreation, variety and the allure of big water.

If that consultant could see Omaha now.

The city that was barely on the national concert scene six years ago now ranks in the top 20 in the world - yes, world - in concert tickets sold. Its gleaming new Qwest Center Omaha pulls in national acts such as U2, Green Day and the Rolling Stones.

National music magazine Spin sings the praises of Omaha’s indie-rock scene, which has emerged from the underground and was on display Saturday during a free concert that drew thousands to Memorial Park.

The city that had long turned its back to the Missouri River is well on the way to turning its once-industrial and junky riverbanks into a place for celebration, recreation and quiet solitude.

High-end retailers such as Williams-Sonoma and Pottery Barn, which Omahans once could find only in catalogs, have set up shop.

New local events, from citywide festivals to small, eclectic arts openings, flourish.

And young people seem to have noticed.

“There is a cool factor for Omaha,” said Amanda Jedlicka, 33, director of Habitat for Humanity of Omaha. “I sense a lot of optimism from my peers.”

“There’s really no doubt it’s a more fun place than it was 10 years ago,” agreed Carla Finney, 36. “The number of shows in town, the events going on - just the overall atmosphere seems better.”

Most evidence that Omaha has become a more fun and attractive place for young people to live and work is anecdotal, gleaned from talks with more than two dozen young Omahans and others.

A Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce online survey of almost 4,000 young professionals two years ago found 72 percent happy with life in Omaha, with only 13 percent dissatisfied.

And on Saturday, the thousands of mostly young people who packed the grassy bowl of Memorial Park seemed to be finding life here pretty good. They were rocking to a free concert by Conor Oberst, the “boy genius” behind Omaha’s acclaimed music scene.

The rocker who makes his home here is symbolic of Omaha’s new appeal among the young, but he also can’t be overlooked as a catalyst in the change. Oberst helped make it cool for young people to call Omaha home.

Rachel Jacobson, 27, an Omaha native who returned a year ago from New York, said she noticed a shift in feelings about Omaha during her five years in the big city.

“At first, people asked me ‘You’re from Omaha? Did you live on a farm?’” she said. “Slowly, as more people perceived Omaha as cool, it was ‘You’re from Omaha? Do you know Conor Oberst?’”

To be sure, a medium-size city such as Omaha will never have urban sizzle on the scale of New York or Chicago. For many who feel the pull of the coasts or the mountains, Omaha will fall short.

But no one can dispute how far the city has come in seven years - and the momentum it has built.

“I’m an Omaha girl, and I sense a more positive self-image of Omaha (among young people) than I have in my life,” said Lyn Wallin Ziegenbein, executive director of the Peter Kiewit Foundation, a big-dollar contributor to many of the recent changes. “There is a feeling this is our time.”

Fun became an official focus for Omaha in 1999.

The Omaha Community Foundation commissioned a Minneapolis consultant to write a report to help philanthropists decide where to put their money.

The city needed more public places with sparkle, Ronnie Brooks said, and to recognize the importance of spontaneity, whimsy and extravagance in city life. Omaha took pride in its enormous capacity for work, Brooks said, but it also needed to play.

Her report struck a chord.

“Because she had pegged us so well, I think we all sat up straight in our chairs,” Ziegenbein said.

There was recognition that Omaha was not responding to those who were ages 18 to 35. Omaha long had a reputation as a great place for families. “But for people like me,” one 20-something said at the time, “this place is not goin’ on.”

That lack of appeal to the young became a concern for Omahans of all ages. Increasingly, “quality of life” was raised as firms here and elsewhere decided where to expand.

The changes that followed can’t be traced to a single event, organization or person. It was a broad effort that included public and private collaborations and seemingly disconnected efforts that fed upon one another.

The most obvious was the decision a year after the study to build the new arena.

Almost overnight, big concert acts stopped in a city they had bypassed for years in favor of Kansas City and Denver. New sports events were added, and Creighton University basketball has gone big-time in its new home.

The concerts added to a local music scene that continues to grow in popularity and prestige. One Percent Productions, which books shows in smaller venues such as the Sokol Underground, scheduled about 40 concerts in 2000. This year, it’s planning more than 200.

“There’s 30,000 people who go to U2, but there’s also 1,000 people excited about seeing the Fiery Furnaces at Sokol Underground,” Jacobson said.

Hand in hand with the music, other live and creative arts are thriving. There are new small galleries, poetry readings and an independent movie theater that Jacobson is developing north of downtown.

Omaha’s new arena also helped jump-start redevelopment on the riverfront and downtown.

In 2000, Roger Dixon, soon to be hired to run the facility, flew in for an interview. As a cab took him from the airport to downtown, he stared at the junkyards and storage tanks along the Missouri River and thought, “These guys must really have some vision.”

And they did, Dixon said, calling the changes on the riverfront - including two new parks, a marina, condo development, glass office parks, a riverboat landing and waterfront restaurant - “breathtaking.”

The riverfront remains a work in progress. Many have yet to connect with the historic river that Bob Kerrey, former governor and former U.S. senator from the state, once called Nebraska’s Grand Canyon.

But several traditional city festivals and some new ones are gravitating to the water, and a new landmark pedestrian bridge is sure to lure.

“We’re never going to have oceans or big lakes,” said Ayanna Boykins, 33, of Omaha. “But we’ve got the Mighty Mo flowing there, and we’re making the most of it.”

Also downtown, more than 1,300 new condos and trendy lofts are meeting young people’s demand for funky, alternative housing - another surefire sign of a happening city.

Tasha Henninger recently sold a condo to a young woman relocating from St. Louis who had pictured Omaha as cornfields and hicks.

“Her friends gave her trouble for moving out here, but now she finds herself defending Omaha,” Henninger said. “She was surprised what she found.”

Downtown isn’t the only place young people find pleasant surprises. Popular chain stores, restaurants and coffee shops are popping up all over.

“When you get a Cheesecake Factory, you’ve made it,” said Shawn Edie, 29, referring to the hip restaurant opening this fall at Westroads Mall.

New entertainment districts are slowly developing in Dundee, Benson, north of downtown, South 24th Street and Village Pointe at 168th Street and West Dodge Road. They’re meeting the demand of young people for more destinations outside the Old Market where they can gather, barhop and walk around.

“I think if you redo this story in another six years, you’ll be saying ‘Man, Benson is really happening,’” said Mike Fratt, general manager of Homer’s music stores.

As 23-year-old Hilah Wheeler spent a night out at Village Pointe, she talked of her planned move to St. Louis next month. She has a thirst for new adventure and hopes to find it in a bigger city.

But this was not the “gonna kick the dust of this old town off my shoes” talk heard in years past.

“Maybe I’ll come back someday,” she said. “I don’t have a problem with Omaha at all.”

Happy to be here In a 2004 online survey that drew responses from 3,949 young professionals ages 25 to 40, almost three-fourths said they were satisfied with life in Omaha.

They were asked: Overall, how satisfied are you with living in Omaha?

• Very satisfied: 15 percent
• Satisfied: 57
• Neutral: 16
• Dissatisfied: 10
• Very Dissatisfied: 3

Source: Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce

Omaha.com: Young Omahans cheer emergence of new Fun City