{"id":39205,"date":"2025-05-30T09:24:53","date_gmt":"2025-05-30T15:24:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=39205"},"modified":"2025-06-02T10:33:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-02T16:33:10","slug":"new-legislative-oversight-division-created","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=39205","title":{"rendered":"New legislative oversight division created"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lawmakers gave final approval May 30 to creation of a new division within the Nebraska Legislature and reorganization of the institution\u2019s oversight functions.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. John Arch<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Currently, there are five divisions that carry out the institutional and administrative functions of the Nebraska Legislature, including the Office of the Public Counsel. That division includes the Office of Inspector General of Nebraska Child Welfare and the Office of Inspector General of the Nebraska Correctional System.<\/p>\n

LB298, introduced by Sen. John Arch of La Vista, creates the Division of Legislative Oversight and moves the Legislative Audit Office, OIG for child welfare and OIG for corrections under the new division.<\/p>\n

The bill also creates the Legislative Oversight Committee, which replaces the existing Performance Audit Committee. Members will consist of the speaker of the Legislature, chairperson of the Executive Board, chairpersons of the Appropriations, Health and Human Services and Judiciary committees and four state senators appointed by the Executive Board.<\/p>\n

LB298 also makes a number of changes to how the inspectors general obtain information, including:
\n\u2022 updating and clarifying subpoena authority;
\n\u2022 removing mandatory direct computer access for IG staff;
\n\u2022 clarifying that information is to be provided to IGs in the most efficient, timely and least burdensome manner;
\n\u2022 clarifying that IGs will suspend an investigation at the request of a law enforcement agency;
\n\u2022 requiring that the IGs be notified as soon as practicable when a criminal investigation involving a death or serious injury required to be reported to the IG has commenced and concluded;
\n\u2022 providing that any confidential information or records shared with the Division of Legislative Oversight, Ombudsman\u2019s Office or the IGs remain confidential; and
\n\u2022 creating a process by which the executive and judicial branches may object to production or disclosure of legally privileged records, reports or documents and negotiate terms of production and disclosure.<\/p>\n

The measure also includes the provisions of Adams Sen. Myron Dorn\u2019s LB228, which makes several technical changes to the Performance Audit Act.<\/p>\n

LB298 passed on a 46-2 vote and takes effect immediately.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lawmakers gave final approval May 30 to creation of a new division within the Nebraska Legislature and reorganization of the institution\u2019s oversight functions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36722,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[246],"class_list":["post-39205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-executive-board","tag-sen-john-arch"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/UpdateBlogPhoto-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39205"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39205\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39248,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39205\/revisions\/39248"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/36722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}