Hopes high for veterans cemetery

As Steve Johnson of Omaha has worked over the past six years to try to establish a national veterans cemetery in eastern Nebraska, he has done so with a sense of urgency.

After all, each year scores of veterans of World War II and other conflicts pass away in the region without a local vets' cemetery to honor their service.

But that may be about to change.

The federal budget that President Barack Obama unveiled Monday includes authorization and planning funds for the Department of Veterans Affairs to establish a new national veterans cemetery in the Omaha area. The proposal would relax a VA policy that long had stood as a barrier to a cemetery serving eastern Nebraska and western Iowa.

If all goes according to plan, Johnson said, a new national shrine to vets could open in the Omaha area in three to five years.

“We are enthusiastic about moving this forward and getting it done for our veterans,'' said Johnson, president of the Memorial Ridge of the Midlands Foundation, which has advocated for the burial ground.

Johnson said his group has considered several possible sites for the cemetery but declined to disclose them. A hill in Bellevue near 36th Street and Nebraska Highway 370, under the flight path to Offutt Air Force Base, previously has been mentioned. The VA would make the final site decision.

The 2011 Obama budget proposal includes funding for five new national cemeteries in all, with a total of almost $12 million for planning and $10 million for land acquisition, said Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb.

The proposal still needs approval from Congress. However, Nelson said the Omaha-area cemetery's inclusion in the Obama budget is significant. At this point, it would not be passed only in the unlikely event that someone in Congress moved to strip it out.

“This is a green light for a new national cemetery,'' Nelson said. “I know there are going to be an awful lot of folks in Sarpy County, Douglas County and western Iowa that will be quite pleased with this result.''

Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., said he hopes the project moves forward quickly. “Our veterans have sacrificed for our nation, and the proposed national cemetery in Omaha has great significance for veterans and their families.”

Right now, the only national cemetery for veterans in Nebraska is Fort McPherson National Cemetery near Maxwell, about 280 miles from Omaha. The closest national cemetery to Omaha is at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. The nearest in Iowa is Keokuk National Cemetery, in the state's southeastern tip.

There is a state veterans cemetery near Des Moines and one expected to open in Alliance, Neb., later this year. Such cemeteries are built with federal assistance but must be maintained with state or local money.

A veterans cemetery burial represents a significant benefit to veterans. Any veteran, veteran's spouse or dependent child is eligible for a federally funded plot, marker and burial in a veterans cemetery.

“It's an honor earned,'' said Jo Schuda, spokesperson for the VA.

Over the past decade, the VA has overseen the biggest expansion in veterans cemeteries since the Civil War, with a goal set by Congress that 90 percent of the nation's veterans would have cemeteries within 75 miles of their homes. Six federal cemeteries have opened in the past year alone, bringing the number nationally to 131.

But eastern Nebraska and western Iowa were left out, failing to meet a VA requirement that there be at least 170,000 veterans living within 75 miles of a cemetery location. The VA said only 133,000 veterans lived that close to Omaha.

That policy left Omaha among the largest urban areas in the country not served by a veterans cemetery.

Johnson's group lobbied the VA to change the rule, considered seeking a state-sponsored cemetery and worked with Nelson, Johanns and Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., on bills to amend the rule.

But as the VA approached meeting the 90 percent target for veterans served, an agency study in 2008 recommended that the 75-mile threshold be relaxed. The study identified Nebraska as one of the nation's most underserved areas and recommended that a cemetery be built there.

With the budget that came out Monday, the Obama administration has endorsed the recommendation.

The budget plan would reduce from 170,000 to 80,000 the number of veterans required to live within a 75-mile radius.

The budget calls for new cemeteries in the Omaha area as well as in Daytona, Fla.; Buffalo-Rochester, N.Y.; Tallahassee, Fla.; and Pueblo, Colo. Together they would serve a total of 500,000 additional veterans.

“VA will continue to maintain the appearance of national cemeteries as national shrines, dedicated to preserving our nation's history, nurturing patriotism and honoring the service and sacrifice veterans have made,'' the Department of Veterans Affairs said in budget documents.

The same proposed VA budget also includes the earlier-announced planning money for a new VA hospital in Omaha, replacing the current one near 42nd Street and Woolworth Avenue.

Johnson is not a veteran, but his 89-year-old father served in World War II, and Johnson has long been interested in paying tribute to local veterans. He began working with others on getting an Omaha-area cemetery in about 2004, he said.

Even when funding for the new 60-acre cemetery is secure, Johnson said, his group's dreams won't stop there.

With private funds raised by his group, he is hoping to also establish war memorials near the cemetery, including a possible memorial to those who served and died in the Cold War. That would be especially appropriate given Offutt's Cold War role as the center for strategic nuclear operations.

It all starts with the new cemetery, Johnson said.

“We are really excited,'' he said. “This is just great for our veterans.''

Contact the writer: 444-1130, henry.cordes@owh.com

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