Brenda Council

Last updated

Brenda Council
Member of the Nebraska Legislature
from the 11th district
In office
January 7, 2009 January 9, 2013

Council started her legal career in 1977 with the National Labor Relations Board in Kansas City. In 1980, she returned to Omaha to work for Union Pacific Railroad's legal department. Council joined the Kutak Rock Law Firm in 1998 and Polk, Waldman, Wickman & Council in 2002. [4]

Council has served on the Omaha School Board and the Omaha City Council, and ran for mayor in 1994 and 1997, losing both elections by slim margins. [5] She was formerly western regional president of the National Caucus of Black School Board Members. She was featured three times in Ebony Magazine due to her prominence as an Omaha leader, and was a permanent roundtable member of the Omaha KETV television Sunday morning talk show, Kaleidoscope.

In February 2008, Council filed to run for the seat in the Nebraska State Legislature being vacated by Senator Ernie Chambers, who had been a state senator for 38 years but was barred from seeking reelection due to a new term limits law. In November 2008, she was elected to the Nebraska Legislature. Council ran for reelection in 2012 but lost to Chambers, who was able to run for the legislature again after sitting out one four-year term.

Personal life

Council attended Omaha Central High School, then the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, graduating in 1974. She received a Juris Doctor law degree from Creighton University School of Law in 1977. [2] She is married to Otha Kenneth Council. [6]

Awards and honors

Council was selected as one of the RAD Women of Omaha and has been featured in three editions of Ebony magazine. [4]

Campaign fund violations

On September 12, 2012, Council pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges that she misused campaign cash at casinos and filed false reports concealing that. She withdrew $63,000 at casinos over several years and deposited $36,000 in cash. In December 2013 she was sentenced to probation and fined $500 for felony wire fraud. [7]

Council was subsequently charged in federal court with wire fraud and pleaded guilty, receiving three years' probation along with fines and assessments of $600. On September 12, 2014, the Nebraska Supreme Court disbarred Council for misusing campaign funds. A referee had recommended a one-year suspension followed by two years of probation, but the Court held that harsher discipline was called for. The court noted that since the 1990s, it had disbarred all but two attorneys in cases of conversion and found that those two cases were distinguishable from Council's case. In both of those cases, the attorney had self-reported the misconduct, a factor not present in Council's case. The court held that the conversion of campaign funds is as serious as converting client funds and warranted disbarment. [8]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ernie Chambers</span> American politician

Ernest William Chambers is an American politician and civil rights activist who represented North Omaha's 11th District in the Nebraska State Legislature from 1971 to 2009 and again from 2013 to 2021. He could not run in 2020 due to term limits.

Operation Boptrot, also referred to as Boptrot, was an investigation by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) into corruption among the Kentucky General Assembly, the Commonwealth's legislature. The operation was highly successful, with the investigation culminating in several indictments in 1992, leading to the conviction of more than a dozen legislators between 1992 and 1995. The investigation also led to reform legislation being passed in 1993.

<i>A Time for Burning</i> 1966 documentary film

A Time for Burning is a 1966 American documentary film that explores the attempts of the minister of Augustana Lutheran Church in Omaha, Nebraska, to persuade his all-white congregation to reach out to "Negro" Lutherans in the city's north side. The film was directed by San Francisco filmmaker William C. Jersey and was nominated for Best Documentary Feature in the 1967 Academy Awards. The film was commissioned by the Lutheran Church in America.

Nancy Thompson is a former Nebraska state senator from Papillion, Nebraska in the Nebraska Legislature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hal Daub</span> American lawyer and politician

Harold John Daub Jr. is an American lawyer and politician from Nebraska who served four terms in the United States House of Representatives and as the 48th Mayor of Omaha, Nebraska. In 2012, Daub was elected to the Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska system. He is a member of the Republican Party.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brad Ashford</span> American politician (1949–2022)

John Bradley Ashford was an American politician who served in the Nebraska Legislature and the United States House of Representatives from Nebraska's 2nd congressional district.

The civil rights movement in Omaha, Nebraska, has roots that extend back until at least 1912. With a history of racial tension that starts before the founding of the city, Omaha has been the home of numerous overt efforts related to securing civil rights for African Americans since at least the 1870s.

Racial tension in Omaha, Nebraska occurred mostly because of the city's volatile mixture of high numbers of new immigrants from southern and eastern Europe and African-American migrants from the Deep South. While racial discrimination existed at several levels, the violent outbreaks were within working classes. Irish Americans, the largest and earliest immigrant group in the 19th century, established the first neighborhoods in South Omaha. All were attracted by new industrial jobs, and most were from rural areas. There was competition among ethnic Irish, newer European immigrants, and African-American migrants from the South, for industrial jobs and housing. They all had difficulty adjusting to industrial demands, which were unmitigated by organized labor in the early years. Some of the early labor organizing resulted in increasing tensions between groups, as later arrivals to the city were used as strikebreakers. In Omaha as in other major cities, racial tension has erupted at times of social and economic strife, often taking the form of mob violence as different groups tried to assert power. Much of the early violence came out of labor struggles in early 20th century industries: between working class ethnic whites and immigrants, and blacks of the Great Migration. Meatpacking companies had used the latter for strikebreakers in 1917 as workers were trying to organize. As veterans returned from World War I, both groups competed for jobs. By the late 1930s, however, interracial teams worked together to organize the meatpacking industry under the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA). Unlike the AFL and some other industrial unions in the CIO, UPWA was progressive. It used its power to help end segregation in restaurants and stores in Omaha, and supported the civil rights movement in the 1960s. Women labor organizers such as Tillie Olsen and Rowena Moore were active in the meatpacking industry in the 1930s and 1940s, respectively.

Brian Kelsey is an American politician and former member of the Tennessee State Senate. A member of the Republican party, he was elected to represent District 31, which encompassed the following parts of Shelby County: Cordova, East Memphis, and Germantown.

Scott Alan Lautenbaugh was an American politician from the state of Nebraska. He served in the Nebraska Legislature from 2007 to 2014, representing Omaha-based district 18.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Creighton University School of Law</span> Law school of Creighton University

Creighton University School of Law, located in Omaha, Nebraska, United States, is part of the Jesuit Creighton University.

Ernest E. Newton is an American politician in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Newton served for seventeen years in the Connecticut General Assembly, serving in the Connecticut House of Representatives from 1988 to 2003 and in the Connecticut State Senate from 2003 to 2006. He pleaded guilty to federal felony corruption charges in September 2005 and served several years in federal prison. Newton was released in February 2010 and in 2012 unsuccessfully attempted a political comeback, losing in the primary in a race for his old state Senate seat. He pleaded guilty to three campaign finance violations in 2019, relating to his 2012 legislative campaign.

Joseph R. Pisani was an American lawyer and politician from New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2024 Nebraska Legislature election</span>

The 2024 Nebraska State Legislature elections will take place as part of the biennial United States elections. Nebraska voters will elect state senators for the 25 odd-numbered seats of the 49 legislative districts in the Nebraska Unicameral. State senators serve four-year terms in the Nebraska Legislature. Note: All elections are technically non-partisan in the State Legislature; therefore, any parties listed are from candidates' websites and official party endorsement lists. Candidates all appear on the ballot as nonpartisan.

References

  1. "'I'm always going to serve': Brenda Council retires from career in which she broke barriers, faced setbacks".
  2. 1 2 "A Biography of Brenda Council". North Omaha History. March 21, 2019. Retrieved April 22, 2024.
  3. Brenda Council profile Archived November 22, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
  4. 1 2 "Spotlight Series: Brenda Council - Voices for Children". September 6, 2019. Retrieved April 22, 2024.
  5. She received 43% of the vote in 1994 and lost by 735 votes in 1997, see Husker Alumni Achievement Award Biography
  6. "Brenda Council". Ballotpedia. Retrieved April 22, 2024.
  7. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on October 4, 2012. Retrieved September 12, 2012.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  8. "Nebraska High Court Disbars Former Legislator". richardclem.com. Retrieved December 23, 2022.