Nebraska Magazine - Fall/Winter 2011

TOWARD A MORE PERFECT UNION | BIG TEN NETWORK Q&A | WRITING CONTEST | MR. DAWES GOES TO WASHINGTON

FOR MEMBERS OF THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA–LINCOLN

FALL/WINTER 2011

Nebraska Innovation Campus $80 Million Core Development Under Way

In an era when American labor unions have lost much of their once-formidable power, Andrew R. Timming has embarked on a truly daring career. A former UNL sociology and Latin American studies major, Timming is today a management consultant who specializes in helping labor unions become better organized and better managed – while also developing more effective strategies for protecting the rights of workers.

Although he readily admits that he faces “some daunting challenges” in his ongoing battle to strengthen U.S. labor unions, the 32-year-old Timming is surprisingly optimistic about his chosen vocation.

“I don’t want to sound messianic or anything,” said the “labor agitator” from St. Paul, Minn., “but I honestly believe that my vision – and my organization [the consulting firm Oliventis LLC] – can help bring about a revitalization of labor unions in this country.”

16 fall /winter2011

e will never forget the moment when he emerged from the Metro de Santiago subway station and discovered “a level of poverty and suffering” that he’d never encountered before.

It happened on a summer morning in 1998 – at a crowded subway stop on the outskirts of Santiago, Chile – and it changed his life forever.

Suddenly, Andrew Timming (B.A. ’00, M.A. ’02) was confronting the stark reality of a villa miseria (a “miserable town,” in Spanish), and he could hardly believe the devastation that loomed before him.

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Everywhere Timming looked, the narrow streets were jammed with foul-smelling garbage ... in which hordes of ragged children were doing their best to find scraps of food that hadn’t yet been eaten.

Perched unsteadily above the trash-crammed alleyways were the callampas – hundreds of tin-roofed shacks held together with frayed ropes and lengths of rusting wire. Inside these rattletrap dwellings, the desperate families who inhabited the notorious poblacions (slums) of Santiago were doing their best to get through another day.

Stunned and horrified, the affluent American exchange student from St. Paul, Minn., stared at the ranks of deformed children who’d been assigned to beg around the subway stations. As he would later learn from a psychologist in Argentina, many of these unfortunate kids had been intentionally blinded – or had endured amputation of their limbs – by organized gangs who hoped that their deformities might move pedestrians to toss a few coins their way.

For Timming, the son of a highly successful M.D. in the Twin Cities, that visit to the Chilean slum was a moment of profound awakening.

“I’d been raised in a St. Paul suburb as the son of a doctor,” Timming recalled, “and all at once I was walking around in a world without electricity or running water. I saw kids playing in garbage cans, and I suddenly realized that when I was their age, I’d been having fun playing Nintendo. But their idea of fun was throwing pieces of garbage back and forth.”

Badly shaken, the youthful Timming wandered around the villa miseria for nearly an hour – before realizing that he might easily wind up as a crime victim in these battered and brutally poor precincts.

“To be quite honest,” he said, “I soon understood that the neighborhood wasn’t terribly safe, and I hurried back to the subway station and headed back downtown. But that brief visit to the Santiago poblacion had shaken me to the core ... and I do think it was probably the turning point, as far as my politics go.”

Almost overnight, the middle-class kid from Woodbury, Minn., was converted into a passionate student of both economics and Latin American politics. As he read about the class warfare that had been a way of life in places like Chile and Argentina for generations, Timming found himself burning with a desire for “social justice and economic equality.”

Although he didn’t know it at the time, his future destiny as a Ph.D. economic sociologist who advises labor unions on how to engage more effectively with employers had been launched in the slums of Santiago.

“I do think that’s where it all started for me,” Timming said.

“When you see people suffering like that, and when you realize that they’re being victimized by economic forces over which they have no control ...

“That’s when you tell yourself: ‘It’s time for me to join the fight!’”

NEBRASKAMAGAZINE 17

"#$%$&'()*+(%!,( "*+-$&'(./#00(%*( !#"#-,&"(#'#$& pend a few hours hanging out with Andrew Timming at his 0 small, sparsely furnished bungalow in St. Paul, and you’ll soon discover that he loves to talk about “the decline of the American

labor movement” – and about what it will take to restore that movement to its former lofty status among U.S. workers.

“You don’t need a Ph.D. in economics to understand that labor unions have been growing weaker in America for some time,” said the veteran researcher and frequent contributor to such high-powered academic publications as Work, Employment & Sociology and the Human Resource Management Journal, whose own economic sociology Ph.D. is from the University of Cambridge in England.

“For a variety of reasons,” added Timming, “the labor movement in both the U.S. and Great Britain has been growing steadily weaker since the late 1970s. That decline has had a lot to do with the ever-increasing concentration of ownership in the news media during recent decades,” explained the youthful labor guru, “but the unions also need to take responsibility for their own shortcomings.

“Let’s face it, the ‘media monopolies’ which came to dominate journalism in the 1970s and 1980s were able to create a sustained narrative in which union workers were often painted as greedy, lazy and interested only in boosting their wages and benefits as much as possible.”

To illustrate his point about the decline of unions in this country, Timming references a telling U.S. Department of Labor statistic that shows that the United States had an 11.9 percent union membership in 2010, compared with 20.1 percent in 1983.

“At the height of the U.S. labor movement in the 1950s and 1960s, more than one in three workers belonged to unions,” he said. “In the years since what is now regarded as the ‘Golden Age of Labor’ in the U.S., millions of workers lost the right to bargain collectively with their bosses.”

According to Timming, the most dramatic period in labor’s decline began around 1980, with the election of Ronald Reagan to the White House.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt that Reagan’s breaking of the highly publicized air traffic controllers’ strike [in 1981] was a turning point,” said the labor researcher. “If you look at how both Reagan and Maggie Thatcher [British prime minister, 1979-1990] were able to whip up public sentiment against labor unions, it’s clear that this was a key step in the collapse of labor’s power.

“Thatcher broke the miners’ union movement in Great Britain ... and I wrote my Ph.D. dissertation in part on how she led a successful campaign to weaken the steelworkers’ union. Reagan and Thatcher symbolized the great shift that took place in labor relations during the last two decades of the 20th century. But they couldn’t have done it without the help of the increasingly monopoly-run news media.”

Readily admitting that he was radicalized in his youth by the “class warfare” he witnessed as a UNL and high school exchange student in Chile and Argentina, Timming is convinced that the loss of millions of jobs during the current recession has also been the product of a “successful attack on the rights of working people” by Wall Street and other centers of U.S. economic power.

Interestingly enough, however, he also believes that the current

18 fall /winter2011

economic crisis may have a silver lining ... since it strongly suggests that the power of collective bargaining may soon be restored in this country.

“History shows us that when things get bad enough, the people will eventually begin to push for a better, more socially just society,” said the cheerfully enthusiastic labor analyst and consultant, while predicting that the pendulum is about to start swinging back toward working people.

“When conditions get bad enough that unemployment reaches the level of 20-25 percent,” predicted Timming, “then rich and poor alike will begin to realize that the current economic system is unsustainable. And that’s when the entire country, Democrats and Republicans, will begin to understand: If you really want to ensure long-term prosperity, you have to give workers a fair wage ... so that they have enough money in their pockets to actually buy the trillions of dollars’ worth of products and services on which our economic health ultimately depends.”

"*++1$&'(%!#%(( !$0(!2+#$&(3$'!%(( ,45/*6,"(#%(7&/ aised in small-town Wisconsin and then St. Paul, Andrew + Timming moved with his family to Lincoln as a senior in high school ... and then descended on the UNL campus in January of 1997.

A straight-A student throughout his years at Nebraska, Timming happily concedes that he was “an academic nerd” whose idea of a good time was to spend entire days at the library wandering through the dense philosophical thickets to be found in the chin-high volumes left to posterity by such major thinkers as Kant, Nietzsche, Hegel and Marx.

As a budding sociologist at UNL, the summa cum laude student was awed by the “jaw-dropping lectures” of several “amazing professors” such as Mary Jo Deegan – a sociology researcher with a knack for “pushing students to the absolute max.

“She challenged you big-time,” recalled Timming, while describing the “thousands and thousands of pages” he labored over during Professor Deegan’s rigorous courses. “I remember how stressed out I became toward the end of the semester,” he said. “And I remember sitting in front of Oldfather Hall before the final exam, feeling like my brain was about to explode.

“Professor Deegan pushed you to the limit, and I’m very grateful for that. Later, when I found myself studying for a Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge, I worked daily with students from Harvard, Yale and Princeton ... and I held my own against them.

“I was able to do that thanks to great teachers like Dr. Deegan – and I’m still very grateful for the intellectual rigor and the discipline that she insisted on in all of her courses.”

After departing Lincoln in 2002 with a master’s degree (and a 4.0 grade-point average during his entire time at UNL), Timming earned his sociology doctorate in the super-charged academic atmosphere at Cambridge, where his left-leaning political philosophy would set the stage for a dissertation on the dynamics of labor relations in Europe.

Since nailing down his Ph.D. in 2006 and going on to become a university teacher himself, Timming has broken new ground in

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s a student at UNL, Andrew Timming had two great passions: chewing on philosophical concepts with friends and chasing the giant catfish that live at the muddy bottom of Branched Oak Lake.

“I was a bit of a nerd at UNL,” recalled the brainy sociologist, “and to show you just how nerdy I was, I should tell you that my favorite activity was a sport I invented – a sport we nicknamed ‘philo-fishing.’”

As practiced by Timming and several “fellow-nerds,” philo-fishing involved two key components: a fervent desire to argue over philosophical concepts and a penchant for pursuing the impressively whiskered inhabitants of Branched Oak, located about 15 miles northwest of Lincoln.

“We had a great time,” said Timming today. “We’d rig up a little bell on our fishing line, so that it would ring when a catfish struck. Then we’d just settle back ... and talk for hours about things like Kant’s Theory of Cosmopolitanism and Nietzsche’s idea of the Eternal Recurrence.

“If we did catch a fish, we’d just throw it back.”

Timming says that he and the other Branched Oak Nerds became so fond of philo-fishing that they often wound up spending three or four hours at a time (in warmer weather) sitting on the lakeshore and waiting for their catfish bells to ring.

So how effective was philo-fishing as a study aid at UNL? One fact says it all: During his five years as an undergrad and graduate student at UNL (1997-2002), Timming never received a course grade lower than “A”. !

NEBRASKAMAGAZINE 19

research on topics with such arcane-sounding titles as “Dissonant Cognition in European Work Councils: An Ethnomethodological Approach” (in Economic and Industrial Democracy) and “What Do Tattoo Artists Know About Human Resource Management: Recruitment and Selection in the Body Art Sector” (in Employee Relations: The International Journal).

Although his scientific research on “Human Resource Management” among tattoo-parlor operators sounds a tad bizarre at first, Timming is quick to explain how he became interested in this odd-sounding area of labor relations.

“I have two older brothers, and believe it or not, both of them happened to wind up as tattoo artists,” he said with a chuckle. “So when they promised me ‘instant access’ to the tattooing industry, I decided: why not?

“And I must say that that turned out to be a very interesting research project, on several levels at once!”

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hen Andrew Timming learned that one of his fellow-professors at the University of Manchester – Senior Lecturer Ralf Brand – was struggling with spinal cancer, the former UNL sociology major didn’t hesitate.

Timming headed for his garage – and the gleaming Marin 21-Speed Hybrid Street/ Mountain bicycle he kept there.

“I wasn’t in the greatest shape,” recalled the labor-union consultant, “but my friend was in trouble and I was determined to help him.”

Timming’s audacious plan: He would raise money for cancer research, in honor of his pal ... by bicycling across northern England and asking for donations along the way. What followed was a five-day, 215-mile odyssey – during the summer of 2009 – in which the indefatigable professor managed to collect more than $12,500 for cancer research at the hospital where his friend was treated.

“I was a little nervous when I started,” remembered Timming, “but that ride turned out to be one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. At one point, I even managed to get a member of the British Parliament out there on the road with me, pedaling away on his bicycle.

“We made the local newspaper, and people were eager to help,” he said. “I raised money for cancer research, and felt great about that. But the best part is that his medical treatment went very well, and he’s cancer-free today.”

For his part, Ralf Brand says he was “extremely honored by Andy’s decision to do the charity ride.” Commenting via e-mail from England, he recently told Nebraska Magazine: “It’s a privilege to have Andy as a friend.” !

20 fall /winter2011

#&#/1H$&'(7&$*&0( ###($&(*+6,+(%*(3#-,( %!,3(0%+*&',+( oday a tenured faculty member in the business school at % England’s University of Manchester, the globe-trotting Timming is now in the middle of a three-year leave, or “secondment,” ...

during which he recently launched a U.S.-based consulting firm dedicated to advising labor unions on how to get better at what they do.

Established as “Oliventis LLC,” the consulting enterprise specializes in “analyzing the business methods and management strategies employed by labor unions” all across the United States. Its goal, said Timming, is to help unions pack more punch for their endless battle to support the rights of workers.

“What we do at Oliventis is help unions improve their own governance and internal functioning,” said the labor aficionado while describing his firm’s daily operation. “On a recent consulting job, for example, we were able to successfully analyze the entire operational structure of a mid-size union in the Midwest.

“We looked at everything from their position descriptions and staff responsibilities to their policies and procedures – and we were able to help them make marked improvements in the way they think about their overall strategy.”

Describing his ultimate goals, Timming doesn’t try to soft-pedal his message. “The sole purpose of Oliventis is to build a society in which unions are a positive force for social change,” said the researcher-consultant, who lives today with his wife and five-year-old son (and a frisky beagle named “Soundwave”) in a quiet, leafy neighborhood in St. Paul.

“Whenever I meet with workers and labor leaders these days, the first thing I ask them is: If your opponents are working day and night to become better managers of their businesses, shouldn’t you be working just as hard to keep up?

“The answers I’m now hearing to that question are very encouraging ... and I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say that one day soon we’re going to see a revival of the labor movement that will surprise this entire nation.” !

mr. dawes GOES TO

washington

BY TOM NUGENT

A

s an African-American whose roots reach back to both Jamaica and rural Nebraska, Daniel Edward Dawes grew up with a keen awareness of the economic hardship often endured by ethnic minorities.

Nowhere is that hardship more evident, he soon learned, than in healthcare â&#x20AC;&#x201C; where lack of money (or lack of insurance) and disparities in care can deprive desperately ill patients of the treatment and the medicines they need to survive.

Determined to fight for better healthcare for the economically disenfranchised, Dawes started by earning a law degree at UNL. As a student in Lincoln, he learned everything he could about health-related legal issues and the laws that govern them.

Then he set out for Washington, D.C. During the next few years, the youthful attorney found himself working at the cutting edge of healthcare reform in America ... while helping to write sweeping new federal legislation aimed at guaranteeing every American equal access to high-quality healthcare.

NEBRASKAMAGAZINE 35

W

hen the 16-year-old boy from smalltown Missouri stepped up to the microphone to talk about his life-and-death struggle with AIDS, the congressional hearing room went utterly silent.

Healthcare attorney Daniel E. Dawes (J.D. ’06), who was moderating the briefing of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Health Braintrust on that morning more than four years ago, remembered being “deeply and permanently affected” by the heart-stopping drama that followed his introduction of the boy with the lifethreatening illness.

The kid’s name was Bryyan Jackson, and the audience in the Gold Room of the Rayburn Office Building on Capitol Hill listened intently as he described his struggle with a disease that has so far killed more than 570,000 Americans.

“In 1996, I lay dying in a hospital bed,” said Bryyan, while the gathering of more than a hundred U.S. House members and staffers leaned forward to catch every word. “In a matter of two months, I went from a playful, energetic and happy five-year-old to a bloated, feverish, vomiting kid who couldn’t walk.

“My mother struggled to carry me to numerous medical appointments – and she begged and prayed for doctors to find a reason why I was appearing near death.”

Gazing around the jam-packed Gold Room – on that March morning in 2007 – the former UNL law student watched several congressional aides reaching for their handkerchiefs.

“I’m not a crier, but I came pretty close that day,” recalled the Washington-based healthcare specialist, who was chairing the meeting as an adviser to the Health Braintrust – a committee that had been formed by the CBC in order to study disparities in access to medical care among ethnic minorities and other “vulnerable populations” in the U.S. “As an attorney who specializes in advising senators and House members on ways to achieve equity in healthcare,” added Dawes, “I’d already spent several months listening to AIDS patients literally begging for their lives.

“Many of those patients simply couldn’t afford the expensive medications that were keeping them alive. For these desperate

36 fall /winter2011

souls, the only hope was the national AIDS Drug Assistance Program [ADAP] – which was the topic of discussion that day in the Gold Room.”

Like many of the more than 1 million Americans who now struggle with HIV/ AIDS (18,000 of them die from it each year), Bryyan Jackson had lived with the disease for several years before it was diagnosed.

“They checked me for a large number of diseases, even ones that exist in other countries,” the kid from St. Charles, Mo., told his congressional audience that day, while the network TV cameras ground away and the still-photographers lined up their shots. “But since I wasn’t at risk for HIV, and was only five years old, I wasn’t tested for it until three months after I became severely ill.

“It was then that my mom and my doctor asked for me to be tested. The result was devastating. I was diagnosed with full-blown AIDS, and a number of other AIDS-related infections, too. And my family was told I wasn’t going to live long.

“The doctor said six months at the most.”

For many in the hearing room, it was a familiar story – the story of a family with limited means that had been caught in an agonizing dilemma: finding a way to come up with more than $50,000 a year to pay for their son’s AIDS care.

It was truly life or death. Without government assistance, the Jacksons would have been forced to watch their son die.

But his life had been saved, thanks to a federal program that had provided him with the drugs required to stave off the deadly virus.

Incredibly enough, however, Jackson’s riveting saga also contained one other twist: the disturbing fact that his own father had actually injected him with the AIDS virus that had nearly taken his life.

Amazed and horrified, Dawes and the rest of the congressional audience sat stricken while Jackson explained: “The way I got HIV-positive was ... my own father was the one who injected me with HIV. He worked in a blood lab and took it from work.

“Not that I was only dying [sic], but I was also a victim of a crime,” said Jackson, whose father was eventually sentenced to 15 years in prison for committing it. “Yet by the grace of God and the power of prayer and medications, I stand here before you today as a miracle, wanting to tell my story to bring hope to many and knowledge to all.”

Deeply moved by Jackson’s saga, the audience at the CBC hearing burst into spontaneous applause, as more than a few staffers dabbed at their eyes.

“That meeting was certainly an unforgettable experience,” said Dawes, “and the bottom line for all of us was crystal-clear. Bryyan Jackson had survived his illness and is doing quite well today because he was able to get the medicines he needed through the national AIDS Drug Assistance Program. And that same program has helped keep thousands of other Americans alive in recent years as well.

“For me, personally, that day in the Gold Room was extremely memorable because I’d gone to law school at Nebraska and then on to Capitol Hill for one basic reason.

“I was determined – and I’m still determined – to use my skills as a lawyer to fight for equitable access to quality healthcare and treatments for all Americans, regardless of their circumstances.”

from jamaica to capitol hill – in one generation

he son of a Jamaican T “international student” who went to study at Lincoln’s Union College

back in the late 1970s and a GermanAmerican “country girl” who’d been raised on a farm in Deshler (about 70 miles southwest of Lincoln), Daniel Dawes was born in the Nebraska capital in 1980. As a result of his unique cultural background and experiences as a multi-racial individual, Dawes grew up with a special sensitivity to the social problems so often encountered by racial and ethnic minorities in America.

ACCESS TO HEALTHCARE:

for “vulnerable” patients, it can sometimes be a matter of life or death

he patient was a Haitian refugee living in South Florida – and she T was obviously in a great deal of pain. But each time she tried to tell the nurses in the Ft. Lauderdale emergency room about her problem, they

responded with nothing more than blank stares.

“Unfortunately, this patient could speak only Haitian Creole,” remembered Daniel Dawes, who witnessed her desperate struggle while he was working as a college intern at the hospital, back in the summer of 2002.

“As I watched her trying to make herself understood,” recalled Dawes, who became a healthcare attorney and legislative policymaker for the Congressional Black Caucus on Washington’s Capitol Hill, “I couldn’t help but think: ‘Oh my gosh, what if her condition is life-threatening?’

“That afternoon was a real revelation for me,” said Dawes. “All at once, I began to realize just how vulnerable many patients really are. And that’s when I decided I wanted to specialize in improving our healthcare and public health systems as a law student at UNL.” !

For Dawes, the stresses and dislocations of bi-racialism, prejudice and unjustified discrimination were underlined early in life – after his parents succumbed to them and divorced. Barely three years old, he wound up living with his paternal grandmother in Jamaica, along with his younger brother Patrick and his cousin Jody, while his struggling father worked a series of low-paying jobs in America to support them.

By the mid-1980s, however, Edward Dawes had managed to carve out a solid financial future for himself in South Florida and remarried, which meant that Daniel and his younger brother could now rejoin him there, along with their new mom, Mernal Dawes. Two years later, their youngest brother, David, would also join the family. By the time he reached junior high school, Daniel Dawes was fully adjusted to his newly adopted world of Miami and environs.

A bright and independent-minded teenager, Dawes was able to land a couple of “very interesting and very motivating” internships as a high school student.

During one of these independent-study

projects, he found himself assigned to work in the emergency room of a public hospital in Ft. Lauderdale ... where he got an up-close look at the massive health problems faced by racial and ethnic minorities in South Florida.

“That was where it all began for me,” Dawes told Nebraska Magazine during a recent interview in Washington. “Day after day, I saw how Haitian patients were unable to communicate with hospital personnel because they spoke only French Creole. Or I watched African-American and Hispanic AIDS patients struggling to find a way to pay for the medications they needed to stay alive.

“By the time I landed in college as an undergrad [at Nova Southeastern University in Ft. Lauderdale], I was determined to find a way to work on these kinds of social problems by seeking a career in hospital administration.”

During his senior year at Nova, as he thought about the best way to prepare for a life in healthcare, Dawes had a sudden inspiration: why not return to his roots in

Nebraska and take advantage of the fact that UNL’s law school was nationally renowned for its expertise in the field of administrative and employment law?

Dawes didn’t hesitate. Within a few days he was on the phone to Lincoln ... and by the fall of 2003 he was walking into his first class as a UNL law student.

“The dean of the College of Law at that time was Professor [Steven L.] Willborn,” Dawes remembered, “and I must say that our first few exchanges were rather comical. Before I got to Lincoln, I was totally gung-ho ... and so I asked him what courses I should take in order to ‘get into healthcare right away’.

“He kind of chuckled, you know, and he said: ‘Well, that’s not how it [law school] works, actually. You’ll have to take some foundational courses first, Mr. Dawes!’”

Within a few days, the hard-charging Dawes was plowing through the typical first-year law school curriculum – while doing his best to keep up with courses in contracts, torts, Constitutional law and all the rest.

NEBRASKAMAGAZINE

37

It wasn’t long, however, before the budding Lincoln lawyer was able to sign up for the courses he really wanted to take ... especially including such exciting-sounding offerings as “Law & Medicine” and “Health Care Law,” both of which were taught by a nationally recognized expert on those topics: Professor Craig M. Lawson.

“That second year in Lincoln was extremely exciting for me,” Dawes recalled, “because I got to study with Professor Lawson, who took a policy approach to healthcare issues in his classes. I also got to study with some other very helpful faculty, including [current UNL College of Law Dean] Professor [Susan] Poser, Professor Anna Shavers, Professor Catherine Wilson, Professor John Snowden, Dean Steve Willborn, Professor John Gradwohl, Dean Glenda Pierce, Professor Jeff Kirkpatrick, Professor Robert Denicola, Professor Colleen Medill and Professor Richard Moberly. These skilled teachers exposed me to other areas of the law that could be applied to healthcare – and many of them were also very good on legal issues that involved the formulation of policy.

“All in all, I think I was very fortunate to have studied law at UNL when I did – because it was the perfect preparation for my later work as a policy adviser to Congress on healthcare issues related to equity and to disparities in equal access to care among vulnerable populations.”

“!"#$%&'(!)(*+,”

on capitol hill

ith his UNL law degree now W firmly in hand, Dawes wasted no time in setting out for the nation’s capital. There his first assignment – funded by a prestigious Louis Stokes Health Policy Fellowship – would be to provide advice and counsel to the Congressional Black Caucus on matters related to equity in healthcare.

“I remember the first ‘wow moment’ I experienced in Washington, and it happened on my very first day at work,” said Dawes.

“This was during the summer of 2006, when I went to a policy meeting that was being run by Congresswoman Donna Christensen [M.D.], who was chairing the CBC Health Braintrust at the time.

“Well, I walked into the hearing room that day, and as soon as I got there, I discovered that just about everybody in attendance was living with AIDS.” Unprepared for the stark emotions that were on display, Dawes soon found himself

38 fall /winter2011

engaged in a series of brutally intense discussions with AIDS patients who wept openly and sometimes shouted with rage as they described their struggles to obtain desperately needed medications.

“In many cases, these people were literally begging us to save them from death,” recalled the 31-year-old attorney.

“You talk about a ‘baptism by fire’! That meeting really shook me up, and by the time I finally walked out of that room, I was totally dedicated to the idea of doing everything I could to help those patients get the access to healthcare they so badly needed.”

If Dawes had been enthusiastic about fighting for equity in healthcare as a law student in Lincoln, he was now “on fire” to join the battle on Capitol Hill. During the next few years, as a healthcare law and policy adviser to the late Senator Ted Kennedy’s senate committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) – and then later as a hard-working “policy wonk” who helped write key “Access and Elimination of Disparities” sections of President Obama’s landmark healthcare reform legislation of 2010 – Dawes established himself as a highly knowledgeable and influential player in the national struggle to make healthcare services accessible to all.

Having already received a Congressional Black Caucus Leadership in Advocacy Award and a citation saluting his Congressional Staff Leadership, Dawes was last spring honored for his contributions to healthcare by the Nebraska Alumni Association – which presented him with an “Early Achiever Award” during ceremonies in Lincoln.

In Washington, meanwhile, Congresswoman Donna M. Christensen (Virgin Islands) continues to sing the praises of the fired-up healthcare attorney loud and clear. “I knew there was something beyond special about Daniel when he beat out hundreds of applicants and was selected for the Louis Stokes Health Policy Fellowship,” said Christensen. “His brilliance and dedication to the law, to health and other social policies, and to truly being a part of the solution to any problem is only a small part of what makes Daniel completely extraordinary.

“Daniel has consistently proven himself to be an effective champion for America’s most underserved and neglected people and has always been an asset – and in many instances a mentor – to me and my staff.

During health reform negotiations, Daniel was determined to harness the power of unity and collaboration, and to ensure that any health reform package introduced included substantive provisions to address a

critical issue in health and in healthcare – eliminating the root causes of disparities among vulnerable, underserved and often marginalized populations.

“As a result, he successfully founded and chaired a diverse, national group of almost 300 organizations and coalitions to advance a health equity agenda in health reform. It was because of Daniel’s genuine appreciation and respect for difference, his superior political and policy acumen and his uncanny ability to find and work from common ground that made this group of such incredible diversity a unified voice. I am proud to count Daniel not only as a former Fellow, and not only as a current leader, but also as a friend and someone I feel lucky and honored to know.”

Like Rep. Christensen, Elsie L. Scott, Ph.D., the president and CEO of the influential Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, described Dawes as “a joy to work with.” Said Dr. Scott: “Daniel’s passion for and commitment to equal access to quality healthcare is an inspiration for all of us who care deeply about this issue.”

Now playing at the top of his game, the still-youthful Dawes today serves as an attorney and manager of federal affairs at the Premier Healthcare Alliance in Washington ... an alliance of more than 2,500 U.S. hospitals that seeks to improve patient care through shared knowledge and advocacy. Ask him to assess the ultimate impact of the groundbreaking 2010 healthcare legislation he helped write, and this cheerful and easygoing young lawyer is quick to admit that “the package certainly wasn’t perfect, and there are a lot of question marks that will have to be addressed in the years ahead.

“Nonetheless,” he added, “I feel very hopeful and very optimistic about healthcare reform in America. For starters, the new law will provide health insurance for more than 32 million Americans who had none (or who were underinsured) and prohibit discrimination against people who have a preexisting condition.

“That’s a giant step forward,” said Dawes with a bright smile of hope for the future of healthcare in America. “But I think it’s also important to point out that we were able to achieve some major gains in healthcare equity under the new law – and that those gains are going to help ensure access to appropriate care for our vulnerable populations.

“For a lawyer who came to Washington to fight for equity in healthcare, it doesn’t get any better than that!” !

a night to remember

hen the news broke that the W U.S. House of Representatives had just passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), Daniel Dawes was sitting on a sofa in the living room of his apartment in Silver Spring, Md. But the â&#x20AC;&#x153;suddenly ecstaticâ&#x20AC;? Dawes didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t remain seated for long.

In a flash he was on his feet â&#x20AC;&#x201C; and excitedly hugging his spouse, Washingtonarea dentist Nedeeka Dawes. â&#x20AC;&#x153;I think I was watching CNN that night,â&#x20AC;? said Dawes, while describing the historic evening of March 21, 2010. â&#x20AC;&#x153;All day long, the House had been arguing over HR 3590, which was its version of President Obamaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s healthcare reform package. â&#x20AC;&#x153;I believe it was around 10:30 in the night when the announcement came that the bill had finally passed the House ... by the incredibly slim margin of 219 to 212.

The vote had been agonizingly close, right up to the last minute, but the results were now clear. Comprehensive healthcare reform was law, and I started jumping for joy.â&#x20AC;?

Dawesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; euphoria on â&#x20AC;&#x153;Healthcare Reform Nightâ&#x20AC;? was easy to understand, of course, since heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d spent most of the previous two years working to help craft major sections of the 1,990-page bill. At 400,000 words, the new law was much longer than â&#x20AC;&#x153;War and Peace,â&#x20AC;? Leo Tolstoyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s monster-sized saga of Russian love and destiny during the Napoleonic era. It was also far more complex ... since its primary purpose was to decrease the fragmentation of health services and outline exactly how the nationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s brand-new â&#x20AC;&#x153;affordable careâ&#x20AC;? measures would work. â&#x20AC;&#x153;The passage of what many people now think of as â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Obamacareâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; was a huge step forward,â&#x20AC;? said Dawes, who worked for months at a time to help craft sections of the law dealing with equal access to healthcare. As a health-oriented staff attorney for both the Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust and the late Sen. Ted Kennedyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s healthcare committee, the former UNL law student had been in the forefront of the struggle to produce the final draft.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;The healthcare reform law certainly isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t perfect,â&#x20AC;? said Dawes, â&#x20AC;&#x153;but I do think it accomplished two important objectives.

First, it will make sure that 32 million uninsured or under-insured Americans can now get coverage. And second, the new act contains numerous provisions aimed at ensuring that â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;vulnerableâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Americans â&#x20AC;&#x201C; everybody from racial and ethnic minorities to women and children to gays and lesbians and people with disabilities â&#x20AC;&#x201C; will have access to preventive services and quality care. I believe, years from now, people will appreciate this landmark law and the positive impact it will have on all Americans by improving our healthcare and public health systems. â&#x20AC;&#x153;For me as a healthcare attorney, working on equal access and eliminating disparities in health status and healthcare was a labor of love â&#x20AC;&#x201C; and thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s why it was such a thrill to see it passed by the U.S. Congress after almost a century of discussions and debate. â&#x20AC;&#x153;That was a night to remember, for sure.â&#x20AC;? !

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, $06/54 &7&3: 45&"- $06/54 &7&3: (".& $06/ 54 &7&3: #6$,&5 $06/54 &7&3: )645-& $06/54 39 NEBRASKAMAGAZINE

NEBRASKA INNOVATION CAMPUS $80 MILLION CORE DEVELOPMENT UNDER WAY

PHOTO BY JON HUMISTON

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Nebraska Innovation Campus is taking shape.

On 232 acres of the former state fairgrounds, the new campus will be a place where private-sector businesses, the university and government can work together to advance innovation for the 21st century.

Businesses locating on the campus – between City and East campuses – will take advantage of UNL’s research faculty to develop new technology and products to strengthen the economic growth potential of the university and Nebraska.

NEBRASKAMAGAZINE 41

T

he University of Nebraska acquired the land for Nebraska Innovation Campus in January 2010 when the Nebraska State Fair moved to Grand Island. In February 2011 the NIC Development Corp. Board of Directors affirmed an agreement with a developer, Nebraska Nova Development LLC, to carry out the first phase of development. Nebraska Nova’s managing partner is Woodbury Corp., a Utah-based development firm. Site work at NIC has begun with infrastructure development slated for completion in 2012.

“Nebraska Nova was selected by the Nebraska Innovation Campus Development Corp. because of its willingness to put its own capital at risk and because of the firm’s financing and development experience,” said Harvey Perlman, UNL chancellor.

“A major obstacle to developing the property and seeking private-sector tenants has been the lack of an established infrastructure and leasable facilities,” Perlman said. “The Woodbury Corp. has agreed to finance the infrastructure and take a leadership role in moving it forward.”

Woodbury Corp. has been a leader in real estate development and office space since 1918 and has worked on several research park projects. It developed University Mall in Orem, Utah, and has more than 9 million square feet of retail, 1.5 million square feet of office, and nine hotel properties. Its new projects include Falcon Hill at Hill Air Force Base, a 550-acre private development; Adams Crossing in Brighton, Colo., a 780-acre mixed-use development of commercial, office, retail and residential; and Metro Center in Aurora, Colo., with 75 acres of retail and other mixed uses.

The first phase of development at Nebraska Innovation Campus includes significant building projects representing an estimated $80 million investment of public and private funds.

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Set to be completed by April 2013, a new and renovated commons building will serve as the anchor for Nebraska Innovation Campus, providing space for university research, incubator businesses or translational research, convenience or retail, tenant offices and labs. Site work and infrastructure development are under way.

Included in the first phase is a nearly 170,000-square-foot central commons building that will form the hub of the Innovation Campus community. The commons building project will repurpose the former 4-H Building, and will include a major addition that will double the size of the existing structure. State funds of $10 million will renovate the building’s east half, while the Woodbury Corp. will renovate the west half and also will build the addition.

Gov. Dave Heineman and the legislature this spring also provided $15 million to be matched by private philanthropy for a

“food, fuel and water” research facility that will support life sciences collaborations.

“The result is that we will have created the critical mass needed to attract privatesector companies,” Perlman said.

“The state investment is doing what it was intended,” Perlman said. “It is jump-starting Innovation Campus and leveraging state funds to produce private sector investments. We are off to a good start because the governor and the legislature had confidence in this vision for Nebraska’s future.”

“This is one of the most ambitious and most significant projects on the horizon for Nebraska,” Gov. Heineman said. “We want to grow and attract new, technology focused companies to our state. Innovation Campus represents an important opportunity for the University of Nebraska to leverage its research talent to fuel new economic growth. Accelerating the

development of Innovation Campus is a critical part of our vision for Nebraska’s future.”

University consultants hired in 2009 estimated the economic impact of Nebraska Innovation Campus could bring annual new payroll to the local and state economy of $267 million, including $149 million in direct annual payroll and $118 million in indirect payroll from new spin-off jobs. Planners are using a 25-year phased development approach.

For more information about Nebraska Innovation Campus and to view the most up-to-date versions of the plans, go to http://innovate.unl.edu. !

NEBRASKAMAGAZINE

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DUNCAN NAMED NIC EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

D

aniel Duncan, who has served as an assistant dean in the Agricultural Research Division at UNL, has been named executive director of Nebraska Innovation Campus Development Corp.

Duncan and two other UNL leaders will form the team working on the development of private sector partnerships. Potential

Nebraska Innovation Campus partners are businesses that might locate on Innovation Campus to work in collaboration with university researchers on the development of innovations leading to new businesses, jobs and economic growth. The other two individuals working on the development of partnerships with private businesses along with Duncan are Ryan Anderson, director of corporate and foundation relations in UNLâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Office of Research, and David Conrad, associate vice chancellor for technology development and executive director of NUtech Ventures.

The Nebraska Innovation Campus Development Corp. Board of Directors includes five members from the private sector and four from the University of Nebraska. Private-sector members are: Tom Henning, CEO of Assurity Life Insurance Co.; Dana Bradford, president of McCarthy Capital Corp.; Matt Williams, president of Gothenburg State Bank; Tonn

Ostergard, president and CEO of Crete Carrier Corp.; and JoAnn Martin, CEO of Ameritas Life Insurance. University representatives are: NU President James B. Milliken; University of Nebraskaâ&#x20AC;&#x201C;Lincoln Chancellor Harvey Perlman; Prem Paul, UNL vice chancellor of research and economic development; and Ronnie Green, vice president and vice chancellor of the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources.

Members of the Nebraska Innovation Campus Faculty Advisory Committee are: Stephen Baenziger, professor, agronomy and horticulture; Andrew Benson, professor, food science and technology; Mary Uhl-Bien, professor, management; Shane Farritor, professor, mechanical engineering; Sally Mackenzie, professor, Center for Plant Science Innovation; Stephen Reichenbach, professor, computer science and engineering; and Will Thomas, professor, history. !

TAKE YOUR PRIDE OUTSIDE Shop the University Bookstore for all your Husker gear!

Tent: $250 Chair: $399

44 fall /winter2011