A Lincoln political organizer is preparing to flood Nebraska's 2028 ballot with 15 separate petitions covering everything from property tax caps to a $50,000 minimum teacher salary to a seasonal fuel tax holiday for farmers and students. Eric Underwood, who leads Advocates for All Nebraskans and Make Nebraska Even Better, says he plans to release the exact wording of his proposals after the November 3 election, with the full slate aimed at qualifying for the November 2028 general election.
Underwood's strategy is a direct response to a legal setback that just hit a rival effort. As reported by the Nebraska Examiner, the Nebraska Constitution requires every petition to address a single subject, and splitting his agenda into 15 distinct measures is meant to insulate each one from that constitutional hurdle. The Nebraska Supreme Court made the stakes of that rule unmistakable in September, ruling 6-1 that the Respect Nebraska Voters initiative illegally combined multiple procedural rules into one petition, a decision that barred it from this November's ballot, according to KLIN.
A Fuel Tax Holiday Aimed at Harvest Season
Among Underwood's proposals is a plan to suspend Nebraska's fuel tax for all drivers every year from September 1 through October 31, timed to a stretch of heavy local travel tied to harvesting and school activities. He's also proposing a permanent 35-cent-per-gallon cap on the state's fuel tax, which currently sits at 31.8 cents per gallon through the end of this year, per the Nebraska Department of Revenue.
The idea traces back to Gov. Jim Pillen's September 24 executive orders easing cost burdens on agricultural producers, including allowing farmers to request refunds on state diesel fuel taxes through December 23 unless extended. Nebraska also added a new 0.25-cent-per-gallon excise tax on dyed diesel fuel effective October 1, a levy that normally targets off-road agricultural and construction equipment, according to VitalLaw. Donald Trump issued a similar order for federal diesel taxes during an October 5 visit to Grand Island, the Nebraska Examiner's reporting notes. Underwood says Pillen's producer-focused relief left other Nebraska drivers wondering, as he put it, what about us. He expects pushback from lawmakers who might instead push to raise the state fuel tax, and spent a week to 10 days finalizing the fuel-tax petition idea. He also met with local taxing authorities before finalizing the broader 2028 package.
Property Taxes, Teacher Pay and the Single-Subject Problem
Underwood's proposals also target property valuation growth, which he wants capped at 3% annually, alongside a separate measure to halve taxable valuations outright by 50%. He wants lower maximum property tax levy limits for the largest taxing authorities, increased levy authority for smaller subdivisions, and a requirement that voters approve any move by a political subdivision to exceed certain tax limits. Another plank would legally block state lawmakers from shifting state costs onto local property taxpayers.
On education, the package includes a $50,000 minimum base salary for all Nebraska public school teachers, funded by repurposing existing K-12 state funds rather than new revenue. The push follows Nebraska's ranking as 49th nationally in average teacher starting salary at $38,811, according to 2025 National Education Association data cited by Nebraska Public Media. Neighboring Iowa raised its own baseline teacher salary to $50,000 in 2025, intensifying the regional pay gap. Underwood has described wading into Nebraska statutes as feeling a lot like diving into Shakespeare, a comment the Nebraska Examiner included in its account of his effort.
Clearing the Signature Threshold by 2028
To land statutory measures on the 2028 ballot, Underwood's petitions will need valid signatures from at least 7% of registered voters, while any constitutional amendments require 10%. Either way, signatures must include at least 5% of voters in at least 38 of Nebraska's 93 counties, with everything due the first week of July 2028. Underwood says a signature-gathering firm will assist using only Nebraska circulators, and his own voter list already includes more than 200,000 names across 150 cities statewide. Petition wording released after the November 3 election will still be subject to change during review by the Nebraska Revisor of Statutes.
Underwood is no stranger to the petition process falling apart before it starts. In June, Advocates for All Nebraskans withdrew all five of its 2026 statewide petition measures — including the property tax cap, a winner-take-all presidential elector proposal, and a hand-counted paper ballot initiative — without ever submitting signatures to the Secretary of State, according to Nebraska Public Media. The winner-take-all proposal, had it passed, could not have affected a presidential election earlier than 2032 absent legislative action. The group's hand-counted paper ballot push had already stalled in the Legislature, while a similar legislative effort to let voters decide the fate of future unfunded mandates failed on a 23-20 vote in January. The group's concerns at the time included volunteer fatigue and voter concerns.
The Unicameral's Partisan Math
Underwood, a former chair of the Nebraska Republican Party, is betting the 2028 ballot can accomplish what the officially nonpartisan, unicameral Legislature has struggled to. Nebraska Republicans currently hold a 33-vote supermajority in the 49-member statehouse — exactly the threshold needed to overcome a filibuster, and three more than the 30 votes required to override a governor's veto. Underwood said Republicans might lose one to three seats in the near term, even as the party has won every statewide election in Nebraska since 2008.
Underwood expects the 2027 and 2028 legislative sessions to produce limited progress, which is part of why he's steering his agenda toward the ballot instead. You can't have the conversation if it's not on paper, he said, and if it's not going to be willed into paper form at the Legislature, now it is. He added that whether it's good, bad or ugly, the part he believes in most is that if it gets on the ballot, at least the people have a choice. He has also called the effort a potential bookend to what needs to happen in the next legislative cycle.
Democratic state senator Danielle Conrad of Lincoln has separately questioned the legality and cost of Pillen's fuel tax relief executive orders, a dispute that sits alongside Underwood's own fuel tax proposals.
Competing Ballot Measures and Local Pressures
Underwood's petitions won't be the only tax overhaul vying for attention. Organizers of the EPIC Consumption Tax initiative launched a second petition and fundraising campaign in July, seeking to eliminate all property, income and inheritance taxes in favor of a broad retail consumption tax, Nebraska Public Media reported. A coalition calling itself No New Taxes has formed to oppose that approach.
Advocates for All Nebraskans has already shown it's willing to push past the state level: in June, the group filed a local Lincoln petition seeking to mandate at least 450 full-time equivalent police officers within two years, in a city that had authorized only 371 sworn officers earlier this year, according to Nebraska Public Media.
