Mutual of Omaha plans skyscraper at downtown library site

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Mutual of Omaha and the city of Omaha plan for the insurance giant to build a skyscraper at the site of the city's downtown main public library, even as the city’s plan to tear down the library and move it to another, less-desirable location has drawn public scorn.

The city plans to have the W. Dale Clark Library out of its current building by September and have the building torn down by December, Mayor Jean Stothert said Wednesday in a news conference.

The razing would make way for what's conceived as a 40- to 50-story, glass-fronted tower that would serve as the new headquarters for Mutual of Omaha.

Mutual of Omaha CEO James Blackledge said the tower will be “on the scale of the First National Bank tower," which is the city's tallest at 634 feet (193 meters). Mutual currently employs about 4,000 workers at its sprawling midtown campus headquarters. Asked the estimated cost of the new tower, Blackledge said it was too soon to say.

The announcement followed a fiery Omaha City Council meeting Tuesday night at which several people passionately urged the members to reject plans to remove W. Dale Clark Library, which has stood on a prime downtown spot for 45 years. The city plans to move the library's services to an older building several blocks south that will cost an estimated $3 million to renovate. The city library system's administrative services would be moved miles away to a vacant Shopko store.

Despite the opposition and questions about the transparency of the process to move the library, Stothert left no doubt about its future.

“We will be moving the Dale Clark library,” Stothert said Wednesday.

The mayor also announced Wednesday that the city will install a 3-mile (4.8-kilometer) streetcar system that will transport people to and from the...