Marquis Who’s Who has added Hal Daub, JD, to its biographical listings, according to an announcement made in Omaha, Nebraska, on December 21, 2017. Marquis picks the people it profiles for their current reference value. So the selection weighs position, notable achievements, visibility and standing in a given field.
From the Army to Congress
Daub grew up in Omaha and graduated from Benson High School there. He then earned a Bachelor of Science in business administration at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, and later a law degree from the University of Nebraska. He also served as a captain in the U.S. Army infantry, first as a platoon leader and then as a company commander.
His legal career began in Omaha at the firm Fitzgerald, Brown, Leahy, McGill & Strom. After that he became vice president and general counsel of Standard Chemical Manufacturing Company. Nebraska voters then sent him to the U.S. House of Representatives for four terms, where he sat on the Ways and Means Committee. He also ran for the U.S. Senate twice.
While in Congress, Daub wrote 200 separate bills, and many of them are still law. One requires members of Congress to pay Social Security taxes. Another extended IRA deductibility to spouses who do not work outside the home. According to the release, he also played a key role in passing the 1986 Tax Reform Act and the Papio-Missouri Basin reauthorization. That measure funded the flood control, recreational dams and trails that the area still uses.
Daub later became a principal and partner at the accounting firm Deloitte & Touche. Omaha voters then elected him mayor twice. His time in office is remembered for a large property tax rate cut for all Omaha taxpayers. He also brought in a police helicopter, infrared helmets for firefighters and the Sun Dawgs summer youth program in city parks.
Several big projects moved ahead on his watch as well. They included riverfront development for a convention center and arena, the First National Bank Tower and the Union Pacific Center. The Hruska Federal Courthouse, the Curtis Regional Park Service headquarters and the West Dodge Expressway were also on the list, along with projects in the South Omaha stockyards and North Omaha.
His public roles go further still. He sat on the boards of the Nebraska League of Municipalities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National League of Cities. For six years he led the National Republican Mayors and Local Officials Association. He was also a delegate to the last ten Republican National Conventions and national committeeman for the Nebraska Republican Party.
In addition, he served as vice chairman of the Metropolitan Entertainment and Convention Authority board and chaired the national board of Community Health Charities of America. He was president and CEO of the American Health Care Association, too. Today he is senior counsel at the Husch Blackwell law firm.
In 1990, President George H.W. Bush named him to the National Advisory Commission on the Public Service. Later, President George W. Bush nominated him to a six-year term on the Social Security Advisory Board. Once the U.S. Senate confirmed him on January 25, 2002, the President directed him on February 5 to chair the board for four years. Daub was then a delegate to the 2006 White House Conference on Aging. He now serves as an elected member of the University of Nebraska Board of Regents.
Civic work and honors
His civic record is long. He sits on the board of the Masonic York Rite Temple Corporation in Nebraska and is a past president and board chairman of the Heart Association. He has also served on the boards of the Autism Action Partnership and the Mid-America Boy Scouts Council, as well as the Salvation Army advisory board. Other ties include Optimists International, the Downtown Rotary Club of Omaha, South Omaha Eagles No. 154 and the American Judicature Society. He is a fellow of the Nebraska Bar Foundation, a 33rd degree Mason and an elder at Dundee Presbyterian Church.
Daub also supports many local institutions, among them the Joslyn Museum, Henry Doorly Zoo, Durham Museum, Omaha Symphony and Omaha Community Playhouse. Together with his wife, he has chaired fundraisers for the Multiple Sclerosis Society, the Alzheimer’s Association, Nebraska Special Olympics, the Omaha Home for Boys and the Academic Decathlon, among others.
His awards include Distinguished Eagle Scout, the Silver Beaver Award in Scouting and Citizen of the Year in 2003. In 2004 he entered the Omaha Chamber of Commerce Business Hall of Fame. That same year the Grand Masonic Lodge of Nebraska gave him its Humanitarian Award. Then, in 2005, Toastmasters International honored him for communication and leadership. More recently, he chaired the Salvation Army’s Be a Hero luncheon and its Tree of Lights campaign, and he led a capital campaign for Madonna School.
Daub belongs to Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 2503, American Legion Post 112, the 40 & 8, the Reserve Officers Association and the Air Force Association. His wife, Mary, née Mernin, comes from Arapahoe, Nebraska, and the couple have three children and five grandchildren.
Marquis Who’s Who traces its roots to 1899, the year A. N. Marquis put out the debut edition of Who’s Who in America. Since then it has profiled top achievers in fields from politics, law and medicine to business, education, religion, art and entertainment. Researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms still rely on it.
