Nebraska State Treasurer Shane Osborn is trying to give a little money back to the people it belongs to.

Wednesday in Omaha, he attempted to distribute more than $300,000. Thursday, during a brief stop in Beatrice, he spread the wealth a little further when he dropped off a check to Roselyn Shaffer.

The money Osborn is distributing is part of Nebraska’s unclaimed property funds. It is controlled by the State Treasurer’s Unclaimed Property Division. It is money that Nebraska residents either have forgotten or never knew they had.

“That money belongs to (the recipient). It doesn’t belong to the State of Nebraska. We need to get it back into their hands,” Osborn told Shaffer and her husband, Dick, at their home Thursday.

During the two and one-half years Osborn has been in office, the state has distributed more than $34 million in unclaimed funds. In 2008 alone, the state returned $12 million to its rightful owners. That, Osborn said, is a considerable increase over the distributions before he came into office.

And he doesn’t plan to stop there. Osborn said his office is stepping up the efforts to implement LB 432 which will allow the state treasurer to find the owners of uncashed state checks and distribute the money to the owner. There is currently about $115 million in that fund, and there are 8,000 to 12,000 Nebraskans who would benefit from the money.

“These are some tough economic times, so I know how important it is form my Unclaimed Property Division to increase its efforts in returning this money back to Nebraska residents,” he said in a press release. “Since the average unclaimed property check is over $900, I recognize that money can go a long way.”

Osborn has joined U.S. Senators Ben Nelson and Mike Johanns on a bill that would  return money from U.S. Savings Bonds to their rightful owners. Nationally there are 40 million savings bonds with a value of more than $16.5 billion that have gone unclaimed. Of that, Osborn said $115 million belongs to Nebraskans.

Currently the unclaimed bonds are stored on microfiche with only the bond numbers posted. In order to cash in those bonds, owners must have the actual certificate. The Unredeemed U.S. Savings Bond Act of 2009, introduced by Senators Jay Rockefeller (W.V.) and Pat Roberts (Kan.), would require that the names of the bondholders be attached to the bonds. That way, people who had no access to the physical paper bonds would still be able to claim their property.

“We need to get the money back to the people. It’s the right thing to do,” Osborn said.