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NEWS + POLITICS + ENTERTAINMENT + FOOD / AUGUST 15, 2013 / ARKTIMES.COM

BIG PIGS. BIG CREEK. BIG PROBLEM? HOG FARM NEAR BUFFALO RIVER RAISES CONCERNS FOR WATERSHED AND COMMUNITY.

BY DAVID RAMSEY

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AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

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THURSDAY, AUGUST 15

Poppy Red (Fayetteville) w/ Classy Nude (Austin, TX)

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PUBLISHER Alan Leveritt EDITOR Lindsey Millar SENIOR EDITOR Max Brantley MANAGING EDITOR Leslie Newell Peacock CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Mara Leveritt ASSOCIATE EDITORS David Koon, David Ramsey, Doug Smith ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR Robert Bell

Jimbo Mathus & Tri State Coalition!! w/ Davis Coen

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This seminal fashion exhibition celebrates the world-renowned work and inspiring life of designer Oscar de la Renta. The exhibit will feature more than 30 of his iconic creations worn by leading arbiters of style, from First Ladies to Hollywood’s brightest stars.

In the 1960s, Dominican-born Oscar de la Renta moved to the United States, where he launched his signature ready-to-wear label and quickly became known as a leading figure in international fashion design. Oscar de la Renta’s award-winning career spans five decades and he continues to produce an exceptional body of work – a testament to his enduring creative vision.

Photographer: Louis Faurer, via Conde Nast

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AUGUST 15, 2013

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COMMENT

Out of pocket, down South In Doug Smith’s August 8 “Words” column, he notes Michael Klossner’s comment on the expression “out of pocket,” used by a spokesperson for Rep. Tom Cotton to indicated his boss’ non-availability. I, too, being from Illinois, remember this colloquialism meaning that one is “broke” financially.

However, upon moving to South Arkansas some 18 years ago, I ran into the Cotton usage almost immediately as an established expression. In these parts, it most assuredly is not merely a “past half year or so” usage, as Klossner asserted, ranking with those other regional ones, such as “fixing to,” “over yonder way” and the ubiquitous “y’all!”

Jim McCollum Emerson

Prison reform needed It’s no secret that the United States has the highest number of people incarcerated in the world. A lot of these are non-violent offenders, such as drug users or alcoholics. The cost of housing an inmate for one year in the state of Arkansas is approximately $50,000.

While our prison system does offer some classes for these individuals, most are not geared toward rehabilitation.

The substance abuse programs are easier to get into if you’ve been stipulated for them by the parole board, but if all you have is a recommendation for this type of program then you are on a waiting list, and the wait is long. There is a chance for non-violent offenders to participate in work release, but again, the opportunities for this are few and the number of inmates wanting work release are many.

I recently saw that the Netherlands is continuing to close prisons because they don’t have enough inmates to fill them. There are several reasons for this.

The Dutch don’t have as many laws regarding illegal substances. For the most part, they don’t incarcerate a person for ingesting substances legal or illegal that only bring harm to themselves.

They have a “fine” system that is based on what a person can afford to pay, not a set amount per offense. They don’t incarcerate, in general, for non-violent offenses and they don’t have lengthy probation sentencing.

Here in the United States, it used to be that if you were stopped for a traffic violation, that’s all you received, a ticket for that offense. Now, with all this technology, you are put under a microscope and everyone knows if you 4

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

spit on a flag back in the ’60s. In other words, a person can almost never escape his/her past here. This is adding to the overcrowding in the prison system. Add to that the problems with our sentencing guidelines and excessive probation sentencing and you have cause for a high rate of recidivism.

A non-violent offender who gets out with a 75-year probation is probably going to screw up again sometime within those 75 years. This is insanity to my way of thinking. It is jamming up our court systems and costing the taxpayers enormous amounts of money.

There is a problem within the parole board as well. If an inmate has been recommended for a particular class and the inmate has been unable to obtain entry into that class prior to their release date, they are often times being held beyond that release date in order to complete a class that may be as long as another 18 months in length. Again, costing the taxpayers more money.

What we need is a complete overhaul of our system, starting with the way we handle non-violent offenders.

Instead of throwing them in with the murderers and rapists, society would

J U N E 7 T H — S E P T. 8 T H , 2 0 1 3

A Lifetime To Collect; Yours for 1 Month.

Rembrandt van Rijn Portrait of the Artist, ca. 1665 Oil on canvas 45 3/4 x 38 1/4 in.

Kenwood House, English Heritage, Iveagh Bequest (88028836) Photo courtesy American Federation of Arts

Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Gainsborough: The Treasures of Kenwood House, London

be better served if we had a true longterm rehabilitation facility. Instead of spending the money to “cage” a nonviolent offender, why not spend that money on a true all inclusive comprehensive program that actually works. A facility that not only has counselors for substance abuse issues, but professionals who would be willing to train these inmates with a life skill, something technical such as welding, HVAC, construction skills, office skills, etc. Anything that would help them become a productive member of society upon their release. We also need ministers in these facilities, for it is my personal belief that only God can truly change the desires of a heart. I know some would say this is mixing government and religion, but it’s not about that. It’s about giving someone every opportunity to turn their life around. A faith-based program is just one of the ways of doing this. And last but not least, we need to do away with the laws in various states that prohibit an ex-inmate from voting or holding a license. If a person does the time, they shouldn’t continue to be punished for the rest of their lives. If these former inmates have paid their debt to society and want to better themselves by becoming a nurse, a doctor, or a lawyer, or whatever they choose to be, they should be given the same opportunity as everyone else. I have seen too many cases where a person has enrolled in an educational program, only to be kicked out a few weeks later when their criminal background check comes back and shows a felony charge. Is it any wonder then that we have such a high recidivism rate? How can we, as a society, ever hope to stop this vicious cycle if there is no true forgiveness? I think we should all give a little more thought to the phrase “Let’s all go Dutch.”

Stephanie Davis Gentry

From the web

Don’t miss seeing these 48 masterpieces on their last U.S. stop before they go back to England. Purchase tickets at arkansasartscenter.org.

The exhibition is organized by the American Federation of Arts and English Heritage and is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities with additional funding from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation. In-kind support is provided by Barbara and Richard S. Lane. presented locally by: Bank of the Ozarks, Harriet & Warren Stephens, Stephens, Inc., Windgate Charitable Foundation.

Sponsored in Arkansas by Chucki and Curt Bradbury, Sandra and Bob Connor, Remmel T. Dickinson and Lisenne Rockefeller.

In response to Sam Eifling’s cover story, “The forgotten in Mayflower” (Aug. 8): I noticed that EXXON has put a fresh coat of paint on the posts which mark the same petroleum pipeline as it crosses thru Howard into Sevier County. That’ll help in the event of a burst pipe, I’m sure. louie

Submit letters to the Editor, Arkansas Times, P.O. Box 34010, Little Rock, AR 72203. We also accept letters via e-mail.

The address is arktimes@arktimes.com.

ORVAL

Join Us For Our Event At The Historic YMCA Building 6th & Broadway • Downtown Little Rock Saturday, September 21 7 – 11pm Admission Is $35 In Advance Or $45 At The Door And Includes: A Night Of Dancing, Food, Drinks, Silent Auction & Live Music By Katmandu

All Proceeds Benefit Out Of The Woods Animal Rescue For More Info Or to Purchase Tickets, Visit www.ootwrescue.org

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AUGUST 15, 2013

5

EDITORIAL

EYE ON ARKANSAS

Infamous

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AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

CLAY WELLS

“N

ews just broke that Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan snuck off to the Koch brothers’ infamous secret gathering of rightwing millionaires.”

Some say snuck and some say sneaked, but either fits Cantor and Ryan. The two low-life Republican congressmen are the kind who look sneaky whatever they’re doing. “Rep. Paul Ryan snuck off to church, where fellow parishioners kept a close eye on him.” “Rep. Eric Cantor snuck off to the barber shop, and out without tipping.”

Meeting with the Koch brothers requires an extra dash of sneakiness, even for Ryan and Cantor.

What the Kochs and their cronies are up to is buying politicians and elections, so as to install a government that will never try to regulate their enterprises or levy taxes on them. For too long America has been focused on freedom and bravery, the Kochs and their kind believe; it’s time for the land of the privileged and the home of the avaricious. (One of the Kochs’ co-conspirators is Jackson Stephens Jr. of Little Rock, who inherited a ton of money and seems to resent those who didn’t. Stephens invests large sums trying to defeat politicians who show sympathy for the middle and lower classes. His “Club for Growth” — or “Club for Greed,” as fellow Republican Mike Huckabee calls it — is spending freely on television advertising against Sen. Mark Pryor, a moderate who occasionally votes with President Obama. One of the ads says, “Liberal Mark Pryor: He’s got a lot to answer for.” It’s rumored that a later ad will say “President Barack Obama: He’s still black.”)

Many Arkansas legislators like to hobnob with rich right-wingers. Even a slow study can figure out that this could work to one’s advantage. The infamous event that Cantor and Ryan attended was a conference of the American Legislative Exchange Council, a right-wing group funded by the Kochs and others that writes reactionary bills for docile legislatures to approve. ALEC is for privatization of schools, against labor, indifferent to air and water pollution. The legislation enacted in Arkansas and other states to discourage the poor, the elderly and minorities from voting is ALEC’s work. A bunch of Arkansas lawmakers were scheduled to attend the same conference as Ryan and Cantor, and at taxpayers’ expense. Virtually shameless, the Arkansans weren’t particularly sneaky about their participation. These are legislators who don’t worry about infamy. Or know how to spell it, in most cases.

The guilty senators were Cecile Bledsoe, Linda Chesterfield, Jane English, Bruce Holland, Jeremy Hutchinson, Johnny Key, Michael Lamoureux and Eddie Joe Williams. The representatives were Randy Alexander, Bob Ballinger, Nate Bell, Ken Bragg, Andy Davis, Jim Dotson, Charlene Fite, Douglas House, Andrea Lea, Mark Lowery, Micah Neal and Richard Womack. Know the enemy. You can be sure that the Kochs know their friends, and that they’ll show it.

ALL WET: Clay Wells submitted this photo of the Triple Falls in Buffalo National River Wilderness Area near Jasper to our Eye On Arkansas Flickr group.

Waltons attack LRSD

T

he latest Walton fortune-funded attack on the Little Rock School District would create a neighborhood charter middle school in majority-white upscale West Little Rock.

The Little Rock School District recognizes the need for a school there and has land under contract for a new middle school.

But the application for a charter school, if approved this fall by the state Board of Education (whose newest member, Diane Zook, has been a financial supporter of the group pushing the charter school), could be up and running first.

This charter school — quasi-private (no school board, private management) — would be publicly financed and free to all comers. With a location far from the inner city, it’s likely, however, to have whiter and more prosperous students than most Little Rock schools.

Which is, of course, the idea.

Many of the parents to be served by this proposed middle school could easily reach Henderson Middle School at John Barrow and I-630 and J.A. Fair High School (a charter high school is also planned eventually). They aren’t interested. Parents from better economic backgrounds aren’t willing to commit their kids to try to make those majorityblack schools work. Easier to start their own neighborhood school with public money.

Enter the Walton Foundation millions, ever ready to further cripple a school district with a teachers union.

In time, the Waltons envision a crazy quilt of dozens of small school districts in Little Rock, separate and almost certainly unequal.

A young law student named John Walker predicted this in 1964. He wrote: “The composition of the schools in the ‘new South’ will reflect the ethnic, economic and educational composition of particular neighborhoods. The result will be more ‘segregated’ schools, some located in ghettoes, some in exclusive suburbs. This result has come to bother many educators and citizens who believe that it is important to the progress of this country that students of all races and backgrounds learn and grow together.”

The Quest Middle School application for Little Rock illustrates that money, not equity, now rules. An organi-

zational meeting was hosted by the Arkansas Public School Resource Center, supported by Walton Foundation money. The driving organizer in Little Rock has been Gary Newton, a former Little Rock MAX Regional Chamber of Commerce BRANTLEY officer and longtime critic of the maxbrantley@arktimes.com Little Rock School District, whose formation of the private Arkansas Learns was funded by the Walton Foundation. He was recently hired to head Arkansans for Education Reform, a charter school lobby funded by the Walton Foundation and other wealthy Arkansans.

They use the work of the Walton-funded education reform school at the University of Arkansas to support their agenda.

The Quest Charter School will use Texas-based Responsive Education Solutions as its manager. The Walton Foundation has already paid it to plan charter schools in Pine Bluff and Little Rock.

Newton would tell you it’s all about quality education.

The implication is that Little Rock schools uniformly suck and charter schools are uniformly good. That’s not true.

There are successful Little Rock schools. And “charter school” is not synonymous with success.

In New York, where the tough Common Core testing is now used, conventional public schools outperformed charter schools, including the much-lauded KIPP schools.

A national study by a research center at Stanford University found Arkansas was one of a handful of states where charter school were outperformed by conventional schools in reading and math.

That same study took special note of Responsive Education Solutions. In comparing its results with comparable conventional public schools, the report said, “the overall effects on growth for students attending Responsive Ed schools are negative.”

The Little Rock School District will fight this school as another case of state-financed segregation. In a world declared post-racial by the U.S. Supreme Court and controlled by big money, I don’t like the district’s odds of success.

OPINION

Pryor senatorial on Obamacare

S

en. Mark Pryor did something last week that no prominent Democrat in this state today dares to do. He defended the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the hated “Obamacare,” and said he was quite proud to have voted for it.

All five Democratic Arkansas members of Congress played key roles in passing the law in their respective houses nearly four years ago, but in the face of a $5 million propaganda deluge in the summer of 2009 that persuaded Arkansans that universal health insurance would ruin their lives, three of them caved and cast nominal votes against the bills they had helped pass so they could say they had opposed the unpopular president’s big initiative. Only Pryor and Rep. Vic Snyder of Little Rock stuck by their convictions. Snyder did not run again in 2010.

Governor Beebe strove mightily to implement Obamacare’s most controversial features and succeeded, but he has taken pains never to utter a word in its defense.

Republicans and Democrats in the Arkansas legislature overwhelmingly voted to implement the biggest feature affecting

Arkansas, but only a few Democrats dare to whisper that it is Obamacare.

Mark Pryor might be the last ERNEST man anyone, espeDUMAS cially liberal Democrats, expects to be enshrined in the pantheon of courageous politicians. Only weeks ago he disappointed tens of thousands by voting against a bill to require background checks on gun-show sales to gain favor with people who go nuts over guns.

But there he was talking to two groups about all the good things the Affordable Care Act was already doing for Arkansas people. One forum was the lion’s den, the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce, which was part of the organization that funneled millions into the ad campaign against Obamacare before Congress voted on even a single provision.

Was that undaunted courage or merely recognition that he now has no choice but to defend a vote that he can’t take back,

How the war will end

I

t’s appropriate that the Supreme Court’s decisions in the marriage equality cases — the cases evaluating the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act and Proposition 8 — came just days before the nation commemorated the 150th anniversaries of the irreversible Battles of Vicksburg and Gettysburg.

In the war to obtain full marriage equality in the United States, it is the summer of 1863. As a result of these two defining cases, we know how this very different American war will turn out. We don’t yet know the date of its Appomattox. The closing period of the push for marriage equality in the United States will include a series of skirmishes that play out at both the federal and state levels in almost every institution of government, leading to the moment when the U.S. Supreme Court ultimately declares end to this chapter of the culture wars.

First, in the coming weeks, the victory in the Windsor DOMA case likely will be consolidated by executive actions by the Obama Administration. The Department of Homeland Security already has determined that same-sex partners can sponsor spouses for green cards. Importantly, “mar-

riage” for purposes of immigration law focuses on the state in which the marriage ceremony occurred rather JAY than where the couBARTH ple is now residing.

While the final directives related to those in the military have not yet been handed down, it appears clear that the Department of Defense will follow a similar logic when it comes to the treatment of military spouses for that highly mobile population.

The Obama Administration also appears to have legal flexibility in expanding rights to couples who were married in states where same-sex marriages are legally performed (the “state of ceremony”) in areas ranging from bankruptcy to financial aid and, perhaps most importantly, in the nearly 200 separate provisions of the federal tax code that are tied to marriage.

When it comes to the major benefits in Social Security and veterans’ spousal benefits, however, the administration has fewer options because marriage is defined by statute as the couple’s “state of domicile.”

Even here, though, as shown by information

as Sen. Blanche Lincoln and Rep. Marion Berry tried to do in March 2010 on the reconciliation vote? Both had voted eagerly for the reform bills — in Berry’s case, a much more liberal version — and then voted “no” on reconciliation when it was meaningless.

(Rep. Mike Ross spoke eloquently of the need for such a law in his home district and cast key votes to keep the more liberal House version alive, but when he saw it was impossible to educate his angry voters on the bill’s provisions he voted against the House bill he had worked on and the more conservative Senate bill that became Obamacare.)

A more realistic explanation of Pryor’s stance is that he was being a senator.

The Constitution created two houses of Congress, which had to agree on the passage of laws. A lower house, in which members had to face the voters every other year, would be sensitive to politics and the instant mood of voters. In the upper chamber, senators were expected to take the long view, put themselves above momentary passions and do what was best for the country. They were given six-year terms.

So a political scientist might forgive Berry and Ross for their inconstancy and perhaps even Lincoln’s cravenness since she was facing an almost spontaneous reelection. Her conflicting votes only disap-

pointed 100 percent of the electorate.

The political path is a little less thorny for Pryor. The last major part of the law will be implemented Jan. 1, 10 months before the election. Obamacare will no longer be a looming catastrophe. People will know whether their Medicare benefits were cut, whether their insurance premiums skyrocketed, whether the government had ordered grandmothers off life support, whether they’ve lost their beautiful relationship with their doctor, whether the budget deficit ballooned (it’s been cut almost in half since Obamacare became law), whether medical care has been rationed and whether any of the other horrors hinted at by Republicans came true.

That doesn’t mean Pryor’s defense of Obamacare will be easy. His opponent, Rep. Tom Cotton, changed the story line a little the other day. He said by voting for Obamacare Pryor was setting the stage for “a single-payer system.” That is Medicare for all, which happens to be the health reform that was favored by a vast majority of Americans before Congress opted for the Republican/Mitt Romney plan, which was to just extend the private, employerbased health-care system to everyone. Lots of people may be saying, with a Cheshire grin, “Oh, please don’t throw us into that briar patch.”

released by the administration regarding nate from a couple’s desire to divorce in a Social Security benefits, the administration non-marriage state. Ultimately, though, it appears to be seeking a way around this limi- is federal court cases by couples wishing to tation. A new subchapter to the Program be married in non-marriage states that will Operations Manual on the Social Security lead to the U.S. Supreme Court finally grapAdministration website instructs proces- pling with whether state bans violate the sors to “hold,” rather than deny, claims in 14th Amendment. At some point, probably soon after the next presidential election, it which the state of ceremony recognized the marriage but the state of domicile does not. seems likely that the Court will do just that.

Second, we will see efforts to expand So, what’s the role of Arkansas in marriage rights beyond the current list of 13 these final stages of the marriage equalstates and the District of Columbia. Advo- ity battle? While the courage of plaintiffs cates see this occurring through a series of in two recently filed court cases should be legislative actions (in states like Illinois and applauded, there are more promising cases Hawaii), votes of the people (in states like in other jurisdictions. More important are Oregon and Colorado), and state court deci- the efforts to overturn Arkansas’s constitusions (in states like New Mexico). Their goal tional ban by a vote of the people. Though is to legalize same-sex marriage in 20 states such a campaign (most realistically in 2016) by the time of the next presidential election. may still fail at the ballot box, the margin Finally, a flurry of actions will be taking likely will be much closer than 2004’s 3-1 place in federal courts. The cases that seem vote passing the ban. Such a campaign could to have the greatest chance of success are remove a political cudgel from the hands of cases from couples in “non-marriage” states anti-gay advocates, while transforming the requesting their home state simply recog- cause of LGBT rights into a true movement nize their marriages from other states. As — which simply has never before existed in an early example, two Ohio men — one this state. While elections and the courts dying of Lou Gehrig’s disease — success- move closer to the inevitable, such a movefully sued in late July to get their Maryland ment could help accelerate the generational marriage recognized despite a ban in their shift in hearts and minds. That’s crucial if home state, so that the dying man could be Arkansas is to become a state where LGBT listed as married on his death certificate. citizens can openly and comfortably live, Other marriage recognition cases will ema- work and raise families. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

7

W O RDS

Cleanliness important As I lay there in the gudder, Thinking thoughts I cannot udder …

“Mariah White says it takes about an hour of milking between the two cows to produce their combined 10 to 11 gallons a day. That doesn’t include the time they spend cleaning the cows’ utters and sterilizing milk jugs.”

“The pier was a joint venture between North Little Rock and the Game and Fish Commission, and is one of the few handicap-accessible places to fish on the river.”

Is it handicap-accessible or handicapped-accessible? I’d say it’s the latter, meaning “accessible to people who are handicapped,” but handicap-accessible appears in print at least as often.

Garner’s Modern American Usage doesn’t like either. “The phrases handicapped-accessible and handicapaccessible are illogical,” Garner writes.

“Although wheelchair-accessible makes sense (accessible by wheelchair), handicapped-accessible does not — unless we do some contortions to suggest that it means ‘accessible to the handicapped.’ ” I don’t find the contortions difficult, and I’m not especially limber.

Don A. Eilbott writes: “Happened

to see the restaurant review for Denton’s Trotline on page 39 of the August 1 issue.

‘Saline countyDOUG ites’? Why not SMITH dougsmith@arktimes.com Saline Countians?”

Pine Bluffian and Forrest Cityian are correct for residents of those cities, Eilbott says. He’s not sure about Helenaites, but he thinks Harrisonite sounds better than Harrisonian. (I don’t.)

“Little Rockites or Little Rockians?”

Eilbott writes. “Perhaps it should be Little Rockets.” (Or Little Rockettes, although some might see objectionable sexism there. On the other hand, “The City of the High Kick” would be a memorable slogan.)

My memory is less than perfect — considerably less — but it seems to me that years ago I was part of a faction agitating for Little Rockers. I don’t think that was ever widely accepted.

Finally, Eilbott asks if there’s a rule for determining what to call people from various places. If there is, I don’t know it. I do know that the Beatles were Liverpudlians. I’m proud of that.

WEEK THAT WAS

ugust 19-24, 2013

For more information go to ArgentaArtsDistrict.org. pa r t i c i pat i n g r e s ta u r a n t s reno’s argenta café eight-dollar lunch 376.2900 argenta market starving artist café 379.9980 372.7976 cornerstone pub & grill 374.1782 twenty-five-dollar dinner

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cregeen’s irish pub 376.7468

crush wine bar 374.9463

mugs cafe 379.9101

ristorante capeo 376.3463

the joint 372.0210

starving artist café 372.7976

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

It was a good week for…

A RACE TO THE BOTTOM. Lt. Governor Mark Darr and Rep. Bruce Westerman each announced as candidates for Fourth District of the U.S. House of Representatives. It’ll be a fight to the death about who hates Obamacare more.

OWNING OBAMACARE. Sen. Mark Pryor finally made got around to speaking up for the controversial health care law. He did vote for it after all. He was going to be hung with it no matter what he said. So he’s chosen a pretty good path of defense — it’s not perfect, it needs refinement, but elements of it are in place and are working.

KALI HARDIG. Doctors said the 12-yearold girl would survive an infection by primary amoebic meningoencephalitis (PAM). That makes her only the third person in North America to survive PAM. Hardig apparently contracted the amoeba while swimming at Willow Springs Water Park in Little Rock.

(More on page 13).

It was a bad week for…

SECRETARY OF STATE MARK MARTIN. Judge Tim Fox sided with blogger and attorney Matt Campbell, who’s sued Martin for failure to produce all public documents in his possession concerning his practice of hiring outside lawyers to represent his office. Martin hired outside counsel to represent him in the suit. Fox granted Campbell’s motion to keep Chad Pekron and Joseph Price of the Quattlebaum firmfrom representing Martin in the Freedom of Information case. The state Democratic Party has called for a criminal probe into Martin’s actions.

SCHOOL CHOICE. The state Board of Education heard 13 appeals of school transfer denials under the new school choice law and denied them all.

SPECIAL CHICKENS. Vikon Farms announced it would spend more than $5 million to restart a former Petit Jean Poultry plant in Arkadelphia that will employ more than 172 people processing a special breed of chicken sold to Asian markets. It’s a freerange chicken fed organically.

THE OBSERVER NOTES ON THE PASSING SCENE

Returning THE OBSERVER CALLED UCA on a tip the other day and learned that Damien Echols of the West Memphis Three will be coming there on Nov. 11-12 to speak and to teach a mini-class with their crop of eager young creative writing students, quick as a whip with a metaphor (see page 31 for more info).

Color us shocked. If Yours Truly had been pent up in the Arkansas hoosegow for 18 years for something we didn’t do — and brought kissing close to the point of a poison needle a few times for the same non-crime — we would make every effort not even to fly over this particular patch of dirt in a jetliner at 30,000 feet, much less return on our own two legs. We tend to carry a grudge.

It probably says something about the kind of human being Echols is that he’s willing to make the journey back here.

Jason Baldwin, who is doing well in his new home out in Seattle, came back to Arkansas last winter for a talk at the Clinton Center. Good for him and good for Echols. Not only is it stirring to see them walking around in the state that once held them in bondage, The Observer has long been of the mind that we should be reminded, and often, of that lowdown shame so it doesn’t happen again.

Hearing that Echols plans to come back to Arkansas reminded us that we met him once. Well, “meet” isn’t quite the word. More like: stared at through glass, him reduced to something like an animal in a zoo and us the guilty Observer. We’d gone down to the prison with our photographer that day in January to talk to all three of them: Jason Baldwin, Jessie Misskelley and Damien Echols. At the last minute, though, prison officials stepped in and said we were only cleared for photos of Misskelley and Echols for some reason.

And so, instead of talking like two men, The Observer watched in silence as Echols was led in and sat down, him in a cage on one side of a pane of glass, The Observer in our own, larger cell on the other. He was lean, his skin bleached white. He lifted his ankle so our photographer could get photos of

the skin rubbed raw by the chains. And then The Observer and Echols were left to mouth our apologies through the glass to one another like kids trying to dodge the teacher in the back of homeroom, both of us muffled by edict. The Observer, fearing the consequences for Echols were we to break that silence, bit our angry tongue, and looked, and smiled, and despaired at what hell had been done to a man in our name.

Eight months later, in the heat of August, we were in Jonesboro to watch him walk free, something we would have bet a thousand bucks and a borrowed guitar would never come to pass had you asked us the probability of it in that cold room down at the prison.

Seeing that — seeing all of them free men, and hearing them speak in their own voices — blew that old, January chill out of our heart and gave us hope to spare. Call us crazy, but knowing that Echols has found enough forgiveness in his own heart to cast his shadow on this land again gives us a bit more.

THE OBSERVER IS WORKING on a history piece right now, so we’ve been reading back though some very old articles. We ran across the following newspaper item, printed in June 1891, and it was just too beautiful not to share. Pretty sure the original author won’t mind: “Joe Spencer, charged with murder, used to be a preacher, and yet has preacher spells sometimes. Last year, he humbugged the citizens of Okmulgee by initiating them into a supposed order of Masonry. He instituted a lodge there, and, for $15 a candidate, put them through the first degree, promising to come back in a few weeks to give them the other degrees. He never showed up again, and when his Okmulgee Masons began to make signs at the genuine Masons in town, [the victims of the humbugging Mason maker] were thought to be crazy or drunk.”

They just don’t make newspaper stories like they used to, do they? Don’t make humbuggers like ol’ Joe Spencer anymore either, thank God. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

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L

ast week, we suggested in this space that Arkansas would be buoyed by raw exuberance of a new regime and the fortuitous structure of the schedule to bolt out to a 4-0 start in 2013. The second third of the campaign promises to be substantially more daunting, but there are caveats.

Consider that Arkansas opens SEC play with its first true home game against Texas A&M in over two decades, and that this A&M team has been the lightning rod of the offseason. Consider that the following week puts the Razorbacks on the road to the Swamp, where the Hogs have never won a game but also had a shimmering upset snatched away from them four years ago.

Consider that the Hogs return home on Oct. 12 to play South Carolina, which boasts the country’s most dynamic defensive player but also has historically scuffled on this state’s turf. And lastly, consider that Game No. 8 is against Alabama, which...you know, let’s not think about that one just yet.

The Razorbacks do open SEC play Sep. 28 in Fayetteville against the Aggies.

If they manage to be 4-0 against the nonconference slate, then this game projects as far more intriguing than we would have thought about eight months ago. A&M was last year’s darling, an upstart team brazenly jumping into the pool with the rest of the thoroughbreds and riding a freewheeling young quarterback with a catchy, if grossly unimaginative, nickname. The Ags popped Bama on the road, destroyed a typically oversold Oklahoma team in the Cotton Bowl, and had the first freshman Heisman winner in history. How could 2013 possibly turn sour?

Well, Johnny Manziel can’t stay off Twitter, can’t keep his family quiet and quite possibly can’t sign any swag without suitable remuneration (this matter hangs over College Station like the proverbial thundercloud as I write this). What hasn’t been stated is how the Aggies will replace a veteran offensive line anchored by No. 2 draft pick Luke Joeckel, or where Manziel will turn for a surefire possession receiver now that Ryan Swope is gone.

This one may or may not qualify as the season’s first true shocker, but Arkansas’s veteran players are still stinging from a listless rout at Kyle Field last year, and are committed to opening SEC play in big fashion.

The Hogs ride Brandon Allen’s best-ever game (200+ passing yards and a careerhigh four touchdown throws) to a 5-0 start.

Hogs 33, Aggies 27.

Bloom comes off the rose the next week, though.

Florida isn’t the machine it was under Spurrier or Meyer, and in fact, there’s got to

be a few Gator fans who worry that Will Muschamp is more Ron Zook than either of the aforementioned titans BEAU who made GainesWILCOX ville the center of the football universe at various times in the last 20 years. That said, the Gators are flush with adept talent on both sides of the ball, and returning quarterback Jeff Driskel’s development accelerated measurably over the course of the last year.

Arkansas won’t handle the stress of Ben Hill Griffith Stadium well. The Gator defense plays at a tenacious pitch from down to down and some of the Hogs’ younger players show chinks in the armor.

Despite a decent running day from Alex Collins, the Hogs turn it over four times and surrender five sacks in a deflating loss.

Gators 27, Hogs 13.

Limping back to Fayetteville, the Hogs get thrown around a little by the Gamecocks, whose slow burn from mid-level also-ran to upper-shelf program is nearing completion under Spurrier. Jadeveon Clowney’s showing in this one will be a little understated, but he is flanked by capable help on the line and in the defensive backfield. Arkansas will have a steady game on the ground, but Allen will struggle against the rush.

What decides this game is special teams.

The Hogs get gashed for a kick return score and a long punt return that sets up Carolina’s Connor Shaw for one of three short TD runs. Gamecocks 40, Hogs 27.

And lo, with a two-game skid and sagging fortunes, the Hogs get to ship on down to Tuscaloosa before the bye week. I won’t bore you with details here, but it’s going to be supremely ugly. Alabama is the reigning alpha and omega of this little sport, and even if AJ McCarron throws an errant one or two or T.J. Yeldon muffs an exchange, this is the best Alabama offense that Nick Saban has had in seven seasons down South. There’s simply too much balance and brute strength for a fledgling competitor like Arkansas to overcome.

And, naturally, the quality of the Tide defense speaks for itself. Arkansas won’t quit like it did in 2012, but it won’t fare much better than it did in 2011, when the Hogs were ranked in the Top 10 and came to Bryant-Denny Stadium with visions of shedding the Saban yoke. This will be the Hogs’ worst loss of 2013, which isn’t terribly unnerving given the competition, but it does mean that going into the final third of the year, the Hogs will be on a three-game skid and hardly on good footing for November.

Crimson Tide 42, Hogs 10.

www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

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Arkansas Reporter

THE

IN S IDE R

Dayong Yang has sued the city of Little Rock and several city employees over the accident in which his wife, Jinglei Yi, died after prolonged exposure to cold water after her car slid off an icy road into a pond in western Little Rock.

His 5-year-old son surived, but was left with permanent injuries.

The facts as retold by Carter Stein of the McMath Woods law firm are compelling in their horror. A 911 dispatcher failed to call water rescue units and their late arrival was critical in what transpired.

The dispatcher was hired by Little Rock despite having been fired from a similar job in Benton because of multiple complaints about her performance. City policies also prevented Yang himself, plus other bystanders, from entering the water to attempt a rescue before the Fire Department team arrived. The child spent more than an hour in the water before being taken to a hospital.

The wrinkle in the case is that the city of Little Rock and its employees have always enjoyed immunity from lawsuit under Arkansas statutes. And there is no claims commission to pursue payments from cities when their employees screw up, as is the case with state employees and the state Claims Commission.

The lawsuit makes the argument — which would be groundbreaking if adopted — that the Arkansas Constitution says, “Every person is entitled to a certain remedy in the laws for all injuries or wrongs he may receive in his person.”

If the statute holds the city harmless from lawsuit, it means Dayong Yang and his neurologically damaged child have been wronged but are left with no remedy.

If Yang can keep his case alive, there’s also a chance private parties might be found to have played a role in events — whether in hardware or software at the communications center or through privately contracted services.

They could have liability the city does not under the generally accepted view of the law.

At some point, you wonder, too, if the city will exhibit a “conscience” after the errors that damaged this immigrant family.

Cyclists, Corps feud over parking

Parking has been reduced at the Big Dam Bridge, which draws huge CONTINUED ON PAGE 13 12

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

BRIAN CHILSON

Groundbreaking lawsuit

JOHNSON: “We used everything we had.”

Saving Lake Conway

Did quick response on the day of the Mayflower spill keep oil from reaching the main body of the lake? ADEQ says yes.

A lakeside resident is skeptical.

BY ELIZABETH MCGOWAN

A

nything for his treasured fishing hole. That was the mantra cycling through Jimmy Joe Johnson’s head on the afternoon of Friday, March 29, as he rushed to keep a filthy stream of crude oil from spilling out of a cove and into the main body of Lake Conway.

Standing at the edge of the lake more than four months later, Johnson had his fingers crossed that his efforts that day weren’t for naught. Officials with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) say they feel certain that soon-to-come results from sediment testing will confirm what water tests revealed — that no oil

reached the main SPECIAL body of the lake.

REPORT But Johnson won’t stop fretting until he sees definitive proof that the lake wasn’t sullied.

Johnson’s lookout on this steamy August day is roughly nine-tenths of a mile from the spot where oil from ExxonMobil’s ruptured Pegasus pipeline gushed into a subdivision of neat, brick homes.

Instinct and familiarity with the local topography guided Johnson and a crew of locals to this site — a man-made dike about the length of a football field that supports two lanes of state Highway 89 traffic — on that fateful Friday afternoon.

The dike isolates a 30-acre, elbowshaped cove thick with lily pads from the sprawling 6,700-acre Lake Conway.

On the day of the spill, Johnson knew he and his team were too late to keep oil out of the cove. But they were intent on stopping the plume of black goo before it contaminated the main body of a lake renowned in Central Arkansas for its stocked bounty of catfish, crappie, bluegill and bass.

“We had one mission and that was to keep the oil out of the lake,” Johnson, superintendent of the Mayflower streets department for 15 years, told a reporter. “Once I figured out where the bust was, there was no doubt the oil was headed to Lake Conway. We used everything we had.”

Johnson joined volunteer firefighters and public works employees from Faulkner County and Mayflower equipped with dump trucks and backhoes. Together, they scrambled to position plywood, dirt, rocks and close to 1,000 tons of gravel to construct barricades to keep oily water from surging CONTINUED ON PAGE 40

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ASK THE TIMES

INSIDER, CONT.

If the “brain-eating parasite” that has made the Benton child so sick is common, why don’t more people have it? Should I be careful swimming in Arkansas’s lakes and streams? Why did she survive when so few do?

PHOTOS FROM PRAYERS FOR KALI LE ANN FACEBOOK PAGE/ CDC, DR. GOVINDA S. VISVESVARA

A.

Green lowered her body temperature Kali Hardig, the 12-year-old to 34 degrees C. (93.2 F.) to further girl being treated at Arkanreduce swelling, and, with the OK of sas Children’s Hospital for the CDC, doctors gave Kali the antiprimary amoebic meningoencephaparasite drug miltefosine, a German litis (PAM), caused by the parasite drug not approved for use in the U.S. Naegleria fowleri, is “very blessed,” by the Federal Drug Administration.

ACH intensivist Dr. Mark Heulitt said Miltefosine was developed to treat last week. breast cancer but has been found to Kali, who was admitted to Chilbe effective against the water-borne dren’s July 19 with a high fever and HARDIG parasite that causes leishmaniasis. vomiting, apparently contracted the Why Kali has survived is unknown. amoeba while swimming at Willow “With a single case, it’s hard to draw Springs Water Park in south Little Rock. much of a conclusion,” Heulitt said.

Only two people in North America “We don’t know if she had as much have survived infection by the amoeba; exposure as other people.”

Kali will be the third. (A child in Heulitt did not credit the German California and another in Mexico also drug for Kali’s recovery altogether; survived.) She is no longer in critical he said her mother’s speedy action condition; she left the intensive care in getting her to the hospital was a unit late last week to begin rehabilitafactor. A 7-year-old boy admitted to tion. She is able to follow commands Histopathology of amoebic Children’s with PAM in 2010 — he’d and make thumbs up or down meningoencephalitis due to also been swimming at Willow Springs responses, which is a good indicator of Naegleria fowleri.

— was also treated with miltefosine, higher brain function, Heulitt said, but the Health Department’s Haselow said, but he died. The she is not yet talking. owners of Willow Springs have closed the park.

While the amoeba is not rare — it lives in the mud Naegleria also occurs in hot springs. A spokesman for under warm lakes and slow rivers — infection is: Only 128 the Centers for Disease Control said it has done no testing cases of PAM have been reported in the United States for the bacteria in Arkansas other than the one that consince 1962. Because the disease kills quickly — as soon firmed its presence in the water at Willow Springs. as within a week — it may go undetected. Doctors don’t The state Health Department does test swimming know why some people are vulnerable and some aren’t. beaches for the presence of fecal coliforms, which can The amoeba moves through the porous plate behind cause gastrointestinal distress. While the odds of contractthe sinuses to reach the brain, where it damages tissue. ing PAM are about 1 in 33 million, Haselow said, people “The risky behavior is not just getting wet but forcibly are “many thousands of times” more likely to be sickened pushing water up the nose,” state Health Department epiby fecal bacteria. demiologist Dr. Dirk T. Haselow said, the way it might be Haselow said if parents have a child “who can’t get in if you fall face forward off water skis or kick up mud from water without being overly vigorous,” he would recomthe bottom of a pond. It can also live in water pipes; two mend they choose a chlorinated pool for swimming. The Louisiana women who used tap water to perform a nasal amoeba can live in low concentrations of chlorine, but not wash with a neti pot became infected and died. what would be found in a public pool. Willow Springs was Heulitt got a call from a Miami hospital last Thursday chlorinated, but had a sandy bottom. after another child was admitted there with PAM. The fed“Recreational water users should assume that there eral Centers for Disease Control had recommended that is a low level of risk when entering all warm freshwater, the hospital contact Kali’s doctors to discuss their protocol. particularly in southern-tier states,” the CDC says.

Kali was first treated with antibiotics and antifungals Heulitt said it’s theorized that some people may have a and a catheter was placed in her brain to reduce swelling. genetic malformation in the sinuses that makes them more Her condition worsened and she had to be intubated, vulnerable to the passage of the amoeba.

Heulitt said. At that point, ACH critical care Dr. Jerril W.

crowds of families, walkers, runners and bicyclists on weekends, after a complaint by Corps of Engineers workers at the Murray Lock and Dam that cars were making egress and ingress to the fenced-off federal property unsafe.

Visitors to the dam were able, until about a month ago, to park parallel on the south side of the span of Rebsamen Park Road from the main road to the lock and dam gate.

The road used to accommodate about 24 vehicles, according to a Times estimate.

The parking lot north of the road can accommodate 39 cars, with four of the spots reserved for handicapped parking. A sign now tells visitors that overflow parking can be found in Murray Park, 6/10ths of a mile east of the entrance to the parking lot and connected to the lot by an asphalt path.

The back story, according to several agreeing sources, is that bicyclists believe employees of the Corps have been driving too fast down the 10 mph entrance to the lock and dam and Corps employees believe cyclists have been careless by congregating in the road.

A Corps employee who was leaving work apparently honked at a cyclist to get out of the road and called police when the cyclist didn’t move. (The Times has asked for a police incident report to confirm.)

The county erected the no parking signs; LRPD officers have written tickets to those who park. (The jurisdiction is complicated at the Big Dam Bridge, assistant City Manager Bryan Day said: The Corps of Engineers owns the property, the county has a local use agreement with the corps and the city leases the land from the corps.)

Day said the city is trying to come up with a plan for more parking. Then the city will have to come up with the money.

Parks and Recreation assistant director Mark Webre said that Murray Park has bathrooms, which he sees as a positive for folks who have to park more than a half mile to get to the bridge, and noted that they’ll be walking when they get to the park as well.

He acknowledged, however, that by reducing parking at the bridge, the city has potentially created a traffic jam on the narrow asphalt path that connects Murray Park and the bridge park, which will now be used by families pushing strollers, little kids, runners and hikers with bikers weaving in and among them. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

13

TROUBLE UPSTREAM A HOG FARM NEAR THE BUFFALO STIRS CONTROVERSY.

BY DAVID RAMSEY

T

he community of Mt. Judea sits on a hill along Arkansas 123, the scenic highway that snakes through the Ozarks in Newton County. This is the country that people have in mind when they think of the “Natural State” — clear rivers and creeks, craggy rocks, colorful cliffs and bluffs, springs, sinkholes, caves.

It is mostly quiet in Mt. Judea, save for when motorcyclists come roaring down 123 to take in the scenery. The people are protective of their small community and suspicious of outsiders and the federal government. “Everybody knows everybody and most everybody’s related,” they say.

Big Creek, one of the largest tributaries of the Buffalo National River, runs up the valley below Mt. Judea’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it town center: a school, a general store, the Eagle Rock Cafe. On a hill across the valley, around a mile away as the crow flies, is C&H Hog Farm, the first facility in the state to get a concentrated animal feeding operation permit (CAFO). The permit allows C&H to house 6,503 hogs: 2,500 sows, 3 boars, and another 4,000 piglets, which at three weeks old will be trucked off to another facility to be fattened for slaughter.

The hogs belong to Cargill, by revenue the largest privately held company in the nation and the sole customer for C&H. The farm has turned this quiet town into the

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AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

center of a very noisy fight. Critics say it poses unacceptable risks to the Buffalo River watershed.

“I was alarmed about it for a couple of reasons,” said Gordon Watkins, a farmer who lives on the Little Buffalo River, the next valley over from Big Creek, and the president of the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance, a citizens group that formed in reaction to C&H’s permit. “One was the size and the scale of this thing and its proximity to Big Creek and the town of Mt. Judea and the school, and of course the Buffalo River.”

“What really set me off was the fact that it was a done deal by the time we heard about it,” Watkins said. “It had been done very quietly with no fanfare and even some neighbors of the property didn’t know about it until after the fact.”

Last week, a coalition formed by the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance, the Arkansas Canoe Club, the National Parks Conservation Association and the Ozark Society sued the two federal agencies that backed the loan to build the facility, claiming that the Farm Services Agency and the Small Business Administration failed to do adequate environmental assessments and offer adequate public notice. The coalition has also been sharply critical of the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) and the state permitting process that approved the facility, though it hasn’t

sued the state so far.

The controversy centers on the inevitable byproduct of the farm: pig crap. Based on C&H’s nutrient management plan (NMP), the facility will generate more than 2 million gallons of manure and wastewater per year. The waste is first collected in 2-foot-deep concrete pits below the animals. Once the shallow pits, diluted with water, are filled, the waste drains into two large man-made storage ponds. Eventually, as the ponds fill, C&H will remove liquid waste and, in an agreement with local landowners, apply it as fertilizer on more than 600 acres of surrounding fields.

C&H, which began operations in spring, is still gearing up to full capacity. It currently houses around 2,000 hogs — gilts, not yet fully grown

BRIAN CHILSON

into sows — and they have yet to fertilize any fields.

Ten of the fields that will be sprayed with hog waste are adjacent to Big Creek, which flows into the Buffalo River less than six miles away.

Critics of the farm say that the amount of concentrated waste that will be produced is more than the vulnerable terrain of the Buffalo River watershed can take and that it will cause both odor and health problems in Mt. Judea.

The farmers counter that the CAFO permit, and the nutrient management plan an engineer developed for them as part of the permit, offer sufficient safeguards and regulations to protect the environment and the town.

C&H is owned by Jason Henson and his cousins, Richard and Philip Campbell. According to Henson,

before proceeding with the new facility, the three C&H farmers and Cargill wanted to get local input.

They set up a meeting at the Mt. Judea firehouse months before they began the permit process. Henson said that the meeting showed Cargill that the farm would have local support.

An area resident who was in attendance at the meeting remembers it differently. The resident said that after a few tough questions, a Cargill representative shut the meeting down. (Many area residents with concerns about C&H were willing to speak only if their names were withheld.)

“They had no data, they had nothing at that meeting,” the resident said. “It was absolutely a fiasco in my opinion. They were not prepared. They thought they were going to come in with a bunch of igno-

rant hicks and they were going to roll over them.”

According to the resident, the meeting was not well publicized in Mt. Judea — the resident said that there were a large group of people from other areas but only a handful of people now impacted by the farm. It was “not a fair representation of the people that are going to be affected by it,” the resident said.

In any case, Cargill decided that it wanted to proceed and sent Henson a letter of intent to contract as a buyer for the farm. The next steps for Henson: getting a permit and getting funding. Henson decided to pursue a CAFO permit, becoming the first applicant in Arkansas to do so.

The CAFO permit, established by ADEQ in 2011, is a general permit — as the name implies, it’s not

LESS THAN SIX MILES AWAY: The Buffalo River near its confluence with Big Creek.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 16 www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

15

individualized to the specific applicant, though the CAFO permit does require a nutrient management plan.

In using the general CAFO permit, C&H and ADEQ followed the letter of the law in terms of notice — the letter of intent and the nutrient management plan sat on ADEQ’s website for 30 days.

“Obviously the average citizen is not trolling ADEQ’s website on a regular basis,” said attorney Hanna Chang of EarthJustice, a California-based environmental law firm that is part of the legal team representing the coalition. Key stakeholders and even relevant public agencies, such as the National Parks Service, were, by their own accounts, unaware.

The first CAFO permit in the state, which happened to be for a site in the Buffalo River watershed, managed to go through with hardly anyone noticing.

“All that C&H needed to do to get the general

one. Marks acknowledged as much, and said that tal assessment, when in fact, according to Cheri, it in hindsight, she believes that ADEQ should have knew nothing about the document. Cheri noted gone above and beyond the minimum public notice that FSA has offices in the same building in Harrequired by law. rison that headquarters the NPS Buffalo National “In retrospect, I wish that we had a public meet- River office, but no one walked down the hall to tell ing before and explained the nutrient management him about the CAFO or the federal loan guarantee. plan,” she said. “I’m not sure it would have changed “There was ample opportunity to communicate this anything. But I understand the way people feel. if they intended to do so,” he said.

They feel like this happened and nobody knew In a February letter to the FSA, Cheri wrote that anything about it.” the inclusion of the NPS as a cooperating agency The notice process for a CAFO permit is now “gives the public and agencies reviewing the docuunder review after a bill passed by Rep. Greg Led- ment the unrealistic view that NPS is on-board with ing (D-Fayetteville), Rep. Warwick Sabin (D-Little the conclusions of the EA. In fact, nothing could be Rock) and Rep. Kelly Linck (R-Yellville) last session. further from the truth.” Cheri’s letter goes on to “It’s definitely time to look at the notice require- articulate 45 flaws with the FSA’s environmental ments,” Marks said. “That’s certainly something assessment and their finding of no significant impact. that has been of great concern. ... We are more than The FSA responded to Cheri in late March willing to revise those.” with 45 counterpoints, and argued that “although a cooperating agency, [NPS] was not required to be contacted.” Both Cheri and the coalition that has filed suit believe that FSA’s letter failed to address Cheri’s key points. FSA state executive director Linda Newkirk declined to comment for this article, citing the pending lawsuit.

BRIAN CHILSON

T

WATER TESTING: Dr. John Van Brahana (far right) is conducting research in the Mt. Judea area.

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AUGUST 15, 2013

permit is to submit certain information,” Chang said.

“If that information complies with what’s required under the general permit, then bingo, they’re in.

There’s a posting on the ADEQ website and they’re finished. There was no individual hearing or comment on this facility. In terms of notice and comment, that was a huge flaw. Folks we know who were living within a half mile of the facility didn’t know about it until it was built.”

ADEQ Director Teresa Marks defended the general permit process. “You have to have some general permits because we deal with thousands of facilities and operations across the state,” she said.

“If we have to have local notice for every person that wants to proceed under the terms of a general permit, it would be very difficult to manage that.”

However, the state is not dealing with thousands of CAFO applications — there has been only

ARKANSAS TIMES

Once it had the permit, C&H secured FSA- and SBA-backed loans totaling more than $3.6 million.

The FSA prepared a federally mandated environmental assessment (the SBA did not), but did not publish notice of a public comment period in any local paper in the area of the farm. Critics say that like the ADEQ permit process, the notice for the public was inadequate — but this time, the federal agencies didn’t meet their minimum legal requirements.

“On the federal side, it’s not a matter of what is common sense or polite or professional,” National Parks Service Superintendent Kevin Cheri said. “It’s what is required by law. Legally we should have been notified.”

Cheri was particularly frustrated because the National Parks Service was listed as a cooperating agency on the cover sheet of the FSA’s environmen-

♦♦♦

he coalition believes that in addition to the lack of notice, both the ADEQ permit and the FSA environmental assessment were shoddily completed and essentially rubber-stamped.

The complaint filed in the federal case describes multiple errors, omissions and inconsistencies in the FSA’s environmental assessment. While the coalition has not taken legal action against the state, Hank Bates — a Little Rock lawyer working with the coalition’s legal team — sent a letter on its behalf to ADEQ, arguing that the CAFO permit should be revoked because of deficiencies in their review of the permit and the nutrient management plan.

“ADEQ did not review that permit,” Bates said. “The Buffalo River is too precious a resource to roll the dice on. When you look at the permit application, it doesn’t instill any confidence.”

One of the coalition’s main concerns is the nutrients, and potentially bacteria, that they believe may seep into the water given the proximity of the spray fields to Big Creek (though the permit requires that C&H maintain a 100-foot buffer from the banks).

Seven of the fields are listed as “occasionally flooded” in the NMP’s soil maps. “Some people have voiced concerns about catastrophic failures,” said Watkins of the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance. “That’s a concern, but there’s also the danger of this slow, continual creep that’s going to occur once this gets into the groundwater and starts showing up in the creek and in the Buffalo. In the Ozarks, we’re lucky if we’ve got 6 or 8 inches of topsoil. Then we hit gravel and then we hit water. ... Anything that’s applied in these fields, if it gets through that shallow topsoil layer and hits that gravel, it’s only a short way before it’s in the water itself.”

The coalition is particularly concerned about the 31,000 pounds of phosphorous that, according to the NMP, will be part of the makeup of C&H’s annual hog waste produced. The University of Arkansas’s soil tests recommended that no further phospho-

BRIAN CHILSON

FACTORY OR FAMILY FARM?: Jason Henson (foreground) at C&H with Farm Bureau staffers.

BRIAN CHILSON

rous be applied to 15 of the 17 application fields included in the NMP. If phosphorous gets in the water, it could lead to nuisance algae, which would threaten the water quality, as well as the ecology of the river and surrounding areas, including plants, birds, and aquatic life.

The potential for problems is magnified because of the unique karst geology of this region in the Ozarks, with its irregular limestone formations.

Karst areas are unusually porous and can have caves or sinkholes in unexpected places. Water often disappears underground; it’s extremely unpredictable where that water will reappear.

Dr. John Van Brahana, a just-retired University of Arkansas geology professor and a renowned karst expert, believes that this was a possible shortcoming in the permit and the review of the nutrient management plan. ADEQ focused on surface water but “surface water and ground water in these types of settings is intimately related. ADEQ didn’t look at ground water; they didn’t look at any karst. The karst involves very reactive rock — as water moves through the cracks and fractures it dissolves the rock and enlarges those openings, facilitating movement of water through the system.”

In a letter to ADEQ, Brahana wrote, “I know of no active karst consultant who recommends that a CAFO be sited on karstified limestone, particularly upgradient from so sensitive a natural resource as the Buffalo National River, with its direct-contact use by canoeists, fishermen, and swimmers.”

Based on what is known about the karst in the Big Creek area where C&H is located, Brahana continued, “The groundwater moves as quickly as water in a stream, except that exact location of pathways is very difficult to predict. The high velocity of the water in conduits is capable of transporting sediment, organic matter, fecal waste, and dissolved solids from the CAFO.” If microbes in the hog waste ended up in springs and surface water after being flushed out by storms, Brahana said, it could lead to a public health disaster. “Those microbes cause more health-related problems than all other groundwater contamination combined,” he said.

Brahana is now testing in the Mt. Judea area to establish a water-quality baseline, as well as dye testing to establish water pathways, and identifying and mapping karst features. Numerous area residents have taken up Brahana’s offer to do free testing on their property. C&H has declined.

It’s not just the sprayfields but the storage ponds themselves that give concern to those worried about risks at C&H. Some amount of seepage through the clay-lined ponds may be inevitable — the permit allows up to 5,000 gallons per acre per day, though C&H says this is dramatically more than what will actually occur. A Newton County-based ADEQ engineer, Marysia Jastrzebski — who was unaware that the permit had been approved until months after the fact — sent an email to ADEQ officials in Little Rock expressing alarm that her team had calculated around 3,400 gallons of seepage per day.

The coalition also expressed fears about a catastrophic failure. Other states have experienced failures in manure ponds and lagoons that led to

the flow of massive quantities of waste into surrounding land and water. Michael Dougherty, president of the Buffalo River Chamber of Commerce and one of founders of the Alliance, said he has “every confidence that these farmers are going to do everything they can to make sure that doesn’t happen. But the experience of wet hog CAFOs is very checkered. ... We have a national treasure in the Buffalo National River. One failure and this national treasure is compromised.”

According to Brahana, the karst terrain gives additional cause for concerns about the clay storage ponds. “In some cases I’ve seen, relatively thick sequences of clay just get blown out there in the fractures themselves,” Brahana said. “The weight of the water will blow those out so it’s almost like somebody pulling a plug in a bathtub and it swirls, down it goes. Those are worst-case scenarios. But those are relatively common.”

“The general permit doesn’t have any requirements that whoever’s approving the permit look at the actual geology of the location and take that into account,” Chang said. “Just the very location of this facility is a problem.”

ADEQ is upfront about the fact that Chang is correct that no special consideration was given to the particular geology of the Ozarks.

“The regulations and the permit were designed to be applicable all through the state, including this area,” ADEQ Deputy Director Ryan Benefield said, adding that the permit requires setbacks if karst features such as sinkholes or caves were discovered, keeping the spray of fertilizer away from those features.

Indeed, the specific location of C&H, including its proximity to the Buffalo, could not have any bearing on approval of the permit at all, Marks said.

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AUGUST 15, 2013

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“The law does not allow us to treat the Buffalo River watershed any differently than it does any other watershed in Arkansas,” she said.

Regarding concerns about phosphorous, ADEQ officials said that the permit relies on the phosphorous index (P-Index) developed by the University of Arkansas to evaluate the risk of phosphorous runoff. The soil tests referenced by the coalition — recommending no additional phosphorous — simply refer to optimum conditions for crops on the field, Benefield said. The P-index, he said, actually directly addresses the coalition’s concerns: evaluating numerous site-specific factors to ensure that C&H will only be allowed to spray on fields that do not have a high risk of runoff.

As for the storage ponds, the C&H farmers said that they are in fact over-engineered, with the liners and volume both oversized by 50 percent more than was required by the regulation.

“We wouldn’t have issued this permit if we didn’t feel like there were enough safeguards in place,” Marks said. “Could there be something that happens? Sure. In any permit we issue there are always certain risks that some catastrophe could happen. With the fact that we’ll be doing inspections on that farm, we feel like we will be able to know if there’s going to be a problem.”

If they did find an issue, Marks said, “Depending on the severity of the violation the Department may give the permittee an opportunity to correct the problem, fine the facility, or in a worst case revoke the permit.”

For the coalition, the responses from ADEQ simply repeat what they view as the deficiencies and limitations in the permit. They believe that the NMP’s safeguards are insufficient, but further point out that the safeguards that do exist are heavily dependent on perfect execution of the plan by C&H and enforcement by ADEQ. “Their view is ‘trust us moving forward,’ ” Bates said. “We’re supposed to trust C&H, who has submitted a faulty permit application, to do the right thing. And we’re supposed to trust ADEQ, who never read it, to do the right thing.”

J

♦♦♦

ason Henson’s argument is straightforward: “I did everything the law required me to do. I feel like I went above and beyond what the law required. If you follow the law, what else can you do?”

He said that the new facility built for C&H is significantly cleaner, less odoriferous, and more environmentally friendly than the smaller hog farms that have long been in operation in Newton County.

The CAFO permit, he said, includes strict rules and guidelines regarding which fields C&H can spray and when they can do it, depending on weather factors, manure samples, and soil samples.

“We have so many rules and regulations that we have to follow,” he said. “The way I see it, we are actually protecting the Buffalo River more than people that had it before us with no rules and regulations. If you are truly concerned with the river, you ought to be tickled to death.”

He said that C&H planned to be “neighbor friendly” about when they were spraying fields

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ARKANSAS TIMES

(the permit specifically mentions avoiding week- down round here for some reason.” Henson and the ends and holidays “when people in the area are Campbells brushed this off; Philip Campbell said more likely to be outdoors”). He said that he did that he is the chief of the volunteer fire department not believe odor would be a problem but wanted to and hasn’t heard anything of the kind.

Of course, it doesn’t take anything so extreme be proactive about that issue, and was investigating to make locals hesitant to speak publicly about any various technologies to mitigate smell. “We want to farm and be good neighbors,” he said. “If we are hin- problems they might have with C&H. As nearly dering somebody else’s lifestyle, we want to make everyone I spoke with reminded me, Mt. Judea is sure we do everything we possibly can to fix that.” “a very small community.” People said they were Henson said that the intense reaction to his reluctant to speak ill of their neighbors; many noted facility caught him off guard, and said the local that the Campbells were an influential family in community supported him. the county. As Henson himself said, “the commuWhen I mentioned that a number of Mt. Judea nity that we live in, you mind your own business residents told me that they were unaware of the and keep your mouth shut. That’s our community.” facility until it was already under construction, HenHenson and C&H certainly have many strong son was incredulous. “We live in a very small com- local backers. The Newton County Quorum Court munity,” he said. “For them people to say that they (of which Richard Campbell is a member) passed didn’t know we was building a hog farm is really its own resolution expressing distaste at any “interhard for me to believe because I had to get 17 fields ference” from Fayetteville, and many residents to apply for this. So you’re saying those people kept have been vocal in their support. Barbara Hershey, their mouths shut for two years? It don’t make who lives about a mile from the farm and has given sense.” He said the same applies to the National C&H permission to spray fertilizer on her land, said, Park Service — as mentioned, NPS has vigorously “These boys are trying to make a decent living. Leave complained that it had no idea. “That’s a bunch of them alone. I trust that they will do their best to bull,” Henson said. keep the environment the way it should be because In Newton County, the controversy over C&H is they were born and raised here. They don’t want to screw up everybody’s water.” the sort of argument that quickly escalates beyond the simple facts of one particular farm. For many, “I don’t mind you coming to enjoy my area,” Herthe National Parks Service remains a bogeyman — shey said. “But don’t tell me how to do it.” there are all sorts of stories of granddaddy losing Hershey’s feelings of strong loyalty to the local land when they turned the Buffalo into the nation’s farmers — and hostility to outsiders — are comfirst national river. mon among Mt. Judea residents. But I also spoke “There’s residual anger over the park being here,” with around a dozen people in the Mt. Judea community who expressed concerns about the facility. said Jack Stewart, a member of the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance. “It very quickly became a land These are folks with deep roots in the area, and rights issue. Once that happens, people close their their worldview is generally on the opposite pole minds.” from the people that make up the Buffalo River The farm has attracted protests in Newton Watershed Alliance (“I’m not what you would call a nut,” as one said).

County, and the Fayetteville City Council passed a resolution opposing the permit given to the farm, These residents said that they could already both of which have exacerbated the us-against- smell the waste, despite the farm not being at full them mentality that hardens around disputes over operational capacity and not yet having sprayed environmental concerns. any fields. Several people that attend church with “We don’t stick our nose in Fayetteville business Henson said it had been noticeable from the church, and Fayetteville ought not stick their nose in ours,” though Henson said otherwise. “It’s been a little Henson said. “That’s our mentality.” touchy,” one said. Said another, “They’re claimNewton County is also a place where a history of ing it’s only Fayetteville people, that nobody local’s violence, particularly arson, still keeps folks on edge. complaining. That’s just not true. A lot of local folks “You’ve got some bad eggs,” one Mt. Judea area are upset.” resident said. “They’ll burn houses, kill people and “In the beginning, we were all promised you bury them. They’ll flat do it.” would not smell any smells — well I smell it almost “They may be exaggerating, or they may not,” every day,” said another area resident. “If it’s a calm said a resident of Jasper, the county seat and one morning and the fog has settled in, it stinks to high of the biggest towns, population 466. “Where a heaven. It’s unbelievable ... it just knocks you down. lot of people live, by the time the sheriff gets there ...There’s been afternoons where it would almost it’s too late.” gag you. I wouldn’t want to put a barbecue grill in To be clear, nobody suggested that any of the my front yard.”

C&H farmers would be involved in threats of any Another said that the smell was noticeable but kind. Even among those that had concerns about manageable, but had concerns about what would the farm, the most common descriptions of Hen- happen if it got worse. “I’d hate for it to get smelling so bad that you couldn’t go outside and enjoy,” son and the Campbells were “good boys,” “good the resident said. “That’s the kind of thing I think old boys,” and “good Christian men.”

Still for whatever reason, numerous area resi- about because I’m outside 90 percent of the time. ... dents I spoke with mentioned a general fear of get- They’re hard working people. I hate to down anybody for trying to work. But it’s something that’s ting “burned out” if they stirred trouble. “It may not be so,” one said. “But we’ve had a lot houses burnt CONTINUED ON PAGE 20

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19

BRIAN CHILSON

WASTE STORAGE: One of C&H’s clay-lined manure ponds is about half full.

going to impact everyone around them. It’s going to skeptical of claims about strong odors, and suggested facility, past the “DO NOT ENTER” sign with Carbe beneficial to them and nobody else, pretty much.” when we were at the diner, “you can walk outside.” gill’s name just above C&H, along with the reminder Several area residents expressed worry about (I spent part of two days in the town of Mt. Judea “swine property of Cargill.” Walking around the Mt. Judea Elementary School, which sits just above and did not notice a smell in the air.) grounds, the smell was significant but not over“It don’t matter what it is, people have a fear of whelming. One of the giant waste-storage ponds was spray fields; a play area behind the school is several hundred feet away as the crow flies. Others said the the unknown,” Henson said. “I can understand still empty, but for some rainwater; the other had presence of the farm had severely damaged their that there.” begun to accumulate hog waste, a thick dark sludge. property values.

“I’m worried about everything,” he said. “You The hogs, more than two thousand of them, were “I don’t mind another man doing what he wants have to be. This is our livelihood. This is our com- audible, enclosed in the two large barns, with an to do on his land, as long as it doesn’t affect me or munity.” He is a ninth-generation Mt. Judean, he automated system providing feed and massive fans my land,” said one. “The first big rain is going to said, and he’s invested in protecting the area. The helping to control temperature and air quality. wash all that crap down on my [property]. They only creek was where he and his daughter learned to Opinions about C&H may vary depending on looked at themselves. They didn’t think about the swim, he said, where they were baptized. His daugh- what one calls a facility like this. The Farm Bureau community. ... I don’t like it one bit but I’m just one ter is a student at Mt. Judea Elementary School. and the C&H farmers call it a multi-generational against Cargill. If enough people get together I’ll be “If I thought we was going to pollute anything, I family farm. Others view it as a “factory farm.” right in the middle and run this dadgum Cargill out wouldn’t have done it to start with,” he said. “It “It’s not like this was the family homestead,” Watof the county. It’s ruined me and ruined a bunch of don’t add up that we’re going to do something to it. kins said. “The Hensons and the Campbells, they often talk about how they’ve been there for eight other people.” The resident said that “all that crap is It don’t make sense.” going to run into the Buffalo” but it was “too late to Henson said that C&H’s impact on the com- generations. The fact is, this is land that they bought do anything. The doggone newspaper people didn’t munity would be “very positive. We’re bringing in specifically to do this project. ... They want to couch do their jobs. Cargill has done bought the legislature.” tax dollars, we’re helping local farmers [with free it as a family farm. It’s an industrialized factory farm.

Another said it was “bullshit” that the contro- fertilizer], and we’re creating jobs.” Henson said And they’re sharecropping for Cargill, if you ask me.” versy came as a surprise. “Them boys should have they would be hiring between nine and 12 people Part of the fear expressed by the coalition is that to work at C&H. C&H may be just the beginning. “One is bad enough, The coalition argues that in fact, due to the but once they get a toehold in there, then there will impact on property values, the presence of be a desire to put more and more farms in that area CAFOs in communities tend to hurt the tax because it’s more cost effective,” said Emily Jones base. They also point to the economic impact of the National Parks Conservation Association. on tourism, both in and around Mt. Judea, “Arkansas should get ready, they’re coming.”

Linck, while careful to state that he respected and all along the Buffalo, which generates $38 million per year and more than 500 jobs. that the C&H farmers followed the permitting proThe tourism angle is what first caught cess in place, said that he wished that the farm hadn’t the attention of Rep. Linck, who, in addition been located so close to the river. “Maybe this is a to the legislature, works as executive direc- great model farm,” he said. “Maybe everything about tor of the Ozark Mountain Region Tourism it is wonderful. I still don’t want to see the hilltops Association. “Regardless of how well the farm of the Buffalo River dotted with these things.” operates, in tourism we’re selling a percepA Cargill representative emailed the Times: “We tion,” he said. “The perception of Arkansas hope to do business for many more years in Arkanis the Natural State. Although technology sas but we currently do not have any growth plans.” has changed what a hog farm is from years Asked about the controversy and the impact on ago to what it is today, the perception of a the watershed and the Mt. Judea community, Cargill hog farm is a nasty mess. ... From the per- wrote, “The family followed the process set up by the spective of tourism, it’s a little frightening state ... The farm has many supporters in the area ... known that they’d get kickback from the River. I because we’re selling the Natural State and we’re The regulations, and the nutrient management plan told [Henson]. ... He’s a good kid. He got indoctri- selling the pristine river. ... The other fear is if this that are in place, were designed by professional soil thing does have problems with pollution soaking scientists and certified engineers to allow the farm nated by Cargill.”

The coalition suing the FSA and SBA argues that into the karst geology ... my goodness, now you’ve to operate and protect the environment.” concerns about air quality are about more than just really got a perception to overcome.”

The hope of some, that Cargill might make it stench — they say that particulate matter and gasses

financially possible for the farmers to relocate, seems ♦♦♦ released into the air are a major public health conunlikely. (“We don’t speculate” was the representacern. They point to studies showing links between he Times arranged to tour C&H, with Beau tive’s response when asked whether there was any respiratory and other health problems for people Bishop of the Farm Bureau as a go-between. circumstance in which they would do so.) in close proximity to CAFOs, particularly vulnerBishop said that Henson and the Campbells Meanwhile, even if the coalition’s lawsuit is able populations such as the children at the Mt. would be willing to give a tour inside the facility, and successful, it won’t necessarily do anything to slow Judea school. said multiple times that they had “nothing to hide” down the operation of the farm. While the loss of Henson said he was not concerned about health and were eager to show their operation in action. the FSA and SBA loan guarantees would throw the issues. “My two cousins have worked on a hog Two appointments were made to visit and then C&H’s underlying financing into question, Henfarm for over 14 years and they look fat and happy canceled the day before (both, according to Bishop, son was not particularly worried. It’s possible his to me,” he said. because shipments of pigs arrived). creditors could proceed without a guarantee, he The third time, we met with Bishop and Hen- noted, and also possible that C&H could simply get “As far as saying that they can smell it, it is a farm,” Henson said. “We’re doing everything we son at the cafe in Mt. Judea but were informed that someone else to guarantee the loan.While coalition can to keep them from smelling it.” Henson said we would not be able to do a tour inside the facil- members are adamant that they won’t back down, that they got a complaint about smell, passed on by ity after all. Asked why, Henson said “biosecurity.” it’s not clear that they have any avenue to stop C&H ADEQ, prior to having a single hog at the site (a few This seemed to be a change in plans — had Cargill now that it’s up and running. Henson and his partresidents suggested that there might be a tendency nixed the tour? Henson wouldn’t say. ners have no intention of shutting down. “We’re in Henson did take us up to see the outside of the it for the long haul,” he said. to blame any smell on the farm). In general, he was

T

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ARKANSAS TIMES

Every year, tobacco kills more Americans than alcohol, car accidents, murders, suicides, drugs, AIDS, and fires combined. If you’re ready to quit, we can help.

Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

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AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

Smoking for Two:

The Challenges and Risks Faced by Pregnant Smokers and Their Babies In spite of extensive research that demonstrates the health consequences of smoking during pregnancy for both the mother and child, 16.5 percent of pregnant women in Arkansas smoke. The majority of these women continue to smoke throughout their pregnancy and, of those who do quit, the majority return to smoking during the pregnancy or shortly after delivering the child.

and other life-threatening illnesses.

Consequently, more than 170,000 women die of smoking-caused diseases in the U.S. each year, with additional deaths perpetuated by the use of other tobacco products such as smokeless tobacco.

The risks and challenges caused from smoking extend beyond pregnancy; for example, parental or other household smoking after birth further increases the chances that children will suffer from smokeAccording to the U.S. Surgeon caused coughs and wheezing, General, a pregnant woman who bronchitis, asthma, pneumonia, smokes is 1.5 to 3.5 times more potentially fatal lower respiratory likely than a non-smoker to have a low-birth weight baby. It is important tract infections, meningitis, SI DS, eye and ear problems, or injury to point out that one of the major or death from cigarette-caused fires. challenges facing preventive Each year, in the U.S., more than maternal and child health services 20,000 children are hospitalized for today is the incidence of low birth respiratory illnesses caused by their weight, which leads to long-term complications such as poor academic parents’ tobacco use and over 1,000 die from them. performance. Numerous studies have also found that smoking and To best address this important public exposure to secondhand smoke among pregnant women is a primary health concern in Arkansas, multiple objectives are being addressed by cause of spontaneous abortions, the Arkansas Department of Health, stillbirths, and sudden infant death with emphasis on pregnancy with syndrome (SIDS) after birth. incentive programs, additional Arkansas Tobacco Quitline support Women who smoke not only put and services, community based their babies’ health at risk, but also their own. Tobacco is a threat to the tobacco education and intervention, health of every woman who smokes. case management, parenting programs and improved physician Smoking increases the likelihood based intervention. of women having a heart attack, stroke, lung cancer, emphysema,

Over 400,000 people die annually from smoking. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

Big Tobacco uses large, flashy storefront signage to attract young people.

They place products near candy to attract young people.

They offer cigars in sweet flavors to attract young people.

Big Tobacco advertising uses bright colors, fun graphics, and glamorous models to attract young people.

If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

Big Tobacco needs young people to replace all the dying smokers. So they create candy-like products with vanilla, grape, and green apple flavors. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

One in three youth smokers will eventually die from a tobacco-related disease. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

Not worried about cancer? Then how do heart attacks, strokes, emphysema, and chronic bronchitis grab you? If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

Approximately 50,000 adult non-smokers die each year from exposure to secondhand smoke.

If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

To get around no-smoking ordinances, Big Tobacco has designed new smokeless nicotinedelivery products, like snus, orbs, and sticks.

If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

There are 69 human carcinogens in tobacco smoke. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

In 2012, youth-rated movies delivered 14.8 billion tobacco impressions, an increase of 33 percent over 2011. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

The Bitter Truth:

How Big Tobacco Targets Youth with Candy Flavored Products Big Tobacco may offer its younger customers a seemingly sweet alternative to conventional tobacco products, but their tactics leave a bitter taste in the mouths of those who know better. Between 2000 and 2012, cigar sales in the U.S. more than doubled, increasing from six billion to more than 13 billion cigars a year. This surge can be attributed to a dramatic increase in the number and types of smaller cigar products available—many of which are flavored, priced and packaged to appeal to young people.

Big Tobacco has targeted African-American communities, using urban culture and language to promote menthol cigarettes. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

In 2009, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) banned candy- and fruit-flavored cigarettes; however, because the FDA does not currently regulate cigars, tobacco companies continue to market them similarly. Alternatively, some companies have modified their flavored cigarettes to meet the legal definition of cigars (e.g., by adding tobacco to the wrapper)—continuing to market them with sweet flavors.

When another 2009 federal law significantly increased taxes on cigarettes and small cigars yet taxed larger cigars at lower rates, some manufacturers added weight to their products to qualify for the lower tax rate. For example, one manufacturer has reportedly increased the weight of its cigars by adding a clay material

used in kitty litter. This knowledge should deter youth from smoking; yet, 18.2 percent of high school students in Arkansas smoke.

Cigars today are no longer just the “big stogies” smoked by older men. Flavored cigars are the most popular among youth. The top three brands—Black & Mild, Swisher Sweets and White Owl—come in a wide variety of flavors, including peach, strawberry, chocolate, grape, blueberry, wild apple, pineapple and watermelon. Some cigars also have flavor-oriented names, such as “Da Bomb Blueberry” and “Banana Split,” with obvious appeal to children and young adults. The tobacco industry capitalizes on this knowledge; as one tobacco retailer pointed out, “While different cigars target a variety of markets, all flavored tobacco products tend to appeal primarily to younger consumers.”

Parents, teachers and other people who care about kids need to recognize how the tobacco industry manipulates our children. We all need to urge our leaders to ban the use of flavorings to target children and teach our children how to recognize the type of media developed to exploit them.

8.6 million people in the United States currently suffer from a smoking-caused illness. If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

Not Your Grandpa’s Chew: Recruiting a New Generation of Smokeless Users Tobacco companies know that virtually all tobacco users start as children; consequently, they develop novel products, with kid-friendly flavors (e.g.

Cherry Skoal) and packaging to attract new users. Tobacco documents show that the U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Company created a specific strategy to ‘graduate’ new, young smokeless tobacco users from candy or fruit flavored starter products to more potent varieties.

In addition to novelty and the appeal of more ‘palatable’ flavors, tobacco companies market smokeless tobacco products as a way to use tobacco in locations or settings where smoking is not allowed or socially acceptable. Responding to the downward trend in smoking rates and the increasing popularity of smokeless tobacco products, cigarette companies continue to develop products that draw on popular cigarette brand names to attract new users; for example, R.J. Reynold’s Camel Snus and Philip Morris USA’s Marlboro Snus. Snus are small, teabag-like pouches containing tobacco and other flavorings that users place between their upper gum and lip. Since these products do not require spitting, their use is easily concealed. Teens have admitted to using them in class due to their discreetness and ability to conceal them.

In addition to Snus, other emerging novelties include tobacco lozenges and pellets, like Camel Orbs, which are dissolvable tobacco products that

look like tic tacs. Camel Strips are flat sheets of ground tobacco that work like dissolvable breath strips and Camel Sticks are toothpick-like sticks of ground tobacco. These new products concern public health organizations for numerous reasons: they may attract even more children and young adults into smokeless tobacco use and addiction; they create the misconception that they are a harmless form of tobacco use; and they can be consumed much less conspicuously than either cigarettes or existing spit tobacco products at home, in school and in other locations.

Furthermore, for individuals trying to quit cigarettes, these new smokeless products may wrongly be used as a ‘tool’ for cessation and instead, end up perpetuating and increasing their nicotine addiction—an addiction that can prove fatal.

Constant exposure to tobacco juice causes cancer of the esophagus, pharynx, larynx, stomach and pancreas. Smokeless tobacco users run a higher risk of developing oral cancer compared to non-users; these cancers can form within five years of regular use. Smokeless tobacco users also have a 60 percent higher risk of developing pancreatic and esophageal cancer. Despite these alarming statistics, currently, 20.3 percent of male high school students in Arkansas use smokeless or spit tobacco. A new generation is using a new line of smokeless tobacco products and compromising the same old thing: their health.

Big Tobacco has targeted women, producing brands with ads featuring slim, attractive, and athletic models.

If you’re ready to quit, we can help. Just call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.

Arts Entertainment AND

THERE SHE IS, MISS GAY ARKANSAS AMERICA The annual female impersonation event returns to the Argenta Community Theater.

BY SANDY SARLO

K

ristian Martin, who won the Miss Gay Arkansas America 2012 pageant performing under the stage name Veronica Duvall, can’t believe his year with the crown is almost up. “It just seems like a couple of weeks,” he said a few days before the 2013 pageant, which is set for 8 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 17, at the Argenta Community Theater.

Martin’s been busy since winning the pageant: “Most people think winning the title makes you a figurehead. But it really is a lot more involved. There’s so much behind the scenes: You have to secure different venues [for the pageant and related events]. Be a mediator for any problems.

Do customer service and ad sales. Be choreographer. Be someone to listen and critique. On top of that, you have to make sure you look the part every time you’re on stage.

“During the year, you are the representative of the state of Arkansas. That means traveling to all corners of the state and outside the state.”

All of that does not translate into big money. “Being Miss Arkansas is sometimes construed as a get-rich-quick deal.

But I didn’t get involved in the art of female impersonating for the money. I did countless gigs for charity this year.”

Among them, dates with Renegades for a Cause, Arkansas AIDS Foundation, Helping People with AIDS and the Northwest Center for Equality.

Martin, who works as entertainment director for Miss Kitty’s in Little Rock, said that he thinks the general population is becoming more accepting of the idea of female impersonation as an art form.

“There are headliner shows in Las Vegas that are top of the line. On a local scale, more people are coming in each and every weekend to see what we’re doing.”

Unlike other pageants, Martin said, Miss Gay Arkansas America allows a 30

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

MARTIN: As Veronica Duvall.

wide range of performances during the talent portion of the event. “Some contestants will dance. Some will sing live. Some will do a comedy routine. Some will do an impersonation of a celebrity.”

On Saturday, Martin, or rather Veronica Duvall, will relinquish her crown to one of 10 hopefuls: Chloe Jacobs, Miss Gay Little Rock; Diedra Windsor Walker, Miss Gay Little Rock alternate; Brooklyn Bisette, Miss Gay Heart of the Ozarks; Rosa Turell-Andrews, Miss Heart of the Ozarks,

alternate; Liyah Doingme Alize, Miss Gay Central Arkansas; M’Shay Victoria Foster, Miss Gay Central Arkansas, alternate; Eden Alive, Miss Gay Newcomer; Queen Anthony Gerard, Miss Gay Newcomer, alternate; Tyler Rane, Miss Gay Fayetteville, and Michelle Montana, Miss Gay Fayetteville, alternate.

Miss Gay Arkansas America is decided on four categories. The interview portion is the afternoon of the pageant and is not open to the public. The interview can net

the contestant up to 150 points based on general appearance, personality and ability to communicate and answer content.

Pre-judging in evening gown attire with an onstage question begins at 7 p.m. The evening gown portion is worth up to 150 points and contestants are judged on suitability of evening gown and hairstyle; presentation, including modeling techniques, poise and smile, and general appearance, including makeup, shoes, gown condition and accessories.

The pageant itself begins at 8 p.m. with each contestant performing a solo talent of no more than three minutes in length.

This portion of the pageant is worth a possible 100 points, and includes the contestant only, with no back-up dancers or onstage props. It’s judged on choreography, appearance, quality and entertainment value. Probably the most anticipated part of the evening is the last event — the long talent. This portion of the contest can be no more than seven minutes and always features an amazing array of props, dancers and talent. The long talent is by far the most point-heavy single portion of the pageant, with a possible 300 points on the line. It’s judged on showmanship and set design, choreography, physical coordination and stage presence, quality and value of presentation as entertainment.

The first Miss Gay Arkansas America was Norman Jones, owner of Discovery and Triniti nightclubs, who, as Norma Kristie, entered and won the first Miss Gay America pageant in 1972 in Nashville. In 1975, Jones assumed control of the contest from the original owner, and eventually sold the pageant in 2005. Jones is writing “My Life, My Pageant, My Crown,” a book about the pageant that will be available via normakristie.com.

The latest Miss Gay America, Sally Sparkles, will make an appearance at Saturday night’s event along with former Miss Gay Arkansas title holders Zia D’Yor, Shawn Tyler Andrews, Kamrin Mikaels, Debbye Taunts and Kelly Cruise.

Tickets, $25 for general admission and $40 for premiere seating, are available at the door or online at missgayarkansas. com.

ROCK CANDY Check out the Times’ A&E blog arktimes.com

A&E NEWS DAMIEN ECHOLS, the most outspoken and visible member of the West Memphis Three and the author of two books, will be returning to the state Nov. 11-12 to give a free public reading and teach a creative writing mini-class for UCA students.

UCA creative writing professor Dr. John Vanderslice said that Echols is coming to Conway as part of the UCA Artist-in-Residence Series, which is administered through the College of Fine Arts and Communication. Vanderslice said that the creative writing department originally wanted to invite Echols to speak at the annual “Arkatext� writing festival, “but we quickly realized that wasn’t practical,� so they invited him as an Artist-in-Residence instead.

Lonnie Soury, who helped build the media campaign that helped free the West Memphis Three and who is still friends with Echols and his wife, Lorri Davis, said that when he spoke to Davis and Echols a few days ago in Boston, Echols was excited about being invited to UCA to speak and teach, and didn’t seem at all apprehensive about coming back to the state that held him on Death Row for 18 years. “It seemed like he was pleased to come back,� Soury said. “I think it’s a big deal for him and Lorri to come back, but they were pleased to do it.

I know they gave some thought to it, but they seem anxious to speak at the university there.�

Soury, who has spoken at events with Echols before, said he may make the trip back to Arkansas to see Echols and others associated with the West Memphis Three cause. “He’s an eloquent spokesperson,� Soury said. “It’s really amazing how thoughtful he is about the issues that impacted him and his life, and the lives of Jessie and Jason.�

Admission

Adopt A dog!

Saturday, August 24 10am-2pm

Hollywood Feed 5235 JFK Blvd North Little Rock Adoptable dogs, Whole Hog BBQ, foster/adoption applications, and an in-store Wish List.

FARM TABLES

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Celebrate President Clinton’s Birthday Saturday, August 17 – 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

rate President on’s Birthday

August 17 .m. to 5 p.m.

FILMMAKER BROTHERS CRAIG AND BRENT RENAUD’S latest documentary will be prominently featured on the coming network debut of Al Jazeera America. The Qatar-funded media conglomerate Al Jazeera paid $500 million for the cable network Current TV in January. Since then, in anticipation of launching a new offshoot, it’s opened 12 news bureaus across the country and hired some 850 staffers.

It’s expected to be available on cable lineups in 48 million homes when it launches next week.

The Renauds’ latest documentary, in collaboration with journalist Christof Putzel, examines Chicago gangs. It will be broadcast in four parts on “America Tonight,� Al Jazeera America’s flagship program. Showtime is 8 p.m.

Aug. 20, debut night.

See what’s NEW at the Clinton Center!

Oscar de la Renta: American Icon

May 18, 2013 – December 1, 2013 This seminal fashion exhibition celebrates the world-renowned work and inspiring life of designer Oscar de la Renta, featuring more than thirty of his iconic creations worn by leading arbiters of style, from First Ladies to Hollywood’s brightest stars. Photo credit: Photographers: Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin

And Freedom for All: The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom

Aug. 10, 2013 – Nov. 17, 2013 Follow along the historic journey of the 1963 March on Washington For Jobs and Freedom through the powerful images of famed photojournalist Stanley Tretick. Tretick was assigned by LOOK magazine to cover the March behind-the-scenes with organizers and program speakers as they led the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and where history led Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to deliver his famous “I Have a Dream� speech.

Head of Class Bash

Aug. 17, 2013 • 9:30 a.m. – 2 p.m.

FREE admission, FREE activities and FREE giveaways including backpacks and school supplies from 3M - while supplies last.

1200 President Clinton Avenue • Little Rock, Arkansas 72201 501.374.4242 • clintonpresidentialcenter.org www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

31

THE TO-DO FRIDAY 8/16

FOUL PLAY CABARET, THE FRONTIER CIRCUS

9 p.m. Maxine’s. $10 adv., $12 day of.

Could there be a more appealing combination of entertainers for the discerning gadabout than country musicians and burlesque performers? I think not. The burlesque troupe in this case would be the lovely, the beautiful and talented, the coolly unflappable ladies of the Foul Play Cabaret, est. 2011, Hot Springs, Ark. According to the group’s online bio, Foul Play Cabaret “has been capturing the hearts of many with their diverse and sultry shows, proving that the only thing hotter than the water in Hot Springs, Arkansas is the women.” Zing! If you require evidence of this claim, check ’em out on the ole YouTube, they’ve got some, uh, teasers posted on there. Yowza!

As far as the music portion of the evening is concerned, that will be handled by The Frontier Circus, a rambunctious bunch of rabble-rousers who mangle your favorite country and garage-psych classics in a delightfully feedback-enveloped manner.

LIST

BY ROBERT BELL

THURSDAY 8/15-SATURDAY 8/17

EUREKA SPRINGS BLUEGRASS FESTIVAL

Various times and venues.

The music festivals up in the Little Switzerland of the Ozarks continue with the annual Eureka Springs Bluegrass Festival, which kicks off at 7 p.m.

Thursday at Basin Spring Park with The Water Melon Social, which features free water and watermelon. There’ll be an open jam as well, so bring your banjo or your fiddle or your dobro or your

acoustic guitar or your mandolin or your harmonica or your standup bass and go ahead and join in. Starting at noon on Friday and Saturday, there will be free music at the park. Friday’s lineup includes the Eureka Springs Bluegrass Band, Gary Allbritton & Friends, The Dragon Masters, Mountain View Friends and The Clark Family Trio with Bill Nesbitt. Saturday’s free offerings include The Buffalo City Ramblers, The Dragon Masters, Buddy Griffin & Friends, The Clark Family, Pam Setser

and Mountain View Friends, The Gravel Yard Bluegrass Band and Ozark Alliance. Saturday night at The Auditorium boasts a huge lineup of players, including Tim Crouch, Arkansas Red, Ron Landers, Donny Catron, Retro & Smiling, Spoon Man and headliners Bobby Osborne & The Rocky Top X-Press (filling in for Jesse McReynolds, who is unable to perform because of health issues). That show starts at 7 p.m. and tickets are $18-$28. Call 479-253-7333 for more information.

FRIDAY 8/16

JIMBO MATHUS AND THE TRI-STATE COALITION

10 p.m. White Water Tavern. $10.

We’ve written quite a bit about Mississippi’s Jimbo Mathus here at the Times and that’s because, well, No. 1 we’re just big fans of his music. His great recent “White Buffalo” album is still getting spins around these parts (Man, that opener, “In the Garden,” is a classic). But also, he comes up with nuggets like the following, which was his answer to a question in a recent interview with the Austin Chronicle’s Derek Van Wagner. The fellow asked him: What makes good American music? Mathus said: “What a hard question that is. I’d say get some bark on you, do your homework and just love music and be passionate about the roots of your indigenous music and play and have fun with it. And that makes you a great American and a great patriot. I like music that creates a positive influence in the world.

Positive change — that’s what I’m trying to be.” It was a hard question, but that sure sounds like the correct answer. Also on this bill: blues singer/songwriter Davis Coen, a South Carolina native based out of Memphis.

He performed at our Heritage Hog Roast back in May. Check out his tune “Change in the Weather,” it’s a good’n.

32

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

CASH FEST: Vince Gill headlines the Johnny Cash Music Festival Saturday.

SATURDAY 8/17

JOHNNY CASH MUSIC FESTIVAL

7 p.m. Arkansas State University. $38-$150.

The Johnny Cash Music Festival enters its third year this weekend, and according to a recent press release from Arkansas State University (which

hosts the event), one part of the festival’s mission is nearly in sight: The restoration of the Cash boyhood home in Dyess is scheduled to be complete and the museum open in the spring.

The festival’s proceeds also help fund a scholarship to ASU, which four students currently enrolled at the univer-

sity have benefited from. The lineup this year skews a bit more toward the mainstream ’80s-’90s side of the country spectrum, with hitmaker Vince Gill as headliner, joined by Larry Gatlin & The Gatlin Brothers, Jimmy Fortune (of The Statler Brothers), and hosts Tommy Cash and Joanne Cash.

IN BRIEF

THURSDAY 8/15

SATURDAY 8/17

JOSEPH ISRAEL

9 p.m. Stickyz. $8 adv., $10 day of.

So a few years ago, I was living in Fayetteville and I walked into the natural foods store to buy some organic Cheetos or something, and I look up and there’s standing Earl “Chinna” Smith. No exaggeration: The man played on like half the reggae albums I own. Probably more than half now that I think about it. I-Roy, Burning Spear, Toots & The Maytals, Big Youth, Dillinger, Max Romeo, The Upsetters, Scientist, The Mighty Diamonds, Augustus Pablo — the list goes on seemingly forever of albums to which Smith contributed his versatile, snaky guitar playing. I think it would be fair to say that he’s the king of reggae session guitarists. So why was he was standing in a hippie “co-op” in Arkansas, looking around like, what is this place? He was in town because he’d hooked up with Joseph Fennell, a.k.a. Joseph Israel, a guy from Fayetteville whose dad owns some popular restaurants. Israel loved reggae so much he grew out dreads and started talking with a patois and converted to Rastafarianism (he also quotes the Bible a lot on his Facebook). Oh, and he went down to Kingston and recorded at Tuff Gong and actually

RASTA MAN: Joseph Israel plays at Stickyz Saturday.

did a duet with Luciano and Dean Fraser (which isn’t too bad). He’s got a new album out called “Kingdom Road” and … I don’t know, it’s all just so weird. There was this bizarre Fayetteville thing going on for a while where these people from Arkansas were all “Jah” this and “Irie” that and “I and I gon’ chant down Babylon” or whatever

and lots of us were all like, “Ha-ha, whatever poseurs.” But then one of them actually became a somewhat notable reggae artist. He put out an album on Universal a few years ago. He’s on a compilation album for children called “Songs for the Car,” alongside Billy Ray Cyrus and Smashmouth and Hanson and Patti LaBelle. Just, weird.

SATURDAY 8/17

YUNG JOC

9 p.m.-5 a.m. Discovery. $10-$15.

NEW JOC CITY: Yung Joc performs at Discovery Saturday.

Atlanta’s Yung Joc first blew up big back in 2006, with his debut for Diddy’s Bad Boy South label, “New Joc City.”

You might remember that video for “I Know You See It.” Most recently, Joc was featured alongside T-Pain on the track “Addicted to Sex.” Atlanta rapper Gucci Mane seemingly dissed Joc on a track from last year’s “Trap God”: “I got all eyes on me like Pac did / But I ain’t tryin’ to go broke like Joc did.” So did Joc respond by going all ballistic and beefin’ with Gucci? Nah, he was totally cool about it while also being hilarious.

He told V-103’s The Loud Pack that he loves Gucci and that “at the end of the day, it’s freedom of speech man. Because I could be like, ‘Whatever, Gucci ugly as ever.’ I could be like, ‘He done burned half the strippers in Atlanta.’ I could say whatever but that don’t mean nothing, it’s just freedom of speech, that’s what music’s about.”

Little Rock’s Whale Fire brings their melodic indie rock to The Joint, with a solo performance from Bryan Frazier starting things off, 9 p.m., $5. Stickyz hosts Open Fields, Knox Hamilton and Catskill Kids, 9 p.m., $5. Up in Conway, The Lantern Theatre’s Late Night Series presents “Circle Mirror Transformation,” through Saturday at 8 p.m., $10, recommended for mature audiences only. Murry’s Dinner Playhouse continues its production of “South Pacific,” Tue.-Sat. at 6 p.m., Sun. 11 a.m. and 5:30 p.m., $15-$35. Alex Summerlin provides the tunes for happy hour at Cajun’s Wharf, with Mr. Lucky headlining, 5:30 p.m. and 9 p.m., $5 after 8:30.

John David Hilliard & Pals perform at The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free.

Texas country act Whiskey Myers plays at Revolution, with The Cadillac Three and Fayetteville’s Damn Arkansan, 9 p.m., $15. Here’s something interesting: Kirk Franklin and Super Bowl champ Ray Lewis will be at Verizon Arena as part of The Dynamic Family Conference presented by St. Mark Baptist Church, 7 p.m., $28 - $53.

FRIDAY 8/16

The Weekend Theater continues its production of Joseph A. Walker’s Tony Award winning play “The River Niger,” Friday and Saturday through Aug. 24, 7:30 p.m., $12-$16. Cow-punkers The P-47s perform with singer/songwriter Mandy McBryde at Reno’s Argenta Cafe, 10 p.m. Kansas City blues trio Trampled Under Foot plays at Stickyz with The Bryant Carter Band, 9 p.m., $10.

SATURDAY 8/17

Bloodshot Records country-rockers Deadstring Brothers play at Maxine’s, with Mad Nomad and Swampbird, 8 p.m., $7. Over at White Water Tavern, the boys in Mulehead will convene to corrupt the innocent audience with their ribald song-stories, 10 p.m. The Top of the Rock Chorus Show: Hot August Night will take place at UALR’s University Theatre, 7-9 p.m., $15 - $20.

Revolution hosts the Texaco Country Music Showdown, featuring Dry County, 8:30 p.m., $10.

SUNDAY 8/18

Up in Fayetteville, Three Days Grace, Hinder and Otherwise perform at the Arkansas Music Pavilion, 7:30 p.m., $32-$37.

TUESDAY 8/20

Nerdcore pioneer MC Chris returns to Little Rock with a show at Juanita’s, with Jesse Dangerously, Dr. Awkward and Tribe One, 9 p.m., $13 adv., $15 day of. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

33

AFTER DARK All events are in the Greater Little Rock area unless otherwise noted. To place an event in the Arkansas Times calendar, please e-mail the listing and all pertinent information, including date, time, location, price and contact information, to calendar@arktimes.com.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 15

MUSIC

Alex Summerlin (happy hour), Mr. Lucky (headliner). Cajun’s Wharf, 5:30 and 9 p.m., $5 after 8:30 p.m. 2400 Cantrell Road. 501-375-5351. www.cajunswharf.com.

Dee Dee Jones. Ladies night, $5 after 9 p.m., free before. Montego Cafe, 8 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com.

Eureka Springs Bluegrass Festival. Various times, cover charges and locations, check website for details. Downtown Eureka Springs, www. eurekasprings.org.

“Inferno.” DJs play pop, electro, house and more, plus drink specials and $1 cover before 11 p.m.

Sway, 9 p.m. 412 Louisiana. 501-907-2582.

Jim Dickerson. Sonny Williams’ Steak Room, 7 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-324-2999. www.sonnywilliamssteakroom.com.

John David Hilliard & Pals. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501830-2100. www.thetavernsportsgrill.com.

Krush Thursdays with DJ Kavaleer. Club Climax, free before 11 p.m. 824 W. Capitol. 501-554-3437.

Michael Eubanks. Newk’s Express Cafe, 6:30 p.m. 4317 Warden Road, NLR. 501-753-8826. newks.com.

Open Fields, Knox Hamilton, Catskill Kids.

Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 9 p.m., $5.

107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz. com.

Open jam with The Port Arthur Band. Parrot Beach Cafe, 9 p.m. 9611 MacArthur Drive, NLR. 771-2994.

Poppy Red, Classy Nude. White Water Tavern, 10 p.m., $5. 2500 W. 7th St. 501-375-8400. www. whitewatertavern.com.

RockUsaurus. Senor Tequila, 7-9 p.m. 10300 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-224-5505. www. senor-tequila.com.

Ted Ludwig Trio. Capital Bar and Grill, 5 p.m., free. 111 Markham St. 501-374-7474. www.capitalhotel.com/CBG. Whale Fire, Bryan Frazier. The Joint, 9 p.m., $5.

301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

Whiskey Myers, The Cadillac Three, Damn Arkansan. Revolution, 9 p.m., $12 adv., $15 day of. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom.com.

COMEDY

T Rexx. The Loony Bin, 7:30 p.m., $7 - $10. 10301 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-228-5555. www. loonybincomedy.com.

EVENTS

Antique/Boutique Walk. Shopping and live entertainment. Downtown Hot Springs, third Thursday of every month, 4 p.m., free. 100 Central Ave., Hot Springs.

DIVAS Inc. Girls Leadership Summit. For young women ages 11-18. Butler Galleries, Arkansas Studies Institute, 9 a.m.-5 p.m., $60.

401 President Clinton Ave. 501-320-5792. www. divasinconline.com.

Kirk Franklin and Ray Lewis. Part of The 34

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

NEXT BIG THING: Disney star Coco Jones will perform at Magic Springs’ Timberwood Amphitheater Saturday, with opener Pricecrew, 6:30 p.m., $50-$60.

Dynamic Family Conference presented by St. Mark Baptist Church. Verizon Arena, 7 p.m., $28 - $53. 1 Alltel Arena Way, NLR. 501-975-9001. verizonarena.com.

Lazy Magnolia Brewery Beer Dinner. Five beers and four courses with guest Leslie Henderson, co-founder and brewmaster of Lazy Magnolia Brewery. The Afterthought, 6:30 p.m., $35. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www.afterthoughtbar.com.

Woodlawn Farmer’s Market. Shoppes on Woodlawn, 4:30 p.m. 4523 Woodlawn. 501666-3600. woodlawnshoppes.blogspot.com.

POETRY

POETluck. Literary salon and potluck. The Writer’s Colony at Dairy Hollow, third Thursday of every month, 6 p.m. 515 Spring St., Eureka Springs.

479-253-7444.

SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. San Antonio Missions.

Dickey-Stephens Park, 7:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400

W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs. com.

CLASSES

Flower Workshop with Tanarah Haynie. Register at theafoundation.org. Thea Foundation, 9 a.m.-4 p.m., $100. 401 Main St., NLR. 501-3799512. www.theafoundation.org.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 16

MUSIC

Alize. West End Smokehouse and Tavern, 10 p.m., $5. 215 N. Shackleford. 501-224-7665. www. westendsmokehouse.net.

Ashley McBryde. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www. thetavernsportsgrill.com.

Big Dam Horns. The Joint, 9:30 p.m. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

Big Stack. Denton’s Trotline, 9 p.m., $6. 2150 Congo Road, Benton. 501-315-1717.

Chasing Pictures. Revolution, 9 p.m., $5 - $8.

300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom.com.

Club Nights at 1620 Savoy. Dance night, with DJs, drink specials and bar menu, until 2 a.m.

1620 Savoy, 10 p.m. 1620 Market St. 501-2211620. www.1620savoy.com.

The Directionals. Vino’s, 9 p.m., $5. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www.vinosbrewpub.com.

Eureka Springs Bluegrass Festival. Various times, cover charges and locations, check website for details. Downtown Eureka Springs. www. eurekasprings.org.

Foul Play Cabaret, The Frontier Circus. Maxine’s, 9:30 p.m. 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs. www. maxinespub.com.

Jimbo Mathus and Tri-State Coalition, Davis Coen. White Water Tavern, 10 p.m., $10. 2500 W. 7th St. 501-375-8400. www.whitewatertavern.com.

The P-47s with Mandy McBryde. Reno’s Argenta Cafe, 10 p.m. 312 N. Main St., NLR. 501-376-2900. www.renosargentacafe.com.

Rotting Out. With Relentless, Minus, Take Offense and Something to Stand For. Downtown Music Hall, 7 p.m., $8 adv., $10 day of. 211 W. Capitol. 501-376-1819. downtownmusichall.com.

Steve Bates. Cornerstone Pub & Grill, 8 p.m. 314 Main St., NLR. 501-374-1782. cstonepub.com.

Synergy, DJ Sleepy Genius. Montego Cafe, 8:30 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com.

Ted Ludwig Trio. Capital Bar and Grill, 9 p.m., free. 111 Markham St. 501-374-7474. www.capitalhotel.com/CBG. Thomas East. Sonny Williams’ Steak Room, 7 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-324-2999. www.sonnywilliamssteakroom.com.

Thread. Thirst n’ Howl, 8:30 p.m. 14710 Cantrell Road. 501-379-8189. www.thirst-n-howl.com.

Trampled Under Foot, Bryant Carter Band.

Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 9 p.m., $10.

107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz. com.

Trey Johnson (happy hour), Ramona and the Soul Rhythms (headliner). Cajun’s Wharf, 5:30 and 9 p.m., $5 after 8:30 p.m. 2400 Cantrell Road.

501-375-5351. www.cajunswharf.com.

“YOLO.” Featuring four DJs and beach volleyball, 18-and-older. Flying DD, $5. 4601 S. University.

501-773-9990. flyingdd.com.

COMEDY

The Main Thing presents “Arkansanity.”

Original two-act comedy play lampooning life in Arkansas. The Joint, through Oct. 19: 8 p.m., $20. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

T Rexx. The Loony Bin, Aug. 16, 7:30 and 10 p.m.; Aug. 17, 7:30 and 10 p.m., $7 - $10. 10301 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-228-5555. www. loonybincomedy.com.

DANCE

Salsa Night. Begins with a one-hour salsa lesson.

Juanita’s, 9 p.m., $8. 614 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-1228. www.littlerocksalsa.com.

EVENTS

DIVAS Inc. Girls Leadership Summit. For young women ages 11-18. Butler Galleries, Arkansas Studies Institute, 9 a.m.-5 p.m., $60.

401 President Clinton Ave. 501-320-5792. www. divasinconline.com.

Fantastic Friday. Literary and music event,

If you’re not HERE, we’re having more fun than you are! refreshments included. For reservations, call 479-968-2452 or email artscenter@centurytel. net. River Valley Arts Center, every third Friday, 7 p.m., $10 suggested donation. 1001 E. B St., Russellville. 479-968-2452. www.arvartscenter.org.

LGBTQ/SGL Youth and Young Adult Group.

Diverse Youth for Social Change is a group for LGBTQ/SGL and straight ally youth and young adults age 14 to 23. For more information, call 244-9690 or search “DYSC” on Facebook. 800 Scott St., 6:30 p.m. 800 Scott St.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 17

Little Rock West Coast Dance Club. Dance lessons. Singles welcome. Ernie Biggs, 7 p.m., $2. 307 Clinton Ave. 501-247-5240. www. arstreetswing.com.

Stepping off the Canvas: A History of Dance from Rembrandt to Turner. In conjunction with the Arkansas Arts Center exhibit, “Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Gainsborough: The Treasures of Kenwood House, London”. Arkansas Arts Center, 7 pm - 9 pm., $20 for non-members, $20 for members. 501 E. 9th St. 501-372-4000. www.arkarts.com.

A Chicago style Speakeasy & Dueling Piano Bar. This is THE premier place to party in Little Rock. “Dueling Pianos” runs Monday through Saturday. Dance & Club music upstairs on Wed, Fri & Sat. Drink specials and more! Do it BIGG! Open 7 Days A Week • 8pm-2am Shows Start at 8:30pm

Located in the Heart of the River Market District 307 President Clinton Avenue

Trim: 2.125x5.875 Bleed: none Live: 1.875x5.625

DANCE

501.372.4782 www.erniebiggs.com

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EVENTS

Argenta Farmers Market. Argenta, 7 a.m.-noon.

Main Street, NLR. Around the World Feast. Taste foods from around the world. PromiseLand Church Ministries, 3-7 p.m., $6-$12. 4520 S. University Ave. 501-570-0048.

CALS Job Skills Workshop: Resume Writing.

Call 501-918-3003 to register. Main Library, 1:30 p.m. 100 S. Rock St. www.cals.lib.ar.us.

Falun Gong meditation. Allsopp Park, 9 a.m., free. Cantrell & Cedar Hill Roads.

Hillcrest Farmers Market. Pulaski Heights Baptist Church, 7 a.m.-2 p.m. 2200 Kavanaugh Blvd.

Little Rock Farmers Market. River Market Pavilions, through Oct. 26: 7 a.m. 400 President Clinton Ave. 375-2552. www.rivermarket.info.

SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Corpus Christi Hooks.

Dickey-Stephens Park, 7:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs. com.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 36

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Publication: Arkansas Times

COMEDY

The Main Thing presents “Arkansanity.”

Original two-act comedy play lampooning life in Arkansas. The Joint, 8 p.m., $20. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

T Rexx. The Loony Bin, 7:30 and 10 p.m., $7 - $10.

10301 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-228-5555. www.loonybincomedy.com.

triple filtered

Closing Date: 8/2/13 QC: CS

MUSIC

The Atomic Studs, Glittercore. TC’s Midtown Grill, 9 p.m., $5. 1611 E. Oak St., Conway. 501205-0576.

Bobby Kuta, Brad Grounds. DJs playing house, indie dance and underground electronic music.

Zin Urban Wine & Beer Bar, 9 p.m. 300 River Market Ave. 501-246-4876. www.zinlr.com.

Chrome Pony. Bear’s Den Pizza, 9 p.m. 235 Farris Road, Conway. 501-328-5556. www.bearsdenpizza.com.

Club Nights at 1620 Savoy. See Aug. 16.

Coco Jones. Magic Springs’ Timberwood Amphitheater, 8 p.m., $50-$60. 1701 E. Grand Ave., Hot Springs.

Deadstring Brothers, Mad Nomad, Swampbird.

Maxine’s, 8 p.m., $7. 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs. www.maxinespub.com.

Easton Corbin, Tyler Farr. Arkansas Music Pavilion, 7:30 p.m., $27-$37. 2536 N. McConnell Ave., Fayetteville. 479-443-5600. www.arkansasmusicpavilion.com.

Eureka Springs Bluegrass Festival. Various times, cover charges and locations, check website for details. Downtown Eureka Springs. www. eurekasprings.org.

Jim Mills (happy hour), Just Sayin’ (headliner).

Cajun’s Wharf, 5:30 and 9 p.m., $5 after 8:30 p.m. 2400 Cantrell Road. 501-375-5351. www. cajunswharf.com.

Joseph Isreal. Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 9 p.m., $8 adv., $10 day of. 107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz.com.

K.I.S.S. Saturdays. Featuring DJ Silky Slim. Dress code enforced. Sway, 10 p.m. 412 Louisiana.

501-492-9802.

Mayday by Midnight. Denton’s Trotline, 9 p.m., $7. 2150 Congo Road, Benton. 501-315-1717.

Mulehead. White Water Tavern, 10 p.m. 2500 W. 7th St. 501-375-8400. www.whitewatertavern.com.

Peter Noone with The Grass Roots and The Buckinghams. Oaklawn, 7 p.m., $20-$30. 2705 Central Ave., Hot Springs. 501-623-4411. www. oaklawn.com.

Pickin’ Porch. Bring your instrument. All ages welcome. Faulkner County Library, 9:30 a.m. 1900 Tyler St., Conway. 501-327-7482. www.fcl.org.

Rodney Block. The Joint, 8 p.m. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

Singer/Songwriters Showcase. Parrot Beach Cafe, 2-7 p.m., free. 9611 MacArthur Drive, NLR. 771-2994.

Switchback, Wreckless Endeavor, Dear Karma.

Vino’s. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www.vinosbrewpub.com.

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SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Corpus Christi Hooks.

Dickey-Stephens Park, 7:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs.com.

Texaco Country Showdown featuring Dry Country. Revolution, 8:30 p.m., $10. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom.com.

Third Annual Johnny Cash Music Festival.

With Vince Gill, Joanne Cash Yates, Tommy Cash, Larry Gatlin and The Gatlin Brothers, Jimmy Fortune and The Statler Brothers. ASU Convocation Center, 7 p.m., $38-$150. 217 Olympic Drive, Jonesboro. 870-972-2781.

Thomas East. Sonny Williams’ Steak Room, 7 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-324-2999. www.sonnywilliamssteakroom.com.

Thread. West End Smokehouse and Tavern, 10 p.m., $5. 215 N. Shackleford. 501-224-7665. www. westendsmokehouse.net.

Top of the Rock Chorus Show: Hot August Night. UALR University Theatre, 7-9 p.m., $15$20. 2801 South Unversity Ave. Trey Johnson. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www. thetavernsportsgrill.com.

Yung Joc. Plus, DJs Brandon Peck, Sleepy Genius, Blade, Whitman and more. Discovery Nightclub, 9 p.m.-5 a.m., $10 before midnight, $15 after.

1021 Jessie Road. 501-664-4784. www.latenightdisco.com.

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AUGUST 15, 2013

35

AFTER DARK, CONT. Color in Motion 5K. Wear white and get blasted with colors. Arkansas State Fairgrounds, 9-11 a.m., $50. 2600 Howard St. 501-372-8341 ext. 8206. www.arkansasstatefair.com.

SUNDAY, AUGUST 18

MUSIC

Lance and Peterson families. Faulkner County Library, 2 p.m., free. 1900 Tyler St., Conway. 501327-7482. www.fcl.org.

Michael Eubanks. Lone Star Steakhouse and Saloon, 7 p.m. 10901 N. Rodney Parham Road.

501-227-8898. www.lonestarsteakhouse.com.

Reggae Sundays with First Impressions. Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 7:30 p.m., $5. 107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz.com.

Stardust Big Band. Arlington Hotel, 3 p.m., $8.

239 Central Ave., Hot Springs. 501-623-7771.

Successful Sunday. Featuring live music and DJs. Montego Cafe, 7 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com.

Sunday Jazz Brunch with Ted Ludwig. The Afterthought Cafe, 11 a.m. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www.vieuxcarrecafe.com.

Three Days Grace, Hinder, Otherwise. Arkansas Music Pavilion, 7:30 p.m., $32-$37. 2536 N. McConnell Ave., Fayetteville. 479-443-5600. www. arkansasmusicpavilion.com.

EVENTS

Bernice Garden Farmers Market. The Bernice Garden, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. 1401 S. Main St. www. thebernicegarden.org.

“Live from the Back Room.” Spoken word event.

Vino’s, 7 p.m. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www. vinosbrewpub.com.

SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Corpus Christi Hooks.

Dickey-Stephens Park, 6:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs.com.

MONDAY, AUGUST 19

MUSIC

Hot Springs Concert Band 2013 Concert Series.

Whittington Park, 6 p.m., free. Whittington Ave., Hot Springs. 501-984-1678.

Irish Traditional Music Session. “SloPlay” begins at 6 p.m. Public session begins at 7 p.m. Hibernia Irish Tavern, first and third Monday of every month.

9700 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-246-4340. www.hiberniairishtavern.com.

Richie Johnson. Cajun’s Wharf, 5:30 p.m. 2400 Cantrell Road. 501-375-5351. www.cajunswharf. com.

LECTURES

Preservation Conversations: Historic Tile.

36

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

Guest speaker Bryan Byrd, owner of American Restoration Tile. Curran Hall, 5-6:30 p.m. 615 E. Capitol. 501-370-3290.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 20

MUSIC

Arkansas River Blues Society Blues Jam. Thirst n’ Howl, through Aug. 27: 7:30 p.m., free. 14710 Cantrell Road. 501-379-8189. www.thirst-n-howl. com.

Brian and Nick. Cajun’s Wharf, 5:30 p.m. 2400 Cantrell Road. 501-375-5351. www.cajunswharf. com.

Lucious Spiller Band. Copeland’s Restaurant of Little Rock, 6-9 p.m. 2602 S. Shackleford Road.

501-312-1616. www.copelandsrestaurantlittlerock. com.

MC Chris, Jesse Dangerously, Dr. Awkward, Tribe One. Juanita’s, 9 p.m., $13 adv., $15 day of.

614 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-1228. www. juanitas.com.

Open Music Jam. The Joint, through Aug. 27: 8 p.m., free. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-3720205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

The P-47s, The Dangerous Idiots. White Water Tavern, 10 p.m. 2500 W. 7th St. 501-375-8400. www.whitewatertavern.com.

Ricky David Tripp. Rocket Twenty One, 5:30 p.m.

2601 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-603-9208. www.ferneaurestaurant.com.

Tuesday Jam Session with Carl Mouton. The Afterthought, 8 p.m., free. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd.

501-663-1196. www.afterthoughtbar.com.

DANCE

“Latin Night.” Revolution, 7 p.m., $5 regular, $7 under 21. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-8230090. www.littlerocksalsa.com.

EVENTS

Faulkner County Seed Library. Opening of first Seed Library in Arkansas. Faulkner County Library, 5:30 p.m. 1900 Tyler St., Conway. 501-327-7482. www.fcl.org.

Little Rock Farmers Market. River Market Pavilions, through Oct. 26: 7 a.m. 400 President Clinton Ave. 375-2552. www.rivermarket.info.

Tales from the South. Authors tell true stories; schedule available on website. Dinner served 5-6:30 p.m., show at 7 p.m. Call for reservations.

Starving Artist Cafe, 5 p.m. 411 N. Main St., NLR. 501-372-7976. www.starvingartistcafe.net.

FILM

Ice Cream Social: “Dumb and Dumber.”

Screening of “Dumb and Dumber” and ice cream floats from local Loblolly Creamery. Vino’s, 6 p.m. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www.vinosbrewpub.com.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 21

MUSIC

Acoustic Open Mic. The Afterthought, 8 p.m., free. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www. afterthoughtbar.com.

Karen Jr. Cajun’s Wharf, 5:30 p.m. 2400 Cantrell Road. 501-375-5351. www.cajunswharf.com.

Pat McCrackin. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www. thetavernsportsgrill.com.

Pickoids. Thirst n’ Howl, 7:30 p.m. 14710 Cantrell Road. 501-379-8189. www.thirst-n-howl.com.

Ricky David Tripp. Rocket Twenty One, 5:30 p.m.

2601 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-603-9208. www.ferneaurestaurant.com.

Twiztid. With Lil Wyte, Jellyroll, Aqualeo and 870 Underground. Revolution, 8 p.m., $20 adv., $25 day of. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom.com.

COMEDY

The Joint Venture. Improv comedy group. The Joint, 8 p.m., $5. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

DANCE

Little Rock Bop Club. Beginning dance lessons for ages 10 and older. Singles welcome. Bess Chisum Stephens Community Center, 7 p.m., $4 for members, $7 for guests. 12th & Cleveland streets. 501-350-4712. www.littlerockbopclub.

POETRY

Wednesday Night Poetry. 21-and-older show.

Maxine’s, 7 p.m., free. 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs. 501-321-0909. maxineslive.com/shows. html.

THIS WEEK IN THEATER

THEATER

“Alice in Wonderland.” Adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s classic tale by The Young Players. Royal Theatre, Aug. 15-17, 7 p.m.; Sun., Aug. 18, 2 p.m., $5-$10. 111 S. Market St., Benton.

“All My Sons.” Precipice Theatre’s production of Arthur Miller’s classic work. The Public Theatre, through Aug. 17, 7:30 p.m.; Sun., Aug. 18, 2 p.m., $10-$13. 616 Center St. 479-530-0723. www.thepublictheatre.com.

“Circle Mirror Transformation.” Part of Lantern’s Late Night Series, suggested for mature audiences only. Lantern Theatre, Aug. 15-17, 8 p.m., $10. 1021 Van Ronkle, Conway. 501-733-6220. www.conwayarts.org/index.html.

“The River Niger.” An Air Force soldier returns to his Harlem family, though not as the hero they anticipated. The Weekend Theater, through Aug. 24: Fri., Sat., 7:30 p.m., $12-$16. 1001 W. 7th St.

501-374-3761. www.weekendtheater.org.

“South Pacific.” Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Pulitzer Prize-winning classic. Murry’s Dinner Playhouse, through Aug. 18: Tue.-Sat., 6 p.m.; Sun., 11 a.m. and 5:30 p.m., $15-$35. 6323 Col. Glenn Road. 501-562-3131. murrysdinnerplayhouse.com.

GALLERIES, MUSEUMS

NEW EXHIBITIONS, EVENTS

CLINTON PRESIDENTIAL CENTER, 1200 President Clinton Ave.: “Head of the Class Bash,” free haircuts, immunizations, first 1,500 students to enter the library will receive a free backpack and school supplies, 10 a.m.-2 p.m.

Aug. 17, “Free Admission Day,” in honor of President Clinton’s 67th birthday (admission free 9 a.m.-5 p.m.); “And Freedom for All: the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom,” photographs by Stanley Tretick of the 1963 march, through Nov. 17; “Oscar de la Renta: American Icon,” designs worn by Laura Bush, Jessica Chastain, Hillary Clinton, Chelsea Clinton and others, and other couture pieces, through Dec. 1. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 1-5 p.m. Sun. $7 adults; $5 college students, seniors, retired military; $3 ages 6-17. 370-8000.

GREG THOMPSON FINE ART, 429 Main St., NLR: Open 5-8 p.m. Aug. 16, Argenta ArtWalk.

664-2787.

HEARNE FINE ART, 1001 Wright Ave.: “Reflections in Silver: Silverpoint Drawings by Aj Smith and Marjorie Williams-Smith,” through Aug. 17, silverpoint drawing workshop by Williams-Smith, 10 a.m.-noon Aug. 17, $75, “Art of the Original Print” demonstration by Smith, 1:30 p.m. Aug. 17, free. 372-6822.

L&L BECK, 5705 Kavanaugh Blvd.: “Impersonating the Impressionists,” paintings by Louis Beck, giclee drawing giveaway 7 p.m. Aug. 15. 6604006.

PAINT BOX GALLERY, 705 Main St., NLR: Jewelry

by P.J. Bryant, through Sept. 15, reception 5-8 p.m. Aug. 16, Argenta ArtWalk. 374-2848.

THEA FOUNDATION, 401 Main St., NLR: Paintings by Eric Forstmann, through Aug. 30, origami cranes by Akeen McDaniel, through Aug. 30, reception 5-8 p.m. Aug. 16, Argenta ArtWalk. Gallery hours: 9 a.m.-noon and 1-5 p.m.

Mon.-Fri. 379-9512.

UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS AT LITTLE ROCK, 2801 S. University: “Transformation 8: Contemporary Works in Small Metals,” wearable objects and sculptural objects, Gallery I, Aug. 16-Oct. 2; “Figurative Forms: Work from the UALR Permanent Collection,” Aug. 15-Sept.

25. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Fri., 10 a.m.-1 p.m. Sat., 2-5 p.m. Sun. 569-3182.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 38

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“Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Gainsborough: The Treasures of Kenwood House, London,” through Sept. 8, $12 adults, $10 seniors, $8 military, $6 students, free to members; “Bauhaus Twenty-21: An Ongoing Legacy,” photographs by Gordon Watkinson, through Sept. 22; “50 Works / 50 214 Weeks / 50 Years,” Alice Pratt Brown Atrium, through 2013; “Ryan Sniegocki: Museum School Ceramic Artist in Residence,” pottery; “Interwoven: Craft Exhibition,” from the permanent collection, through Nov. 17. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue.-Fri., 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat., 11 a.m.-5 p.m.

Sun. 372-4000.

214BUTLER CENTER GALLERIES, Arkansas Studies Institute, 401 President Clinton Ave.: “MidSouthern Watercolorists 43rd Annual Juried Exhibition,” through Oct. 27; “Get a Simple Landscape,” drawings by Jerry Phillips, through Sept. 29; “Creative Expressions,” work by individuals with mental illness at the Arkansas State Hospital, through Aug. 25. 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.Sat. 320-5700.

LAMAN LIBRARY, 2801 Orange St., NLR: “Discover Greatness: An Illustrated History of Negro Baseball Leagues,” photographs tracing black baseball from the 19th century through 1947, through Aug. 24. 758-1720.

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LAKE VILLAGE GUAYACHOYA CULTURAL CENTER, 1652 U.S. 65: 2013 “Small Works on Paper,” Aug. 20-Sept.

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EL DORADO SOUTH ARKANSAS ARTS CENTER, 110 E. Fifth St.: “Ebb and Flow,” acrylics, oil pastel and chalk by Melanie Pyron, through Aug. 30.

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BENTONVILLE CRYSTAL BRIDGES MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART, One Museum Way: “Conversations on Luis Jimenez,” educator Sara Segerlin and musician Al Papa Rap program on the Latin American sculptor, 3:30-4:15 p.m. in the South Lobby. Aug. 17.

BENTONVILLE CRYSTAL BRIDGES MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART, One Museum Way: “Angels & Tomboys: Girlhood in 19th-Century American Art,” work by John Singer Sargent, Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins, Mary Cassatt and others, through Sept.

30; “Surveying George Washington,” historical documents, through Sept. 30; permanent collection of American masterworks spanning four centuries. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon., Thu., Sat.-Sun.; 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Wed.-Fri. 479-418-5700.

ONGOING MUSEUM EXHIBITS

ARKANSAS INLAND MARITIME MUSEUM, North Little Rock: “Captain’s Cabin Exhibit,” photographs, biographies, sea stories from the crew, and personal artifacts, through August. 371-8320.

ESSE, 1510 S. Main St.: “What’s Inside: A Century of Women and Handbags (1900-1999),” purses from the collection of Anita Davis, 11 a.m.-4 p.m.

Tue.-Sun., $10-$8. 916-9022.

HISTORIC ARKANSAS MUSEUM, 200 E. Third St.: “Heeding the Call: The Firefighter Collection of Johnny Reep,” through Jan. 5; “The Sense of Nature: David Mudrinich, John Van Horn and Judy Wright Walter,” through Oct. 6; “Jason A. Smith: Stills”; “Arkansas Made,” ongoing; “The Curious World of Patent Models,” through Sept. 29. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 1-5 p.m. Sun. 324-9351.

MOVIE REVIEW

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‘ELYSIUM’: Matt Damon stars.

Dull dystopia ‘Elysium’ lays it on thick.

BY MIKE POWELL

T

here is a moment during the explosive, confused third act of the new sci-fi action movie “Elysium” when mercenary agent C.M. Kruger (Sharlto Copley) is stomping down the corridor of a space station in hot pursuit of hero Max Da Costa (Matt Damon) and shouts, “Do you hear that sound? That’s the sound of me coming to get you!”

Maybe we can forgive Kruger’s literalism in light of the fact that he only realized he was the movie’s villain five minutes earlier. But even for a sci-fi audience there for the robots and occasional explosion, it’s an embarrassing line, like a placeholder for something at least passably clever someone was supposed to write but didn’t quite get around to.

Not all the movie goes down this badly, but a lot of it does. Set in the familiar scifi territory of the not-too-distant future, “Elysium” tells a story of a world split into two groups: The haves, who live on a prefab planet called Elysium about a 20-minute spaceship commute from Earth, and the have-nots, who toil in dust-covered shantytowns stacked on hillsides, like a hyperbolically run-down vision of Mexico as seen from behind the border wall in El Paso.

The have-nots live impoverished, fearful lives; the haves sip Riesling on neoclassical verandas. Max, an ex-con trying to make good, buses to a dangerous factory

job and comes home at night to a oneroom apartment with cinder-block walls, while up on Elysium they have sparkling green lawns and what amounts to allaccess healthcare pods capable of healing everything from a grenade wound to leukemia within seconds.

If all that sounds familiar, that’s because they movie’s makers really want it to. “Elysium” strives to be an allegory for modern life at almost every turn, not so much drawing parallels as laying them down in thick black paint. Of course, plenty of scifi movies show us terrible futures meant to represent endgames for the way society seems to be going now. What drags “Elysium” down isn’t the story, which is forgivably convoluted, or the characters, who are only given brief chances to be human beings, but the lack of imagination that went into what you could call the movie’s decor — in other words, the way it makes all its familiar sci-fi conventions clever and fun.

Take, for example, the Elysians. Besides conniving Secretary of State Jessica Delacourt (Jodie Foster), we don’t meet any of them personally, which is fine. But do they have to drink white wine and be introduced to the sound of the same Bach cello suite that Rich People are always introduced to in movies? Or the Earth scenes, which are supposed to take place in Los Angeles, but seemingly for no other rea-

son than that lots of other dystopian scifi movies take place in Los Angeles. Or the sequences of data being uploaded and downloaded into chunky, USB-like devices that plug into peoples’ heads. For a sci-fi movie, “Elysium” feels oddly dated, and the few parts where it tries to assert that it was made in 2013 are awkward: Besides Max and his parole officer — basically a drive-thru pole painted to look like a human being — everyone in Los Angeles’ first language appears to be Spanish, while Elysium’s forcibly multicultural presidential cabinet looks like a Kashi Good Friends box at a shareholder’s meeting.

It all matters because on some level, genre movies live and die by style. It’s not the story you tell, but how you tell it, and with what wild new wild devices or reality-bending conceits. Writer-director Neill Blomkamp’s last movie, “District 9,” was similar to “Elysium”: gritty, sweaty, tactile, and driven by old-fashioned storytelling virtues like heroism and moral uprightness (which is different from, say, the more searching, philosophical tone of a movie like “Blade Runner”). And to be fair, the movie is probably slower than a lot of action movies are now. While being chased through the streets of Los Angeles by a military craft, Max is temporarily hidden under a cart of pigs by a woman in the marketplace — a scene not played for its heart-pounding, hectic, second-to-second thrills, but the opportunity to show us the dynamic of the world he lives in. But we don’t get moments like this often, and in the absence of an idiosyncratic vision to carry the movie, it falls on Damon’s shoulders. In preparation for filming, he spent four hours a day working out. The movie needs and uses all of him.

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SAVING LAKE CONWAY, CONT. From page 12 over or through the dike. One of their first jobs was plugging a pair of 48-inch metal pipes connecting the cove and the main lake. Meanwhile, pumps sucked water from the bottom of the cove so it wouldn’t overflow into the lake.

“We was part of a big team,” said Johnson, 50, who grew up fishing in the lake and playing in its network of nearby streams. “We was working to save our lake.”

Ryan Benefield, the ADEQ’s deputy director, is confident the local crew did just that.

So far, water tests in the main lake conducted by the agency have shown no signs of diluted bitumen, Benefield said. That’s the type of heavy Canadian crude that the Pegasus was carrying when it broke.

Sediment testing throughout the spill corridor, roughly a mile long, began July 27 as the spill cleanup evolved from “response” mode, overseen by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, to the “remediation” phase, coordinated

by ADEQ. Results of the sediment tests are not yet available, Benefield said.

He is convinced the sediment tests also will bring good news because water tests have repeatedly come back clean enough to be below any level of concern.

“We haven’t seen anything in the main body of the lake indicating that it has been affected by the oil spill,” Benefield said. “There’s just no opportunity for the sediments to be impacted.”

Much of the lake is quite shallow, measuring barely six feet deep, Benefield said.

Heavy metals found in diluted bitumen are a major concern with any such spill.

These compounds, which include mercury, manganese, nickel and chromium, are toxic at high doses. Some, such as arsenic and lead, can damage the human nervous system even at relatively low doses.

Neighbors suspect oil in lake Genieve Long, a 28-year-old mother and full-time college student who has lived next to Lake Conway all of her life, patrols the lake regularly. She is suspicious of the testing done by ExxonMobil and state authorities, she said, because she doesn’t think they are testing lake channels where she is sure currents carried oil connected with the spill.

Oil had time to breach the Highway 89 dike before Johnson and other workers built barricades and blocked the pair 40

AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

of culverts, Long said.

“I have a very good knowledge of what goes on in the lake,” she said. “My father was a fisherman who taught me about fish and currents. I’m not trying to cause trouble. I’m trying to make problems go away. I’m concerned about the environment and about people’s health, and that they aren’t getting the attention they need.”

Long said she felt rebuffed by ADEQ officials when she told them several times that she had observed oil near the cove where her family lives.

“They told me it was nothing to worry about, that it’s just natural organisms decomposing,” she said. “I know the difference between what I’m seeing and what I’ve seen all of my life.

I have fished this lake, played in this lake, even waded out in it when I was a kid. I know what this lake looked like before the spill.”

In 1948, the state Game and Fish Commission built what is now officially known as the Craig D. Campbell Lake Conway Reservoir by damming Palarm Creek. It’s the largest lake ever created by a state conservation agency, and it fueled a real estate boomlet in Conway and Mayflower.

While the main body of the lake could be free of oil from the Pegasus spill, oil did reach the cove. Early on, authorities installed sets of absorbent booms and weirs that went from the surface of the water to the soil below to isolate as much oil as possible. While water tests in the cove have revealed that levels of heavy metals are below levels of concern, Benefield said the ADEQ won’t know how successful the cleanup efforts have been there until results of the sediment testing are available.

Cleanups of heavily oiled sites can be massive, intensive and expensive.

A Canadian-owned pipeline operator, Enbridge Inc., ended up dredging and then rebuilding an entire creek in Marshall, Mich., after a burst pipeline spewed at least a million gallons of diluted bitumen into wetlands along the Kalamazoo River in 2010. That cleanup is ongoing because the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that as much as 180,000 gallons of oil remain in the river today.

From response to remediation The cove was upgraded from the response stage to the remediation stage about a month ago, Benefield said.

Long-term remediation, headed by the ADEQ, requires ExxonMobil to design

SAVING LAKE CONWAY, CONT. an investigation plan ensuring that no oil is left behind. It calls for multiple rounds of sampling in the lake, the cove and the rest of the spill’s path.

Benefield said his agency still works closely with Nicolas Brescia, the EPA’s on-scene coordinator, as it proceeds with the cleanup. Brescia, based at the EPA’s Region 6 Office in Dallas, is no longer at the Mayflower site full time.

Brescia said he participates in weekly conference calls with all of the cleanup authorities to monitor progress.

The ADEQ has extensive remediation experience, Benefield said, and is capable of handling oil spills.

“Of course, this is a large release with some unique aspects,” he said. “I won’t say that we clean up spills of 5,000 barrels every day but we do clean up spills pretty much every day.”

The main body of Lake Conway was never off limits to boaters or fishers, Game and Fish Commission spokesperson Keith Stephens said in an interview. Access to the cove was restricted after the spill because so much heavy equipment was congregated there. The cove is now accessible, he added, even though it is rarely used and has never been a popular fishing spot.

Rumors have circulated among lakeside residents that authorities go out early in the morning to collect dead fish in the cove and the lake. Stephens said his agency has never received any reports about dead fish after the spill.

When the spill first occurred, the focus was on the immediate response — removing all of the visible oil in the water, vegetation and soil. So far, the company has spent $47.5 million on cleanup, ExxonMobil spokesman Aaron Stryk said in an email.

The Northwoods subdivision in Mayflower is the only area of the spill still in the response stage, because five homes have yet to be declared oil-free, Benefield said.

off because they work 10-hour shifts Monday through Thursday.

By the time the rain began that Friday night, Mayflower had about exhausted its 75-ton supply of gravel.

County workers supplemented that by hauling in their own gravel from about eight miles away as crews labored through Saturday’s rain.

Johnson praised ExxonMobil for the way its workers tried to slow the oil before it reached the cove.

Two major obstacles — a railroad track and four lanes of Interstate 40 — meant cleanup crews had to navigate a

circuitous, northeastern path to stop the oil as it surged across asphalt, concrete, a grassy culvert 20- to 30-feet wide and wetlands on its path toward the cove and lake. Workers laid out gravel and positioned large pipes at strategic angles so the oil would rise and pool. That way, it was easier to suck it up with vacuums and skimmers.

“When you hear oil spill, you think something happened at a gas station,” Johnson said. “When he told me that an oil pipeline had busted, I said ‘Oh, no.’

“If we had to work night and day to stop that oil, we’d work night and day.

And we’d do it all again if this ever happened again.”

Then he paused and tugged at the brim of his baseball cap: “I just hope we don’t ever have to.”

This story is part of a joint investigative project by the Arkansas Times and InsideClimate News. Funding for the project comes from people like you who donated to an ioby.org crowd-funding campaign that raised nearly $27,000 and from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.

“We’d do it all again” Johnson said that if the pipeline had to burst, it’s fortunate it happened in the subdivision. Any farther north and the oil would have had a much more direct route to the main body of Lake Conway.

“All these years I knew the pipeline was here but I never dreamed of it busting,” Johnson said. “That’s something you hear of in a different state or a different place.”

When a county worker notified him about the spill on that Friday afternoon, he was at home building himself a workshop. He and his co-workers had the day www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 15, 2013

41

Dining WHAT’S COOKIN’

TRIO’S RESTAURANT is celebrating the Dog Days of Summer in August on its patio, welcoming folks to bring their dogs to dinner all month. Pets will receive a goody bag of biscuits and tennis balls and other treats and owners can get half off an appetizer or dessert with their entree order.

Hollywood Feed, across Cantrell Road from Trio’s (in the Pavilion in the Park at 8201 Cantrell), made the goody bags to order.

Trio’s has been pet friendly for 27 years, according to Dog Friendly Little Rock, which recently sniffed out a ruling from the state Health Department that it is OK to have dogs on restaurant patios. A blog reader was moved to ask because of a complaint filed with the Health Department against U.S. Pizza about a dog on the patio.

Here is some advice from Dog Friendly Little Rock about taking your pooch to lunch: “Keep your dog on a leash and under your control at all times Never allow your dog on restaurant chairs, tables, or other furnishings Never allow your dog to lick or touch dishes or utensils (EW!) If possible, bring your own water bowl If your dog’s being a jerk you should leave And, I’m sure this one goes without saying, but always clean up after your pup.”

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AUGUST 15, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

Not an inviting House

Service, new menu disappoint.

T

he House in Hillcrest should be one of Little Rock’s top spots for dining. It boasts a prime location on the corner of Palm and Kavanaugh, sports a funky decor that seems tailor-made for Hillcrest, and offers a nice patio for outdoor dining and several options both upstairs and down for indoor seating. Somehow, though, all this potential has been wasted over the years that The House has been open, with a revolving cast of cooks coming through to “revitalize” and “revamp” the menu multiple times. Is it a brunch joint? A high-end burger place? A sit-down lunch spot? A dive bar with snacks to soak up all that free-flowing booze? Strangely enough, the place has attempted to be all those things, and it’s only been open for around four years.

For us, The House has been nothing but one disappointment after another. Apathetic service, mediocre food, and some of the worst French fries we’ve ever eaten put a lingering bad taste in our mouth that’s taken quite a long time to dissipate. But June brought yet another announcement from The House that they were once again revamping their menu, bringing in all sorts of fun new things to eat and drink while updating some of the old dishes. So being the sort of forgiving souls we are, it only seemed proper to head back down to Palm Street and see what that new menu was capable of doing.

We started off with a dish that The House has always been able to do well, the Sweet Potato Waffle Fries ($2.80 bowl/$6.25 bucket) and were pleased to see that they were as good as ever, salty and sweet all at once with a nice crisp exterior and a mealy interior that was only improved by the curried ketchup served to the side. Our second starter, the Beer Cheese Soup ($5.95) was a complete disaster however — so much so that it’s hard to know where to begin. Maybe it was the way our tipsy server (who we saw take a nip or three behind the bar) slid the bowl onto the table, splashing soup over the edge of the bowl to the plate below. Or perhaps it was the temperature of the soup, which was decidedly cooler than the humid, stuffy dining room. But what really made this soup bad was the flavor: salty, and some-

JESS ROBERTS

THE ITALIAN BISTRO VESUVIO that was once located off the lobby of the Governor’s Suites on Merrill Drive is now open at new digs at 1315 Breckenridge Drive, formerly the home of El Chico Mexican Restaurant. The new space seats 100-plus and has a large bar; the menu, which has received acclaim from folks around town, is the same: seafood, poultry, steak, veal served in traditional Italian fashion.

The restaurant, owned by Bill Criswell, is open every day from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. A baby grand piano should be arriving in a couple of weeks for live music, host John Dicus said. He said the restaurant has been “very busy,” so folks are finding it in its new location fine.

DISAPPOINTMENT: Chicken and waffles at The House.

The House 722 N. Palm St. 663-4500

QUICK BITE The House has definitely taken advantage of the growing craft beer scene by developing one of the most varied and respectable lists in town, with new brews rotating onto the menu regularly both in bottle and on tap.

HOURS 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to midnight Friday, 10 a.m. until midnight Saturday, 10 a.m. until 11 p.m. Sunday.

OTHER INFO All major credit cards, full bar.

how incredibly bitter, with very little else in the way of flavor. After three or four bites, we couldn’t take any more and pushed the soup to the side.

Our entrees fared little better. Wanting to try one of the new additions to the menu, we ordered a plate of Chicken and Waffles ($11), described on the menu as a “cheddar and jalapeno waffle served with strawberry and jalapeno syrup and topped with a fried chicken breast.” We found a few bits of green in the otherwise dry waffle that might have been jalapenos, though we could taste neither pepper nor the promised cheddar. The syrup leaned more to the strawberry side, with no discernible jalapeno present there, either. As for the

chicken breast, the batter was so thick and cooked so long that it shattered at the first touch of our forks into a burnt-tasting pile of greasy shards. The meat itself wasn’t bad, and we had to respect the excellent flavor of the ripe strawberries dotted atop the dish — but overall, this was not anything approaching good.

Our final disappointment of the night came in the form of the Mac and Cheese Burger ($10.50), which we ordered with a turkey patty to mix things up a bit. There are some good turkey burgers in Little Rock at places like Big Orange, but unfortunately The House doesn’t reach that level. Take one dry, flavorless chunk of ground turkey, top it with a sloppy mess of what can only charitably be called macaroni and cheese, and throw some bacon and barbecue sauce on it and you’ve got what passes for a burger here. We were thankful for the bacon on this sandwich just because it was pretty much the only thing that had actual flavor, and left us wishing we had just ordered the sweet potato fries and been done with it.

If there’s anything we can say to the folks running The House, it’s this: There’s no need to constantly revamp your menu in an attempt to draw the crowds in. What’s needed is a staff that spends less time behind the bar boozing and bantering and more time making sure that food is cooked and served correctly. Execution has always been an issue for this restaurant, and judging by our most recent meal, nothing in that regard has changed.

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BLENDING FAMILIAR TASTES, UNEXPECTED DELIGHTS, AND NEW TWISTS

“Our complementary menu will blend extraordinary flavors with many delicious signature dishes in a comfortable and casual environment.”

Chef Scott Raines

Welcome to In appreciation to our loyal customers and an invitation to our new friends,

Join us August 20-22

In The Former VesuVIo BIsTro LocaTIon • Mon-Thu 5-9pM ~ Fri-SaT 5-10pM

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ALL menu items will be $4.99 or less (excluding A.W. Lin’s combo, Sushi or Sashimi Combo and Love Boat)

We have crafted a new menu with Chinese, exotic Thai influences and South Asian fusion we can’t wait to share. New Lunch options include multiple course dishes, tantalizing mini-appetizers and classic rice and noodle dishes you expect.

CELEBRATE SUNDAYS WITH 35% OFF BRUNCH MENU FOR A LIMITED TIME — AUG. 18, 25 AND SEPT. 1

Enjoy our new Brunch menu with more drink and entrée specials, featuring dinner items at lunch prices.

501-821-5398 • www.awlins.com 17717 CHENAL PKWY, H101 • LITTLE ROCK

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AUGUST 15, 2013

43

It’s back!

1620 SAVOY 1620 Market St 501-221-1620 1620savoy.com Free Soufflé (Chocolate Jamaican Rum or Grand Marnier) with purchase of entrée.

American Pie Pizza 10912 Colonel Glenn Rd #7000 501-225-1900 americanpiepizza.net $5 off any purchase over $20 (not including alcohol) – Colonel Glenn location only.

4square Cafe and Gifts 405 President Clinton Ave 501-244-2622 4squaregifts.com Buy any sandwich or wrap and get a free cake truffle.

B-Side 11121 N. Rodney Parham 501-716-2700 lillysdimsum.com 1/2 Order Beignets with house made fruit coulis $3.

A.W. Lin’s Asian Cuisine 17717 Chenal Pkwy 501-821-5398 awlins.com Happy Hour Sunday - Thursday 3-7pm $2 draft beer, $2 special drinks, $3 house Sake. Half price selected appetizers and sushi.

Monday - Thursday: Sushi special: buy one get one half off 3-7pm Sunday and Monday: Kid’s eat free (12 and under) Thursday is Ladies Night: Sangria $4 glass & $18 pitcher (ladies only) Half price appetizer

Baseline Pit Stop Bar & Grill 5506 Baseline Rd 501-562-9635 pitstopbarandgrill.com Two eggs any style and your choice of meat with hash browns, toast and a cup of coffee or soda for $6 from 8am to 10am. Ask about our daily lunch specials.

Acadia Restaurant 3000 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-603-9630 acadiahillcrest.com 20 oz Blackened Porter House steak, served with a Crawfish Risotto and Roasted Garlic Compound Butter. $39.75 for Prix Fixe Entrée only or $43.75 for three courses.

Black Angus 10907 N Rodney Parham Rd 501-228-7800 blackanguscafe.com $1 off two hamburger steak dinners (includes hamburger steak, choice of baked potato or fries, side salad and bread)

Afterthought Bistro & Bar (formerly Vieux Carré) 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-663-1196 afterthoughtbar.com Three Course Prix Fixe Menu $25 – Select from a range of options. Not valid with any other discount or coupon. Alcohol and gratuity not included.

All Aboard Restaurant & Grill 6813 Cantrell Road 501-975-7401 all-aboardrestaurant.com Buy a meal, get a “Lil” engineers meal for half off.

Big Whiskey’s American Bar & Grill 225 E Markham St 501-324-2449 bigwhiskeys.com 50% off an appetizer with purchase of an entrée.

Bobbie Jean’s Soul Food 3201 W. 56th St 501-570-8585 BLT sandwiches for $2.50.

Bookends Café 120 River Market Ave 501-918-3091 cals.org Turkey, Cheese, and Avocado Sandwich with Potato Salad $5.

Boscos Restaurant & Brewing Co. 500 President Clinton Ave 501-907-1881 boscosbeer.com 20% off lunch. Dine-in only, no carry out and customer must ask for the restaurant month special.

Boston’s Restaurant & Sports Bar 3201 Bankhead Drive 501-235-2000 bostons.com 25% off any large or medium pizza.

Dine-in only.

Café @ Heifer 1 World Avenue 501-907-8801 heifer.org ½ sandwich, side and a drink for $6.99.

Brave New Restaurant 2300 Cottondale Ln #105 501-663-2677 bravenewrestaurant.com Duck Sausage Dog: A unique twist on the typical hot dog - duck sausage, grilled and served on a challah hoagie, with purple cabbage kraut, caramelized onions and our own mayo/Dijon sauce for $10.75.

Cafe Bossa Nova 2701 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-614-668 cafebossanova.com Moqueca (regularly priced at $24) for $21.19 during the month of August. $1 off Fejoida on Saturdays.

Bray Gourmet 323 Center Street 501-353-1045 braygourmet.com Bray’s Smoked Turkey Spread: Your choice of original, Cajun, jalapeno, or dill spread. Served with lettuce and tomato on choice of sourdough, marble rye, white, or wheat for $5.29.

Bravo! Cucina Italiana 17815 Chenal Pkwy 501-821-2485 bravoitalian.com Bravo Hour! $5 drink specials and $3.95 appetizers Monday-Friday, 3-7pm.

Browning’s Mexican Grill 5805 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-663-9956 browningsmexicangrill.com Lunch Special – Browning’s Duo for $6.99.

Buffalo Grill 1611 Rebsamen Park Rd • 501-2969535 400 N Bowman Rd #9 • 501-224-0012 buffalogrilllr.com Mahi Mahi Salad $8.99.

Butcher Shop 10825 Hermitage Road 501-312-2748 thebutchershoplittlerock.com Half price drinks and appetizers from 5-7pm Mon thru Fri. Bar area only.

Cafe Prego 5510 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-663-5355 10% off your entire tab or 20% off bottles of wine.

Cajun’s Wharf 2400 Cantrell Rd 501-375-5351 cajunswharf.com $35 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month dinner menu. (Choose two out of three courses) Camp David Interstate 30 & 6th St. Inside Holiday Inn Presidential Conference Center 501-975-CAMP(2267) $2 Miller Lt Draft, $3 house wines, $4 house liquors from 4:30 to 6:30 daily.

Canon Grill 2811 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-664-2068 canongrill.com Free Cheese Dip with purchase of two Entrées, one per table.

Cantina Cinco de Mayo 23 Rahling Road, Suite A1 501-821-2740 Sun-Thurs: $3.49 Margaritas, 99¢ Draft Beer - Dos Equis & Blue Moon Fri & Sat: $2.99 Margaritas, Small Draft Beer 99¢ .

Cantina Laredo 207 N University Ave #300 501-280-0407 facebook.com/cantinalaredolittlerock Wednesday Special – Half price any wine by the glass, 4pm-close Thursday Special – Half price house Margarita for Ladies night, 4pm-close.

Capers 14502 Cantrell Rd 501-868-7600 capersrestaurant.com $13 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month lunch menu. $30 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month dinner menu. (Choose two out of three courses)

Casa Mañana 6820 Cantrell Rd • 501-280-9888 18321 Cantrell Rd. • 501-868-8822 400 President Clinton Ave, D • 501372-6637 casamananamexicanfood.com 15% off your order. Excluding alcohol.

China Wok 10402 Stagecoach Road, Ste. G 501-407-0833 Monday-Saturday 10:30-3pm Lunch Special includes choice of entrée, pork fried rice and soup or can of soda for $5.25. Excludes egg foo young, special lo mein and Mongolian beef.

Cheers in the Heights 2010 N Van Buren St 501-663-5937 cheersith.com A complimentary piece of carrot cake with the purchase of two entrées (Cheers in the Heights location only).

Chi’s Too 5110 W. Markham 501-604-7777 Buy one complete dinner, get one free kids’ meal. Limit: Kids 12 and under. Two free kids’ meals per table.

Dine-in only.

Ciao Baci 605 Beechwood 501-603-0238 ciaobaci.org Chef’s four course tasting for $30.

Cojita’s Mexican Grill 406 S. Luoisiana St. 501-244-0733 $4 off any $15 purchase. Two tacos, rice and beans for $4, dine-in only. $3 Margaritas now available during Happy Hour, 4-7pm.

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Your favorite Little Rock chefs have put together a variety of specials for the month of August that are great values on the city’s most delicious dining.

Attention - You Must Ask Your Server about these specials throughout August DineLR.com Community Bakery 1200 Main St 501-375-7105 communitybakery.com $1 off Iced coffee, iced Latte, Espresso Frappe, Espresso milkshake, fruit smoothie.

Community Bakery • WLR 270 S Shackleford Rd 501-224-1656 Free cookie of your choice with any purchase.

Copper Grill 300 E 3rd St # 101 501-375-3333 coppergrilllr.com $13 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month lunch menu. $30 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month dinner menu.

Corky’s Ribs & BBQ 12005 Westhaven Dr 501-954-7427 corkysbbq.com $1 off all Phil’s sandwiches.

Curry in a Hurry 11121 N Rodney Parham Rd 501-224-4567 facebook.com/curryhurry Free Butter Naan with purchase of two entrées.

Damgoode Pies 6706 Cantrell Rd • 501-664-2239 2701 Kavanaugh Blvd • 501-664-2274 10720 N Rodney Parham Rd • 501664-2239 damgoodepies.com ½ off appetizers. Buy any large pizza and get 50% off any appetizer.

Dempsey Bakery 323 S Cross St 501-375-2257 dempseybakery.com Free Sugar Cookie with lunch purchase.

Doe’s Eat Place 1023 W Markham St 501-376-1195 doeseatplace.net 8 oz. filet with Arkansas Toast, potatoes and soaked salad for $35.

El Porton Mexican Restaurant 12111 W Markham St #450 501-223-8588 5507 Ranch Dr 501-868-7333 elportonmexicanrestaurants.com Happy Hour Mon-Fri 2-5 – Regular Margarita $2.95, 25 oz. Draft Beer $2.95 Lunch Special $5.99 Mon-Fri Entrée with Soft Drink Famous Dave’s 225 N Shackleford Rd 501-221-3283 famousdaves.com $5 off purchase of $20.

Green Corner Store & Soda Fountain 1423 Main St 501-374-1111 thegreencornerstore.com Beat the August heat with $1 off anything at the Soda Fountain.

Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken 300 President Clinton Ave., Ste. D 501-372-2211 gusfriedschicken.com/little-rock-ar Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken!

Now serving fried catfish Monday and Tuesday all day!

Gusano’s Chicago Style Pizzeria 313 President Clinton Ave 501-374-1441 gusanospizza.com $7.49 Lunch Special – 8” One Topping Pizza, Side Salad and Soft Drink.

Happy Hour 3-6pm - $2 domestic drafts 12oz. $3 well drinks.

Far East Asian Cuisine & Bar 11610 Pleasant Ridge Rd #100 Pleasant Ridge West Shopping Center 501-219-9399 fareastasiancuisine.com Hillcrest Artisan Meats House wine and beer 50% off.

2807 Kavanaugh Blvd.

Appetizers 30% off from 4:00 to 6:00, 501-671-6328 dine in only. hillcrestartisanmeats.com “Olli-Day” Every Friday! 20% off Forbidden Garden Virginia’s Olli Salami. Also featuring 14810 Cantrell Rd daily sandwich and soup specials.

501-868-8149 facebook.com/ForbiddenGardenAR The Hop Diner $1 off a glass of wine.

201 E. Markham 501-224-0975 The Fold Botanas & Bar $1 Off A Combo Meal (comes with 3501 Old Cantrell Road fries & drink).

501-916-9706 thefoldlr.com Iriana’s Pizza $1 off all Mexican beers for the rest 201 E. Markham of August.

501-374-3656 irianaspizza.com Genghis Grill 15% off any whole pizza.

12318 Chenal Pkwy 501-223-2695 J. Gumbo’s genghisgrill.com Buy one bowl at regular price and get 12911 Cantrell Rd, Ste 18 501-916-9635 one for half price. jgumbos.com Any (one) entrée, chips and a drink Graffiti’s Italian Restaurant for $8 + tax.

7811 Cantrell Rd 501-224-9079 Jimmy’s Serious Sandwiches littlerockgraffitis.net 5116 West Markham One free appetizer with the 501-666-3354 purchase of two full entrées (only jimmysserioussandwiches.com one per table).

From 4-8pm Only, dine in or carry out.

Purchase a sandwich or salad and get one of the following for free: House Made Dessert, Serious Size A Sandwich, Extra Side Order, Soft Drink Or Iced Tea.

Jordan’s BarBQ 8912 Stagecoach Road 501-455-2800 2 piece fish dinner with fries, slaw, hushpuppies & a drink for $6.50.

Regular size BBQ sandwich, pork or beef, with 2 select sides (beans, slaw, potato salad, corn or chips) & a drink for $6.50.

La Casa Real 11121 Rodney Parham #9-10A 501-219-4689 20% off a whole meal with purchase of two entrées, not including alcohol.

La Hacienda 3024 Cantrell Road 501-661-0600 $2.99 Margaritas on Wednesday and Thursday Larry’s Pizza Downtown 1122 S. Center Street 501-372-6004 larryspizzaofarkansas.com Free 20 oz. tea or fountain drink with purchase of a small or large garden salad. Take-out only.

Las Palmas III 10402 Stagecoach Road 501-455-8500 laspalmasarkansas.com Free small dine-in cheese dip with purchase of two entrées; $2 off all pitchers Monday-Wednesday 3pmclose; 20% off Coctel de Camarones.

Layla’s Gyros And Pizzeria 9501 N. Rodney Parham Rd. 501-227-7272 laylasgyro.com Lunch only: Gyro Sandwich, fries & drink $6.65.

Leo’s Greek Castle facebook.com/leosgreekcastle 2925 Kavanaugh Blvd.

501-666-7414 Free baklava with purchase of a Gyro Platter after 5pm.

Lilly’s Dim Sum Then Some 11121 N. Rodney Parham, Ste. 35B 501-716-2700 lillysdimsum.com Sunday: 50% off all wine bottles.

Loca Luna 3519 Old Cantrell Road 501-663-4666 localuna.com Mon: Wine Night- ½ off all wine under $28 Tues: $9 large pizza, $2 draft.

Wed: Lady’s Special happy hour- $2.

Domestic Beer, $4 Margaritas, Wine, Martinis, Cozmo.

Thurs: Men’s special happy hour- $2 Domestic Beer, $4 Margaritas, Wine, Martinis, Cozmo.

Mellow Mushroom 16103 Chenal Parkway, Ste. 900 501-379-9157 mellowmushroom.com/westlittlerock 1/2 priced appetizers during late night happy hour 9-close.

Mexico Chiquito 13924 Cantrell Road 501-217-0700 mexicochiquito.net All you can eat taco dinners $9.99.

Montego Café 315 Main Street 501-372-1555 montegocafe.com Monday-Friday 4-7pm: 1/2 off any appetizer & all specialty drinks $5.

The Oyster Bar 3003 W. Markham 501.666.7100 LRoysterbar.com $2 Off a Lb Of Shrimp $1 Off Half a Lb Of Shrimp Packet House Grill 1406 Cantrell Road 501-372-1578 packethousegrill.com 10% off all weekend specials

Your favorite Little Rock chefs have put together a variety of specials for the month of August that are great values on the city’s most delicious dining.

Attention - You Must Ask Your Server about these specials throughout August DineLR.com Pancetta Regional Kitchen & Wine Bar 3 Statehouse Plaza • In the Marriott 501-399-8000 marriott.com/litpb Lunch: Bucatini pasta with Sunday gravy + pecorino $12.50 per person(includes soft beverage but not tax & tip) Dinner: St. Louis style ribs with Diamond Bear root beer barbecue + Mexican street corn $25 per person (includes dinner & dessert, but not tax & tip) Complimentary valet parking up to 2-1/2 hrs.

The Pantry Restaurant 11401 N. Rodney Parham 501-353-1875 littlerockpantry.com Enjoy our Happy Hour white and red wine for $15 a bottle.

Pho Thanh My Restaurant 302 N Shackleford 501-312-7498 ½ OFF An order of eggrolls with a purchase of $20 or more.

Pizza Café 1517 Rebsamen Park 501-664-6133 pizzacafelr.com $2 Domestics all day Monday and Tuesday.

The Pizza Joint 6100 Stone Road 501-868-9108 thepizzajoint.org $5 Off any purchase over $20 (not including alcohol).

Planet Smoothie 102A Markham Park Drive 501-227-6399 facebook.com/ PlanetSmoothieMarkham Try a 22 oz. “Smoothie of the Month” for $2.99.

Plaza Grille (Doubletree Hotel) 424 West Markham St 501-372-4371 DoubletreeLR.com Cilantro Crusted Atlantic Salmon with fingerling potatoes and fresh vegetable of the day for $14.

Prose Garden Café 100 Rock Street Main Library, 5th Floor 501-918-3023 cals.org Turkey, cheese & avocado sandwich with potato salad $5.

Prost 120 Ottenheimer (River Market) 501-244-9550 willydspianobar.com Half-Priced appetizers 4-7pm when you mention restaurant month.

The Purple Cow 8026 Cantrell Road 501-221-3555 11602 Chenal Parkway 501-224-4433 purplecowlr.com Free scoop of ice cream with purchase of entrée (Limit one per table).

RJ Tao 5501 Kavanaugh Blvd. #G 501-603-0080/0082 Two can dine for $60. One sharing appetizer, 2 entrées (seafood or steak) and bottle of wine.

Red Door Restaurant 3701 Cantrell Road 501-666-8482 reddoorrestaurant.net Mon: Apps ½ Price With Entrée Tues: Wine Night - ½ off all wine under $28 a bottle.

Wed: Filet Night- 7oz. Angus Tenderloin Filet $16.95 .

Thurs: Ladies Special Happy Hour$2 domestic beer, $4 margaritas, martinis, wine & cozmo.

Revolution Restaurant 300 President Clinton Avenue 501-823-0091 rumbarevolution.com Lunch Special: choice of seasoned beef, shredded chicken or fish tacos (grilled, blackened or fried), chips & salsa and soft drink $7.99.

The Root Café 1500 S. Main Street 501-414-0423 therootcafe.com Weekday Breakfast Special: Try our award-winning weekday breakfast and take 20% off of your breakfast entrée (available Tues-Fri 7-11am). Also featuring Saturday and Sunday brunch and full lunch menu TuesdaySaturday.

Rosalia’s Family Bakery 2701 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-319-7035 facebook.com/RosaliasFamilyBakery Free small brewed coffee with purchase of specialty coffee drink.

Salut Bistro 1501 N. University (In The Prospect Bldg.)

501-660-4200 salut-bistro.com Free dessert with purchase of 2 entrées.

Santo Coyote 11610 Pleasant Ridge Dr., Ste. 110 501-658-0140 santo-coyote.com $1.99 Margaritas on Wednesday.

Free flan with purchase of $15 or more.

Sky Modern Japanese 11525 Cantrell Road 501-224-4300 skylittlerock.com Sunday-Thursday 5-7pm: $4 house wine, $4.50 house rolls, $4 Drafts, $2 Domestics, $3 Imports.

SO Restaurant-Bar 3610 Kavanaugh Blvd.

501-663-1464 sorestaurantbar.com Three-course prix fixe menu - $65 Star Of India 301 N. Shackleford #C4 501-227-9900 lrstarofindia.com 15% Off dinner entrée.

Stickyz Rock ‘N’ Roll Chicken Shack 107 River Market Avenue 501-372-7707 stickyz.com Lunch Special: 4 of our famous hand-cut chicken fingers in 12 different varieties, choice of baked potato soup or chicken & sausage gumbo, 2 dipping sauces and soft drink $7.99.

Sushi Cafe 5823 Kavanaugh Boulevard 501-663-9888 sushicaferocks.com Sunday-Thursday: Chef’s special, 2 adults for $50 (Sushi Only).

The Tavern Sports Grill 17815 Chenal Pkwy, Ste. F101 501-830-2100 thetavernsportsgrill.com Come try our new menu by Donnie Ferneau, plus $1 off drinks and $2.50 domestic pints from 3-7pm.

On Thursday night: $10 buckets, $8 PBR buckets, $2.50 domestic pints all night.

Thirst N’ Howl Bar & Grill 14710 Cantrell Road 501-379-8189 thirst-n-howl.com 10% off any burger TuesdayThursday.

Tracy Cakes 10301 N. Rodney Parham 501-227-4243 tracycakesar.com Buy 3 cupcakes get 1 free.

Trio’s Restaurant 8201 Cantrell Road #100 501-221-3330 triosrestaurant.com Half off dessert with your purchase of an entrée at lunch, dinner and brunch. Dog Days of Summer – Trio’s partners with Hollywood Feed across the street on Cantrell. All month, doggies dining on our patio receive free Doggy Goodie Bag.

Tropical Smoothie 12911 Cantrell Rd. #19 • 501-224-1113 11900 Kanis Rd. • 501-221-6773 10221 N. Rodney Parham • 501-224-2233 524 S. Broadway St. • 501-246-3145 410 S. University Ave. Ste. 140 501-240-1021 tropicalsmoothie.com Start your day off right! ½ priced smoothies from 7-9am, MondayFriday.

Vesuvio Bistro 1315 Breckenridge Drive 501-225-0500 vesuviobistro.com Costato Di Maiale Alla Milanese: Bonein pork chop butterflied and pan fried, served with sautéed vegetables and potatoes for $28. Now open 4-10pm.

Other nightly specials also available.

West End Smokehouse 215 N. Shackleford 501-224-7665 westendsmokehouse.net Every Friday: All sandwiches $5.99 from 11am-3pm.

Free pool with purchase of $8.99 Or more.

Willy D’s Piano Bar 322 President Clinton Avenue 501-244-9550 willydspianobar.com Half priced appetizers 7-9 pm when you mention restaurant month.

WT Bubba’s 500 President Clinton Avenue #40 501-244-2528 wtbubbas.com Free appetizer with any food purchase.

Ya Ya’s Euro Bistro 17711 Chenal Parkway 501-821-1144 yayasar.com Select appetizers: Two for one from 3-5:30pm Blue Summer Signature Cocktail $5 All Day for August Restaurant Month Zin Urban Wine & Beer Bar 300 River Market Avenue #1 501-246-4876 zinlr.com Mention the Savor the City promo and receive 15% off all bottles of wine

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ARKANSAS TIMES

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www.arktimes.com august 15, 2013 39

What this program can do for you: Free Public Workshops: These presentations take place at various locations in Pulaski County to inform residents of ways to avoid peak day and time demand watering; maintain a healthy landscape; and be more efficient with automatic sprinkler systems by using new technologies to ultimately save money on your water bill!

Site and Home Consultations: Receive a FREE evaluation of your home or business

sprinkler system. See how to properly use all of the components and find out just how much water your sprinkler system is using. You can also get helpful advice on landscape options that are more water efficient. Call 501.340.6650 for more information.

Presentations for Civic Groups & P.O.A.s: These short presentations are

for groups that want to learn about being more water efficient. Call 501.340.6650 to schedule.

3 simple steps that can help reduce your water bill:

1. Avoid afternoon watering, as well as watering during the peak water usage time

of day from 5:30 – 7:30 am. Divide the watering session into half before the peak time of day and half after to get the most out of your watering and avoid run-off.

2. Keep an efficient sprinkler system. Make sure heads are working properly

and not leaking. Keep spray off of streets, sidewalks, and other hardscapes.

3. Install a rain shut off device. Consult an experienced irrigation contractor to install

a new rain sensor to keep your system from running during or after a rain shower.

Learn more at carkw.com or uaex.edu

501.340.6650

Scan this QR code to learn more about this important program.

carkw.com

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