Arkansas Money & Politics September 2021 by AY Magazine

You’ve worked hard to achieve success. You deserve a financial advisor that works as hard for you. Barron’s Top 1,200 Financial Advisors 2014-2021 Barron’s Top 1,000 Financial Advisors 2009-2013 Ameriprise Chairman’s Advisory Council 2007-2021 Forbes Best-in-State Wealth Advisors 2018, 2020-2021 Joey Small, APMA®, CRPC® Private Wealth Advisor | President Small & Associates Financial A private wealth advisory practice of Ameriprise Financial Services, LLC

Not Federally Insured | No Financial Institution Guarantee | May Lose Value The Compass is a trademark of Ameriprise Financial, Inc. For awards details, please visit my website at smallandassociatesfinancial.com Ameriprise Financial Services, LLC. Member FINRA and SIPC. © 2021 Ameriprise Financial, Inc. All rights reserved. (08/21)

501.975.7968 36 Rahling Cir, Ste 2 Little Rock, AR 72223 joseph.a.small@ampf.com smallandassociatesfinancial.com AR license #2765004

2021 DIAMOND JOURNALISM AWARDS

AY Media Group is proud of those staff members recognized in the 2021 Society of Professional Journalists Diamond Journalism Awards, which honor the South’s top journalists.

Heather Baker

Special Section, Print/Online Second Place, Arkansas Mental Health Guide Judges’ comments: “This topic may not be front and center for many, but COVID-19 has brought the issue to a wider audience. These well-written stories document journeys that others may have had. Plus, there is a full listing of resources and help for anyone seeking aid. Good job.”

Dustin Jayroe

Winner, Outstanding New Journalist Judges’ comments: “The mark of a good writer and storyteller is when the reader can glide through a story without stopping. That’s what you get from Dustin Jayroe. The research is spot-on, the writing is conversational. From topic to topic his work stands out. It’s hard to believe he’s only been in the profession for fewer than five years. Congratulations.” Editorials, Magazines First Place, Editor’s Letter, Arkansas Mental Health Guide Commentary, Print/Online Second Place, Deserts for Trees column, Arkansas Money & Politics Health, Science & Environment Writing, Print/Online Second Place, Pandemic reporting, AY, About You Ongoing Coverage, Magazines Third Place, Substance Use reporting, AY, About You *Shared with Dwain Hebda

Mark Carter

Editorials, Magazines Second Place, Editor’s Letters, Arkansas Money & Politics Sports, Magazines Second Place, “Enjoying the Ride,” Arkansas Money & Politics Judges’ comments: “The pandemic has given thousands of people the chance to explore the world of road biking and mountain biking. This story puts that into perspective to show how the activity is growing by leaps and bounds. And, it’s important to the state’s economy. A good piece. A good read.” Business Writing, Print/Online Second Place, Pandemic and business reporting, Arkansas Money & Politics

Rebecca Robertson

Magazine Design First Place, Food and Home series, AY, About You Judges’ comments: “This submission truly reflects the elements of modern magazine design. Large, beautifully composed and well-lit photographs are accompanied by nice page layouts and a combination of fonts and color palettes that fit the mood and theme of the stories, amplifying their messaging and overall storytelling power.” Magazine Design Second Place, Business series, Arkansas Money & Politics

Jamison Mosleey

Photo Spread/Essay Second Place, A Fight to End the Fight, AY, About You *Shared with Ebony Blevins and Ian Lyle. Judges’ comments: “Dramatic black and white photo spread of a protest of mostly black young people. The eight pictures showed a lot of emotion. Special use of color in the flag draped around one young man’s shoulders really popped.”

Lora Puls

aymag.com

SEPTEMBER CONTENTS

Adam Mitchell and Citizens Bank looked at the pandemic as an opportunity to showcase the institution’s finest hour.

19 | On the move

62 | THE SURGE The rise of the COVID-19 delta variant has placed renewed pressure on hospitals and front-line health care workers.

Female banking executives are on the move in the Arkansas finance industry, and their progress has been hard-earned.

36 | Power Women in Banking

AMP is pleased to once again recognize the state’s Power Women in Banking as chosen by readers.

42 | Best Financial Advisors

We asked, and Arkansas Money & Politics readers shared with us their favorite Arkansas financial advisors.

ON THE COV E R 98 | THE RETURN OF BEVO Looks like Arkansans will get to add Hate Texas Week to the schedule again every year with the latest SEC expansion. SE PT E M B E R 2 02 1

Carole Smith of Simmons Bank was photographed by Jamison Mosley at the Simmons branch on Rodney Parham in Little Rock for the September cover. Smith climbed the corporate ladder through hard work and respect. Page 12

ARMON E YA N D P OL ITIC S.COM

SEPTEMBER CONTENTS PRESIDENT & PUBLISHER

Heather Baker | hbaker@armoneyandpolitics.com EDITOR Mark Carter | mcarter@armoneyandpolitics.com CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Dustin Jayroe | djayroe@armoneyandpolitics.com COPY EDITOR Lisa Fischer | lfischer@armoneyandpolitics.com ONLINE EDITOR Lindsey Castrellon | lindsey@armoneyandpolitics.com STAFF WRITER Emily Beirne | ebeirne@armoneyandpolitics.com ART DIRECTOR Jamison Mosley | jmosley@armoneyandpolitics.com

26 | BUDDING STARS The acclaimed FIS Fintech Accelerator at The Venture Center in Little Rock wrapped up another cohort.

PRODUCTION MANAGER Rebecca Robertson | rrobertson@armoneyandpolitics.com DIGITAL MEDIA DIRECTOR Kellie McAnulty | kmcanulty@armoneyandpolitics.com GRAPHIC DESIGNER Lora Puls | lpuls@armoneyandpolitics.com SENIOR ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE Greg Churan | gchuran@armoneyandpolitics.com ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Tonya Higginbotham | thigginbotham@armoneyandpolitics.com Mary Funderburg | mary@armoneyandpolitics.com Tonya Mead | tmead@armoneyandpolitics.com Shasta Ballard | sballard@armoneyandpolitics.com Amanda Moore | amoore@armoneyandpolitics.com ASSISTANT TO THE PUBLISHER Jessica Everson | jeverson@armoneyandpolitics.com ADVERTISING COORDINATOR Jacob Carpenter | ads@armoneyandpolitics.com

90 | WELCOME BACK The venerable White Water Tavern in Little Rock reopened in August after COVID-closing in March 2020.

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT Ginger Roell | groell@armoneyandpolitics.com ADMINISTRATION Casandra Moore | admin@armoneyandpolitics.com

CEO | Vicki Vowell TO ADVERTISE

call 501-244-9700 email hbaker@armoneyandpolitics.com TO SUBSCRIBE | 501-244-9700 ADVISORY COMMITTEE

Joyce Elliott, Arkansas State Senator; Gretchen Hall, CEO, Little Rock Convention & Visitors Bureau; Stacy Hurst, Secretary, Arkansas Department of Parks, Heritage & Tourism; Heather Larkin, CEO, Arkansas Community Foundation; Elizabeth Pulley, CEO, Children’s Advocacy Centers; Gina Radke, CEO, Galley Support Innovations; Steve Straessle, Principal, Little Rock Catholic High School; Kathy Webb, Representative, Little Rock City Board

EDITORIAL INTERN Kayla McCall

CONTRIBUTORS

Angela Forsyth, Becky Gillette, Katie Zakrzewski, Kelley Bass, Dwain Hebda, Carl Kozlowski

106 | WILD WEST The dawn of the NIL area in college sports is opening up a tricky landscape for the NCAA and member schools. ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM

AMP magazine is published monthly, Volume IV, Issue 5 AMP magazine (ISSN 2162-7754) is published monthly by AY Media Group, 910 W. Second St., Suite 200, Little Rock, AR 72201. Periodicals postage paid at Little Rock, AR, and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to AMP, 910 W. Second St., Suite 200, Little Rock, AR 72201. Subscription Inquiries: Subscription rate is $28 for one year (12 issues). Single issues are available upon request for $5. For subscriptions, inquiries or address changes, call 501-244-9700. The contents of AMP are copyrighted, and material contained herein may not be copied or reproduced in any manner without the written permission of the publisher. Articles in AMP should not be considered specific advice, as individual circumstances vary. Products and services advertised in the magazine are not necessarily endorsed by AMP. Please recycle this magazine.

SE PTE M B E R 2021

PLUGGED IN

Carlton Saffa and Saracen Casino Resort in Pine Bluff were profiled in the August issue of AMP. Saffa, featured on the cover, is the chief market officer for Saracen and has helped oversee a successful opening for the venture.

FEEDBACK THE LITTLE HOSPITAL THAT COULD: BAXTER REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER BRINGS BIG-CITY CARE TO SMALL-TOWN ARKANSAS “The biggest issue with other rural hospitals is [they] don’t want to pay for staffing. Hold for 12 hrs then transfer. That’s the blueprint.” Jerry Parrish NEW LITTLE ROCK CONCERT VENUE ANNOUNCES OPENING ACTS “Saw Tab Benoit in El Dorado in June. A very good performance. See that Samantha Fish is on tour with him, too. Woo Hoo!!” Danny Jericho Road COVID CASES SURGING IN ALL BUT THREE ARKANSAS SCHOOL DISTRICTS, ACCORDING TO ACHI MAP “You can still get COVID-19 AFTER vaccination. They left that part out. Do you know what takes a heavy toll on the immune system? Fear. Good Job.” Debra Beuthling-Gentry

OC youth center ‘ribbon ripping’ to commemorate the reopening of the facility.

INSTAGRAM Dr. Alexandra Marshall has gifted $50,000 to UAMS for the Marshall Scholarship for Sexual Health and Gender Equity in the Fay W. Boozman College of Public Health.

NO GREATER LOVE THAN THIS: THE FOUNDATION CARRIES ON LEGACY OF BRANDON BURLSWORTH “Brandon Burlsworth’s story and legacy are so incredible. To this day, I literally get chills when I read articles like this one. What a great example of a #leader and #leadership. What a tragic loss.” Mike Holland

TOP ONLINE ARTICLES 1. World’s Largest Locomotive to Pass Through Arkansas 2. AMP’s 2021 Future 50 3. Wipro to Open Delivery Center in Central Arkansas 4. Steve Landers Eyeing Run for LR Mayor: ‘I Could Offer a Different Twist’ 5. Walmart Extends COVID-19 Emergency Leave Policy to July 2021 6. New Little Rock Concert Venue Announces Opening Acts 7. Three Arkansas Hospitals Announce Employee Vaccine Requirements 8. Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott Issues New Mask Mandate 9. Technopreneur vs. Entrepreneur 10. Alice L. Walton Foundation and Cleveland Clinic Team Up On Specialty Care in NW Arkansas

Arkansas-grown taco restaurant @tacos4lifegrill announced that it has officially donated 20 million meals to nonprofit partner, Feed My Starving Children. Do you have a @arkansasgameandfish nature center in your community?

July 26 - Aug. 26

CORRECTION

Janette Daniels is the CEO of Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital in Fayetteville. The Encompass entry was listed incorrectly in the largest hospitals list that appeared in the August issue.

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@AMPPOB ARM ON E YA N D P OL ITIC S.COM

EDITOR’S LETTER

By Mark Carter

HATE TEXAS WEEK IS BACK

n 1977, Arkansas was still something pretty darn close to a college football blueblood, and Texas was still, well, Texas. And the third week of October, Hate Texas Week, saw the No. 2 horns in Fayetteville to take on the No. 8 Hogs and first-year Arkansas coach Lou Holtz. It was ABC’s national game of the week, back when there was only one national broadcast per week, and it was big-time. Former Razorback player Benedict Arn, er, Fred Akers, was making his as Texas coach. Fortunately for him and not us, he inherited Earl Campbell. Both teams were coming off 5-5-1 seasons the year before, the send-off campaigns for legends-of-the-game Frank Broyles and Darrell Royal. And both teams were set up for success in ’77, though the Hogs were unranked in the preseason polls, and UT ranked “only” 18th in what was then a top 20. But by mid-October, both teams were undefeated, the Hogs having easily dispatched No. 15 Oklahoma State, 28-6, in Little Rock in September, and UT coming off a 13-6 win over Oklahoma in Dallas the week before. Barry Switzer once said that Campbell was the only football player he ever saw who could’ve gone straight from high school to the NFL. And even though the horns had Big Earl, the Hogs had future Pro Football Hall-

of-Famer Dan Hampton and the incomparable Steve Little, one of the greatest kickers who ever lived. Of course, Texas had a kicker of its own considered one of the best ever to play the college game — Russell Erxleben. Little, whose No. 12 jersey remains retired on the Hill, and Erx would live up to their billing that day. The score stood at 9-6 Hogs midway through the 4th quarter, five field goals the only points. And one of them from Little came from 67 yards out — yes, 67 (kickers could use tees on FGs back then) — and tied Erxleben’s college record-long kick registered just a few weeks earlier against Rice. The game was dominated by defense and field position (and Texas refs); it remains one of the most enjoyable games I’ve ever watched. The first 55 minutes of it, anyway. It was the LSU-Bama 2011 game before there was a 2011 LSU-Bama game. (Top-ranked LSU beat No. 2 Alabama 9-6 in overtime that year in Tuscaloosa, and that game also ranks up there as one of the best I’ve watched.) In today’s game, yards come easy. On that overcast and windy day in Northwest Arkansas, they were hard earned and scarce.

See LETTER, page 48 By Heather Baker

PUBLISHER’S LETTER

After Erxleben missed a would-be tying FG early in the 4th, the Hogs managed to burn a little clock but that’s all. The horns took over on their own 20 following a punt and proceeded to ride the back of Campbell. Big No. 34 ran for 188 yards on the day, more than half of UT’s total offense. But more devastatingly, his key third-down conversion with just under five minutes left set up the bad guys at the 1. Another heartbreaker to the shorthorns. For what it’s worth, Arkansas is 3-2 against Texas since we left the Southwest Conference. But we haven’t beaten the horns in Fayetteville (in three tries) since the glorious 42-11 rout in ’81. That fall afternoon in ’77, my 11-year-old self balled from our seats on the west side possibly all the way back down the Hill, the UT band having taken on the mission to personally and maliciously serenade me with that gosh-forsaken song (may it rot in hell) as we filed out of Razorback Stadium. That was one of the last of the truly “big time” matchups between the Hogs and horns. Sure, we still played with SWC titles on the line, but there would be no more clashes of top 10 teams. But as much as we all hate the burnt orange, I’m looking forward to the return of

SEPTEMBER MEANS FOOTBALL, POWER WOMEN IN BANKING AND MORE

t’s September, already? Don’t get me wrong — I’m ready for some football and tailgating. But it seems like summer flew right past us. Still, I’m happy for September because in addition to football, it means Power Women in Banking in AMP. It means Best Financial Advisors, and this year, it also means Diversity in the Workplace, a special feature introduced in this month’s issue. We asked our readers to tell us which Arkansas companies or businesses they feel place a priority on diversity and inclusion of employees of color, gender, orientation, disability and more. AMP readers also shared with us their “best” financial advisors in the state and who they thought

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Heather Baker 7

were the movers and shakers among women in the Arkansas banking and finance industry. Also inside, we’ve got the return of Texas, fintech, cybersecurity, hospitals in the surge and more. We also have an executive Q&A with Susannah Marshall, the state banking commissioner; a financial advisor Q&A with five of the best advisors Central Arkansas has to offer; and a fintech Q&A with Vance Smiley of Southern Bancorp and Wayne Miller of The Venture Center. Thank you for reading. Enjoy what’s left of summer, and send me your comments at HBaker@ARMoneyandPolitics.com. SE PTE M B E R 2021

VIEWPOINT

TIME FOR A CONVERSATION ABOUT ENTREPRENEURS & MENTAL HEALTH By The Venture Center Team

t’s time for us to talk about mental health. Mental illness disproportionately affects entrepreneurs, and a recent Forbes article stated that a staggering 49 percent of entrepreneurs struggle with mental health issues, ranging from burnout and anxiety to loneliness and depression. Considering those numbers, it’s easy to conclude that entrepreneurs are highly susceptible to severe illness and even death due to their conditions. So, entrepreneurs and the whole entrepreneurial ecosystem must be thoughtful about mental health. Suicide Prevention Month is every September and the perfect time to talk about it. At The Venture Center, we see people on their best days. Nails polished, suits pressed and with their best faces forward, the entrepreneurs we meet regularly punch above their weight and frankly, impress the heck out of everyone around. But beyond the perfect pitches and killer soft skills are human beings that in rare moments of vulnerability may say, “It’s a little lonely working this way.” A year ago, we were reminded that people sometimes only show what they want us to see when a friend and founder we admired and mentored took his own life. We’d seen him shine and work incredibly hard, but we didn’t know he was in such a dark place. Back in January, while feeling the impact of our friend’s death, The Venture Center started a new mental health series called VCHealth. In partnership with The Bridgeway and Ken Clark’s (MA, LMFT) Chenal Family Therapy, the program opened the conversation around entrepreneurs and mental health. Talking openly about hard topics is the first step to normalizing those struggles, empowering people to get the help they need and equipping the entrepreneurial ecosystem with tools to recognize and help a strug-

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gling person. And the past year and a half has presented struggles in spades. The pandemic has fueled mental health issues, including increased isolation, alcohol abuse, addiction, anxiety and depression. For entrepreneurs, these issues have a rippling effect. Ken said in one of our first sessions, “It is not uncommon to see tragedy befall the startup community, maybe right before the tipping point in somebody’s business, because the mental game got so muddied, and they became so isolated and alone.” Nothing increases isolation quite like a pandemic. Bruce Trimble of The BridgeWay expressed deep concern about the increase in alcohol consumption attributed to stay-at-home orders. He shared that Nielsen reported a 54 percent increase in national sales of alcohol for the week ending March 21, 2020, compared with one year before, and online sales increased 262 percent from 2019. The alarming increase shows the urgent need for better mental health resources. Alternately, we’re operating in fits and starts regarding the safety of reconnecting in person. The back and forth is enough to cause whiplash in the most flexible person, and for some people, adjusting to “in person” is just as challenging as working from home. Ken recently said, “While a lot of the world can’t wait to get back to work and in the office or school, a significant amount of both adults and children are experiencing clinical levels of distress around the return. We’re seeing a substantial increase in the number of clients experiencing clinical conditions like anxiety, depression, adjustment disorder, PTSD and even chronic grief around the world reopening. “For many, the pandemic with all its problems gave us a taste of a slower pace, greater relational connection and higher levels of self-care that now have to be

abandoned as we return to ‘normal.’” The ground continues to shift beneath all of us, and entrepreneurs are especially vulnerable to destabilization. Fear, isolation and lack of access to mental health care can have serious repercussions, but what can we do about it? We can be part of the solution, which means we learn about mental health and get comfortable talking about it. We learn how to recognize when others need help. Years ago, simply seeing a therapist was a taboo subject, indicating an overall reluctance to look mental health issues square in the face. But just the other day, a Venture Center team member openly shared a plan to take a five-minute meditation break on the advice of a therapist. It turns out, it helps with ADHD and anxiety. But this vulnerability suggests something bigger — awareness of and progress in mental health wellness. Sometimes, entrepreneurs have the tools to build the next cool coffee shop or the next Venmo but don’t recognize that they are struggling or that they can reach out for help. This month is a great time to learn how to have vulnerable conversations about how to connect struggling people with necessary tools in order to reduce suicide rates. Join us to learn more at VentureCenter.co/health. A safe community awaits.

The Venture Center is an entrepreneursupport organization in Little Rock that helps startups become viable, high-growth businesses. It is home to the award-winning FIS Fintech Accelerator and the ICBA ThinkTECH Accelerator.

ARMON E YA N D P OL ITIC S.COM

DIGEST

NEWSMAKERS By AMP Staff

New Majestic Steel Plant To Create 225 Jobs

ajestic Steel USA has opened a processing facility and service center at the Nucor Steel campus outside Blytheville in Mississippi County, the company announced in late August. Majestic, a privately held and family-owned company based in Cleveland, Ohio, is a processor and distributor of flat-rolled steel. The 515,000-square-foot facility at Nucor will feature “next generation processing and warehousing equipment” and create roughly 225 new jobs, according to a press release. The facility is expected to be fully operational by the end of 2022. Majestic did not reveal how much the facility cost to build. Company officials said the facility will enable it to better service customers in the central and southern regions of the United States and provide close proximity Nucor’s new galvanized line, which is currently under construction. “Today’s announcement cements our commitment to provide the best supply chain solution and value add to our customers and further strengthens our partnership with Nucor,” said Todd Leebow, Majestic president and CEO, in a statement. “Our intention with this investment is to offer our customers in the region the combined benefit of localized service and national resources.” Tony Brooks, vice president and general manager of Nucor Steel Arkansas, said the partnership with Majestic brings economic development to the region and represents another example of the steel industry’s positive economic impact. Nucor Corporation, based in Charlotte, N.C., is a Fortune 200 company and the largest steel producer in the United States, as well as the largest recycler in North America. Nucor Steel Arkansas manufactures hot-rolled, cold-rolled and coated-sheet steel. Gov. Asa Hutchinson said, “I’m pleased to welcome Majestic Steel to northeast Arkansas. The company is making a significant investment in the state, thanks to the hardworking, dedicated employees in the steel industry, and the jobs being created will go a long way in improving the quality of life for families in the area.”

Arkansas Democrats Welcome Interim Chair Nicole Hart Nicole Hart is leading the Democratic Party of Arkansas as interim chair, effective Sept. 1. Hart is an Iraq War veteran and a former veterans official in former Gov. Mike Beebe’s administration and a nonprofit CEO. Stepping up from the role of vice chair, she takes over for Michael John Gray, who stepped down effective Aug. 31. Hart will serve as DPA chair until an election can be held at October’s state committee meeting. “Service has always defined my life, and it hasn’t always been at a time of my choosing,” she said. “As a person of faith, Iraq War veteran, wife and mother, it has long been this way. ‘Always In Service’ has defined who I am and what I believe I am called to do. So it is with honor that I ready myself to do so for our party, for our state and for our people.” Hart attended Southwestern Christian College in Texas and Harding University in Searcy before completing her studies in political science at the University of Arkansas Little Rock. She deployed to Iraq in 2003 and went on to serve as a senior advisor for Military & Veterans Affairs, Homeland Secretary, under Beebe. ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM

UAMS and Baptist Health officials cut the ribbon in August on the new facility.

UAMS, Baptist Health Partner on Cancer Center The first UAMS Baptist Health Cancer Center is open on the Baptist Health Medical Center campus in North Little Rock. The center offers cancer research, diagnostic and treatment services. The services are an extension of those available at the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute on the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences campus in Little Rock. “This collaboration benefits the people of Arkansas by bringing the most advanced cancer care in the state closer to where people live,” said Dr. Cam Patterson, chancellor and CEO of UAMS Health, in a statement. “Building on our longstanding relationship, UAMS and Baptist Health are taking steps to expand the innovative and unique oncological care found at UAMS’ Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute into all corners of the state.” The center is staffed by oncologists, nurses and radiation therapists from UAMS. The center includes two clinics, both located in the Baptist Health Springhill Medical Plaza. The center will provide medical oncology, infusion and radiation therapy for most cancer types with the exception of brain/spine, full body therapy and brachytherapy. More complex cancer treatments, including surgery, will be referred to UAMS for treatment. SE PTE M B E R 2021

Thank you for nominating Aptus Financial for Diversity in the Workplace and AMP’s Best Finanical Advisors!

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Inspiring Solutions for Small Business Antonio Reed, owner of ATV Trucking in Crossett, felt his business struggle when the pandemic led to the Georgia Pacific paper mill closing. Fewer goods to haul meant semi-trailers sitting idle. C

Impact investment funds through FORGE Community Loan Fund, Inc., and Arkansas Community Foundation enabled extra aid to small businesses like Reed’s. He was able to keep his business rolling.

Charitable giving allows the Community Foundation to make impact investments with nonprofits like FORGE and make grants to hundreds of Arkansas nonprofits. To learn more, contact the Foundation staff today.

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Contact our staff at

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Carole Smith, SVP, Simmons Bank

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BANKING

QUALITYOVER QUANTITY

RESPECT, HARD WORK CLEAR PATH FOR SIMMONS BANK’S CAROLE SMITH BY ANGELA FORSYTH | PHOTOGRAPHY BY JAMISON MOSLEY

hen it comes to women in banking, the number in leadership roles is a classic example of quality over quantity. Women in top-tier positions may still be a rare occurrence, but the few who get there are certainly exceptional. Among this elite group is Carole Smith who spearheads business development for Simmons Bank’s Central Arkansas Metro region as senior vice president. Smith’s leadership position is one she doesn’t take for granted. “As most people know, banking has been a man’s world,” she acknowledged. “But I think women have made a huge impact in our industry. We deal with issues a little differently, oftentimes, than men. What I find, especially with direct customer contact, is that customers like the difference.” She also believes that women tend to have more collaborative personalities. They tend to be less taskoriented and more relationship-focused, a trait customers respond to. “Hats off to all the women out there in this business who have managed to work their way through a sort of man’s world and been successful at it,” she said. Smith’s role — director of business development — is a strategic one. She ensures bankers have the plans and tools in place to grow the business organically. She also maximizes the Simmons brand and controls all charitable activity.

A typical day might include working with commercial bankers on customer- and prospect-call planning. She might meet with her business development team to plan community involvement activities, review charitable-giving budgets and requests or brainstorm ways to maximize community involvement. She might meet with one of her former customers to help transition the customer to a new manager in her group. Or, she might meet with other departments in the bank — wealth, investments, etc. — to discuss referring customers to each other. Smith might not have a “typical day,” but one thing that’s constant is, you’ll almost always find her working in a group. “My philosophy in managing a team is very clear,” Smith noted. “Be collaborative, inclusive, communicative. I don’t make decisions in a vacuum.” Another hallmark of Smith’s management style is expecting the people on her team to act timely in response to the needs of others on the team. The banking business relies heavily on meeting customers’ needs with a sense of urgency. That same attitude should apply to team members as well. Smith’s ability to work well with others and her willingness to work hard served her well for climbing the ladder. Soon after receiving her MBA at the

MY PHILOSOPHY IN MANAGING A TEAM IS VERY CLEAR. BE COLLABORATIVE, INCLUSIVE, COMMUNICATIVE. I DON’T MAKE DECISIONS IN A VACUUM.

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January 2020, Smith did exactly that — just in time for the arrival of COVID-19. For the first time, Simmons Bank had built a written, sales-and-business-development branding plan and dedicated a large amount of resources to it. COVID ended up putting a halt to that plan in March 2020, and Simmons quickly diverted all those resources to the PPP loan program. Smith personally managed a huge part of the incoming PPP loan process for Central Arkansas until June 2021. That’s when the bank was able to dust off the original strategic business development plan, revise it and execute it. Smith co u l d n’t h a v e pushed past the challenges of the last few years — nor the ones she’s overcome throughout her career — if it weren’t for her strong work ethic. When asked about the secret to her success, she’ll say a lot of it boils down to the long hours she has spent working. “I can pretty much outwork anybody in terms of time and effort.” The other thing she’ll say is, “respect.” Smith’s philosophy is to always show it to customers, colleagues, competitors and community partners. “Respect — if you give that, you get it back,” she said. “I have always eagerly accepted my place at the table when it was offered to me and worked harder than anybody who was at that table. But, on the

University of Arkansas, Smith entered the banking world as a management trainee. She worked her way through several banks, honing her lending skills and making strong connections along the way. She took a break for a few years in the early 2000s due to some burnout, but quickly realized banking was in her blood, and she returned to the industry. “I was fortunate enough to earn the trust and respect of one of my best mentors, Congressman French Hill, who was at the time the founder of Delta Trust & Bank. He gave me the chance to get back in the business,” Smith recalled. Simmons Bank later purchased Delta Trust and offered her the position she now holds. Transitioning from her position as a lender to director of business management at the SVP level was a unique challenge. As a lender, Smith had managed a large portfolio of commercial loan accounts and relationships. Now with this new role, she was entering uncharted waters. “Banks are notorious for not dedicating resources to sales and business development planning. Simmons was no different,” Smith noted. The bank had been experiencing good growth for eight years straight, and the bankers were focused on keeping up with the business already coming to them. Diverting resources to business development planning was difficult but in

RESPECT — IF YOU GIVE THAT, YOU GET IT BACK.

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Smith personally managed a huge part of the incoming PPP loan process for Central Arkansas until June 2021.

to work less and live a little bit more in my golden years,” she shared. So, when she’s not working, one might find her at a Razorback game or might not find her at all since she loves to travel. Or perhaps she’ll be found in the least likely of places. “If I could do anything I wanted, I would move to the country and build a cat farm taking care of all that came my way.”

flip side of that is trying to be gracious and respectful when I thought I deserved to sit at the table but wasn’t offered a chance to do so.” An avid Razorback fan and world traveler, Smith said she’s trying to find a little more balance these days. “There was a time in my life when I was always working, but I’m attempting

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BANKING

POWER FROM

PANDEMIC NEW CITIZENS BANK CHIEF PLATS FUTURE COURSE By Dwain Hebda

dam Mitchell is not in a hurry to repeat the trials of 2020, but the new CEO of Citizens Bank isn’t about to forget the lessons learned, either. Mitchell, who was named to his post from president and chief lending officer in April, said while not pleasant, the challenges of last year proved in many ways to be the bank’s finest hour. “The final regulation on PPP loans came out on a Thursday and at 5:15 p.m. on Friday, I pulled the team and decided to go all-in on PPP loans,” he said. “Quite honestly, I saw some bigger banks entering the platform and was worried that our customers, our local bread-and-butter of how we do business, would lose out on these funds. We were one of the first banks in the state and the region to actually get involved with PPP loans.” Leadership quickly formed a team to grind through the weekend, developing automated processing on the front end and bringing on external legal counsel to keep everything within guidelines. When the smoke had cleared, the Batesvillebased bank had helped its Main Street clientele preserve operations in the pan-

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demic’s darkest hour. “To me, that is what community banking is all about,” Mitchell said. “In a time of crisis, you do not hide from it. You face it head-on. We needed to be there for our friends, our families and our customers, as well as making sure our associates are safe and happy, so they can get through it, too. “And if you don’t do that, if you’re not there in times that are good and bad, I don’t think you can really define yourself as a community banker.” COVID-19 descended like a solar eclipse last year, creeping over a business community bracing for the worst. Not the least of which were community banks; after all, such institutions crumbled first under the blows of previous calamities such as the Great Depression, Black Monday 1987, the Great Recession of 10 years ago and other regional events. Surely, went conventional wisdom, a global pandemic would hit Main Street hardest and pick off the small and the rural first. But as with many other elements of this unprecedented period, the still-unfolding drama of COVID-19 and its variants has yet to follow any path but its

own, including in the business community. And as a result, institutions such as Citizens Bank are faring better than most anyone expected. Anyone, that is, except an intriguing dissenting opinion published by the Walton School of Business at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. Professor Timothy Yaeger and doctoral student Cao Fang constructed a “stress test” for banks, to predict the level of distress suffered in the industry and how that distress is felt differently according to institutional size. In an article written last year, the duo noted while community banks (those with assets under $10 billion) are, unsurprisingly, projected to fail faster in 2020 and 2021 than their larger peers, they also predict a faster bounce back in these companies over a five-year period. The reason, they surmised, is because COVID presents a steeper “V” decline and rebound pattern, unlike the protracted “U” of previous financial crises. This especially works in favor of smaller banks that typically lack the reserves to ride out a prolonged market siege. To Mitchell, this makes the pandemic

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experience one of opportunity: a time to leverage operational innovation and formulate market strategy in a way that readies the bank to maximize the coming rebound to the fullest. “If you don’t take the pandemic and learn from it about how it changed how things work and how things might be changed forever, then you’re losing the whole story of the pandemic,” he said. “There’s a bunch of positives that actually came out of the past 18 months. “Our online channel went up 40 percent through [2020], which I think is the perfect blend. You’re going to have the technology function, and you’re going to have the physical component, though strategically smaller. And, the people within the branch have to be really talented and make sure they know everything.” Pushing the technology envelope doesn’t just serve the customers of today; it is also an important element of attracting new ones tomorrow, Mitchell said. Digital offerings are an important leveling agent between small institutions and very large competitors; what used to be an arms race of multiplying physical branches — advantage big banks — can now more fairly be fought online. “You still see large institutions branching out,” Mitchell said. “You see JPMorgan Chase coming to town, for instance, even though they’re branching out in a smaller footprint. You’ll still have a branch presence, even in the future model, though probably not as many. But the future will really turn on two things. “Number one, focusing a lot on the people behind the technology having a community bank presence. Secondly, being faster to make a decision — what we continue to do better than most — which makes customers really like doing business with you. If you can get something done and do it quickly and be nimble, it really helps you. You don’t have to go through so many layers to get

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“In a time of crisis, you do not hide from it. You face it head-on.”

Adam Mitchell

something done. “I think that’s always going to be the key to being progressive in future models. You can have the best technology in the world, but if it’s not responsive, and if a customer can’t get an answer when they have a problem, then you’re not doing anyone a service.” Established in 1953 by a group of local business leaders, Citizens Bank today operates 19 locations around the state, employing 208. Markets are a mix of urban centers in Northwest Arkansas and Central Arkansas, as well as a clutch of mid-sized to smaller communities, such as Imboden, Cave City, Monticello and Arkadelphia. Mitchell said additional growth is forthcoming. He declined to go into detail except to say the new locations are about a year off, will represent organic growth and are rooted in the entrepreneurial mindset that has ruled bank operations since its founding. This, he said, keeps Citizens moving forward, no matter how radically different startups and new companies look from era to era. “That [mindset] is the thing that carries you forward,” he said. “We posture an internal culture that your ideas are appreciated, and we have to be changing and evolving as we go with our customer base. We’re entrepreneurial, ourselves. “In the small-business arena, you’ve

got to be available to be really, a consultative banker, because [customers] still need the same help to get their business going. They just might need a little bit more of the legs of the chair around them to make sure that the business actually runs well. That’s part of bankers being on the side of the small-business owner, which is still the lifeblood of all of our communities.” As for challenges and opportunities, Mitchell said staying attuned to staff optimization will be key. He also sees the future in quality partnerships. “On the path forward, you’ll see differentiations in lines of business,” he said. “Most banks will get the majority of their revenue from loans, but I think the challenge for any bank going forward is the need to diversify. If you have everything in one basket, it’s not good for insulation. “I think the way fintechs are rolling, a lot of banks will hold up their hands and say, ‘How do I get in the door?’ The way I see things going on, they’re going to open up the ability to have equity partners in these fintechs, so you don’t have to go in and hire the hundred people to develop your own technology. You can actually partner with others. I think you’ll see that in the future as the new wave, allowing community banks to participate on a big-bank scale.”

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PAYING

COST

THE

TO BE THE BOSS By Dwain Hebda

WOMEN IN BANKING MAKE STRIDES, BUT THERE’S A LONG WAY TO GO

BANKING

sked for the most imBoth North and James acknowledge uity that still exists between men and pactful element of that mere boldness is not enough to women. Statistics show while women her rise from telllevel a playing field tilted against them have made strides landing leadership er to the execuas women, and women of color to boot. roles — 45 percent of first- and secondtive leadership They readily admit without the investlevel banking managers nationwide are ranks with ment of their mentors and supervifemale, per the American Banking AsArvest Bank, sors, all the proclaiming in the world sociation — they still regularly crack Tanya James has a ready answer. She wouldn’t have moved their careers one their heads on the glass ceiling. asked for it. inch. As it is, both took two decades to Even the promise of higher profits “For me, I’ve been very clear on comget where they are now. has done little to change minds, polimunicating career goals. I call them And even as the industry itself cies and promotion ratios. As the webspecial projects,” she said. “Ever since moves toward greater diversity and parsite Bank on Women reports, research I was a teller, I’ve always had a special ity, the status of women in the banking shows companies with sufficient feproject, and it’s given me experience and financial services industry is still male representation on the board enthat I need for the next joy an 84 percent return step.” on sales, 60 percent reJames, senior vice turn on invested capital DESPITE SHAREHOLDER PRESSURE president, branch adminand 46 percent return on istration, said articulating capital. Yet, it hasn’t been TO INCREASE GENDER DIVERSITY AT a goal is the first step in enough to move most THE EXECUTIVE LEVEL, ONLY TWO achieving it, and a key step into executive leadership for women in business at the same rate as men. WOMEN ADVANCED TO BANK CEO looking to advance. In fact, in the Febru“A woman has to take ary 2020 report, “Women IN THE FIVE YEARS BETWEEN 2013 initiative and clearly state in the Boardroom,” the AND 2018, PER THE ABA. what her career goals are American Bankers Asand do it in a way that sociation’s own research comes from a good space showed only 1.4 percent and not being arrogant,” she said. “Unviewed through a cracked corporate of women in S&P 500 finance compatil you really communicate what your lens, a schizophrenic perspective that nies, and just 4.3 percent of all women ultimate goal is, your team can’t really acknowledges women for their valuin banking were CEOs. And the majorhelp you and give you the special projable contributions while holding the ity of those who were led institutions ects that you need to help gain experikey to the C-suite out of reach. with less than $1 billion in assets. ences in those areas.” “There’s definitely areas, such as Even more telling, despite shareMartie North, senior vice president market leadership, where there still holder pressure to increase gender diand director of community developcontinues to be under representation versity at the executive level, only two ment for Simmons Bank, goes a step across the state,” North said. “We just women advanced to bank CEO in the further, saying many women look at don’t see a lot of women as bank presifive years between 2013 and 2018, per opportunities differently than their dents. We don’t see a lot of women as the ABA. male counterparts, with a perspective commercial lenders. We don’t see a lot One contributing factor for this, says that hamstrings their advancement. of women in the C-suite. So those are Bank On Women, is that women leave “There’s more intentionality today areas where, definitely, I would love to the industry much faster than men — in companies trying to help people see more women ascend. I can’t speak in part, no doubt, to the inequities in identify the steps necessary for them to to the reasons why that’s happening, advancement opportunities — providaccomplish their goals,” she said. “But but it would be wonderful to see more ing fewer with the requisite job experi... people have to speak up and let it be women in these positions.” ence and readiness to step into leaderknown that they have those interests to The banking industry has shown ship opportunities. move from here, to here and this is the that it, too, has yet to formulate an efSocialization differences also come path, the career path that they desire.” fective formula to remedy the ineqinto play. The organization noted stud-

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ies that show women need to be asked more than once before they seek a promotion, run for election or take on a new role, often because they trail men in the professional development that gives them the confidence to do so. “I learned at a women’s leadership conference once that men can look at a job description and say, ‘You know what? I meet about 50 percent of this job description. I’m going to apply for it,’” North said. “Women, on the other hand, will look at it and say, ‘I am not 100 percent in line with this job description, so I’m not going to apply for it.’ “I don’t know how often in our pursuit of being perfect that we are limiting our own opportunities, but go for it. To all of that, I say go for it.” Experts are sharply divided on whether attitudes among younger workers — often portrayed as more progressive on matters of gender and wage equality — are in fact the sole answer to the problem. As Business Insider noted a couple of years ago, even as millennials have taken over the workplace and narrowed the pay gap, men’s wages grew faster than women’s in all regions of the country except the West Coast and in all eight industry sectors studied. This even includes education and health care, where the percentage of women in the workforce is highest. Still, that doesn’t minimize the caseby-case evidence of how progress can be made when it comes to gender equity in the workplace, especially in younger companies that don’t have to paddle against years of entrenched attitudes and practices. Tori Bogner joined Fayetteville-based Signature Bank as vice president and marketing director just two years ago. She said the institution’s relatively short tenure has helped it structure itself in a way that promotes diversity at all levels. “Something I find unique about Signature is, we’re not that old of a bank. We were founded in 2005,” she said. “I don’t

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Tanya James

Martie North

mean to call anyone out by saying this, but I grew up in a rural side of the state where everything’s kind of the good ol’ boy network. If you’ve got a bank that’s founded 100 years ago, there’s a high likelihood that those great-grandsons are still part of the leadership of the organization. “At Signature, we’re only 16 years old, and there were a lot of women involved in the very beginning of our organization. It’s been a natural progression for everyone who’s been involved since the beginning to rise and grow into those leadership positions, whether they’re male or female.” Bogner said Signature’s focus on diversity and gender equity is evident as a matter of course in formalized career mapping and mentorship opportunities for employees, things that previous generations often didn’t have. These are not only effective in maintaining a level playing field come promotion time, she added, but show a keen understanding of what attracts and retains modern female employees, who increasingly expect to move up, or they’ll move on. “I had the pleasure of serving as only the ninth or 10th female president in the 90-year history of student government at the University of Arkansas, and I only graduated college nine years ago,” Bogner said. “I came out of a pretty significant leadership role as a female, and I never even considered that my gender would hold me back in the workplace as I moved forward and went to work.

Tori Bogner

“But it’s interesting; college doesn’t teach you how the workplace really functions. There was a situation where I was passed over for a particular job opening because, ‘It wasn’t the right fit for a female.’ It was a department full of other females, and they thought that they needed a male to balance it out. And I’m lucky; that’s the one and only time that’s happened, and that hasn’t been a significant detraction in my career.” Bogner said this early lesson made her more aware of gender bias, including implied bias that can creep into even the best work environment. She said companies’ ability to bring such attitudes out in the open will go farthest toward addressing the challenge of making workplace opportunities equal for all. “Overall, people are recognizing that women expect to have whatever role they deserve, based on their work history and proven performance,” she said. “That being said, there’s value in having some of those real conversations about the ‘things that people don’t say.’ Even if they’re not saying it, they’re thinking it. “When it comes to topics about image and how you’re portrayed and what people are thinking when they’re looking at you, even though that’s not something that’s supposed to be happening anymore, it does. It still does, and it’s worth talking about the differences in how different genders look at different things and how different generations consider different things.”

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BANKING

MODERN-DAY BANK ROBBERS By Becky Gillette

Financial institutions use multiple layers of security to keep customers’ data safe

ustomer financial data has high value with the criminals of the world, which means banks and other financial institutions have to be constantly evaluating and evolving to keep customers’ information safe. “Our customers rely on us to protect their data and keep it from those bad actors,” said Chief Information Security Officer Kendall Reese of Simmons Bank. “If we do not protect their sensitive data, we lose customers’ trust, and ultimately, we lose their business. Further, bank regulatory agencies track and measure a bank’s ability to protect customer data. They ex-

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pect us to safeguard the data effectively, and cyber is always a highly reviewed area when our regulators are performing examinations.” At Simmons Bank, many levels of controls are used. No one control or person protects customers’ data; it is protected by many tools and by all of the Simmons Bank associates. “Security is a portion of everyone’s role here at Simmons Bank,” Reese said. It definitely is a challenge to provide 24/7 online access for customers. The very same mechanism customers use to access their accounts and perform transactions

can be used by criminals to perform malicious activity. Reese said user credentials plus multifactor authentication (MFA) can mitigate many of the risks to a customer account being accessed by a hacker. Simmons Bank provides general cybersecurity tips to its customers on a regular basis. “We intend to give customers the basics that will allow them to be skeptical when the bad actor attempts to gain access to their data,” Reese said. The information security (InfoSec) team at Simmons has many sources that are constantly monitored to identify the

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threats and rapidly make changes within the security tooling to counter those new threats. “Continuous learning is very important in our industry,” Reese said. “Also, InfoSec teams tend to be very open to sharing cyber and information security experiences with other banks. This allows banks to be proactive to potential malicious activity that is occurring in peers.” Ransomware continues to be a top threat. Taylor Cassat, vice president of business development and cyber intelligence at Little Rock cybersecurity training provider Forge Institute, said finance and insurance institutions were the top cyber targets for both 2019 and 2020. In 2020, the targeting of financial institutions rose 238 percent alone. “Most of these groups [outside those sponsored by nation-states] are monetarily driven, so why not look to the source for the money?” he asked. “The average cost of a data breach in the financial sector topped $5 million.” It is so difficult to battle cyberattacks because the cyber environment is constantly changing. For example, each time a new software update comes out, there’s potential for avenues for exploitation. “People want things to be easy and accessible, which also leaves them vulnerable,” Cassat said. “When was the last time you changed your passwords for your bank accounts? Or your email address? The average American probably doesn’t do this more than once yearly.” Each time a ransomware group gets too well-known, it seems to disappear. Recently, though, Cassat said his team is starting to see groups jump back into relevance with a slight rebrand. Darkside (the Colonial Pipelines exploiter) is believed to have rebranded as Blackmatter, for example. Cassat said the best possible thing any institution can do is invest in the legitimate professional development of its people, develop a cyber-specific analytic capability and work on sophisticated cy-

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bersecurity controls and regulations that are assessed on a routine basis. Jason Cathey, Bank OZK’s chief information security officer, said the abrupt closure of many workplaces in the spring of 2020 ushered in a new era of remote work for many. “This pandemic-related shift to remote workplaces and cloud providers has resulted in increased threats from social engineering [phishing], ransomware and third-party breaches,” he said. “I believe people are the most important defense against cyber threats; as such, Bank OZK has invested significant time and effort creating targeted security awareness training for our bankers and customers. Additionally, our dedicated information security team maintains industry leading certifications and attends premier conferences to stay current on ever-changing cybersecurity threats.” Cybersecurity is a top priority for the bank’s board of directors and executive leadership, which Cathey said is evident in its security-minded culture and strong commitment to its people, facilities and sophisticated technology. Creating a strong cybersecurity culture starts at the top, said Tony Ferguson, senior vice president, business development/regional director for SBS Cyber Security. SBS acquired Arkansas-based BLU3 Technologies in 2014. Its executives now are based in Little Rock. Ferguson refers to cyber theft as the modern version of bank robbery. “Cyber-bank theft and fraud is a daily occurrence through various schemes targeted directly at the financial institution or through the customers to gain access to both consumer and commercial accounts,” he said. “Most community banks do a good job and really make an effort to implement security best practices. It is required.” Reputational risk can outweigh the actual financial loss in the event of a cyber incident. “A company’s brand and reputation can

Kendall Reese

Taylor Cassat

Jason Cathey

Tony Ferguson

Vance Smiley

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“It is not a matter of if but a matter of when your business will experience a cyber incident. In reality, nearly all businesses have already experienced some level of unauthorized access on their network or confidential information.” be directly linked to how it manages, responds and mitigates cyber risk,” Ferguson said. “Our local financial institutions are pillars of our communities and carry a high level of trust. Maintaining a perception of honesty and transparency are essential to avoid a short-term recovery becoming a long-term disaster following a cyber incident.” Business leaders and the board of directors must be prepared and know how they will respond to a cyberattack. “It is not a matter of if but a matter of when your business will experience a cyber incident,” Ferguson said. “In reality, nearly all businesses have already experienced some level of unauthorized access on their network or confidential information.”

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Every year, the number of cyberattacks and amount of data exposed continue to break records. This year, there has been a number of high-profile incidents including SolarWinds, JBS and Colonial Pipeline. However, the highest area of growth continues to be the small-business community where there are limited resources, budgets and focus on cybersecurity, Ferguson noted. “Ransomware is the leading weapon of choice, but the sophistication of threats in 2021 also increased with the use of emerging technologies by criminal organizations,” he said. “A number of the highprofile incidents this year highlighted both the sophistication and far-reaching impacts of supply chain disruption as a result of a ransomware attack. It becomes

reality when it disrupts daily lives and is not just a headline about a large corporation losing money.” A common misconception is that small businesses have a lower risk of being the target of a cyberattack than large corporations. In fact, the majority of malware attack victims are categorized as a small business. “All businesses, regardless of size, must have a layered approach to cybersecurity,” Ferguson said. “People continue to be the weakest link in any security program, and malicious attackers target people internal and external to your organization. An organization with a strong security culture goes beyond internal employees and talks about cybersecurity threats with its customers as well.”

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BANKING

A FINTECH

Q&A

VANCE SMILEY OF SOUTHERN BANCORP AND WAYNE MILLER OF THE VENTURE CENTER By Mark Carter

Vance Smiley

Wayne Miller

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inancial technology has become so established as a branch of the financial services industry that “fintech” was spawned to describe it. Indeed, as the world becomes more digital by the day, fintech is an increasingly important component to banking and finance. Broadly speaking, fintech can refer to any innovation in the way business is transacted, according to Investopedia. Mobile money transfers, depositing a check on your smartphone, applying for a loan or credit card online…. All fintech. And Arkansas has a nice fintech pedigree. Walter Smiley’s Systematics, founded in 1968 in Little Rock as a data processing software firm, grew into a national leader in its field, even attracting a large investment from the Stephens family. Smiley eventually licensed his software to banks, took the company public and then sold it to Alltel, another homegrown firm, in 1990. Alltel then sold the division to the Fortune 500 Fidelity Information Services (FIS) in 2003. Each year, The Venture Center in Little Rock hosts two prominent, global accelerator programs for fintech startups — the FIS Fintech Accelerator and the ICBA ThinkTECH Accelerator. And Arkansas-based financial institutions like Southern Bancorp, which serves rural residents and small businesses mostly in the Arkansas and Mississippi delta regions, are striving to carry on the state’s fintech pedigree. Arkansas Money & Politics visited with Southern Bancorp’s Vance Smiley, son of Systematics founder Walter, and Wayne Miller of The Venture Center, about the growth of fintech and issues facing the industry. Smiley now presides over Southern Bancorp’s fintech endeavors as chief innovation officer. Miller is executive director of The Venture Center, which strives to grow innovation in the startup ecosystem through education, collaboration and acceleration.

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“

Broadly speaking, fintech can refer to any innovation in the way business is transacted, according to Investopedia. Mobile money transfers, depositing a check on your smartphone, applying for a loan or credit card online…. All fintech.

tunities. Armed with this information, The Venture Center vets thousands of fintechs in the marketplace to find the most promising companies with high-impact solutions. Only 10 fintech companies make the cut for each program. Once the program begins, visitors meet one-on-one with fintech company founders to provide critical feedback. This collaboration helps shape the fintech’s go-to-market strategy and can impact the overall solution, so it better fits potential clients’ needs.

AMP: How has Southern Bancorp utilized fintech? SMILEY: Fintech is a broad term, but generally speaking, we consider it the discipline of rethinking the technology, payments, processes and user interface normally found in classic banks. At Southern Bancorp, we are creating fintech groups to build more focused customer experiences through our digital division known as TeamWALT (wealth accumulation and lifestyle tech). Our TeamWALT solutions are designed to be nearly 100 percent self-service through mobile devices. A lot of upfront work goes into making sure customers can do what they need to do without talking to a person, thereby alleviating pressure on a staffed call center.

AMP: Tell us about traditional banking’s relationship with fintech startups. MILLER: This year, The Venture Center saw hundreds of banks come through the FIS Fintech and ICBA ThinkTECH programs or attend our fintech events. When a bank or financial institution visits the program, The Venture Center team curates a full day of meetings and demos, allowing the visitors to explore technologies we’ve selected from thousands of fintechs. While the relationship between traditional banks and fintech startups may have been met with skepticism or reticence at one time, today we see collaboration and a quickly growing number of partnerships between the two. These partnerships are a win-win, as banks are able to effectively meet the quickly changing needs of a growing digital customer base, while customers are able to enjoy the digital experience they need while keeping their trusted banking relationships.

AMP: How important are the FIS Fintech and ICBA ThinkTECH accelerators to advancing the industry? MILLER: Both accelerator programs play a crucial role in advancing the financial services industry. The Independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA) represents nearly 5,500 banks across the country, and FIS facilitates the movement of roughly $10 trillion through the processing of approximately 79 billion transactions for over 20,000 clients worldwide. The Venture Center and the boots-on-the-ground financial services experts and decision-makers collaborate to define the most relevant industry challenges and oppor-

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SMILEY: We are always willing to hear from potential fintech partners, though many in that space are aiming to work with classic banks by integrating their solution into the classic tech stack. We are avoiding the classic core altogether by building our own back-end tech. While this limits our fintech startup audience, we believe our eventual partners will be those fintechs struggling with the limitations imposed by classic core systems.

AMP: How are banks handling increased security risks posed by fintech implementation?

AMP: What are the benefits of fintech for consumers? For banking institutions?

MILLER: As the world continues to move online, it’s important to remember that bad actors will always look for a way to capitalize. But through fintech partnerships, banks can mitigate risks, identify fraudulent activity faster and strengthen the security behaviors of their employees. A focus on cybersecurity is critical for all businesses today.

SMILEY: Ironically, banks outsourced most of their tech (and innovation for that matter) years ago. We are already skilled at dealing with external vendors, so we’re not convinced the risk is actually higher. Though, perhaps doing business with a fintech means we can get our arms around all the moving parts easier.

SMILEY: There is a lot of overhead in the way banks operate in this country. Ultimately, consumers are paying for that (e.g., staffing costs, artificially high interchange fees, NSF fees, interest rates, etc.). If pure digital offerings reduce cost, ultimately that savings should make its way back to the consumer.

AMP: In terms of fintech implementation, how do Arkansas institutions measure up?

MILLER: Today’s consumers do everything possible online and through mobile devices. From shopping and socializing to working and planning, technology has provided convenience, efficiency and delight — and with fintech advancements, banking is no different. Today’s customers can open a bank account with a few clicks, and that’s invaluable. Additionally, many fintechs focus on increasing financial inclusion for previously underserved and underbanked people and communities. Tools that allow banks to serve people considered “credit invisible” are critical in the effort to ensure everyone has the ability to access loans to start businesses or buy homes.

MILLER: Arkansas institutions and startups are among the best in the world. Gov. Asa Hutchinson often touts Arkansas as the birthplace of fintech, and today we remain a vital fintech hub. Back in 1968, Little Rock’s Walter Smiley started the very first fintech, Systematics. Systematics eventually became Fidelity National Information Systems, or FIS, which today has 55,000 employees and is arguably the biggest fintech in the world. Fintech is in Arkansas’ DNA, and it shows in the companies we have grown here, including Teslar Software, FI Works, BankLabs and CobblerTech. In short, Arkansas fintechs are top-notch.

“

SMILEY: Compared to the rest of the country, we’re probably a little behind. In this part of the country, personal customer relationships are the priority. Though the question is, how long that remains the case. Our position is that we need to get started now, learning how to have just as good of a customer relationship online as we do when they walk into a branch.

The industry will continue to grow and gain traction in the years to come.

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all the ways we should be thinking about our customers, but they need regulated and chartered institutions to take their companies to the next level.

AMP: What’s next for fintech? SMILEY: Payments are clearly a place we need to improve. We’re far behind some countries in our adoption of real-time payments (i.e., cash replacements). The cryptos and their blockchains are working hard to blaze the trail. We also think banks are going to have to get back to the business of providing value and not remain a commodity as the transition from in-person to online happens. Fintechs are demonstrating

MILLER: The future of fintech is bright. From banking as a service, artificial intelligence and machine learning, blockchain, IoT or Internet of Things, an increase in API platforms and marketplaces and a cross-industry application of fintech, the industry will continue to grow and gain traction in the years to come. See more fintech coverage page 74.

Wayne Miller with Collins Andrews of FIS at the 2021 FIS Fintech Demo Day. (Jon Yoder)

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Q&A BY MARK CARTER

Banking Remains Strong in Arkansas Susannah Marshall

Susannah Marshall, Arkansas State Bank Commissioner

year and a half into the COVID-19 pandemic, Susannah Marshall says Arkansas banks are strong and continue to outperform the national average in most areas. She should know. Last year, she was appointed by Gov. Asa Hutchinson to replace the retiring Candace Franks as commissioner of the Arkansas State Bank Department. Franks had been with the department for 40 years, and Marshall was the logical choice to succeed her. Marshall had served as deputy bank commissioner since 2007 and had been with the department since 1995, when she started as a commercial bank examiner. Then in 2005, she became a financial analyst and was

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promoted to financial analyst supervisor. Marshall is a graduate of Arkansas State University the Southwestern Graduate School of Banking in Dallas. She holds the designation of Commissioned Senior Examiner and is a certified examination manager. Marshall serves the Conference of State Bank Supervisors as vice chair of a multistate regional regulatory committee and a national committee of state and federal regulators, and previously sat on its board. She recently visited with Arkansas Money & Politics about the state of the banking industry in Arkansas, some of the pressing issues related to COVID that the state’s financial institutions still face, and more.

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BANKING

AMP: How would you assess the overall state of the industry in Arkansas right now? How has the pandemic impacted banks’ books?

AMP: In Arkansas, women increasingly are enjoying more prominent roles in the industry and assuming positions of leadership. Why do you think that is, and what took so long?

Marshall: The banking industry in Arkansas is healthy and operating in an overall strong position given the ongoing pandemic. During the past 12 months, Arkansas banks’ operations have rebounded from the initial impact of the pandemic. As of June 30, the financial performance of Arkansas banks continues to outperform the national average in most all trends and ratios. However, the prolonged period of historically low interest rates has continued to place pressure on margins, and Arkansas banks are currently challenged with higher levels of liquidity coupled with overall lower loan demand. The exceptional growth in total assets continues to be driven by the impact of the various governmental relief programs and the resulting response from bank customers to preserve cash and operate in a conservative posture. Arkansas banks maintain higher levels of capital, which provide protection against unforeseen operational weaknesses and deterioration in economic conditions. Lastly, loan portfolio performance has been generally sustained, and I remain very optimistic, yet cautious, regarding the overall soundness of the banking industry in Arkansas.

Marshall: Women are integral in the success of banking operations both in Arkansas and across the country. I am proud to see more female bankers serving in leadership roles within the industry, and I strongly encourage women, at any stage of their professional development, to consider choosing a career in banking. I see many different areas within institutions where women are becoming more active such as department managers, executive officer positions and board membership. I applaud women who are looking for opportunities where they can showcase their education, skillset and talents in the financial services sector. Today, women are more engaged with managing their financial independence. And with additional emphasis on female banker positions, I think banks may often attract female customers or female staff members to mentor other women and help them navigate their own financial goals. I hope this trend continues, and I see the industry is becoming more holistically focused on discussions regarding diversity in banking and financial service providers. AMP: How has climate change and green financing impacted the state banking industry? Marshall: Climate change and the impact of climate-related issues have been highlighted within the banking industry in recent months. I fully expect this trend to continue, and although the discussions are often initiated at a high level among the largest financial institutions, topics such as climate will often filter into narratives with all banks, regardless of asset size and geographic footprint. The federal regulatory agencies are beginning to address and evaluate the financial-system impact associated with climate risk. Today, I would say that most community banks in Arkansas and across the country have not elevated the topic of climate risk within their bank’s risk matrix; however, for some institutions, it is likely that they have anecdotally addressed this topic for quite some time as it relates to various loan customers. I believe climate change, environmental initiatives and green financing are industry hot topics that will continue to be present and expand in the coming years.

AMP: How are Arkansas banks dealing with staffing challenges that come with the pandemic? Marshall: Staffing challenges are present across many business sectors nationally and in Arkansas. Banks, like other industries, are managing multiple issues as they pertain to the workforce. Arkansas banks are challenged with evaluating the impact of remote work opportunities, safely providing services to customers and adequately protecting staff members across all levels of operations. Banks are reporting a high level of vacancies for skilled and experienced employees and the need to seek alternatives and incentives to attract and retain staff in a fiercely competitive job market. As essential workers, it is critically important that we maintain a robust supply of personnel to lead and operate the financial institutions that serve Arkansas communities and meet the needs of our citizens and customers.

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CHARTERED BANKS IN ARKANSAS BANK NAME

CITY

ASSETS

Bank OZK

Little Rock

27,276,892

Arvest Bank

Fayetteville

26,259,747

Pine Bluff

23,287,971

Conway

17,206,340

First Security Bank

Searcy

7,548,380

First National Bank

Paragould

1,889,262

Farmers Bank & Trust Company

Magnolia

1,853,102

First Community Bank

Batesville

1,851,655

The First National Bank of Fort Smith

Fort Smith

1,800,042

Arkadelphia

1,760,967

The Farmers & Merchants Bank

Stuttgart

1,657,417

First Financial Bank

El Dorado

1,557,182

Danville

1,116,311

The Citizens Bank

Batesville

1,112,002

Relyance Bank

Pine Bluff

1,022,372

Jacksonville

932,369

Encore Bank

Little Rock

908,083

Anstaff Bank

Green Forest

907,307

Fayetteville

805,650

Murfreesboro

733,758

Springdale

694,752

West Memphis

670,844

Generations Bank

Rogers

659,308

The Malvern National Bank

Malvern

627,296

Bank of England

England

616,109

Simmons Bank Centennial Bank

Southern Bancorp

Chambers Bank

First Arkansas Bank and Trust

Signature Bank of Arkansas Diamond Bank Legacy National Bank Evolve Bank & Trust

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BANK NAME

CITY

ASSETS

FNBC Bank

Ash Flat

601,205

Stone Bank

Mountain View

536,261

Forrest City

528,047

Booneville

506,513

West Memphis

500,264

Citizens Bank & Trust Co.

Van Buren

492,103

Eagle Bank and Trust Company

Little Rock

467,017

Eureka Springs

453,647

First Service Bank

Greenbrier

447,207

First State Bank

Russellville

412,808

Central Bank

Little Rock

369,323

Newport

350,247

Helena

340,604

Mena

331,586

Farmers Bank and Trust Company

Blytheville

316,514

First State Bank of DeQueen

De Queen

314,044

Wynne

305,985

Forrest City

290,243

Huntsville

287,193

Walnut Ridge

277,348

Lonoke

266,749

Bank of Little Rock

Little Rock

266,338

Union Bank & Trust Company

Monticello

260,279

Greenwood

255,592

First National Bank of North Arkansas

Berryville

250,914

Commercial Bank & Trust Company

Monticello

247,993

Horatio

241,597

Paris

237,359

Springdale

232,868

Magnolia

221,001

First National Bank of Eastern Arkansas First Western Bank Fidelity Bank

CS Bank

Merchants & Planters Bank Partners Bank The Union Bank of Mena

Cross County Bank Armor Bank Today’s Bank The First National Bank of Lawrence County First State Bank

Farmers Bank

Horatio State Bank The First National Bank at Paris United Bank The Peoples Bank

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BANK NAME

CITY

ASSETS

Petit Jean State Bank

Morrilton

214,227

FBT Bank & Mortgage

Fordyce

204,340

Smackover State Bank

Smackover

194,015

The First National Bank of Izard County

Calico Rock

192,643

Premier Bank of Arkansas

Jonesboro

189,692

Sheridan

184,107

Merchants and Farmers Bank

Dumas

177,917

Bank of Salem

Salem

172,746

Bank of Delight

Delight

160,628

Bank of Cave City

Cave City

153,842

McGehee Bank

McGehee

144,947

Bodcaw Bank

Stamps

143,858

Warren Bank and Trust Company

Warren

138,624

Riverwind Bank

Augusta

130,632

First State Bank of Warren

Warren

119,983

Piggott State Bank

Piggott

115,234

Star City

108,688

Pocahontas

99,640

Logan County Bank

Scranton

91,064

Bank of Bearden

Bearden

88,844

Rison

88,262

First Natural State Bank

McGehee

81,129

Home Bank of Arkansas

Portland

74,189

Lake Village

72,066

Security Bank

Stephens

67,401

Riverside Bank

Sparkman

62,210

Merchants & Planters Bank

Clarendon

43,197

Bradley

29,622

Peoples Bank

Connect Bank RiverBank

Gateway Bank

Bank of Lake Village

Community State Bank SE PT E M B E R 2 02 1

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Source: FDIC

CONGRATULATIONS

Sandy Ferguson Powerful Women in Banking 2021 All of us at Generations Bank are honored to work alongside Sandy. For 40 years, she has led by example to be the difference in the lives of our team members, customers, and communities.

mygenerations.bank

Your personal financial goals deserve a personal approach. Putting the needs of my clients first is the approach I believe in. I’ll work with you to find the right financial solutions to help you plan for your unique goals. And together, we’ll track your progress over time, adjusting your plan along the way to help get you where you want to go. Lester Matlock, CFP®, CRPC®, APMA® Private Wealth Advisor Natural State Private Wealth Group A private wealth advisory practice of Ameriprise Services, LLC

501.537.1100 415 N. McKinley St Little Rock, AR 72205 lester.p.matlock@ampf.com ameripriseadvisors.com/lester.p.matlock AR license #1653354

Not Federally Insured | No Financial Institution Guarantee | May Lose Value Investment advisory products and services are made available through Ameriprise Financial Services, LLC, a registered investment adviser. Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, Inc. (CFP Board) owns the CFP® certification mark, the CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ certification mark, and the CFP® certification mark (with plaque design) logo in the United States, which it authorizes use of by individuals who successfully complete CFP Board’s initial and ongoing certification requirements. © 2021 Ameriprise Financial, Inc. All rights reserved. ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM

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POWER

WOMEN IN BANKING

The executives recognized in AMP’s list of 2021 Power Women in Banking were nominated by readers. In a male-dominated industry, their perseverance, hard work and expertise have propelled them to influential positions in Arkansas banking and finance. We’re proud to recognize them in this month’s issue. JANICE ACOSTA, SVP/Wealth Management Division Manager, Relyance Bank HEATHER ALBRIGHT, President of Arkansas market, Bank of America NATALIE BARTHOLOMEW, CAO, Grand Savings Bank (Bentonville) MICHELE BEASLEY, VP, Consumer Lending, Telcoe Federal Credit Union

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CHARLOTTE DOLLAR, Compliance Manager, Abaca (North Little Rock) Dollar was Abaca’s first full-time hire in July 2019. Abaca provides financial services including banking, payments and lending to the underserved cannabis industry in Arkansas. Dollar joined with seven years of experience in mortgage compliance and now helps the North Little Rock firm navigate the growing business of medical marijuana. She holds a degree in anthropology from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

TIFFANY DUHAMEL-BARGER, Senior Private Banker/VP, Arvest Bank (Little Rock) STEPHANIE EDWARDS, SVP/ Operations, Bank of England VALERIE ERKMAN, SVP/Chief Marketing Officer, Arkansas Federal Credit Union Erkman has a history of working in the banking and telecommunications industries. She is skilled in e-commerce, lead generation and conversion, brand

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management, multichannel marketing, internal and external communications as well as coaching for excellence. She has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. NATALIE EVANS VP, Wealth Advisor Bank OZK Evans serves Bank OZK as a vice president and wealth advisor and has been with the bank since 2019. She previously worked for almost 14 years in estate and asset services for the American Cancer Society in Little Rock, and has been active with the Association of Fundraising Professionals, Arkansas Chapter. She is a 2004 graduate of Ouachita Baptist University. SANDY FERGUSON, CFO, Generations Bank Ferguson serves as CFO for Generations Bank in Rogers, where she just celebrated her 40th anniversary with the bank. Starting in 1981 as a teller, Ferguson has continued to play a pivotal role working in every department throughout her career. Generations Bank is allowing Ferguson to lend her expertise to all facets of the bank while she also serves on the board of directors. JENNIFER FLOYD, CAO, Home Bancshares/Centennial Bank ELIZABETH GLASBRENNER, Co-founder/CEO, Smiley Technologies NATALIE HAIRSTON, SVP/Commercial Loan Officer, Simmons Bank Hairston has been with Simmons since May of this year after previously serving as a senior vice president and commercial loan officer for Bank OZK. She graduated from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock with a

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bachelor’s degree in business administration in 2007. She volunteers for Our House and has served on the board of the Junior League of Little Rock as treasurer and development vice president. CHARLESTIEN HARRIS, Credit Counselor/ Financial Coach, Southern Bancorp Community Partners Harris serves as a financial coach and credit counselor. She is accustomed to helping individuals develop plans to get out of debt, start a business or buy a first home. Harris also teaches financial classes to the general public. She received a bachelor’s degree in home economics and fashion merchandising from Southern University and Agricultural and Mechanical College at Baton Rouge. SHARON INGRAM, Assistant Vice President/RCA Manager/Project Manager, U.S. Bank TANYA CARTER JAMES, SVP/Branch Administrator, Arvest Bank (Little Rock) ARDELLA LEE, Director of Loan Operations, Southern Bancorp Lee was promoted to her current position of vice president for loan operations in September 2020. In this role, she manages all loan processing and administration for the $1.6 billion, nonprofit bank-holding company. She has worked in banking for more than 25 years and previously served as a loan operations officer. A Smackover native, Lee joined Southern Bancorp in 2001 after attending South Arkansas Community College.

MELODY MARTENS, Bentonville Market President, Signature Bank Martens has served as market president for Signature Bank since 2013 and has had a hand in the banking industry for more than 27 years. Martens also serves as chair of Signature’s Bentonville board of directors and was named to Arkansas Money & Politics’ 2019 Power Women list. She is involved with Bentonville Garden Club, Excellerate Foundation and is a board member for City Sessions. NICOLE MATSOUKAS, SVP, IT/Strategic Initiatives, Arkansas Federal Credit Union Matsoukas has played a key role in the implementation of several major projects over the years that have assisted in driving the credit union forward. Most recently, she led the two-year conversion of the core banking system and played an integral role in various credit union mergers. She previously served as vice president of member service center operations, where she was responsible for the operations of the contact center and several branch locations. CHRISTINE MORRISON, President of Mortgage Lending, Signature Bank Morrison began her banking career in 1990 and was a founding member of Signature’s startup in 2004. A University of Arkansas alumnus with a bachelor’s degree in communications, she is a graduate of Leadership Springdale, a member of the Mortgage Bankers Association of Northwest Arkansas and the NWA Board of Realtors. She also is past president of Altrusa International of Springdale and Executive Women’s International.

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Congratulations Natalie Evans Arkansas Power Women in Banking nominee Thank you, Natalie, for all of your hard work and for making everyone at Bank OZK proud.

Natalie Evans VP, Wealth Advisor - Trust & Wealth

MEMBER FDIC

CONGRATULATIONS We are honored to work beside Nicole and Valerie. They lead by example, & are one of the reasons we have been named one of the best credit union’s in the country. Thank you, Nicole and Valerie, for your leadership.

800.456.3000 | afcu.org

Nicole Matsoukas

Valerie Erkman

SVP/Chief Information Officer

SVP/Chief Marketing Officer

2021

Federally insured by NCUA

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Congratulations,

CARRIE PRICE, for being recognized as a leader and significant contributor in the banking industry!*

CARRIE PRICE

SVP | CHIEF MARKETING OFFICER

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* As determined by AMP readers.

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THE POWER OF ARKANSAS’ BANKS Arkansas is fortunate to have a strong banking sector. That has never been more evident than the past year as we faced unprecedented challenges. Arkansas banks have risen to the challenge by working tirelessly to assist customers in many ways, including: • Finding innovative ways to serve customers while ensuring their safety • Enabling 43,600 Arkansas businesses to receive PPP loans totaling $3.3 Billion • Leading the way nationally with 15 financial institutions offering customers a certified Bank On account It is humbling to be recognized as one of the “Power Women in Banking”, and it’s an honor to serve our banks as president and CEO of the Arkansas Bankers Association. - Lorrie Trogden

www.arkbankers.org

Congratulations Wealth Builders! We are beyond proud of these leaders who exemplify Southern Bancorp’s mission of being wealth builders for everyone on a daily basis. Congratulations to them and all of the women powering Arkansas’ banking industry!

Charlestien Harris HUD Certified Housing & Credit Counselor

Andrea Parnell

Ardella Lee

Chief People Officer

Director of Loan Operations

Wendy Von Kanel Regional President

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AMBER MURPHY, Customer Relationship Manager, First Financial Bank (El Dorado) MARNIE OLDNER, CEO, Stone Bank Oldner has worked with banks nationwide as a managing principal at DD&F Consulting Group. A business and accounting graduate of Cal State-Fullerton, Oldner was a CPA with Price Waterhouse Coopers in Newport Beach, Calif., before moving to Arkansas. She currently serves on the board of the Arkansas Bankers Association and is a member of the Federal Reserve’s 8th District Community Depository Institutions Advisory Council as well as the Federal Reserve’s National Advisory Council. CATHY HASTINGS OWEN, Chairman, Eagle Bank ANDREA PARNELL, Chief People Officer, Southern Bancorp Parnell oversees talent acquisition and retention strategies in alignment with Southern Bancorp’s values-based approach to banking. She has developed and implemented performance management, succession planning and career development programs and early in her career focused on merger and acquisition activities. KARLA PAYNE, CFO, Arvest Bank BETH PRESLEY, VP, Marketing, Arvest Bank (Fort Smith) CARRIE PRICE, SVP/Chief Marketing Officer, First Community Bank (Batesville) Price oversees marketing in Arkansas and Missouri for First Community. She joined the bank in January after spending more than 16 years with Southern Bancorp. At Southern,

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she served as senior marketing officer for Arkansas and Mississippi, as assistant vice president and as marketing director. She graduated from the University of Arkansas in 2004. LORI ROSS, Arkadelphia President, Citizens Bank Ross has served as president of Citizens Bank’s Arkadelphia operations since 2016. She previously served as Arkadelphia market president for what was then Bank of the Ozarks, as senior vice president and lending officer for Summit Bank in Arkadelphia and as commercial lender for Southern Bancorp. She graduated from Henderson State in 2001 and earned her MBA from Union University in 2005. ERIN SIMPSON, Executive Vice President/Chief Risk Officer, Encore Bank CAROLE SMITH, Senior Vice President/ Commercial Banker, Simmons Bank Smith leads business development for the Central Arkansas market and previously managed a $100 million commercial loan portfolio. She served as chairman for UA Little Rock’s College of Business Advisory Council and as president and chairman for Leadership Greater Little Rock’s Board of Trustees. A University of Arkansas alumnus, Carole holds master’s degrees in business and banking from the UA and Southern Methodist University. SANDY STRAESSLE, SVP, Retail Banking, Stone Bank Prior to joining Stone Bank in 2016, Straessle had 15 years of banking experience at Regions Bank where she served as senior vice president for retail admin-

istration and group branch manager over seven Little Rock locations. A Little Rock native with a degree in interdisciplinary studies from UA Little Rock, she is a graduate of Leadership Arkansas, a member of the Arkansas Women Executives organization and a board member for Junior Achievement of Arkansas. DONNA TOWNSELL, SVP, Director of Investor Relations, Home Bancshares/ Centennial Bank LORRIE TROGDEN, President/CEO, Arkansas Bankers Association Prior to serving as president and CEO of the Arkansas Bankers Association, Trogden worked for 10 years as the associate executive director for the Arkansas Bar Association and for eight years in human resources for Acxiom and Alltel. Trogden serves as a board officer for the Arkansas Society of Association Professionals, Arkansas Capital Corporation and the Graduate School of Banking at the University of Wisconsin. She also serves on the boards of Economics Arkansas and the Graduate School of Banking at Louisiana State University. CHRISTIE TURNER, First State Bank (Fayetteville) TARA WALKER, Bank of Little Rock WENDY VON KANEL, Central Region President, Southern Bancorp Based in Helena-West Helena, Von Kanel oversees the community development bank’s operations across 12 markets and 17 branches in Arkansas and Mississippi. A Phillips County native, Von Kanel joined Southern Bancorp in 1998 as a mortgage loan processor, rising to market president in 2018 and regional president in 2019.

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Financial advisors help put their clients in a position to make money work for them instead of chasing it their entire lives. Arkansas Money & Politics asked readers to reveal their favorite financial advisors, and they delivered. The professionals listed in this special section are committed to guiding their clients through the sometimes intimidating world of investments and transforming “finances” from a potential source of stress to a golden opportunity.

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RAYMOND BERTASI Northwestern Mutual/The Bertasi Financial Group, Little Rock Bertasi believes that identifying your financial goals and suggesting innovative solutions to help you implement them is a hallmark of a great financial advisor. In addition, through his association with The Bertasi Financial Group, he has access to a staff of seasoned professionals, which ensures he has the manpower and technical ability to promptly meet the needs of his clients. MELISSA W. BRADLEY, Merrill Lynch Wealth Management/Smouni Bradley Group, Little Rock Bradley believes that helping clients achieve their goals and dreams never gets old, even after more than 20 years of working with individuals and families. She values the relationships that she has built over the years and truly believes the key to success is a written financial strategy. JOHNNY BROWN, CFP® Brown Capital Management, Little Rock Brown is a Certified Financial Planner™ and president of Brown Capital Management. He has been in the investment industry since 1999 and has experience managing investments through two of the worst recessions and bear markets in the stock market in U.S. history. He has eight years of experience as an equity analyst. SCOTT BURTON, CDFA® Merrill Lynch, Hot Springs Burton is a Hot Springs native and graduate of the University of Arkansas. After his divorce, he decided to help others navigate the financial aspect of divorce by earn-

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ing the designation of Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA). He is heavily involved in the Hot Springs community through the Chamber of Commerce and Oaklawn Rotary Club among other community activities. CHAD CARLSON, CFP® Simmons Investment Services, Little Rock Carlson is a Certified Financial Planner™ with more than 24 years of experience in the financial services industry. A Little Rock native and graduate of Catholic High School for Boys, Carlson returned home after his graduation from Baylor University to begin his career in 1996. In 2001, he joined Delta Trust, which was later acquired by Simmons Bank. JASON CHACKO, CFP®, CRPS® Morgan Stanley/ The Chacko Group, Hot Springs Chacko is a Certified Financial Planner™ and Chartered Retirement Plans Specialist® with Morgan Stanley Wealth Management. Since joining The Chacko Group as a financial advisor in 2009, he has concentrated on providing effective and efficient financial solutions for the individual goals of his clients. In addition to his care for his clients, Chacko currently serves as the branch manager for the Morgan Stanley office in Hot Springs. JAMES CHAVEZ JR. Encompass Financial Partners, Little Rock Chavez is a partner and financial advisor at the Little Rock firm. He previously served as a financial advisor and college unit director for Northwestern Mutual in Little Rock. His goal is to work with business owners who want to improve their bottom line, medical professionals who want to achieve profitability for their practice and young professionals and families who are looking to put their best foot forward financially.

BRIAN COLE Raymond James Financial Services/ Signature Private Wealth Management, Fayetteville Cole received a Bachelor of Science in business administration (marketing) from the University of Arkansas in 1990. After college, he attended the University of Arkansas at Little Rock William H. Bowen School of Law, receiving a juris doctor in 1994. Cole practiced law for six years, focusing primarily on banking and probate law, and remains a member of the Arkansas Bar Association. After leaving private law practice, Cole managed the Arvest Asset Management office in Fayetteville for several years. He then joined Raymond James in May of 2006. CINDY CONGER, CPA/PFS, CFP® Conger Wealth Management, Little Rock Conger earned her bachelor’s degree in accounting in 1981 and her MBA at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock in 1983. In 1985, she was a founding partner in The Arkansas Financial Group, Inc. in Little Rock. There she gained experience, expertise and national acclaim. Worth magazine recognized Cindy for a decade as one of the top practitioners in the nation. BARRY M. CORKERN, CFP®, AIFA® Barry M. Corkern and Company, Little Rock Charging a fee for objective advice, unclouded by commission-driven sales rhetoric, was a novel idea in 1982. This led to Corkern to become the first person in Arkansas to register solely as an investment advisor. Corkern is a graduate of the private wealth management profession tract at the esteemed Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania), has provided litigation support and expert witness testimony in more than 75 cases, is the founding president of the Arkansas Chapter of the Financial Planning Association.

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KELLEY CURTIS DUNLAP, CRPC® Stifel/The Curtis Team, Little Rock With more than 20 years in the financial industry, Dunlap has been a partner of The Curtis Team at Stifel since 2011. Devoting her time to a select client base consisting of affluent families and successful businesses, she focuses on mitigating risk and pursuing growth of her clients’ wealth with an emphasis on holistic planning and risk management strategies. She utilizes her Chartered Retirement Planning CounselorSM (CRPC®) by assisting business owners in developing a retirement plan tailored to their needs. She also is a member of National Association of Plan Advisors (NAPA) and sits on the Stifel Retirement Plans Roundtable. ERIC EIDSON Arvest Wealth Management, Little Rock Eidson is a vice president and Senior Retirement Plan Relationship Manager with Arvest Wealth Management, serving the Little Rock and Fort Smith markets. He works closely with retirement plan sponsors to assist with ﬁduciary and compliance responsibilities, investment selection and monitoring and a customized education plan for participants. Eidson joined Arvest Wealth Management in 2013 and previously served as an investment assistant and client advisor. A University of Arkansas graduate, he holds the designations of Accredited Investment Fiduciary® and Chartered Retirement Plans SpecialistSM. JASON FEILKE, CFP® Meridian Investment Advisors, Little Rock Feilke joined Meridian in 2012 as Director of Retirement Plan Services in charge of retirement plan consulting to businesses. He previously worked at BKD Wealth Advisors and Merrill Lynch, where he managed retirement plans for businesses and served as wealth management advisor to families. He received his bachelor’s degree in financial management and an MBA from the Walton ColSE PT E M B E R 2 02 1

lege of Business at the University of Arkansas. He is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™. JASON GERBER Prime Capital Investment Advisors, Little Rock As managing partner for Prime Capital Investment Advisors, Gerber provides both financial planning and wealth management services. His team also advises companies, large and small, on how to best manage and offer a retirement plan to its employees. He graduated from Ouachita Baptist University and earned a master’s degree in financial planning. He is a Certified Financial Planner™ Professional and an Accredited Investment Fiduciary®. MICAH GIBSON Heritage Oak Wealth Advisors, Rogers Gibson is the founder and owner of Heritage Oak Wealth Advisors, where he works with a select group of high-net worth clients to provide a comprehensive wealth management plan personalized to the needs and desires of each client and family. He has a passion for cultivating lasting relationships with the clients he serves, and his personal care towards each client’s needs are unmatched. Gibson has worked in wealth management for almost 20 years and executes a unique approach to detailed planning and execution. CORY DENICE GRUMMER Stephens Inc., Little Rock Cory Grummer, CFP®, is a senior vice president and leader of the Wealth Planning team at Stephens. She has a background working as a financial analyst in private equity and in the public sector. In 2013, Grummer joined Stephens where she now works with clients to create comprehensive financial plans for various stages of life. She particularly enjoys wealth planning and helping families to achieve their legacy and charitable goals and is inspired by seeing the empowerment clients gain and the success they enjoy from having a long44

term financial plan. SARAH CATHERINE GUTIERREZ, MPP, CFP®, CRPS® Aptus Financial Services, Little Rock Gutierrez is the founder of Aptus Financial. She holds an MPP from Harvard University and the CFP® and CRPS® designations. She was recently recognized in the 2020 Investment News 40 under 40 class of investment advisors and serves as adjunct instructor in personal finance in the Department of Surgery for the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Gutierrez is a national speaker on “living like a resident” for physicians; eliminating conflicts of interest in the financial industry; and recruiting women to become financial advisors. CHRIS HARKINS Harkins Rafferty Wealth Management/Raymond James, Little Rock Harkins has been helping families and individuals for more than 30 years. Working with a smaller group of clients allows Raymond James to create a greater understanding of your goals along with viable solutions for every element of the wealth management equation. Harkins takes a deep dive into addressing clients’ interests and concerns, helping them better understand their options and solutions. Originally from Chicago, Harkins attended Loyola University of Chicago. GREG HARTZ Foundation Resource Management, Little Rock Hartz is the founder and a senior partner at Foundation Resource Management (FRM), a SEC-registered investment advisory firm in Little Rock. Hartz has 35 years of experience as a value investment portfolio manager. He is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Charterholder and holds the Personal Financial Specialist designation of the American Institute of CPAs. He is a life-long resident of Arkansas. ARM ON E YA N D P OL ITIC S.COM

JOHN HOEFL, CRPC, & LARA WILKERSON Aspire Wealth, Hot Springs As a financial professional and an active member of his community, Hoefl is dedicated to helping individuals and businesses build their financial futures. Wilkerson has been in the financial industry for more than 15 years. She has worked with various broker dealers, and her expertise ranges from bonds, annuities, long-term care and more. ROB HOLDFORD Wealth Management Inc., Little Rock By learning from the past and planning for tomorrow, Holdford helps clients live powerfully in the present moment, free of worry and regret. He is an author, wealth advisor, life coach and public speaker. For more than 30 years in the financial services industry, Holdford has practiced within the discipline of comprehensive financial planning, concentrating on retirement planning, estate planning and investment tax reduction strategies. LOREN MARSHALL IPSEN Ipsen Advisor Group, Little Rock Ipsen received the recognition of being in the Ameriprise Circle of Success in 2013 and has 19 years of experience. He earned an associate degree in arts business administration from Texarkana College and a Bachelor of Business Administration (finance) from Texas A&M-Texarkana. Ipsen believes that clients’ financial goals are individual and strives to help them achieve those goals. Ipsen takes the time to understand what’s truly important, whether it’s saving for college, retiring the way clients want, making smart investments or anything else.

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CARL IRICO Transparent Wealth Partners/Ameriprise, Little Rock Irico has been a financial planner for 34 years. As chairman and founder of Transparent Wealth Partners, he continues working with the firm in a special projects role working on firm-wide matters that benefit all clients. Throughout his career, he specialized in retirement income strategies, tax planning, employee stock options and comprehensive financial planning. STEVE IRWIN Foresight Investment Advisors, Hot Springs Irwin has been serving the insurance and financial needs of senior clients for more than 29 years. He developed a passion for working with retirees who want to minimize risk and ensure their money lasts. Irwin’s success with clients in Arkansas led him to share his knowledge and techniques to hundreds of agents and advisors from around the nation. MATT JONES, JD, CFP Legacy Capital Wealth Partners, Little Rock Jones began working in the wealth management industry in 1994 after receiving his undergraduate degree from the UA and his law degree from UA Little Rock. Having completed the requirements to become a CFP®, he worked locally for both Morgan Keegan and Stephens Inc. In 1997, he joined the late Frank McGehee to form what is today Legacy Capital. Jones now serves as president and directional leader for Legacy. He and the firm’s other advisors focus on providing holistic and customized wealth management services to affluent and ultra-affluent clientele. Legacy’s client base is nationwide and includes some of Arkansas’ most prominent families.

KELLY JOURNEY, CFP, AAMS, CRPC, CRPS AND ADPA Edward Jones, Little Rock When Journey was young, she would balance her mother’s checkbook, remind kids at school they needed to save some of their allowance and loved reading the Wall Street Journal at the library. The financial industry always fascinated her from an early age. As a woman, she is keenly aware how important it is to have financial independence, no matter what your family dynamic. Journey is a general partner and financial advisor with Edward Jones in Little Rock. . FRANK KELLY, CFP® Ifrah Financial Services, Little Rock Kelly has been working in the financial services since 1976 and earned his CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ Certification in 1990. He served for six years on the board of the Arkansas Chapter of the International Association for Financial Planning (IAFP) and for two of those years as president. He is a member of the Financial Planning Association (FPA). . EDWARD MAHAFFY ClientFirst Wealth Management Mahaffy, a repeat member of this list, founded ClientFirst Wealth Management, a fee-only RIA and fiduciary managing more than $200 million for Arkansans, in 2007. Prior to launching ClientFirst, he spent six years as a branch manager and portfolio manager with Raymond James, six years as a vice president and portfolio manager at Merrill Lynch and 11 years as a financial advisor and portfolio manager at Stephens Inc. Designated as a Certified Financial Planner and Chartered Financial Consultant, Mahaffy holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from The Citadel, and he earned his MBA from the UA.

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LESTER MATLOCK Natural State Private Wealth Group/Ameriprise, Little Rock Matlock is CEO of the Little Rock firm and has more than 26 years of experience in the industry. His retirement income strategies include wealth preservation strategies, investments, retirement plan distribution, tax planning strategies, estate planning strategies and charitable giving. He holds the APMA®, CFP® and CRPC® designations. DAVID MEADOR Transparent Wealth Partners, Little Rock Meador has more than 20 years of investing, financial planning and wealth management experience. As founder and owner of Transparent Wealth Partners, Meador continues the love for his work and his clients while he finds joy in collaborating on thoughtful financial planning with his clients. MEREDITH MOLL Foundation Resource Management, Little Rock Moll is a partner and portfolio manager at FRM. A CFA Charterholder, she earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business administration from Columbia University. She has 16 years of experience. FRM serves charitable foundations, insurance companies, hospitals, retirement plans and high net-worth families. The company began operation in 1992 and has seven CFA charter holders. TRENT MURCHISON Edward Jones, Maumelle As an Edward Jones financial advisor, Murchison enjoys developing longterm relationships with clients in which they can build wealth, live generously and leave a legacy. This is accomplished by using an established process to build a personalized strategy that will help clients achieve what’s most important to them.

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GEOFFREY H. NIEBAUM Mendel Capital Management, Little Rock

LARRY ROOT Larry Root and Associates/Ameriprise, Little Rock

Niebaum brings 15 years of investment advisory experience to his role leading Mendel Capital Management. As president, he focuses on investment management and overall strategic growth of Mendel Capital. Prior to joining Mendel Capital, Niebaum was a partner and portfolio manager for Integra Capital Advisors. His investment management career began with Morgan Stanley Smith Barney.

Root’s practice has changed over the years with its clients. Many clients have worked with the firm for 25 years or longer. Root understands the impact the firm can have in clients’ lives through a fulfilling retirement, education of children and grandchildren as well as facing the difficult events of life. The firm works to make a difference in the lives of its clients.

JUSTIN PHILLIPS Allstate, Conway Phillips, who served in the Marine Corps for four years, strives every day to be the catalyst for his clients’ financial success. He is passionate about his clients, and that partly comes from his “why” — Phillips had a heart attack at 31, so he truly knows the importance of planning ahead and putting his clients in a position of financial power. TIM RAFFERTY Harkins Rafferty Wealth Management/Raymond James, Little Rock Rafferty is a vice president with Raymond James in the firm’s Little Rock branch office. He provides a comprehensive approach to wealth management, risk management and estate planning to individuals, families and businesses. Originally from New Orleans, he is active in the community as a volunteer for organizations such as Little Rock Montessori School and Christ the King Catholic Church. CASSANDRA RECTOR Edward Jones, Little Rock As an Edward Jones financial advisor, Rector unites her two passions — serving others and education. Being a financial advisor allows her to serve others and her community by helping people meet financial goals.

MAUREEN RUGGIERO, CFS Mendel Capital Management, Little Rock As CFO, Ruggiero is Chief Compliance and Operating Officer for the firm. Since joining Mendel Capital in 2000, she has earned her Series 65 license, the CFS designation and a master of business administration. She advises clients on their wealth management concerns, retirement plan services, portfolio management and investment analysis. MATT RUSH Strategic Financial Partners, Little Rock Rush helps corporations, high-net-worth individuals and affluent families accumulate and retain their wealth. He understands that every client has a unique situation and believes each client’s situation deserves highly customized and fully transparent solutions. Rush earned his bachelor’s in business administration from the University of Central Arkansas in 2006. ROCKLIN SENAVININ Fiduciary Wealth Management, Little Rock Senavinin is president and co-founder of Fiduciary Wealth Management, a fee-only registered investment advisory firm in Little Rock. As a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professional, he has advanced training in the holistic process of creating a personal ARM ON E YA N D P OL ITIC S.COM

financial plan that addresses a person’s comprehensive needs for both the short and long term. JOHN SHREWSBURY Genwealth Financial Advisors, Bryant Shrewsbury has been helping Arkansans work toward financial independence for more than two decades. He believes financial planning truly has the power to change lives. As co-owner and managing principal of Genwealth Financial Advisors, he has a heart for developing leaders within his team and serving his clients with excellence. TOMEK SIWIEC New Wave Wealth Advisors, Springdale Originally from Poland, Siwiec moved to Rogers in 1999, where he launched his career at Arvest in commercial lending and wealth management. With an MA in finance and nearly

20 years of experience, he joined New Wave Wealth Advisors in 2019 and is solely focused on helping his clients by leveraging independent solutions for investments management and financial planning. JOEY SMALL, CRPC®, APMA® Small & Associates Financial/Ameriprise, Little Rock Small is a private wealth advisor and president of Small & Associates Financial, a private wealth advisory practice of Ameriprise Financial. He provides personalized financial advice to help clients achieve their goals, today and tomorrow. Small has 22 years of experience with Ameriprise Financial, during which time he has been named to numerous top advisor lists. DAVID TRENT Legacy Capital Wealth Partners, Little Rock With more than three decades of wealth manage-

ment experience and after seven years as an investment representative with two major firms, Trent became inspired to start his own company focused on unbiased, objective money management service. In early 1996, he founded Trent Capital Management Inc., a Registered Investment Advisory firm. He merged his firm with Legacy Capital on Jan 1, 2021. KARRON E. WAGES CFP® Financial Decisions Inc., Little Rock Wages is the president and lead financial planner at Financial Decisions Inc. She began her financial planning career at The Arkansas Financial Group in 1996, working her way up to vice president and chief compliance officer. In 2005, she transferred over to manage the affiliate firm, Financial Decisions Inc., which delivers financial planning and investment management services to clients of all financial asset levels.

Barry M. Corkern, CFP®, AIFA®

IT’S A DIFFERENT RELATIONSHIP Barry M. Corkern and Company, Inc. is an independent registered investment advisory firm. As fiduciaries, our interests are aligned with our clients’ interests. We do not recommend commission-based financial products and services. How do you know if your adviser is a fiduciary adviser? Start by asking them how they are compensated and who pays that compensation. Contact us to learn more about how “it’s a different relationship” when working with our firm.

BCORKERN.COM 2300 Andover Court, #100 • LITTLE ROCK • (501) 664-7866

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LETTER,

continued from page 7 Hate Texas Week. We’ll trade Texas refs for SEC refs, so that’s a wash, but maybe seeing Bevo every fall will spark a seemingly longlost connection to our rich past. If nothing else, UT to the SEC is bad, bad news for the Aggies, and that’s good news for us. Here’s to more top 10 showdowns between the Porkers and the steers… *** This issue of AMP was at the press as Arkansas and Texas renewed their rivalry on 9-11; here’s hoping you’re reading this in a good mood. My refusal to capitalize any reference to the UT mascot in this month’s maazine is childish and dumb, yes. But to members of my generation, Texas represents the evil empire. Sometimes you just gotta go juvenile. No real disrespect is intended. That may be a lie, but I sincerely am looking forward to having Texas in the SEC with Oklahoma. While I’ve grown to “hate” every team in the SEC in certain ways, and have grown particularly strong bonds of distaste for Ole Miss, LSU and Texas A&M (the latter representing a renewed repulsion), we haven’t had a Texas since, well, 1991. As Orville Henry once said, we traded one Texas for a bunch of ‘em when we moved over to the SEC, and that makes it hard to fine tune one’s hatred. In the old SWC, it was easy. I think the state of Arkansas has missed having Texas on the schedule every year. (And I think the addition of Oklahoma has potential to start an actual “borderline” rivalry.) But let’s face it, Hate Texas Week is almost like the lead-up to a holiday around here. That may seem sad to some, but I can remember a few years growing up where we all could say, “Well, at least we beat Texas.” *** Katie Zakrzewski is a living, breathing contraction in terms. And anyone who knows her would understand that’s meant as a good thing. As unique as they come, she “rings true,” as someone close to me used to say of the good people. She’s one of the good people. KZ is the cavalry riding out to meet the Nazi onslaught, screaming, “Not today, you

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What matters most to you in life? It’s a big question. But it’s just one of many questions I’ll ask to better understand you, your goals and your dreams. All to help you live confidently – today and in the future.

Larry Root CFP®, CFS®, APMA® Private Wealth Advisor Larry Root & Associates A private wealth advisory practice of Ameriprise Financial Services, LLC

501.975.7999 22 Rahling Circle Little Rock, AR 72223 larry.r.root@ampf.com larryrootadvisor.com AR license #14925

Not Federally Insured | No Financial Institution Guarantee | May Lose Value Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards Inc. owns the certification marks CFP®, CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ and CFP (with plaque design) in the U.S. Ameriprise Financial Services, LLC. Member FINRA and SIPC. © 2021 Ameriprise Financial, Inc. All rights reserved. (09/21)

#$%*#@^!” Our former associate editor is now the national communications coordinator for Citizens Climate Lobby, where she hopes to infuse some of her true, puregrain conservatism (not populism but conservatism) to the cause. A conservative environmentalist? Hmmm. My money is on law school next for KZ, then mayor of North Little Rock (she’s a Baring Cross gal), governor of Arkansas and perhaps next, Empress of Earth. She’d have

my vote. For now, she’ll still submit a Digs of the Deal now and again, or who knows? Maybe even help with a list. (Breathe, Katie, just breath…) All I know for sure is, we miss her and wish her all the best. And we raise a symbolic pint in her honor. Here’s to you, KZ. *** As always, thanks for reading. Hit me up with any story ideas, suggestions or critiques, good and bad. I’m always available at MCarter@ARMoneyandPolitics.com.

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DESIGN AWARDS Arkansas Money & Politics

NOVEMBER

2021

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FINANCIAL ADVISORS Q&A

FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH:

INVESTMENT ADVICE FROM FIVE OF THE BEST IN THE BUSINESS By Lindsey Castrellon

HAT DOES IT TAKE TO BE A FINANCIAL ADVISOR? At the very least, it could take dozens of finance and business courses, a bachelor’s degree and a seemingly endless series of licenses and certifications. Oh, and a little something called the Series 65 exam. But, what about being one of the best financial advisors? We visited with five of the state’s best to get advice on some of the most prevalent topics in financial planning today.

SARAH CATHERINE GUTIERREZ, APTUS FINANCIAL Sarah Catherine Gutierrez is a speaker, writer and owner of Aptus Financial in Little Rock. She started her company with a vision that all people should have access to an advisor on their own terms with no conflicts of interest in their own money. She specializes in — well, almost everything — but especially providing straightforward financial planning advice for more vulnerable clients, such as young professionals, women and medical students.

AMP: One of your unique services is pro-

their student loans. We are seeing student loan burdens that can get to $1 million or more for married physicians. They need careful planning, especially since these student-loan interest rates are often greater than 6 percent.

Gutierrez: One of the most important

AMP: Do you have any advice for ways the younger generation can achieve financial stability in the current market?

viding financial guidance to physicians and medical students. What are some new financial concerns you’ve noticed among those in the medical field, and how are you able to help?

financial concerns for physicians getting out of training is figuring out a savings rate that will allow them to retire on their own terms, then build a financial plan to help them invest those savings in the most tax-efficient way. Many physicians can find themselves working with advisors who sell financial products that can be in direct conflict with those tax-efficient investment vehicles and/or working with advisors that don’t have the expertise or financial incentive to help them manage

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Gutierrez: Our advice for the younger

generations in our retirement plans is to focus your financial stability on what you can control, aka your savings rate and cash flow management. Tolerate volatility in what you can’t control, aka investing. We believe there are five critical elements of financial stability for young people: 1. “Save 10,” or save 10 percent for retirement,

a powerful tool for building long-term wealth. 2. Address your student loan debt. Get a plan for how you will pay your student loans, which will go back into repayment early next year after two years in a COVID forbearance. 3. Never carry credit card debt month to month — instead save ahead for big-ticket purchases. 4. Keep mortgage and rent payments at less than 14 percent of gross monthly pay. 5. Always have three to six months of savings in an emergency fund. AMP: Has the pandemic affected the way

people are planning for retirement? How have your retirement planning strategies had to change to fit their needs? Gutierrez: The pandemic has absolutely

impacted the way people see liquid sav-

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ings and debt. Before, given low interest rates on savings and such a long period of economic growth, it was hard to convince our retirement plan participants to keep three to six months in a savings account paying very little interest when they could earn so much more in a bull market. Most people nearing retirement now realize how important it is to have a cushion that is fairly liquid. Also, on a broader scale, we learned from the pandemic that women and older employees are our most vulnerable employees. It’s one thing to be in your 60s wanting to work and another to have to work. Debt, like student loans, credit cards and mortgages, can handcuff older employees to being in the latter, more vulnerable situation. It seems that people are more motivated to get out of debt to prepare for retirement. I hope this trend continues, and I see

the industry becoming more holistically focused on discussions regarding diversity in banking and financial service providers. AMP: What is the smartest thing some-

one can do right now to protect their assets, investments, etc., until things calm down?

Gutierrez: The biggest risk to a port-

folio in a down market is behavioral. In other words, the only folks who lose in a down market are those who sell, attempting to time the market, rather than stay the course. The best protection is a good financial plan, one that you understand and test mentally against all potential market moves. And remember, we don’t absolutely know that the market will correct in the next six months or year. Gosh, who would have expected in 2020 to get

hit by a global pandemic and deep recession, then end the year with the market higher than where we started? Whether the markets feel calm or volatile, all folks need to have an asset allocation appropriate for the years they have until retirement. If close to retirement, then you would have a lot more bonds in your allocation than those with decades to retirement, which helps to cushion any market correction, large or small. Once you have a plan, then stick with it, through thick or thin. That’s been the best advice through all market cycles. There’s no reason to think the future will be any different. We always tell retirement plan participants to believe in a self-healing economy that will, on average, grow over time. If we don’t fundamentally believe that, then we have much bigger problems than our retirement accounts.

JAY GADBERRY, GADBERRY FINANCIAL GROUP Jay Gadberry worked with major financial institutions for decades prior to launching his own firm, Gadberry Financial Group in Little Rock. Although he learned a lot during those years of service, Gadberry also learned that there was a gap to be filled in the wealth advisory sector. He wanted to build a full-service investment firm that was focused completely on the benefit and success of his clients rather than on sales and commissions. He wanted to be able to focus on building long-term relationships with real people in a way that supported the Little Rock community he loved so much.

AMP: One of your specialties is advising

corporations and businesses in addition to individuals. How has the pandemic affected retirement planning strategies for both?

Gadberry: The most significant issue was

tions had on the way you and your team typically serve clients and the community? Gadberry: We don’t see our clients in

person as much, and we certainly miss that. However, we have all adapted to the new realities of service in a post-COVID world. We have enjoyed the efficiencies and effectiveness of virtual meetings and other remote services, but we do miss our face-to-face time.

the disruption caused by the pandemic. The initial market downside in the early days later gave way to one of the strongest markets in recent memory. It underscored the need for patience and a steady and reassuring hand. Adhering to the plan in place to avoid making detrimental, short-term emotional decisions is paramount.

you take to make your clients feel at ease with financial planning and strategies?

AMP: What effects have COVID restric-

Gadberry: It has been important to

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AMP: What are some extra steps that

make certain we are keeping historical perspectives in addition to news in front of our clients as they face market uncertainty. Our regular roundtable discussions and webinars with the industry’s best, along with frequent communication, have helped to keep our clients informed and at ease. AMP: What is the smartest thing someone can do to protect their assets, investments, etc., right now until things calm down? Gadberry: Being certain that your goals,

objectives and investment horizon are reflected in your portfolio construction. Working with a seasoned investment consultant can keep you from making detrimental short-term decisions.

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LESTER MATLOCK, NATURAL STATE PRIVATE WEALTH GROUP Lester Matlock is a private wealth advisor and CEO of Little Rock’s Natural State Private Wealth Group, a practice of Ameriprise Financial Services. He believes each of his clients are unique, as are their financial goals, and he delivers personalized financial advice to help clients achieve those goals.

AMP: How has the pandemic affected

the way your clients are planning for retirement?

Matlock: Quite honestly, for some on the front lines, it’s caused them to think about retiring earlier, which means forecasting how their retirement portfolios may react to drawing funds sooner and for a longer period. For others, I question the impact of the pandemic on our economy, as well as the recent rise in inflation and its impact on client’s retirement incomes over time. AMP: Do you have any advice for ways the younger generation can achieve financial stability in the current market? Matlock: If the pandemic has taught us

anything financially, it’s that having an emergency fund can be a “saving grace.” In addition, having short- and long-term

disability protection can play a vital role in replacing a portion of your income should you fall victim to sickness or injury and find yourself without income for an extended period. If you’re younger and saving for retirement, time can be your ally, and compound interest can work in your favor. Start saving early, remain diversified in your investment portfolio, and stick to your long-term plan. AMP: Do you prefer to encourage clients

to take risks in their financial planning, or play it safe? Matlock: I encourage clients to under-

stand their risk tolerance. This can be done through education with a financial professional or through completing a risk tolerance exam or questionnaire. Understand that different goals and time horizons may have different investment ob-

jectives. Saving for a goal three years out may result in taking less risk than a goal 10 years away. AMP: What’s the smartest thing someone can do to protect their assets, investments, etc., right now until things calm down? Matlock: If your goals are long-term, re-

main invested. If you are systematically saving, continue to do so even during down markets. I’ve always believed the smartest thing a person could ever do is have a plan for what they want to accomplish. Revisit your plan regularly, and track your progress. History is filled with challenging times, but it’s also filled with success in overcoming those challenging times, usually by people who have remained consistent in sticking to their plan.

JOEY SMALL, SMALL & ASSOCIATES Joey Small is a private wealth advisor in Little Rock and president of Small & Associates Financial, a practice of Ameriprise Financial Services. He takes the time to understand what’s truly important to clients — whether it’s saving for college, retiring the right way, making smart investments or anything else.

AMP: How has the pandemic affected the way your clients are planning for retirement? Small: Comprehensive planning clients

are best prepared to adapt and adjust to tougher economic and financial market environments, and that has been no dif-

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ferent this time. Comprehensive financial planning helps to ensure clients are on track to meet those financial goals that are important to them. For many, the pandemic has not harmed their finances and may have increased their ability to save, given fewer spending opportunities. For others, retirement plans have been ac-

celerated due to a work environment that might be more challenging than before pandemic, such as changes in how they are allowed to interact with customers or fellow co-workers, managing social distancing in the workplace, or general job duties that have become more difficult due to the pandemic.

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AMP: Do you have any advice for ways the younger generation can achieve financial stability in the current market? Small: First, the sooner one learns the fine

art of delaying gratification, the sooner they’ll find it easier to keep their personal finances in order. Also, realizing how important it is to make sure and track that their expenses do not exceed income can lead to being able to save more money over time. In turn, budgeting can help in establishing an emergency fund, which is savings on hand to help stay out of trouble financially, help keep a handle on credit card debt and provide peace of mind. Lastly, begin saving for retirement immediately. Because of the way compound interest works, the sooner one begins saving, the less principal they’ll have to invest to end up with the amount needed to retire.

Further, some employers will match the retirement plan contribution of their employees, which is like getting free money towards retirement, so make sure to contribute enough to receive the full matching contribution offered by the employer. AMP: What are extra steps that you take to make your clients feel at ease with financial planning and strategies? Small: Our foundational planning, at a

minimum, can provide high-level confidence to clients on how they stand in reaching their financial goals. However, comprehensive financial planning is the extra step to ensure one is on track to meet those financial goals that are important to our clients. The people weathering a financial crisis are those with a financial plan. The more time one spends on a

quality plan equals less worry and anxiety. AMP: What is the smartest thing someone can do to protect their assets, investments, etc., right now until things calm down? Small: Things are relatively calm when

examining volatility in the financial markets on a historical basis. Avoid making emotional, short-term decisions regarding long-term goals is the most common advice that can be followed during any downturn in the economic and financial markets. Assess any brief downturn, or periods of heightened volatility, against the context of the long-term financial goals. Additionally, those who can reduce spending and route some of those dollars towards their financial goals can increase confidence that their goals will be reached.

BARRY CORKERN, BARRY M. CORKERN & CO. Barry M. Corkern of Little Rock is a registered investment advisor with the Securities and Exchange Commission. For more than 30 years, he has guided individuals, multiple generations of the same family, business owners, endowments, foundations and retirement plans to make a profound impact on their financial decisions and planning. With longer experience in fee-based wealth management than any other Arkansas wealth manager, Corkern provides expert, timely and strategic information to a select group of clients with complex financial needs. His clients reside in Arkansas and seven other states. AMP: How does the pandemic continue to affect the way you do business? How has it changed your clients’ needs? Corkern: Because investment advisor reg-

ulations require a disaster response plan, we have continually updated our technology to continue business during events such as the pandemic. We were able to use this technology with more clients and found they are comfortable with online meetings, texting and other ways of communicating. I don’t see any difference in the needs of our clients. We keep pouring accurate information to them to manage their concerns and fears. If anything, we saw more clients investing more into the stock market. That made us feel like our message and experience was getting heard.

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AMP: What is one investment trend you dislike? Corkern: Day trading is speculation, not investing. I compare it to a trip to Las Vegas to gamble. That works for some investors, but it’s not a good idea for long-term financial goals. AMP: What is the smartest thing some-

one can do to protect their assets, investments, etc., right now until things calm down? Corkern: I would say that their money

is as safe now as it was before the pandemic. Financial institutions are very strong, especially after the financial crisis of 2008-09. Everyone needs an in-

vestment policy to which they adhere to — always. A well-designed investment policy based on their risk tolerance anticipates the worst possible events and the best possible events. Too many people fail to have a written long-term investment policy. AMP: What are some extra steps that you take to make your clients feel at ease with financial planning and strategies? Corkern: We listen, and we take all the time our client needs to arrive at a common understanding of what they want and need in the future. We educate our clients with facts, truth and information. It is a good environment for decision making for the client.

SE PTE M B E R 2021

GO FROM OVERLOOKED TO INVALUABLE

OUR DIVERSITY & INCLUSION COUNCIL

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At USAble Life, we are changing how we see each other and how the world sees us. Together, we champion a diverse workforce and foster an inclusive culture.

Learn more about us at USAbleLife.com ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM

SE PTE M B E R 2021

A Growing Health System for a Growing Community

Expanded Access

Innovative Services

More Specialists

New Medical Ofﬁces

Award Winning Care From An Award Winning Team Conway Regional has been the community’s hospital for 100 years, providing high-quality, compassionate care. As our community continues

2020

to grow, we are growing alongside you to ensure all of your healthcare needs are met right here in Conway. When your family needs medical care, you can trust our board-certiﬁed providers to provide you with the comprehensive care you deserve when you need it most.

We’re not just growing—we’re growing together. Pictured, Left to Right: Jeremiah Keng, DO, Family Medicine, Neelakanta Dadi, MD, Hematology-Oncology, Mallory Smith, MD, Infectious Disease, Rimsha Hasan, MD, Cardiology, Swetha Boddeda, MD, Rheumatology, and Anthony Manning, MD, FACS, General Surgery

DIVERSITY

in the

WORKPLACE I

t’s our differences that make us unique, and this uniqueness makes us stronger. This month, Arkansas Money & Politics is recognizing those companies that have embraced diversity in their workplace. This diversity takes many forms, from skin color to sexual orientation, but also includes the disabled, veterans and more. AMP readers nominated companies across Arkansas who have taken up the mantle of diversity in their workplaces and strive to make their workplace a more inclusive one. These don’t represent all the companies in Arkansas who make diversity a priority, but just a sampling from our readers.

DIVERSITY IN THE

WORKPLACE

SAble Life believes in making a meaningful difference in the lives of their customers and employees. They know they are only as strong as their teammates — a wonderfully diverse group. USAble Life celebrates that diversity and the value it brings to their organization. They want all employees to have a seat at the table to create an inclusive workplace for all. USAble Life is making extensive strides in their Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion efforts by establishing an Inclusion Council — co-chaired by Jim Casey, CEO — that is cross-functional, cross-location, crossgenerational, and multicultural. They are driving efforts to improve talent development and increase diversity

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in leadership around a safe and inclusive culture by: • Providing Unconscious Bias Training to 94% of employees with additional training opportunities planned; • Hosting two diversity and inclusion literacy events in 2021 — Juneteenth and What Pride Means to me; • Launching four Employee Resource Groups (ERGs): Black, Disabilities, LGBTQ+ and Women; • Celebrating and recognizing diversity awareness months such as Asian and Pacific Islander American Heritage, Black, Disability Awareness, Diversity, Hispanic Heritage, Native American Heritage, and Women’s History. In addition to the diversity and inclu-

sion efforts internally, USAble Life supports diverse organizations through philanthropy. During 2021 they donated to the following organizations: • Mosaic Templars Cultural Center; • The Trevor Project; • Stop Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) Hate. Through diversity and inclusion learning opportunities, celebrating and recognizing differences, and supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion in other organizations, USAble Life is making a meaningful difference in the lives of their customers, employees, and in their communities. They know that what makes each of us different is what makes us unique and stronger together.

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COMPANY

CITY

MEGA (1,000-PLUS EMPLOYEES) | ARKANSAS BLUE CROSS AND BLUE SHIELD

| WALMART

Little Rock

Bentonville

| SIMMONS BANK

Pine Bluff

| CONWAY REGIONAL HEALTH SYSTEM

Conway

LARGE (251 TO 1,000 EMPLOYEES) | CENTRAL ARKANSAS LIBRARY SYSTEM (CALS)

| USABLE LIFE

Little Rock

| FAB&T — FIRST ARKANSAS BANK AND TRUST

| ARKANSAS UROLOGY

Jacksonville

Little Rock MEDIUM (51 TO 250 EMPLOYEES)

| THADEN SCHOOL

Bentonville

| ENTEGRITY

Little Rock

| ARKANSAS COMMUNITY FOUNDATION (ARCF)

| NEW DOOR REAL ESTATE

Little Rock

Jonesboro SMALL (LESS THAN 50 EMPLOYEES)

| SOUL FISH CAFE

Little Rock

| GALLEY SUPPORT INNOVATIONS

Sherwood

|E K PROFESSIONALS PERMANENT COSMETICS INSTITUTE

| PLUSH HOMES COMPANY REALTORS

| BE ENOUGH NONPROFIT

| UNITED SYSTEMS OF ARKANSAS

| AMR ARCHITECTS

Little Rock

Little Rock North Little Rock Little Rock

Committed to giving you our best. Join us in congratulating Carole Smith, senior vice president, on being named to the “Top Women in Banking” list and Chad Carlson, senior vice president, Simmons Investment Services, on being selected once again as a “Best Financial Advisor.” We are proud of the impact that Carole and Chad make daily for our customers and community. Come in and see what we can do for you.

Carole Smith, Senior Vice President Business Development Officer

Chad Carlson, Senior Vice President Simmons Investment Services

There is strength in our diversity. Simmons Bank is proud to be honored as one of the top three large businesses for “Diversity in the Workplace” by Arkansas Money & Politics. Known for our Better Together culture, we are deeply grateful for the associates whose diverse backgrounds, perspectives and skills help advance our shared vision of seeing those around us prosper.

Whole Person Health. Better Health. Achieving better health for individuals and communities across our great state is a vision we all share. How we feel mentally and emotionally can impact our ability to live a healthy life. Behavioral health conditions such as addiction, anxiety and depression can limit healthy behaviors. This connection between our mental, emotional and social well-being are part of behavioral health and have a direct effect on our physical health. Whether you’re in urban areas around Little Rock or Fayetteville, rural communities across the Delta or anywhere in between, Arkansas Blue Cross is focused on improving the health, security and peace of mind of all we serve because together we can become a healthier Arkansas.

Learn more at hub.arkansasbluecross.com.

00220.01.02-0921

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

HEALTH CARE

The

Siege

By Dwain Hebda Photos by Bryan Clifton

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Jeri Horton, RN, visits a patient in the ICU at UAMS.

ARKANSAS HOSPITALS DIG IN WITH THIRD COVID WAVE ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM

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Larry Shackelford, president and CEO of Washington Regional Medical Center in Fayetteville, balks at the notion of another COVID-19 wave.

There are similarities between the events of 2020 and 2021, sure, but something about the current situation feels a world apart from that of last year. “We’ve been in this pandemic for 18 months. It’s the same pandemic, but it feels different now,” Shackelford said. “It really is almost a new pandemic, I think. It’s happened much more quickly, and the speed of increase was greater, and it happened at a time when everybody was already really tired.” “Tired” is the theme of any conversation about the current state of health care in Arkansas — nay, the nation — and Shackelford’s facility is no exception. He doesn’t have to look far to see the effect of a year and a half of front-line staff holding back the tide with a teacup; he can read it in their body language, see it in their eyes. And, after more than three decades in hospital administration, he finds himself more concerned than he has ever been about the ability of the system to hold the line against a virulent adversary. “What we’re seeing now is, we’re at risk of not

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being able to do some of the core services that our community depends upon because of the demand and the impact of COVID,” he said. “We’re tired of COVID, we’re tired of talking about COVID, but I have never in my career seen a particular crisis that has put at greater risk the overall general health of our community.” The problem is not just an Arkansas one, but that is of small comfort to the local medical community, which for months has been operating in a state at or near the top of infection rates compared to anywhere in the nation. Arkansas’ new cases began surging over the summer, touching off a nearly endless string of reports pointing to high infection rates and a spike in the death toll. As of the end of August, the state’s official COVID total was closing in on 24,000 cases. The pivotal moment came on Aug. 24 when Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced the state had officially run out of ICU beds due to the number of COVID patients, a statistic that was picked up by news outlets around the country. Shackelford said that cataclysmic scenario could easily repeat itself in the future, as managing space needs becomes extremely complicated. “This is a war on COVID, and when you’re doing wartime management, you have to do things differently,” he said. “We’ve got a group of key leaders that meets every morning, first thing. It’s a daily event where we’re trying to look at what is our bed space, what is our staffing? The particular challenge is, we’re not just seeing sick COVID patients, but it also ties to the fact that there were many that put wellness and elective procedures by the wayside last year, and we’re now seeing some of the results of that. People are coming to the ER, and they’re sicker when they get here. “For us, and I think for lots of hospitals in Northwest Arkansas, it’s not just an equation of the number of hospital beds that you have and that you can open. It’s the acuity of both the critical care and COVID. The intensity of the staffing means you can’t open all the physical beds that you’ve got. So, as we’re trying to look down the road, if we see [numbers are] going to continue to grow, then you have to start making decisions that are hard. What are other core parts of our business that we can put back on hold to be able to redeploy those staff to take care of what’s here now?” That alone is enough to demoralize front-line workers, but in this third wave, there are additional factors adding to the decaying morale, administrators said. Arkansas continues to rank near the bot-

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Jeri Horton and fellow UAMS RN Victoria Wilkinson.

tom of states in terms of vaccinations. On Aug. 30, the Mayo Clinic ranked the Natural State 15th lowest for people who have received one dose (53 percent) and 7th lowest for people who are fully vaccinated (41 percent). Mississippi ranks last on both measurements. Thus, said administrators, many caregivers are feeling the additional weight of frustration over dealing with conditions they see as entirely avoidable, if only more people would sit for a vaccine. “That’s another aspect of this that is different today,” said Matt Troup, president and CEO of Conway Regional Health System. “We all had a lot of sympathy and empathy a year ago, because really there was nothing we could do. But today, a lot of our clinicians are so frustrated and puzzled, because this is so preventable if people would just accept the vaccine. For some staff, it’s human nature to not help but feel like all of this is preventable.” Complicating the situation is the high number of health care workers who themselves have not been vaccinated. In June, statistics from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) were released on vaccination rates among front-line workers in 2,500 hospitals nationwide. The numbers showed overall around 25 percent of health care workers with direct contact to patients have not received a single dose of the vaccine as of the end of May. Just in the nation’s 50 largest hospitals, the number was even higher, close to 33 percent.

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The situation led several Arkansas hospitals to make the controversial decision over the summer to require vaccination of its employees, among them Arkansas Heart Hospital, CHI St. Vincent, Arkansas Children’s Hospital, Washington Regional, Mercy Health Systems, Medical Associates of Northwest Arkansas, St. Bernards Healthcare System in Jonesboro and Baptist Memorial Health Care. Conway Regional is also on that list; Troup said the COVID situation is so dire that personal freedoms have to be weighed against the greater good of public health. “I think the one thing I feel like we can do as an organization is mandate the vaccine, because at least I can say that we did all we could to protect ourselves, our patients and our community,” he said. “The data is so incredibly overwhelming that vaccination helps to reduce the severity of illness. There’s a new study coming out about every 12 minutes it

Larry Shackelford

Matt Troup

Stephen Mette

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UAMS registered nurse Haylie Day

“Getting the vaccine could also mean that when your loved one has a heart attack or needs an ICU bed, we’re able to be there for them.” seems like, and no one is refuting the fact that if you get vaccinated, you’re less likely to be hospitalized. And if you are hospitalized, you’re less likely to be put on a vent and die. “Getting the vaccine could also mean that when your loved one has a heart attack or needs an ICU bed, we’re able to be there for them. That’s the disconnect I think the community at large is not seeing; getting the vaccine means that we’re able to take care of other patients. We need to be willing as a community to suspend our individual right to refuse the vaccination for the benefit of the good of helping our fellow neighbor.” The announcement touched off protests in some communities among health care workers being forced to choose between keeping their jobs or maintaining their right to choose. Troup said he expects to lose some workers over the mandate, which

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he finds regrettable. “There is a small minority who have kind of moved on from the clinical argument that the vaccine is unsafe and it’s dangerous and are really getting down more to a rights issue,” he said. “There are going to be staff, I’m sure, that will leave our employ over this, and I hate it because we need them. We’re at a time when we need every hand that we can possibly get. “This morning, as I’m sitting here, we have well over 30 critical care patients, and for a 150-bed hospital, that is a really intense service. People need to realize that the vaccine is the answer to freeing up that bed for their next loved one. We need to get beyond the individual rights issue.” One hospital that is not mandating vaccinations is UAMS, but only because state law prohibits it, said Dr. Stephen “Steppe” Mette, senior vice chan-

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UAMS registered nurse Chad Conder

cellor for UAMS Health and chief executive officer for UAMS Medical Center. He said the hospital is seeking a waiver from that regulation to allow it to require vaccinations among all employees. Without it, he said, COVID variants will continue to escalate and with it, staff burnout or attrition to travel nursing positions, which are generally more lucrative than hospital employment, ultimately compromising hospitals’ ability to deliver care. “We’ve had enough time as a society, as the public, as a community, to do the right thing,” he said. “We already went into the pandemic with a nursing and respiratory therapist and technician shortage in Arkansas, certainly at UAMS. And the degree of illness and how full our hospitals are and the severity of illness and what we’re asking our health care providers to do, I think will indeed result in more great nurses, great health care professionals leaving the profession because of fatigue, burnout and frustration. “I’ve never seen, in my 35 years in health care, the

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number of providers and health care professionals who are demoralized and frustrated to the point of disenchantment with the profession, based so much on the certainty this third wave could have been prevented by the public adhering to public health measures — getting vaccinated, mask wearing, et cetera. All the hard work that went into the first and second waves through the first year of the pandemic feels, not wasted, but why are we still doing this? That demoralization, that disenfranchisement, is extremely worrisome.” In the meantime, Mette said the hospital continues to do what it can to provide for the physical and mental health and well-being of its front-line staff, something that grows harder with rising infection rates and growing employment vacancies. “We try to emphasize with our staff that they need to take care of themselves. We, as an organization, try to do things that will emphasize the need for wellness and resilience,” he said. “We are trying to address some compensation issues and bonus pay, which is a double-edged sword — incentivizing individuals to work more because of our staffing shortage just leads to more burnout. “We have not instituted any kind of requests not to go on vacation, like we did in the first part of the pandemic. We have not put requests for leave on hold during this third wave. We do value that time off, and I think that is helping, but it’s insufficient.” At this, Mette paused, searching for the words to continue. Like all hospital chief executives, his is the challenge of leading a team into daily battle against an enemy hydra, feeding them on small victories and scant hope, working desperately to preserve them to fight another day. It’s a mission that often pits his charges against their own instincts. “You know the old adage, ‘Physician, heal thyself,’” he said. “Well, not only physicians, but other health care workers are really not the best at making sure they take care of themselves, because they’re so mission-driven. They’re in the profession to take care of others, often at the expense of their own health and their own happiness. “Our providers, our nurses, our respiratory specialists, our technicians, our physicians have really become experts in taking care of COVID-19 patients, as evidenced by our mortality rates continuing to go down at UAMS. We’ve become experts, but it comes at a toll. It has been an 18-month marathon, and people are worn out.”

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MENTAL HEALTH

IN THE WORKPLACE By Bruce Trimble

Since 2020, Americans have adapted to a pandemic that impacted nearly every aspect of life, from work and school to everyday activities like getting groceries and even our wardrobes. Whether employees are working remotely or in person, COVID-19 has also impacted the mental health of employers and employees. Additionally, the unemployment rate increased to 14.7 percent in April 2020 and has yet to return to its 3.5 percent pre-pandemic rate. Source: “The Employment Situation - November 2020.” Bls.gov, Bureau of Labor Statistics, www.bls.gov/ news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf

environment for employees with mental illness. • The majority of employees surveyed are seeking new employment opportunities. Source: https://mhanational.org/research-reports/2021-mind-workplace-report

IMPACT OF THE PANDEMIC ON MENTAL HEALTH OF EMPLOYEES In 2021, Mental Health America (MHA) published its third annual Work Health Survey which measured the perceptions of over 5,000 employees across 17 industries in the U.S. The report yields insights into how we may better understand the mental health challenges employees were and are experiencing during the pandemic. Survey questions measured financial insecurity, burnout, supervisor support, workplace stress, and mental illness. The findings of the survey are alarming. Financial Insecurity • Employees who report earning an annual income of less than $60,000 are concerned about their finances. • Nearly 2 in 3 employees cannot save for an emergency. • About 1 in 3 employees cannot afford their healthcare costs. Employee Burnout • Most employees are experiencing the early signs of burnout. • Employees experiencing exhaustion, an early sign of burnout, report that workplace stress affects their mental health. • Nearly 1 in 4 employees experienced the more severe signs of burnout, including reduced production and cynicism towards coworkers and their jobs. Supervisor Support • Employees are not receiving adequate support from supervisors to help manage stress. • Employees who cannot talk to their supervisors about job stressors are less likely to perceive their workplace as a safe environment for employees who live with mental illnesses. • Employers who do not provide and educate employees about mental health resources are less likely to be perceived as a safe environment for employees who live with mental illnesses. • Employees who feel acknowledged at work are less likely to seek out other employment opportunities. Workplace Stress and Mental Illness • Nearly 9 in 10 employees report that their workplace stress affects their mental health. • Over 65 percent of employees find it difficult to concentrate because of their work environment, compared to 46 percent of respondents in 2018. • Nearly 3 in 5 employees feel that their employer does not provide a safe

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EMPLOYERS ARE TALKING ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH But there is good news! In January of this year, the American Psychological Association reported that employers are talking about employee mental health more than before. Even pre-pandemic, employers were learning to be more proactive in identifying symptoms of depression, anxiety, and other disorders. According to a 2020 survey by Business Group on Health, nearly half of large employers trained their managers to recognize such issues, and an additional 18 percent planned to begin to do so in 2021. Plus, 54 percent of employers planned to offer free or low-cost virtual mental health visits in 2021. Sources: https://www.apa.org/monitor/2021/01/trends-employers-support

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https://www.businessgrouphealth.org/en/who-we-are/newsroom/press-releases/ large-us-employers-accelerating-adoption-of-virtual-care-mental-health-servicesfor-2021 Paying more attention to employee mental health is an essential first step because so much of what contributes to employee stress can be addressed in the following ways: • Employers can make employee mental health a priority. • They can encourage people to talk about it. • They can build supports for both in-person, hybrid, and fully remote workforces. Here are some tactics to address each of the stressors outlined in the Work Health Survey: Work Collaboratively to Improve Financila Insecurity MHA asserts that both federal and state governments must work collaboratively to enforce meaningful change in minimum wage and income equality policy to ensure all people feel financially secure, especially in a traumatic event or emergency such as a global pandemic. Source: https://mhanational.org/sites/default/files/MTW_Report_2021.pdf Address Early Signs of Employee Burnout For employees experiencing exhaustion, supervisors should assist employees with managing or adjusting their workload. In addition, interventions could include supervisors encouraging employees to take a personal day or plan a vacation to recharge. Employees often express concern about not being able to take needed time off when handling an unmanageable workload. Consider the source for late stages of burnout. For employees experiencing cynicism or reduced professional efficacy, interventions could include a change in supervisors, teams, or projects or seeking out other positions or responsibilities within the company. Share stress management information during orientation. New employee orientation and onboarding are opportunities to share the importance of managing stress and balancing work-life demands. In addition, educate new employees about company policies and resources that support employee mental health. Inform employees of policies and programs. Education about stress management and burnout prevention should be an ongoing part of staff communication. Send written or verbal reminders to staff about the resources that support mental health, and encourage employees to use available benefits, such as Employee Assistance Programs or paid time off. Be Supportive Regular check-ins with employees can help supervisors better understand their needs and provide the appropriate support. In addition, regular supervisor check-ins should emphasize bi-directional feedback, acknowledge employees’ efforts, and provide emotional support. If an employee expresses a mental health concern, here’s how the supervisor can start the conversation: • Ask appropriate open-ended questions. • Actively listen with complete attention to the employee. • Recognize their feelings and express understanding back to them. • Encourage them to use the company’s mental health resources. Supervisors should negotiate realistic expectations and strategize how to best meet these expectations under the given circumstances in collaboration with employees. In terms of employee output, focus on goals accomplished rather than hours logged. Being patient and flexible as a supervisor can mean

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a lot for employees struggling with their mental health. According to MHA’s Mind the Workplace 2018 Report, having positive relationships with coworkers and supervisors is the top reason employees feel satisfied at work. Connection is critical, and supervisors can help facilitate how employees stay connected in a virtual work environment. Aspire to be empathetic. Empathy is defined as the ability to understand and share feelings. Allegedly, empathy cannot be taught, but it can be inspired. At The BridgeWay, demonstrating empathy is at the core of our values in providing quality care and supporting our employees. Video: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1204720049563971 Talk About Mental Illness According to MHA, employers that acted with transparency and flexibility likely experienced a smoother transition during the pandemic than companies that did not consider workplace culture, especially in high-stress or remote work environments. To provide a safe and welcoming environment for employees who live with mental illnesses, employers should consider: •H iring and training supervisors to feel comfortable providing emotional support. •E ncouraging employees to talk to their supervisors about changing job stressors. •E ncouraging supervisors to check in with employees regularly. •P roviding proper recognition to employees for their efforts. •P roviding additional resources for emotional support. • Practice and demonstrate self-care. For more information about how to promote a supportive workplace, please visit MHA’s website at www.mhanational.org/workplace Self-Care is Trending One of the positive outcomes of the pandemic is that people are exploring self-care more than ever. For example, a May 11, 2020 Tweet by Google Search Trends revealed that selfcare was at an all-time high. Specifically, the number of searches for “self-care” has more than doubled since 2015. Given the stigma associated with mental illness and the treatment thereof, it is encouraging that more people are paying attention to their mental health. I hope we can continue that trend as the pandemic continues and eventually subsides. Sources: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=self-care&geo=US Considering that nearly one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness, employers cannot afford to ignore the financial impact that mental health has on the workplace. Source: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/mentalillness#:~:text=Mental%20illnesses%20are%20common%20in,(51.5%20million%20in%202019).

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HEALTH CARE

RECONNECTING THE DISCONNECTED

Ken Clark believes employers can help with mental health toll from COVID By Carl Kozlowski

he past 18 months have been undeniably tough on American society, with more than 37 million people having suffered on some level from COVID-19 and more than 600,000 deaths attributed to it. But the mental health toll likely is even more widespread, as forced lockdowns and isolation dramatically increased domestic abuse cases and addictions nationwide. Now that the business world is striving to recover and figure out the best way forward for productivity, employers and employees alike have to deal with a fresh set of issues. Thankfully, there are plenty of skilled mental health professionals available to help guide them through the emotionally arduous journey. As CEO of Chenal Family Therapy, Ken Clark, MA, LMFT, is a key figure in the Little Rock mental health industry, having received the Mentoring Excellence Award from The Investment News. “We’re in the middle of a thing that is being referred to as the ‘Great Resignation,’ where we are seeing folks as the world reopens not just changing jobs, but changing careers,” Clark said. “They got a taste of what life could be like with better work, life balance, things like that. You know, that kind of facing death and mortality, all that kind of stuff, has made them really rethink. “So I think broadly we’re going to see a bunch of turnover, which is going to be tough on businesses but probably great for employees in a lot of ways mentally and financially.” One major issue that Clark anticipates workforces facing is a sense of disconnect. Because even if they’re in the office, workers are expected to remain distant from one another. With the basic human need for contact and interaction stifled, workers feel isolation, and this can result in dimin-

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ished loyalty. “This has probably lowered work drama in some ways, but it’s also resulted in a lower work connection, which makes people think they don’t have a work family,” he noted. “So overall, the apathy about jobs, the angst about jobs, the sense of wasted time, the sense of being stuck in a dead-end job, those things have all ramped up and are also leading people to and especially workers to action. “I think employers are living in fear right now. If they enforce masks and vaccines, then employees that are already on the fence about leaving may tip over.” Clark noted that Chenal Family Therapy is seeing “a huge spike in alcohol and other substance use,” and feels this is stemming from people being stuck at home. After all, it’s much easier to access a liquor cabinet in the house than to have a drink at the office, and families being forced to be around each other 24 hours a day creates a pressure-cooker atmosphere. As a result, Chenal’s 200-member staff has been handling a tidal wave of new patients in addition to its sizable base of longterm clients. Clark calculates that it provided 100,000 hours of mental health service in the past year, and that client numbers have risen to 50 percent more than prepandemic levels. But there are changes in the way those services are rendered. “We are noticing that the traditional 60-minute therapy session is a little outmoded in this environment and that there’s a lot of people who just need to jump on a Zoom call for 15 minutes,” he said. “We can give you a tool to go try with your family and then you go back to it. And so, I think we’re seeing a very needed shift away from the expectation of all therapy as an hour long, and the therapists love it.” Another important consideration is finding a way to fit an appropriate amount

of play into work life amid all the current stress. Without office pranks and water cooler gossip as part of people’s daily lives, people are getting fed up with interacting primarily via Zoom. “If I would push employers towards anything, it would be to figure out how to help your people play right now, collectively or individually,” Clark said. “If you can do that, they’re going to be super appreciative and will continue to feel bonded to one another.” To maintain healthy work environments, Clark recommends that employers have care coordinators who check in with each employee individually. He also believes the old notions of what constitutes a “normal” workplace no longer apply. “I don’t think things will return to normal because we are in a new normal,” he said. “Everything that I’m hearing says that this is another six to 12 months, you know, of some kind of major impact from the delta variant and these different things. It takes 30 days to build a habit, and we’ve had 400 days of this. “We need to think about the good things we started doing during this period and remember to continue those, whether it’s family dinners or walking your dog in the morning instead of just running out the door for work. We encourage everyone to sit down and dream about what is worth fighting for.”

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SUPPORTING MENTAL HEALTH IN THE WORKPLACE Nearly one in five adults lives with a mental illness. Employers can’t afford to ignore the financial impact mental health has on the workplace. Absenteeism, lost productivity, decreased retention = $$$$ The BridgeWay is here to assist you.

1-800-245-0011 *National Institute of Mental Health, 2019

Monthly Mental Health Tip: Make reasonable adjustments.

For more tips on how to promote mental health at work, visit our LinkedIn via QR code.

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Quality Care Rooted in Arkansas

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Customized physical, occupational and speech therapy programs are conducted by licensed therapists who focus on improving mobility and motor skills following an injury or illness. The enrichment of daily physical function can significantly improve a resident’s selfreliance and overall happiness. Our staff provides residents with specially tailored treatment plans designed to recapture health, independent living and facilitate a return home. Jamestown features separate rooms and private suites with a private entrance for the comfort and convenience of shortterm residents and their families focused on returning home. A full meal service with snacks is prepared daily.

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

STARTUPS

VENTURE CENTER ACCELERATOR PROGRAMS

BOOSTING FINTECH SPACE By Emily Beirne // Photos by Jon Yoder

Wayne Miller, executive director of The Venture Center; Collins Andrews, FIS executive in residence at The Venture Center; and Daniel Schutte, managing director, accelerator programs, The Venture Center.

etting off on the right foot is undoubtedly a science, especially when it comes to starting a business. The right resources, a solid plan of action and experience are only a few components that entrepreneurs must consider when taking that jump into the business world as a startup. And given how long it can take to become an established and respectable brand, it’s no wonder that some individuals with million-dollar ideas might shy away from taking that next step. Arkansas is lucky to be the home to one of the most innovative entrepreneurial resource centers in the country. The Venture Center, located in Little Rock, provides startups with the opportunity to strengthen their concepts and make lasting connections in their prospective industries through specialized programs. SE PT E M B E R 2 02 1

The FIS Fintech and ICBA (Independent Community Bankers of America) ThinkTECH accelerators at The Venture Center both promote the growth of startups in the financial sectors. FIS brings the entire package right to the fintechaffiliated entrepreneurs with bankers, financial executives and experts in the field for presentations and advice. Likewise, ICBA ThinkTech provides fintech entrepreneurs with mentorship from experts and access to the ICBA executive network. But that’s not all — the ICBA ThinkTech Accelerator is the only community bankfocused fintech accelerator in the world, and it’s right here in the Natural State. Executive Director Wayne Miller said The Venture Center has roughly 10 community programs held monthly or bimonthly mixed in with yearly programs 74

that focus on bringing entrepreneurs together with pitches and structured mentorships. “We create programs to help keep people connected and help keep them stay on top of the available resources,” he said. “The Venture Center just tries to grow the entire entrepreneurial ecosystem, and we try to connect entrepreneurs with corporate partners or government partners or whatever or whoever is needed. We love it because we can help move things forward while working with really amazing entrepreneurs.” The amount of interaction and assistance entrepreneurs and businesses receive from the accelerator programs is unmatched. The programs typically span around 12 weeks and require entrepreneurs to push their ideas and learn. But Miller has witnessed time and again how much exposure the businesses are able to receive, and he believes the benefits of this exposure in the long run are immeasurable. “When people participate in the accelerator, they’re getting a chance to interact with mentors, they’re getting a chance to share ideas amongst themselves, they’re getting stretched in terms of process and learning skill sets about marketing, sales, finance, etc.,” Miller said. “The big difference for us is the way we go about providing connections. If these companies were to go out on the street tomorrow and they wanted to meet with 125 banks, the opportunity for them to do that would take them years. But through the accelerator, this is possible to accomplish in at least one month to 12 weeks.” Countless businesses and entrepreneurs have applied and journeyed through the accelerator programs. FIS

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Venture Center team members (from left) Michelle Anderson, Hamza Qadir, Anneliese Armstrong, Pierce Sloane, Daniel Schutte, Wayne Miller, Mimi San Pedro, Collins Andrews and Becky Pittman.

Nick Sky, co-founder of ChangED, at the 2019 FIS program.

“Demo Day” in August 2021 featured a few alumni businesses that had completed the program. The businesses were able to present their concepts and show their growth. One such growth-stage company from the 2021 FIS Fintech Accelerator is Little Rock’s BankLabs, led by Matt Johnner. BankLabs is a lending company that offers assistance to the community-oriented banking industry. “At BankLabs, we like to position ourselves as a friendly fintech, here to help banks elevate with new technology,” he said. “Our two products help banks increase efficiency and save time by being available on mobile devices and making everything automatic. Through the accelerator, we worked on our second product, Participate. Participate automates how banks work on loans together. This helps banks make customers happy by closing in days rather than months with e-signature automated workflow and electronic documents.” Through the program, BankLabs was able to put its second product through the wringer — it was laid out before experts and potential clients who came up with ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM

ideas to make the product more effective. Johnner explained: “The Venture Center organized calls between us and FIS clients where we received feedback after each and every demo. So, after 25 minutes of conversation on the demo with a bank, The Venture Center speaks with the banking client in a five-minute, rapidfire session: What do you think is going to fit? Would you recommend any changes? What do you think about their choice model? And then on a weekly call-in, they would read back the feedback from all those different banks along the way for that prior week, and that was helpful. “There were so many helpful points. The meetings with banks for rapid, iterative feedback on how we’re perceived and therefore can improve, and then the elevated status within the FIS executive space, which ultimately will help us with 75

distribution partnerships leveraging their brand and their distribution network, to name a few.” Teslar, a fintech lending company based in Springdale, is an ICBA ThinkTech Accelerator program alumnus. Its mission is to improve the efficiency ratios in banks by simplifying the exception tracking methods. The company uses advanced software and innovative approaches to help financial institutions strengthen their operational systems. Much like BankLabs, Teslar went into the accelerator with the goal of building connections and hearing firsthand from bankers about its business model and what could be improved. Teslar’s Colin Savells said the firm applied for the ICBA ThinkTech Accelerator after The Venture Center approached its chairman and CEO, Joe Ehrhardt. SE PTE M B E R 2021

“Every time we have an accelerator event, the program brings in visitation, food, lodging, air travel and participation from the fintech visitors, and all of that adds up to about a million dollars for the state.”

“The experience was empowering, to say the least,” Savells said. “All the bankers we spoke with, the connections we made with other companies and clients and the feedback we received, all helped us push further. The relationship Teslar has with The Venture Center is long-term, more of a partnership now.” The impact of the connections made and partnerships formed through the programs applies to not only fintech companies and The Venture Center, but among the alumni firms, who may have completed the programs at different times. BankLabs Marketing Coordinator Felecia Hancock said, “The Venture Center has also been trying to build its alumni of fintech companies who have been through the program and connecting them with one another. When you first look at the program, it just looks like a 10week course. The programs are, of course, very valuable, but I think that it’s especially unique that The Venture Center has worked on how to prolong those relationships past the 10 weeks and make the relationships really work for the cohort members.” SE PT E M B E R 2 02 1

The Venture Center has recently announced the Spark! program to cater to small businesses looking to dip their toes into an accelerator program but at a different scale. Referred to as a “pre-accelerator” program, Spark! is designed to help local entrepreneurs get in touch with the right connections and opportunities to take their small business to the next level. Much like the FIS Fintech and ICBA ThinkTech, it will use mentorship and demos along with group sessions, expertled workshops plus the chance to win cash prizes in a pitch contest. Spark!, FIS Fintech and ICBA ThinkTech represent application-based programs. Savells believes they are worth every second. “Apply, apply, apply. There is no other program like this that will help move your business forward. The feedback, face time with experts in your industry and lasting relationships are invaluable,” he said. The programs have not only helped aspiring entrepreneurs and businesses looking for growth but also boosted the outlook for Arkansas to become a larger global presence in the startup world. The 76

Venture Center has turned Arkansas into a one-of-a-kind resource for fintech companies to explore and branch their roots. “Every time we have an accelerator event, the program brings in visitation, food, lodging, air travel and participation from the fintech visitors, and all of that adds up to about a million dollars for the state,” Miller said. “And then, of course, we’ve had a handful of companies out of the accelerator programs that have come through our program and decide to make Arkansas, specifically Little Rock, their own and move their headquarters here. So, we’re continuously working on ways to amplify our state and bring in more companies that will want to stay here.” Becky Pittman, The Venture Center’s director of communications and brand engagement, said the programs shine a positive light on the state. “There are definitely eyes on Arkansas,” she said. “When judges, leaders and influencers visit the state, they thoroughly enjoy their stay because our entire community pulls together and welcomes our visitors with open arms. Arkansas is seen in a very good light.” ARM ON E YA N D P OL ITIC S.COM

WINDOW ROCK

If you’re searching for adventure, you don’t have to look far. Just hop in the car and chances are you’ll find things to see, do and explore, just a few miles up the road. Get trip ideas at Arkansas.com. arkansas.com

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

SMALL BUSINESS

REIMAGINING DOWNTOWN

ROGERS

Entertainment district brings new excitement to community By Kayla McCall

he Railyard Entertainment District, new to the city of Rogers, represents an effort to strengthen the downtown area. Local businesses, such as Club Frisco, The Foreman and Parkside Public, are cultivating excitement for the district’s potential moving forward. Opened this past June, the Rogers Railyard District resides on roughly five blocks throughout the east side of downtown Rogers. With its many stores and restaurants, the district brings attractions allowing patrons to enjoy downtown in a new way. Sitting right in front of the train tracks, the district promises to be a regional attraction joining other NWA landmarks located in Rogers, such as the Walmart AMP open-air concert venue, Pinnacle Country Club, Beaver Lake and the Daisy Airgun Museum. The city is growing right along with the Northwest Arkansas region. In August, its school district was named the best employer in the state by Forbes, and Rogers now is home to three public high schools (Rogers High, Heritage High and

Rogers New Tech High.) The latest 2021 estimates have Rogers approaching a population of 71,000. And though residents may be divided by high school loyalty, downtown offers a distinct community connection. But while neighboring cities like Bentonville and Fayetteville saw significant transformation or activity in recent years, downtown Rogers remained the same. But city officials began to see downtown’s potential as new businesses moved in. Peter Masonis, public relations manager for the city, said, “The city of Rogers was hoping that the Railyard Entertainment District would come to fruition for the past few years as part of an effort to help revitalize downtown.” Bentonville and Fayetteville may attract more traffic than Rogers, but the city has been taking notice. The new entertainment district, opened in June, allows for alcoholic beverages to be carried openly throughout the district, and it’s helping draw new visitors and promote new downtown attractions. After purchasing a wristband from a participating business, district patrons of legal drinking age can carry and consume

The latest 2021 estimates have Rogers approaching a population of 71,000. And though residents may be divided by high school loyalty, downtown offers a distinct community connection.

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Business has been good in the district, evidenced by a recent line wrapped around the building at Ozark Beer Co. (Photo provided)

Rogers city officials believe the entertainment district will help spur downtown revitalization. ARM O N E YA ND P O L I T I C S .COM (Photo provided)

alcohol within district boundaries Monday through Friday from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Beverages must be purchased at participating district businesses and consumed from compostable district cup. In addition to the entertainment district, the Railyard offers activities for all ages. Families can enjoy a playground and splash pad, and live concerts are held each weekend. The district also is near the Lake Atalanta bike trails and the Railyard Bike Park. The Walton Family Foundation has had its hand in the shaping a major part of Northwest Arkansas. From Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville to the area’s worldrenowned bike trails and the Razorback Regional Greenway, the foundation is investing in its larger home community including Rogers. The city is working with the foundation’s Northwest Arkansas Design Excellence Program to promote a high level of design throughout Benton and Washington counties. The Railyard Bike Park is part of this effort to rebrand downtown Rogers. The focus on downtown is helping grow a sense of distinct community

SMALL BUSINESS

in Rogers, according to Jeremy Pate, senior program officer with the Walton Family Foundation, which supports local communities. “The park exemplifies how collaborations between cities and Northwest Arkansas Design Excellence Program can leverage diverse perspectives and experiences that result in public spaces where everyone feels welcomed,” he said. “Railyard Park will help foster community connections, economic vitality and vibrancy in downtown Rogers.” Fifteen businesses are participating as part of the entertainment district — Ozark Beer Co., Havana Tropical Grill, Yeyo’s Mezcaleria Taqueria, The Foreman, Onyx Coffee Lab, Moonbroch Brewing Co., Hapa’s Hawaiian Bar & Grill, Victory Theater, Parkside Public, The Rail Pizza Co., Levi’s Gastrolounge,

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Iron Horse Coffee Co., Club Frisco, Las Palmas and Butterfield Stage. Business owners agree that increased foot traffic brings a new positivity to the downtown area. Masonis said feedback from businesses so far has been encouraging. Marty Shutter, marketing director for Ozark Beer Co., said the addition of the entertainment district has resulted in an “amazing” transformation. “Most of us live in or near downtown, so we’re both personally excited for the amazing things happening in our front yard, but also excited to see the influx of people taking in downtown Rogers for the first time,” he said. That is happening more and more. Ozark Beer Co. has seen increased traffic and retail sales since the district opened. “We benefit directly from more and

more people who come downtown and discover our beer, purchasing from us and hopefully soon from a local restaurant or liquor store,” Shutter said. “We’re finding that people make an entire night or day out of enjoying downtown Rogers, so that increased and repeat traffic is a huge boon to our business.” Since the pandemic hit, supporting local businesses has become a priority across the country. Shutter said his business is feeling a sense of gratitude towards its home city. “OBC is inseparable from the community that supports us, and it’s important to us that we are not only giving back but actively engaged in creating and fostering that community which makes Rogers such a wonderful place to live and work,” Shutter said. Masonis said it’s too early to determine just how district businesses’ bottom lines will be impacted, but he noted that there’s an excitement in seeing Rogers residents and visitors enjoying downtown in a new way. “The eagerness to be a part of revitalizing downtown is tangible,” he said. “Patrons have benefited from getting a drink and heading outside to enjoy the music from Butterfield Stage or congregating in Frisco Plaza on a nice evening. This has all created a spark of excitement in downtown that we look forward to seeing grow even further.”

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Power

WOMEN 2021 Spotlighting Arkansas women who are setting themselves apart in the world of business and politics.

NOMINATIONS OPEN NOW!

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

THE GIFT THAT KEEPS ON GIVING When you buy a hunting and

ARKANSAS GAME

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FISH COMMISSION

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

DIGS OF THE DEAL

Ghosts

of the

Camden’s McCollum-Chidester House a Living History

Past

By Katie Zakrzewski Photos by Glendle Griggs

ne of the most pivotal wars in the history of the United States was the Civil War, and one of the most important strongholds in the South was located in the business-savvy town of Camden, Arkansas. The trading center for southern Arkansas because of the Ouachita River and steamboat service from New Orleans, the city of Camden presented an economic and geographic advantage to whichever side held it. But one of the most important buildings in Camden during the turnover of military hands from the Confederate to the Union army was the McCollum-Chidester House, located on historic Washington Street. Which, by the way, many say is visited by the ghosts of the city’s past. The history of the McCollum-Chidester House predates the Civil War. “The McCollum-Chidester House was built in 1847 by business man and merchant, Peter McCollum, who was from South Carolina. McCollum and his six children lived in the house. He and his family contributed to the growth and prosperity of Camden and by 1860, it was the second largest town in Arkansas,” wrote Glendle Griggs, a board member of the Ouachita County Historical Society, to AMP.

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The McCollum-Chidester House is located in Camden’s historic district.

“The McCollum family hosted many famous visitors to Camden, including politicians, steamboat captains, ministers, prospective business owners, and brought education and culture to Camden.” The Arkansas Gazette described the home in an article from 1934, noting a host of notable guests in the house: “Culture and hospitality were among Mr. McCollum’s largest contributions to Camden’s early days. He built a home for his family, fitting it with every convenience procurable at that time. Wallpaper was unknown in Camden until 1857 when Mr. McCollum imported some of a dull grey design from New York City for the parlor walls of his house. In that same year he brought from New York for his home the first cast iron cooking stove in Camden, a luxury

Folks still live in the house — folks from a century and a half ago.

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and a novelty. Illustrious men and women of the times were guests and visitors at the hospitable McCollum home, including Gen. Albert Pike, General Royston, Judge Edward Cross, Judge Somerville, Hon. J.K. Jones, Judge Lewis B. Fort, Capt. Len Moore, Capt. John W. Tobin, Capt. Lloyd Tilghman, Gen. John Dockery, the Rev. William Stout, who established St. John’s parish in 1859; Father Martin, a Roman Catholic missionary and Bishop Capers. Brilliant eve-

SE PTE M B E R 2021

“ The McCollum family hosted many famous visitors to Camden, including politicians, steamboat captains, ministers, prospective business owners, and brought education and culture to Camden.”

ning parties were given at the McCollum home.” Griggs emphasized the importance of the city’s location for travel and economics. “You could travel from New Orleans, bringing supplies and goods on a luxury steamboat in just three days, and ship cotton, agriculture, woods and other manufactured products on the return trip to New Orleans.” Danny Harrell of the Ouachita County Historical Society Museum, office manager at the McCollum-Chidester House, concurred. “The McCollum-Chidester House is located right on the edge of the historical district. Of all of these historic homes, our house was the oldest house in Camden. The house helped build up business because it lodged important business people and industries. Butterfield Stagecoach Operations’ headquarters moved here in 1863.” Camden was as pivotal to the state’s development as the McCollum-Chidester House was pivotal to Camden’s. In 1863, John T. Chidester became the second owner of the historic home. “Chidester purchased the home from McCollum in 1863 for $10,000 in gold. The Civil War was in progress, and McCollum was pretty wise in not accepting payment in [Confederate] money,” Harrell said. Chidester’s past would end up playing a pivotal role in the way that he helped shape the city. Chidester was born in 1816 in Middlefield, New York, and found a job at an early age with the Robertson Circus, caring for its animals. This job is where he discovered his love for horses. At age 16, Chidester began driving a stagecoach from Washington, D.C., to Cincinnati. Later in life, he moved to Tuscumbia, Ala., to start his own stagecoach line, where he carried both passengers and U.S. mail, which created a profitable business. He was a major contributor

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Danny Harrell shows off a restored Chidester Stage Lines coach, on display at the McCollum-Chidester House.

Shreveport with 12,000 Union troops but frequently found himself encountering Confederate resistance. This series of skirmishes and the troop exchange of Camden became known as the Red River Campaign of the Civil War. As supplies dwindled, Steele decided to regroup in Camden in 1864 for 11 days. The McCollum-Chidester House was initially occupied by Confederate Gen. Sterling Price. “Union forces soon entered the town to use as a resting spot,” Harrell explained. “They didn’t destroy anything here and sent scouting parties east and west trying to find supplies. People moved everything out of stores because they knew troops were coming.” Outnumbered, the Confederate troops retreated to the outskirts of town while Union troops occupied Camden. Bullet holes and damage by cannon fire can still be seen in

in the John Butterfield Overland Mail Company (1858-1861) as a subcontractor for Butterfield to transport mail across Arkansas from Memphis to Fort Smith. Chidester began operating his stagecoach lines in Arkansas in 1858, but he and his family did not move to Camden until 1863. When Chidester purchased the house from McCollum, he and his wife remodeled the home by adding two more bedrooms and enlarging the dining room. Two of Chidester’s sons would die defending the Confederacy, not far from the house where they grew up. Shortly after the home remodeling was completed, the Civil War would change the face of the McCollum-Chidester House’s history and leave the paranormal behind with it. As Union troops occupied Little Rock, the Confederate rendezvous point was moved to the west of Camden. Union Gen. Frederick Steele began to make his way to

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

The McCollum-Chidester House has hosted state dignitaries, campaigning Union generals and some say, still harbors ghosts.

the McCollum-Chidester House. “The house was the first on the outside of Camden that troops would have encountered. They wanted officers to stay in the houses because families would feed and shelter them, but nothing was destroyed. The officers were being treated well,” Harrell said. “As long as there was a Union officer in the house, there were no problems. “A story passed down through word of mouth in the city is that some Union troops raided the nearby smoke house, and they stole as much meat as they could carry. When the officers in the house were told by residents about what had happened, the supplies were promptly returned.” After 11 days, with no luck of finding supplies outside of the town, the starving Union troops decided to return to Little Rock. During the Civil War years, there was little to no stage-

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coach business for Chidester. After the war ended, he rebuilt his stagecoach operation with one particularly successful line that stretched 1,560 miles from Fort Worth to Yuma. After the railroads began making a major impact in the transportation sector, Chidester sold his business in 1881 as four different railroads passed through Camden. The house was purchased by the Ouachita County Historical Society along with all of the belongings inside. But Harrell said that folks still live in the house — folks from a century and a half ago. Officers stayed in the east bedroom of the house during the Civil War, and it’s assumed that Gen. Steele did as well. In the mirror on one of the dressers, called the cathedral dresser, is where the house’s first recorded paranormal activity took place. “Photographer Elmer Lee did a photo shoot in the

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“We had placed some Civil War swords from our collection on the dresser, and there was lots of activity near the dresser. At the end of the investigation, a spirit was later caught on an SLS camera at the foot of the bed in the room, and it appeared to be holding on to the bedpost.”

A mid-19th century fire extinguisher sits next to a modern version.

minutes,” Harrell said. “We had placed some Civil War swords from our collection on the dresser, and there was lots of activity near the dresser. At the end of the investigation, a spirit was later caught on an SLS camera at the foot of the bed in the room, and it appeared to be holding on to the bedpost.” Harrell reassured AMP that the entities that still occupy the McCollum-Chidester House are friendly and pop in sometimes to say hello. Today, Harrell gives tours of the McCollum-Chidester House Wednesday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. He’s eager to share the house’s history with the rest of the Natural State. And there is plenty of history to share: the McCollum-Chidester House summarizes the history of Camden with its age, elegance and pivotal role in Arkansas’ past.

house during the late 1980’s. After receiving the developed film back, a photo showed a person in the mirror wearing military clothing — tall boots, pants tucked down into the boots and a possible sword or sabre by his side,” Harrell explained. “It is unknown if this is a Union or Confederate soldier. This was before photoshop technology, and the photographer was wearing tennis shoes and coveralls that particular day. The museum manager was also present in the room.” Harrell explained that multiple paranormal investigations have taken place ever since. “In a November 2020 paranormal investigation by Natural State Paranormal, they set up cameras and their equipment in [the east bedroom with the cathedral mirror]. In three hours of video recording, orbs and anomalies were present in the room for a span of about three

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SE PTE M B E R 2021

BACK

IN Travis Hill

BUSINE

LR’s venerable White Water Tavern predates ‘dive-bar cool’ By Kelley Bass Photography by Rebecca Fellers

ravis Hill wasn’t in the market to buy a bar. Far, far from it. But the White Water Tavern, which reopened in August, isn’t your run-of-the-mill bar. Far, far from it. “This is like a church for me,” Hill said as we sit at a table in the venerable tavern at Seventh and Thayer in Little Rock. The White Water, which closed for 17 months in March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, has been around so long there was no such thing as “zoning” when it opened as The Pitcher in the 1940s. Thus, its position as the only commercial establishment in a humble residential neighborhood hard by the railroad tracks. “I heard the White Water was for sale; I got a note from a friend of mine,” Hill said. “Word was an investment group wanted to buy it and knock it down.” That worrisome news lit a fire under Hill, but, “I thought the buck would stop when I went home, but within an hour my wife [Natalee Miller] said, ‘Let’s do it.’ Matt [White, the co-owner at the time] took me to lunch and said, ‘Do you know what you’re getting into?’ But this place has given me so much, I felt like I have to give back.” A long time ago in a life far, far away from the one he leads now, Hill — single at the time — lived “at the end of Dennison,” a short walk from the WWT, a Little Rock institution. He was there often, he said. And he got ingrained in the fabric of the place, what he calls the “Mattmosphere,” in homage to his friend, Matt White. Long before he became the owner, Hill was famous for his three-day “Holiday Hangout” festivals at the WWT, which bring artists it’s hard to believe would play 79-person rooms. (Keep reading for more on Hill’s background and the HH shows.) Hill knew the only way he would undertake this project was as the majority owner — “outside people wanted to be partners, but I’ve been in business before, and 505 partnerships mean the boat is going to sink” — and only if he could build a world-class team. That starts with Matt White, who wasn’t prepared to

SMALL BUSINESS remain an owner but whose heart is still very much in the place and who continues to book the stellar music the WWT is famous for. Says Hill: “Matt is handling all the music; Jordan Trotter is our sound man; Kevin Creasy is the bar manager; and Mike Meza, who has bartended all over town, is going to be the main guy behind the bar. “Shane Clinton, who was at Four Quarter, [on Main Street in North Little Rock] will be running the kitchen. So, if we’re open, people know they can get a really good cheeseburger.” Besides resurrecting the kitchen as an in-house operation, Hill knew there were several other things he needed and wanted to do differently than past owners. For one thing, he really wanted to be the “owner.” The last several operators — every one of them since Larry “Goose” Garrison left — only leased the place, first from Garrison and then from his family. So, Hill met with the Garrison heirs, and he now owns the place. Past owners, even Garrison, leased the gravel parking lot across Thayer from the WWT. Hill now owns it. He’s also bought the grassy lot just behind the WWT, where a Saturday farmers market is now held. He envisions a beer garden there if/when he can get the zoning changed to commercial. The White Water Tavern was a dive bar before that was considered cool. Its history reads like a country song that Billy Joe Shaver might have sung here. Launched in 1977 with the floattrip-loving co-owners’ canoe as the primary decoration, closed twice by arson (committed by the same guy) in 1980 and 1982 with another non-arson fire closing it in 1984, and surely the most bizarre fire ever shutting it in the late 1990s, when a drunken motorcyclist crashed into the building, bursting a gas line and causing the blaze. And just when it looked like that

The WWT was one of the city’s first hot spots for live music in the late 1970s.

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The White Water Tavern was a dive bar before that was considered cool.

was the end of the WWT’s very long road, Hill stepped up to buy it. And what’s the first thing he has to deal with other than getting ready to reopen? A raging recurrence of COVID-19, of course. But at least the first WWT owners’ canoe survived and still hangs from the ceiling. That canoe, cold beer and fantastic, can’t-believe-this-famous-guy-is-playing-in-a-placethat-holds-79-people live music are the three constants that have always defined the White Water Tavern. Fabulous, greasy, wellgriddled cheeseburgers were a highlight from time to time, and now that Hill is in charge, they’re back! The WWT was one of the city’s first hot spots for live music in the late 1970s and into the 1980s, with legendary acts like the Greasy Greens, Burger, Sweet Magnolia, even the Cate Brothers playing there. So, it’s not surprising that upgrading the sound and the stage lights were one of Hill’s first projects. The list of notable artists who have played the White Water is impressive, especially considering how tiny the place is and thus the small number of tickets that can be sold. For instance, the late, great Billy Joe Shaver, the famed Texas songwriter who provided the largest-selling album in Waylon Jennings’ career by writing or co-writing 11 of the 12 songs on 1973’s “Honky Tonk Heroes.” The WWT got in a bidding war with another local club owner to get Shaver to play there. They won, and then promptly lost money since at $25 a ticket there weren’t enough available

to cover Shaver’s fee. But they didn’t care. Shaver played there three times before his death on Oct. 28, 2020. That’s not the first or last time the WWT lost money on a show. “We lost money, but it was [always] a cool show,” Hill said of shows he promoted at the WWT before he ever dreamed he’d own the place. Other big names who’ve graced the bar’s tiny stage: Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Dale Watson, Billy Bragg, Hayes Carll, Dan Baird (first famous as the leader of the Georgia Satellites) and all the luminaries who’ve played the Holiday Hangout. (In 2020, Hill even “did an online Holiday Hangout to raise money for them, helped them pay some bills.”) The first time Leon Bridges, winner of a Grammy Award in 2018 and four-time nominee, ever played outside his home state of Texas was at the White Water Tavern on a Monday night. But with just two songs on the internet and no recordings issued, Bridges still packed the place, Hill said. Another very popular band that has played the White Water several times is Lucero, with Little Rock native Ben Nichols on lead vocals. Nichols has been quoted as saying the White Water Tavern “has been a big reason I’ve come back to Little Rock as often as I have. It’s definitely the bar I feel most at home at.” Former owner White noted that, “Lucero was our first show. And they’ve played here many times after they were too big to play here. Ben has done a lot of really sweet things for this bar. He’s an amazing ambassador, name dropping [the WWT] in songs.” When he plays one, “You can hear the whole crowd sing ‘White Water Tavern!’”

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“...You can hear the whole crowd sing ‘White Water Tavern!’” 94

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The WWT crew (from left): Matt White, Kevin Creasy, Natalee Miller, Mike Meza, Shawn Hood, Shane Clinton, Travis Hill.

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SMALL BUSINESS 40,000-square-foot warehouse.” Hill later took Last Chance Records in a different direction. A band named Glossary is a Tennessee-based group that Hill estimated played the White Water about five times a year. “I saw Glossary wanted to do a vinyl release, but the guys told me, ‘We really don’t have the money.’ Glossary needed to get their record pressed,” he said, and Last Chance made it happen. Hill also had become friends with B.J. Barham, the leader of American Aquarium, a band that also was playing often at the WWT in those days (and really IS too popular to play there now). “American Aquarium had played here on Friday, in Oxford on Saturday, then they drove back here Sunday, and Monday we hung out,” Hill remembered. “We were drinking pitchers of PBR, and I asked B.J., ‘Why don’t you let me press your new album on vinyl, and you can sell it on the road and then pay me back?’ I invested $12,000 in that record, which was a lot of money to me. My girlfriend, now my wife, said, ‘You’re crazy, you’ll never get that money The Holiday Hangout back.’ But I did. B.J became tradition at also asked, ‘Why the WWT. don’t you be our record label?’ and I was too naïve to know what I was getting into. But we did it.” But an even better, more heartwarming story is how Hill helped brilliant Oklahoma singer-songwriter John Moreland, who had “bought a ticket to the White Water fifth anniversary show in February 2012,” which celebrated the fifth anniversary of Matt White and Sean Hughes owning the WWT. “I asked if he’d be interested in playing a couple of songs, since he’d driven over from Oklahoma. He did, and I was floored” by how good he was. Later, “I told John, ‘Stop playing free shows; let me help you.’” That help came in getting “In the Throes,” Moreland’s second album, pressed, distributed and publicized in 2013. Moreland since has gone on to record five more acclaimed albums.

THE STORY BEHIND THE MUSIC AT WWT

The story of Travis Hill is almost as interesting as the story of Little Rock’s White Water Tavern. And even before he bought the WWT in August, those stories were intertwined. Hill was a regular at the White Water when he lived nearby, and then he got involved promoting shows there, most notably his Holiday Hangout, a three-day early-December festival that sells out almost instantly and brings people from around the country and the world to Little Rock. Hill moved here from Fayetteville in 1992. “I was going to start a band. I moved to town, and then the guy I was going to start the band with bailed on me.” So, he enrolled at UA Little Rock and planned to be a music major. “Then I saw you had to be proficient in classical piano,” so he changed majors to radio, TV and film with a music minor. And he started working at KUAR, the public radio station housed on campus. “I did a lot of IT work there, and then I was encouraged to apply for a job at Arkansas Children’s Hospital in medical simulation. I knew nothing about that but was told, ‘We can train you.’” At that time, Hill lived on Dennison Street and became a regular at the White Water Tavern. Fortuitously for Hill and for many musicians he hadn’t yet met, Hill bought an interest in Last Chance Records, which was a distributor of “cutout” records. Since CDs had become the music format of choice — and vinyl hadn’t made its resurgence — many record labels chose to ditch a percentage of their vinyl catalogs. Distributors like Last Chance bought those up and then sold them, in Hill’s case through a relatively new channel called eBay, which debuted in late 1995. “We were selling about 300 albums a week out of this

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That was significant help in and of itself, but another break for Moreland came about through pure happenstance. Hill remembered, “I was driving home from Lowe’s one day when Cory Branan [a notable musician himself ] called and said, ‘Can you take some beer and wine to Lonoke? The 400 Unit [Jason Isbell’s backing band] is broken down there.’ Cory was friendly with those guys. Jason was in New York and was flying to meet them in Oklahoma the next day. So, I took a copy of ‘In the Throes’ and gave it to Amanda [Shires, Isbell’s wife and fiddle player in the 400 Unit]. The very next day, Amanda tweets about it. Then Jason tweets about it. And then they want John to open shows for them.” (Indeed, this reporter saw Moreland open for Isbell and company at Cain’s Ballroom in Moreland’s hometown of Tulsa in July 2015.) Besides Isbell and Shires, another musician who became a major John Moreland fan was Miranda Lambert. “John called me and told me that Miranda had asked him to get reserved seats for her at his upcoming show at the White Water,” Hill said. “John didn’t tell her that wasn’t the way things worked here, but she showed up, and nobody bothered her. She sang every word to every song.” Hill has no trouble explaining what Last Chance Records is all about: “My goal was always to help hardworking musicians I thought needed wider exposure and deserved to make a middle-class living.” While that commitment shows Hill’s selfless attitude, he freely admits there was more of a selfish reason behind the advent of the Holiday Hangout concerts at the White Water. “There was a tour called ‘This Is American Music’ with Two Cow Garage, Glossary, Centromatic and the Drams [Brent Best’s other band besides Slobberbone]. I couldn’t make any of the shows on that tour, but I thought, if I can get the Drams, Glossary and Two Cow Garage as well as [local musician] Kevin Kerby, that would be great. We did two nights in 2009. 2010 was the second year, and it was my birthday show. The third year, I said, ‘Let’s get stupid,’” and the number and fame level of the acts increased. “We’ve done three days for a decade, and the last time, we

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had people from 21 states and two or three foreign countries,” Hill said. “We have three people from the UK who come every year.” A few years back, Hill was working to get the Bottle Rockets, the famed American outfit from St. Louis, to play Holiday Hangout, but he couldn’t get the booking agent to reply to him. Turns out the agent was responding to the wrong email address. “Three weeks out, he finally gets me and says he’ll throw in Marshall Crenshaw for free.” (The Bottle Rockets were backing Crenshaw on his tour at that point.) The Legendary Shack Shakers is another band Last Chance Records has worked with, and one year when they were at the Holiday Hangout, “five people from California flew in to Little Rock to come to a Shack Shakers show. When they learned the show was sold out, they just looked crestfallen. So, I took five passes and gave them to them and said, ‘Have fun.’”

‘RAW… AS HONEST AS IT GETS’

The White Water Tavern has been featured in several prestigious publications, including Southern Living, Garden and Gun and Esquire, the latter of which named the WWT as one of the best 24 best bars in the country in May 2017. Said Esquire: “The White Water Tavern is perched along railroad tracks in a forgotten part of town. Streetlamps cast a movie-set glow onto a ’40s Oldsmobile in the parking lot, where cars are parked like dusty fixtures that never left. “A string of lights tossed in a bush and a cat greet you at the entrance. The tap and the jukebox are both down. But for a sum total of nine dollars, you get a stiff drink and admission into a room with red canoes suspended from the ceiling and a retro bearded guy with cuffed jeans and slicked-back hair unloading his original songs with the help of an old acoustic guitar, his voice enchanting, the poetry of the South. “There are no singed orange peels held over pretentious glassware here. This is Americana as it should be — raw, a little ugly, but as honest as it gets.”

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SPORTS COMMENTARY

DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN THE RETURN OF ‘HATE TEXAS WEEK’ IS STIRRING THE ECHOES By Mark Carter

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Left: QB Quinn Grovey carries against UT in Fayetteville, 1989. Bottom Left: Chuck Dicus hauls in a pass from Bill Montgomery in the ‘69 Big Shootout. Below: Frank Broyles is carried off the field after coaching the Hogs to a 30-6 win over A&M in Little Rock that sent Arkansas to the ‘76 Cotton Bowl. (Courtesy of UA)

hirty years ago, Frank Broyles led his people out from under the thumb of a burnt orange pharaoh and into the promised land, where TV cash and ESPN exposure flow like milk and honey. A generation later, it looks like the Broyles tribe — awash in Southeastern Conference dividends but struggling to regain its football footing in the nation’s toughest league — will meet pharaoh for the final time on the gridiron…as a nonconference opponent. This month, 13 years after Arkansas and Texas launched a home-and-home in Austin, the Razorbacks finally get the return game in Fayetteville. The game represents the Hogs’ nonconference marquee matchup in 2021, a chance to show-

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case on a national primetime stage just how improved they are under secondyear coach Sam Pittman. For the college football world, however, it means a taste of SEC life for the Big 12’s bell cow (apparently the SEC needed more cow bell), and a preview of what will once again become a conference game, possibly as soon as next season. Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC is happening; all that remains to be figured out is exactly when it will happen. But for a large and aging chunk of the Razorback fanbase, Texas and everything it represents — burnt orange bloat, the eyes of Texas, that obnoxious band, those Texas refs — go way beyond a mere glimpse into the future of the SEC — the league’s immediate future almost assuredly will dictate

that of college football at its highest level. *** For those Hog fans who remember Kenny Hatfield’s punt return for a score to help topple top-ranked Texas in 1964 on the way to a national championship; who remember the stage of Dec. 6, 1969; who remember “Arkansas 31, Oklahoma 6,” in the 1978 Orange Bowl, the return of Arkansas-Texas means — to borrow from Yogi Berra — “déjà vu all over again.” Broyles knew Arkansas wouldn’t have been included in the old Big 8’s ultimate absorption of the floundering Southwest Conference, which created the Big 12. Texas politics dictated which schools would ride UT’s back into the Big 12, and as the logo effectively shouted to

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Demetrius Wilson leaps to secure a touchdown pass from Brandon Allen in the 2014 Texas Bowl. (Photos provided)

the heavens, Arkansas was the only nonTexas school in the old SWC. That it represented the league’s No. 2 overall brand didn’t matter, and why should it have? By 1995, the Big 12 had been launched; had the Hogs not been sitting in the Birmingham clubhouse by then… well, let’s just be grateful we were. Fortunately for Arkansas, Broyles read the tea leaves and made sure the Hogs were included in what was then a groundbreaking expansion. Sure, Penn State joined the Big 10 in 1990 but was the only school invited. The SEC, however, was truly forward-thinking. It took advantage of a little-noticed 1987 NCAA ruling that allowed the Division 2 Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference and Central Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (made up of HBCU schools along the Atlantic seaboard) to expand to 12 members, split into divi-

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sions and hold a conference championship game in football. What if such a scenario were played out on the big stage of D-1, thought former SEC Commissioner Roy Kramer, quite possibly to the ultimate chagrin of the NCAA office in Indianapolis. There are tales, of course, of an original plan entailing SEC expansion to 14 with the addition of Arkansas, Texas, Texas A&M and Florida State. Texas politics of the time — there it is again — wasn’t going to abandon the little brothers of the SWC and then-independent FSU decided easier paths to championships lay elsewhere. Ultimately, Arkansas accepted before the ink on the invite was dry and later in ’91, so did South Carolina, buttressing the league’s east and west flanks. But more importantly, the SEC’s money-printing, conference-championship football game was on.

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*** Though a founding member of the SWC in 1915, Arkansas was, from 1925 on, the outsider. A big chunk of the state’s collective psyche is tied to Arkansas’ outsider status in the SWC. Sure, UT essentially ran the league and made subordination feel standard throughout the membership. Its perceived bullying ways eventually led Colorado (to the Pac 12), Nebraska (Big 10), Texas A&M and Missouri (SEC) to seek greener pastures. (UT’s forcing the Big 12 to make the “down hook ’em horns sign” an unsportsmanlike-conduct penalty says all one needs to know.) But once the Okies schools skedaddled and the SWC became the modern SWC, Arkansas was on an island. And for close to 75 years, it often felt like a particularly lonely one at that. Without a natural rival in the league,

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Matt Jones’ (photoshopped) TD run against UT in Austin in 2003 helped the Hogs to a big nonconference win.

souri. And I’ll happily trade Bama and Auburn every year for the horns and Sooners. Texas hasn’t really been relevant on the national stage since Vince Young fueled a BCS title in 2005, and OU is a playoff regular because, well, it plays in the Big 12. That offense is legit, to be sure, but can the Sooners hold up against the grind of an SEC schedule, and likely a nine-game conference slate moving forward? And how cool would it be to alternate hosting UT and OU on campus in alternating years? An OU “rivalry” might start out a little manufactured, but it wouldn’t stay that way for long. In game weeks, Fort Smith might be boiling over by Friday night.

Arkansas came to see UT as the evil empire and usual chief impediment to Dallas, home of the Cotton Bowl and the SWC champion every New Year’s Day. And by the ’60s, Arkansas and Texas were playing almost every year with championship implications on the line. Indeed, for Arkansans of a certain age, the University of Texas is the boogeyman. Almost every big season included if not necessitated a win over Texas, and in several of the Hogs’ biggest years, Texas represented the lone loss. And though even Arkansans admit the “rivalry” is one-sided, not just on the football field but in how it’s viewed by the respective fan bases, Hog fans don’t care. (Bevo, frankly, should feel flattered.) “Arkansas-Texas” maintains some historical weight in the CFB world, even if teasippers are loath even to acknowledge us. But there’s no denying the addition of

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Hogs-horns to the annual SEC slate — on top of adding the Red River Shootout and possibly UT and A&M on Thanksgiving again — helps further separate the league from the pack. And most importantly for Hog fans, despite pre-SEC history with Ole Miss and LSU, adding Texas to the permanent schedule fuels whatever organic vibe was added for Arkansas when former conference-mate A&M joined the SEC in 2012. Though nothing is yet set in stone and never really is (as proven by the 30-minutes-from-being-official Pac 16 roughly a decade ago), what probably will happen is this: The SEC, for football, will be divided into four 4-team pods. Pod winners would face off in an SEC “semifinal,” likely on campus, the week before the SEC championship game. I’d bet the farm on Arkansas being placed in a pod with UT, OU and Mis-

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*** Pros outweigh cons for Arkansas in an expanded SEC, starting, of course, with money. Because both new additions deliver enough brand and revenue-generating power to make slicing the SEC pie even further worthwhile. And let’s face it, Texas and Oklahoma are CFB bluebloods. Texas also generates the most money of any collegiate athletics program ($224 million annually as of 2019, per USA Today). It ranks fourth (both overall and among the Power 5) in all-time wins, claims four national championships and has been awarded versions of five others. Meanwhile, OU ranks sixth in all-time wins (overall and P5), is eighth in revenue ($163M) and claims seven national titles. Despite just enduring arguably its worst decade in the history of the program, Arkansas remains in the top 25 (at 24) in all-time wins (720) among P5 schools and 32nd overall; 2019 revenue

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came in $137.5 million, good still for 20th is not what’s good for the gander. the per-school numbers equal to in the nation; and of course, we rightfully Don’t be surprised to see the Big 10 now, and enough change to the claim the ’64 national title and should match the move to 16 soon. The SEC just central pot to grow the numbers claim a share of the ’77 championship, clearly gained the perception advantage to $70 million per school annually. versions of which actually were awarded and to sit still is to fall further behind. Here’s what that looks like.” to us. The Big 10 already has had informal (Counting UT and OU, the SEC will discussions with Kansas and Iowa State, Money is everything. Visiting aliens include 12 of the 20 richest programs in both geographic fits and both AAU memknow that much about our planet. But the country.) bers. (The Big 10 still likes to lord its acain the fast lanes in which college football Earlier this year, the SEC signed a 10demics over the SEC.) runs, prestige and power matter almost year, $3 billion deal with ESPN that starts But could Notre Dame be convinced as much, especially in the South and in 2024 and will drop $300 million a to break off its quasi-ACC membership to parts of the Midwest. By adding two of year into SEC coffers. Currently, the SEC join the Big 10 as a full member? Adding the biggest brands in the sport (and make makes $55 million a year from CBS for Notre Dame and Kansas (for its basketno mistake, CFB runs college athletics broadcast rights. The new deal will comball brand despite ongoing investigations because it essentially funds college athmit the SEC exclusively to the ESPN faminto alleged cheating) would not match letics), the SEC crossed the Ohio River, ily of networks, and ABC and is expected the prestige of UT and OU to the SEC lifted its leg and marked its territory. to raise the league’s annual member disbut would serve as something of a counSome sort of Frankenstein-like schedtribution from around terpunch. $45.5 million to possibly Otherwise, prospects of this $70 million. multi-conference alliance notPros outweigh cons for Arkansas Before the move bewithstanding, might the Pac 12 came official a few weeks change its mind about expandin an expanded SEC, starting, of ago, Andrew Bucholtz of ing and pick the four biggest course, with money. Because both Awful Announcing forebrands left in the Big 12? To do cast what the member so, it would have to amend its new additions deliver enough brand distributions might look policy against adding schools like with UT and OU on with religious affiliations. And and revenue-generating power board: that said, could BYU with its to make slicing the SEC pie even “The two key numstrong brand and huge global bers … are the 2019-20 following somehow end up in further worthwhile. per-school distribuan expanded Pac 12? (Probably tion ($45.5 million not, but it’s fun to speculate.) per school, which, And might West Virginia multiplied by 14 members, gives end up in the ACC? Time will tell. If I’m uling alliance reportedly is in the works $637 million in central conference Oklahoma State, TCU, Baylor, Kansas between the Big 10, ACC and Pac 12, and revenues to be distributed) and the State, Iowa State or West Virginia, I’m the jetsam of the Big 12 is looking to add expected boost of $300 million per sweating bullets. One thing’s for sure. It four new members — BYU, Houston, year conference-wide from 2024-25 sure is nice to have a seat in the BirmingCincinnati and UCF. But the SEC is now on (which, divided by 14 members, ham clubhouse to watch it all unfold out setting the agenda, and it looks as if that is $21.4 million per school, leading beyond the hedges. agenda will include a Power 5 breakaway to a total of $66.9 million per school (at least for football) from the NCAA, each year). That provides the foun*** minus the Big 12 leftovers that don’t get dation to run what the current Robert Mann is one of the old school picked up. A super-division consisting of and future per-school numbers Texas haters. He’s 59, grew up in Bryant a four 16-team conferences could very well would look like if the league went lifelong Hog fan, and he hates Texas. He be on its way. to 16 schools (with Texas and OklaHATES Texas. Not only does he wear his It makes sense to me. What doesn’t homa) under three scenarios: no feelings symbolically on his sleeve, Mann make sense is schools like Texas competchange to the central pot, enough wears them quite literally on his person. ing on the same level as Louisiana-Monchange to the central pot to keep And tries to ensure as many Arkansans as roe. What’s good for the goose in this case

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Left: For Stadium Shoppe owner Robert Mann, the return of Bevo is good business. Above: Mann houses his personal collection of Razorback and SWC memorabilia at the shop. (Photos by Meredith Mashburn)

possible do too. Mann owns The Stadium Shoppe on Razorback Road in Fayetteville, a Charlie Welch dinger down the street from Baum-Walker Stadium. He plans to sell a lot of merchandise this fall now that full capacities are back at college stadiums. Having Texas coming to Fayetteville is nothing short of a lottery ticket for businesses like his.

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In addition to his usual Razorback merch, Mann is selling a lot of gear designed just for the Texas game. He paused for a moment when asked about Texas, in particular. “Texas back on the schedule… As much as I despise Texas, this game will be a windfall for Fayetteville and businesses in general, and mine in particular. Strictly from a business perspective, ev-

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ery business in Fayetteville is gonna love having Texas back on the schedule.” As the former longtime manager of the UA’s Hog Heaven stores and a lifelong fan, Mann knows what moves fellow Hog callers. In essence, when Razorbackers see burnt orange, they see red. And be cause of that, businesses like the Stadium Shoppe see a lot of green. “One thing, too, is that with Texas, I

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can do merchandise especially for that game,” he told me. Aside from a few LSU-specific or Alabama game shirts and the usual array of “Beat [insert team here]” buttons, Arkansas really hasn’t had that in the SEC. Of course, game-specific merch generally is reserved for big rivalries. And from Arkansas’ perspective, at least, it doesn’t get any bigger than beating Texas. Mann said younger generations are catching on to why it’s so easy to hate Texas. “Personally, I’d rather Texas just go away,” he’ll quip to anyone within earshot. “But in the SEC, Texas is about to find out that they’re not in Kansas anymore.” *** Mike Irwin is a broadcasting legend in Arkansas. Based in Fayetteville, he’s covered the Hogs for 45 years, currently for KNWA in Northwest Arkansas and KARK in Little Rock. He’s probably as

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Top: Mann believes younger Hog fans will soon catch on to “hating Texas.” (Photo by Meredith Mashburn)

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connected as any sports journalist in the state. For a recent “Ask Mike” segment on Pig Trail Nation, Irwin opened up about Texas and OU to the SEC and its repercussions. “The fact that there hasn’t been more opposition tells me that other than [initially] Texas A&M and Missouri, SEC teams are looking at dollars and are not worrying about other issues. “There are a lot of things going on here. But there may be more going on in the long term. SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey is not happy with the NCAA. He didn’t like the way Mark Emert canceled the NCAA basketball tournament in 2020 without informing member schools first. “Supposedly, Sankey and other ADs didn’t like the threats the NCAA issued this past spring to schools in states that passed bans on males competing against women as transgenders. These states were largely in the footprint of the SEC. “Then there are the change in name/image/likeness rules which were largely brought about by the NCAA getting money from video game sales by offering up athletes who had the same numbers and likenesses as real college athletes. The NCAA got sued and lost.” Irwin also believes, as many do, that Sankey intends to lead a restructuring of college sports at the highest level. “So, there’s talk that Sankey may have his eye on reducing the Power 5 conferences to a Power 4 and then at some point, leading those schools into a new athletic association a step above the NCAA,” Irwin said. “Essentially, colleges that compete at the upper level of athletics would be grouped together, make their own rules and voting on common interests without having to deal with getting voted

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down by so called mid-major schools. “I’m assuming this new governing body would also be free of politics. “As far as Texas causing issues in the SEC and trying to boss the other schools around, that was easy to do in the Big 12. It’s not happening in the SEC. Alabama, LSU, Georgia, Florida are right up there in revenues with Texas. This league has too many big boys to let one big boy try to run things. Especially when they’re the new kid on the block. “Also, I don’t know about Oklahoma, but Texas is going to get a rude awakening in terms of the level of competition in all sports.” *** For Arkansas fans, much of the Texas mystique harkens back to the 1969 Big Shootout, the real Game of the Century. Surely no other contest encapsulates the “you gotta be kidding me” feeling of big games slipping through fingers, of what ifs and how comes than that one does. The Denver Post’s Terry Frei published a book in 2002 about the game and its setting. Horns, Hogs & Nixon Coming: Texas vs. Arkansas in Dixie’s Last Stand is a mustread — up to a certain point for some of us — and not just for college football fans. (It’s about college football, but then

again it’s not really about college football. Definitely worthwhile.) In it, Frei recreates the intense hype that led to the game and ABC’s thenunprecedented move to approach the schools about rescheduling the game from its typical October slot to December. With both teams expected to compete for the national title in ‘69, on the advice of former CFB historian and broadcaster Beano Cook, ABC rolled the dice and bet on the Hogs and horns entering the game undefeated and ranked 1 and 2. And Beano knew his stuff — that’s exactly what happened. Frei wrote of UT’s flying into the Fort Smith airport and the bus ride up 71 into Fayetteville. He wrote of UT players seeing fans on the side of roads gazing upon them as the enemy, of business signs everywhere forecasting their doom. As the UT bus careened through the fog over Mount Gaylor and its neighbors, players likened the experience to what it must’ve been like parachuting into Vietnam. (It’s always been called Fayette-nam for a reason, I suppose.) This year’s Sept. 11 revival of ArkansasTexas may not quite match that level of anticipation. But Texas to the SEC seems to be stirring some echoes. And maybe that’s exactly what we needed.

I DON’T KNOW ABOUT OKLAHOMA, BUT TEXAS IS GOING TO GET A RUDE AWAKENING IN TERMS OF THE LEVEL OF COMPETITION IN ALL SPORTS. - Robert Mann

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SPORTS BUSINESS

By Evin Demirel

the new

WILD WEST WITH NO STANDARDIZED RULES IN PLACE, NCAA’S NIL LANDSCAPE A TRICKY ONE

ecades ago, a few Razorback fans put $100 bills into the hands of Arkansas basketball great Sidney Moncrief. “I can’t say that occasionally an alumnus or overzealous fan didn’t walk up to me after a game and put a hundreddollar bill in my hand when he shook it,” Moncrief wrote in his autobiography. This, however, was appreciation cash. Moncrief was already a Razorback and was not heading elsewhere. It wasn’t under-the-table cash meant to sway a high school recruit to one school or another, which has long been perceived by the public as one of the biggest problems in big time college basketball or football. Bringing that booster money out into the light and legitimizing it is one of the biggest selling points of the new NIL laws, which allow student-athletes to profit off of their names, images and likenesses through ads, commercials, sponsorships, signing events, camps and other opportunities. No more need to pad pockets on the DL, the theory goes, when

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deals can be announced publicly, and everybody can benefit from the exposure. Already, the entire Arkansas football offensive line has been featured in The Wall Street Journal for inking deals with a local barbecue joint. The O-linemen are just some of the nearly 100 Razorback student-athletes across all sports who are making good side money this fall. “As of [the last] report that I received, we had 93 student athletes that had worked with over 65 companies for 121 different name, image, and likeness agreements, a little over six figures in totality,” Arkansas athletic director Hunter Yurachek recently told Razorback sports radio host Josh Bertaccini. “And it’s not just football and basketball, but 16 of our 19 sports have student athletes that have signed name, image and likeness agreements — 53 men and 40 women.” Arkansas football star Grant Morgan is among the latest Razorbacks to announce a deal, his with Walk-On’s Sports Bistreaux. This is so appropriate, given Morgan started his career as a walk-

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on and has developed into the Hogs’ best walk-on since the late Brandon Burlsworth. For all the feel-good fuzzies, however, there are already some troubling developments. ILLEGAL NIL DEALINGS COST RAZORBACKS A RECRUIT? Yurachek also discussed the negatives of the new NIL laws in his interview on The Red Zone. “The negatives of this is what happens in the recruiting process,” he said. “We feel like we may have lost a recruit in a particular sport that will go unnamed because a school promised upfront that recruit a name, image and likeness agreement, which is illegal by kind of the basic NIL rules. “Right now, we have 50 different rules because each state gets to kind of operate under their own premise. And so we need something, whether it’s NCAA or federal legislation, so that we’re all kind of operating from the same playbook as far as name, image and likeness goes moving forward.” Lots to unpack there. First, the fact that Arkansas would have lost a recruit (my guess is football or basketball) to a school offering the carrot of making more money isn’t novel at all. It’s just taking a different form here. In the past, the Alabamas and Kentuckys of the world could offer that same recruit the

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“We need something, whether it’s NCAA or federal legislation, so that we’re all kind of operating from the same playbook as far as name, image and likeness goes moving forward.”

Hunter Yurachek

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prospect of bettering themselves for the draft and making more money by getting drafted higher. “When you think about all those schools that have been at the top, this has always been a part of the recruiting tactic. But they’ve just been sold on going to the NFL, getting a great education and the support from the people around these institutions,” ESPN analyst Marcus Spears said. This is a dynamic that has actually played in Arkansas’ favor when it comes to baseball. Peyton Stovall, for instance, is the equivalent of a five-star recruit who turned down a signing bonus of around $2 million to play for Dave Van Horn this summer. Stovall cited Arkansas’ ability to prepare its players for the MLB as a big reason he’s becoming a Razorback. We can also safely assume Stovall is looking forward to some NIL opportunities given the avid Arkansas baseball fanbase. But that success story for Razorback baseball shouldn’t cloud the bigger picture: In the new NIL world, there’s an unequal playing field among schools in different parts of the country as far as what they can and can’t offer recruits coming out of high school. The SEC schools, for instance, can sell recruits on the potential of crafting NIL deals with (usually local) companies or companies from the area where that recruit grew up. The University of Arkansas has an entire new office of athlete brand development that helps Razorbacks with business skills, storytelling, public speaking and understanding NIL legislation. But, critically, it does not hook Hogs up with deals. (That’s usually up to the student-athlete and their inner circle that includes a representative/agent.)

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“The rules and laws outside of the SEC schools are different and can impact recruiting more, as some schools can start arranging deals for athletes, which SEC schools can’t do,” Harrison Reno wrote for SI.com. “Obviously, arranging deals for athletes could be seen as an advantage in recruiting as schools could promise athletes deals as part of their recruiting pitch.” Reno continues: “A prime example of the differences between conferences and the rules and regulations impacting recruiting would be the surge of recruiting a school like USC has seen in California. They have already landed products like defensive end Mykel Williams from the state of Georgia.” This potential trend of SEC recruits heading to USC is also relevant to Arkansas basketball fans. IS KIJANI WRIGHT THE RAZORBACK RECRUIT IN QUESTION? Recently, Arkansas basketball coach Eric Musselman was in the running to get a commitment from five-star big man Kijani Wright, who also had Texas, Stanford and USC in his top four. Wright, a southern Californian, recently chose to stay home by committing to the Trojans. While staying close to home is no doubt a factor in his reasoning, it also would not be surprising in the least if the fact that USC had set up NIL deals for its recruits on the front end also played a factor. Yurachek declined to provide any details on the Razorback recruit in question, so proposing Wright is speculation on my part. I don’t bring him up to disparage the young man in any way, but rather to point out the differences in state laws around NIL, how it’s already played a role in USC

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getting a football recruit from Georgia and how it could easily have played a role in other sports for other SEC teams. And this applies to other schools in the Pac-12, as well. For instance, the Arkansas basketball program also lost out on highly touted big man Kel’el Ware out of North Little Rock. Ware said all along that he was looking forward to getting out of state, but it would not be surprising if Oregon’s NIL potential (supported by Nike) was just as appealing as USC’s when compared to what SEC schools can offer. Regardless of conference, it’s illegal for high school recruits to sign NIL deals before they enroll in college. But the extent to which schools in some states can entice those recruits with the potential (which can become a “promise”) of NIL deals in the future is one significant gray zone in an emerging NIL landscape that has more opportunities than what you could find to wager on with the best betting app. “It hasn’t helped that permissible NIL activities began under a patchwork of state laws or executive orders permitting NIL activities,” the AP’s Aaron Beard wrote. “There are no standardized rules, and the NCAA has left specific guidance to school compliance offices. Broader NCAA regulations or a federal law are nowhere close to happening.” He also quoted Oklahoma coach Lincoln Riley, who said these early NIL days have already offered insights into which schools will “bend and push the rules in this game.” Some recruits may decide it’s not worth tampering with in a gray zone. “If I’m a player that was tempted, get paid in my recruitment illegally, should I even mess with that when I know I can just go make the money legally and not

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jeopardize my name or my eligibility or all of that?,” Riley said. “So in some ways, it may even it out a little bit, if you will. I think the purists hope that. But the reality is, we’re going to have to have some lines and regulations, especially when it comes to the recruiting piece for this to work and not be a mess.” ARKANSAS BASKETBALL NIL DEALS Yurachek told Bertaccini that, “For the University of Arkansas and our student athletes, I thought we were ahead of this, developed a flagship program, hired a senior associate AD for athlete brand development. We now have an athlete brand development department that consists of three full-time employees.” This department helps Razorbacks like Devo Davis understand the industry better so he can make good decisions about who does business with. And he’s inking a number of deals, including ones with FAB&T and Gwatney Chevrolet in Jacksonville. Such deals “just show the support across the state that our student athletes have from businesses, because most of those agreements are ... within this state, which is awesome,” Yurachek said. How much are these deals worth? Yurachek said that, in total, 92 Razorbacks have signed contracts for a little more than $100,000. That means most of these are going to be in the hundreds or thousands. Perhaps someone like Devo

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Davis or KJ Jefferson could get a five-digit deal. We know the potential for much bigger deals is out there, however. Consider Alabama’s quarterback, Bryce Young, is already closing in on $1 million in total bank. But how can Razorbacks get bigger and better deals? Maybe they just need to mentally prepare themselves with surreal mind training videos. Or the secret to success could be much simpler: In the next decade, just win a handful of college football national championships.

This story first appeared on BestofArkansasSports.com.

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THE LAST WORD

THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL By Dwain Hebda

t’s an exercise so old and well-worn it’s practically a party trick: Ask your parents or grandparents where they were when they heard the news President John F. Kennedy was shot, and they likely can tell you right down to the brand of coffee they were drinking. That kind of frozen-in-time moment, where everything in your memory coalesces like amber around a beetle, doesn’t happen very often. I lived through the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan and can tell you only deductively how I got the word. I know for a fact they didn’t pipe news broadcasts through the high school intercom or roll out TVs as they did during those horrible days in Dallas. The Iran Hostage Crisis was headline news morning, noon and night for 444 straight days between 1979 and 1981, yet I had to look those dates up and today cannot tell you the name of a single former hostage. Miracle on Ice? Wasn’t a hockey fan. Baby Jessica kept us glued to our TV sets for two days back in 1987, yet I defy you to remember why. Even those incidents that did freeze the moment have ways of working themselves loose. Given the chance, I could walk to the very spot in my college dorm TV lounge where I saw the footage of space shuttle Challenger exploding, but did we pause even a second on Jan. 28 of this year to mark the 35th anniversary of that tragedy? Maybe you did; I didn’t know about it until preparing this article. My point is not that those events — and a million others just like them over a typical lifetime — aren’t important in their own right. They are very important, history-making even. But as time goes on and other more immediate things push to the top of the list, it’s often hard to summon the pain, joy, outrage or sadness as sharp as the day it was minted.

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This month, we mark the 20th anniversary of an event that stands, in my mind anyway, as a rare exception to this rule. The attack on U.S. soil by al-Qaida terrorists on 9/11 stands as stark and clear to me today as it did on that brilliant morning. I was in the car headed to my job at Alltel in Lincoln, Neb., and called a friend of mine to talk about the radio reports of some wayward pilot somehow managing to veer so far off-course he’d hit the World Trade Center. When he set me straight, I drove directly to my desk and spent the day staring at a TV monitor on our floor. I remember the panic rising as reports came in of the other planes and can still hear myself gasp audibly when the towers went down. Worse, we were in the middle of moving to Arkansas, and my beloved had moved ahead of me to get the kids started in their new school. At a time when everyone wanted to be close to their loved ones, I was 11 hours away from mine, not knowing what else was to come. The next thing I remember as clearly was standing during Sunday Mass on Sept. 16, where out of nowhere tears started rolling down my cheeks and wouldn’t stop. I won’t bore you with a cliché, “Gosh, where has the time gone?” as we achieve our two-decade anniversary as a people and nation forever changed. Nor will I tell you that we should rend our garments every Sept. 11 merely to conjure the same outrage we felt back then. But there is something to be said for honoring those events and spots in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania as the sacred tableau of American history they are. Twenty years is long enough, after all, for at least one generation to be born with no concept of 9/11 as the fulcrum of the 21st century about which turns nearly every political, ideological, sociological, religious and even technological lever since. We can never let

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that become the norm, woke sensitivities and revisionism be damned. Late last month, the sheaves of 9/11 were gathered as the last American troops came home, bone-tired, from Afghanistan. It was an unceremonious and ignoble departure, one far short of what two decades worth of fighting American men and women deserved. And just as the grass has regrown in Stoyestown, Pa., the Pentagon Wall again gleams, and Ground Zero gurgles and hums with life, the desert sands will soon erase our footprints. Were my children younger, I might be at a loss as many parents are today to adequately explain why it all happened in the first place, this 20-year loss of life and treasure, if only to come back to where we started. But if I were in that position, I could still point to 9/11 as the reason why. Not for the violence, the sorrow and the death; not for what was or was not gained. But for what that time showed us about ourselves and the capacity for heroism humans have under fire. That love of country and a well of unity still exists in our beloved homeland. Sucker-punched, we stood tall. Challenged, we answered. Mourning, we linked arms. And in these times, where we find so much to quarrel about, I’m just naive enough to believe that well has yet to run dry; that time has not robbed love, faith and compassion of its power to overcome anything we brothers and sisters see fit to put between us. May the families of those who died on 9/11 and in the 20 years since continue to find comfort and hope. May the turmoil of this story’s last chapter not add an epilogue of bloodshed. And may we as a people find a way back to appreciating what’s universal and good in all of us, as we did then, facing challenges that surround us but cannot divide us. That would be the most fitting tribute of all.

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Geoffrey Niebaum

Maureen Ruggiero

CEO Mendel Capital

CFO Mendel Capital

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