Talk Business & Politics September/October 2014

September/October 2014

Mark Pryor & Tom Cotton Their Most Important Issues Asa Hutchinson vs. Mike Ross The Next Arkansas Governor Does Arkansas Need A Workforce Czar?

Beyond The Private Option Women In Business Professional Choices The History Of The Fayetteville Square

Marlon

Blackwell ON ARCHITECTURE & LIFE

Contents September/October 2014 5 Publisher’s Letter Commentary

7 Aaron Brooks

The Political Aversion To Corporate Inversions

8 Mike Stafford

Arkansas CEOs See A Strong Economy

34

30 Jason Tolbert

Why Asa Hutchinson Will Win

32 Michael Cook

Why Mike Ross Will Win

74 Point Counterpoint

Sen. Mark Pryor & Cong. Tom Cotton The Most Important Issues Facing Arkansas Profiles

10 Sherman Tate

The Domino Effect

14 The Fayetteville Square

83

10

Heart & Soul of Downtown

56 76

18 Warwick Sabin

Another Role, Another Challenge

22 Shannon Newton A Good Turn

Hometown, Arkansas

48 Big Changes, Little Rock Insights

46 Domtar: Safety in Numbers APEI: R&D Top 100

65 66 68

Regional Northwest Arkansas In & Out of Africa Immigration Issues The Compass Report Northeast Arkansas

70 Greensborough Village Revealed 72 Osceola Organizing For Opportunity 73 Battleground in NE Arkansas 56

Industry Health Care Beyond The Private Option

62 Environment

An Acronym For Disaster Relief

41 Architecture

The Latest Trends Are Here To Stay

83 In-Depth

Building A New Workforce

96 Executive Q&A

Camden Mayor Chris Claybaker Has Enjoyed A Long Ride

94 Leadership

Embracing Change Six Leaders Share Advice

Story: Architect Marlon Blackwell 34 Cover

This world-renowned architect has built a number of contrasts into his life. It’s deliberate.

Features

24 Politics: The Battle For Arkansas Governor

Mike Ross and Asa Hutchinson face off to become the state’s chief executive.

76 Business: The Work of a Woman

An updated report describes the voices of Arkansas women at work and at home.

COVER PHOTO: KAT WILSON

www.talkbusiness.net

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New EPA rules hurt Arkansans just like you.

It’s time for the truth.

You may have heard that Arkansas is “well-positioned” to implement new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rules restricting coal energy. But here’s the truth: 1. The new regulations will force our most economical and reliable power plants to shut down.

2. Replacing coal plants with natural gas plants will increase your electric bills by up to 30%.

3. Despite the enormous cost of implementing these new EPA rules, the result will be less than a 1% reduction of CO2 gasses globally.

The proposed EPA rules are unfair to Arkansans. Help us send that message to the EPA at www.tellepa.com.

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

From the Publisher

The Workforce Dilemma Talk Business & Politics is owned by River Rock Communications and is published six times a year. For additional copies, to be included in our mailing list, or for information about advertising, contact Katherine Daniels at katherine@talkbusiness.net.

September/October 2014 Publisher & Editor-in-Chief Roby Brock roby@talkbusiness.net Art Director Bryan Pistole DesignMatters LLC bryan@designmattersllc.com Editor Bill Paddack wbp17@comcast.net Contributing Writers Larry Brannan Steve Brawner Jeanni Brosius Wesley Brown Kerri Jackson Case Michael Cook Paul Holmes Rex Nelson Ethan Nobles Casey Penn Ben Pollock Bob Qualls Ryan Saylor Kim Souza Michael Tilley Jason Tolbert Michael Wilkey Photographers Trey Ashcraft treyark@yahoo.com Stephanie Dunn dunnmsteph09@yahoo.com Tim Rand pix@trand.com Bob Ocken bob@ockenphotography.com Kat Wilson katographic@gmail.com Vice President Operations Stephanie Baker stephanie@talkbusiness.net Vice President Sales & Marketing Katherine Daniels katherine@talkbusiness.net Printer John Parke Democrat Printing & Litho jparke@democratprinting.com River Rock Communications 8308 Cantrell Road Little Rock, AR 72227 501.529.1737

No one will argue that Arkansas is in need of a jobs overhaul.

While state officials have done an admirable job of pursuing and landing strategic economic development projects in the last several years – despite a recession and challenging recovery – Arkansas still lags.

There are forces far beyond government’s ability to control in the changing jobs landscape, and while finger-pointing makes for easy scapegoats, it doesn’t solve problems.

Here are the central issues: 1. Existing jobs are available, but a skilled workforce isn’t there to fill them all.

2. Workers for jobs of the future need to be trained today.

3. Addressing issues 1 and 2 requires great flexibility and quick decision-making, but they also require more research.

We’ve been tracking changes in Arkansas’ workforce and noted several trends in the last year or so. While our unemployment rate has declined dramatically, our labor force has also shrunk at an alarming rate. We’ve seen a big drop-off in the number of employed and unemployed workers apparently just checking out.

Economists and observers estimate it is a combination of the long-term unemployed giving up looking for work, Baby Boomers retiring and job seekers moving to other states for employment. But no one knows for sure. There isn’t a set of data points that the state or private industry collects that anyone can turn to for empirical examples to answer the question “why?” so we rely on anecdotal evidence and assumptions.

You can’t truly address a problem if you don’t know the reason it exists.

We’ve got to find a way as a state or through a financed effort in the private sector to understand why our labor force is shifting and what potential solutions might be crafted to change our fortunes. This is our long-term challenge.

In the short-run, we must find a way to merge industry and state resources to meet immediate employment opportunities. There are a lot of conversations going on right now to make this happen but in many ways the dialogue is aimed at getting many people up to speed.

While good, those more advanced in the conversation need to take action now.

I’ve pushed state leaders to address the possibility of a “workforce czar,” a point person to marry private industry and public workforce efforts.

As Randy Zook with the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce told me recently, “We have to move at the speed of business.”

Would it be useful to have someone with the authority to identify industry needs and quickly adapt state services to meet them? Would it be helpful for a person or group to know that if red tape stands in the way of a solution, he or she could have license to slice through the bureaucracy? And could this person pool the resources of the private sector to take action independent of state government in ways that solve some of our workforce problems?

AEDC director Grant Tennille likes the idea. In a recent interview, he expressed support for private industry to pony up the money, take over training in key areas and encourage state and local resources to follow.

In this issue and several upcoming magazine editions, we’ll dive deeper into this subject.

I hope you’ll join the conversation. If you have thoughts, share them with me by email at roby@talkbusiness.net.

Sincerely,

Roby Brock Publisher & Editor-in-Chief www.talkbusiness.net

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Commentary

The Political Aversion to Corporate Inversions

By Aaron Brooks

T

his has been a banner year for corporate mergers and acquisitions. A combination of favorable conditions, including increased corporate cash and historically low interest rates, have caused M&A volume for the first half of 2014 to surge to a seven-year high, with approximately $1.8 trillion in announced transactions.

The most significant (and controversial) trend to emerge from this booming market has been the rise of so-called tax “inversions.” Put simply, inversions are cross-border mergers in which a larger company purchases a smaller company in a more tax-friendly country, and then declares itself to be domiciled in the low-tax jurisdiction. This maneuver can sharply reduce a company’s tax bill, even though in the vast majority of cases, the company’s mailing address (and not its operations or physical location) is the only thing that moves.

Because the United States has the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world, it comes as no surprise that inversions are particularly attractive to American corporations; since 2013, at least 19 U.S. companies have announced such moves, and researchers from the congressional Joint Commission on Taxation estimate that inversions will cost the federal government almost $20 billion in lost revenue over the next decade.

This flurry of activity has recently received widespread attention in business and political circles: President Obama denounced inversions as unpatriotic in a weekly radio address and has referred elsewhere to inverting companies as “corporate deserters,” the Wall Street Journal has extensively covered the subject, and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew penned an op-ed in the Washington Post asserting that inversions (while legal) shift a greater share of the tax burden from participating

Aaron Brooks

companies to American small businesses and individuals.

In the same op-ed, Lew urged Congress to enact legislation to address the practice, and his is far from the only voice calling for action. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, from Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) to Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), have expressed a desire to explore a legislative fix. Many discussions coalesce around a two-step solution: inversion-specific legislation in the short term and, in the long term, much-needed comprehensive tax reform aimed at lowering the corporate tax rate and creating a more competitive system to reduce the appeal of foreign incorporation.

While such bipartisan interest is as encouraging as it is rare, observers remain skeptical that it will lead to the passage of any legislation, and indeed there are a host of specific questions that must be resolved before the framework of a viable proposal can emerge. For its part, the Obama administration (with the encouragement of some congressional Democrats) is reviewing an assortment of potential administrative actions, like banning inversions among companies with federal contracts and revising the tax code to eliminate the economic incentives that drive companies to invert, in case Congress fails to act.

Notably, this issue is not new. In 1996, the Treasury issued Treas. Reg. § 1.367(a)-3(c), and in 2004, a Republican Congress passed the American Jobs Creation Act, each containing anti-inversion provisions that ultimately failed to deter these transactions.

As a result of these experiences, some believe that even if further reforms are enacted, creative lawyers and accountants will continue to facilitate overseas repatriation in some form as long as foreign tax regimes remain attractive.

There is also an argument to be made that the negative attention focused on the inversion trend, while a public relations

nightmare, exaggerates both its prevalence and impact. Post-inversion, companies continue to pay U.S. corporate taxes – anticipated tax savings are largely confined to their foreign profits. And assuming that inversions in fact cost the Treasury $20 billion over the next 10 years, that amount would equal less than 1 percent of all estimated corporate taxes for the same period.

Perhaps most significantly, Walgreen Co. recently illustrated that inverting is not always a no-brainer for company management. The massive pharmacy chain recently surprised investors by announcing that its $15 billion acquisition of German company Alliance Boots would not be structured as an inversion; on a conference call explaining the company’s reasoning, CEO Gregory Wasson cited the possibility of a protracted legal battle with the IRS, and potential consumer backlash and political ramifications. If other companies reach the same conclusion as Walgreen, the collective outcry and momentum for government intervention could fade.

In any event, the likelihood of Congress passing meaningful legislation in the foreseeable future (on this issue or any other) seems low, and the Obama administration’s appetite for taking executive action on this front remains to be seen. But until either the rules of the game or the economic incentives change, it’s a safe bet that corporations will consider using inversions as a means to minimize their cost of doing business and maximize the return to their shareholders.

Aaron Brooks is an attorney with Little Rockbased Wright, Lindsey & Jennings, LLP. A graduate of the University of Central Arkansas and Harvard Law School, his practice focuses primarily on mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance and securities law. www.talkbusiness.net

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Commentary

Arkansas CEOs See Increased Sales, Strong Economy for Remainder of the Year The second Business Leaders Economic Confidence Survey and forecast for Arkansas shows that although capital investments are still stalled, sales, employment and the overall economy are headed in the right direction.

Mike Stafford

By Mike Stafford, CEG Partners

A

t the end of 2013, our survey showed that if Arkansas businesses were cars, most that were “in the shop” before were about to start taking to the streets the first half of 2014. Now, we see many of our more than 150 surveyed CEOs, presidents and other Arkansas leaders have the “top down” and are cruising the economic highways for the remainder of 2014.

Unemployment indicators from the Bureau of Labor Statistics continue to look positive. On a national level, the unemployment rate continued to inch down and finally met 2003 levels. For Arkansas, the job market looked stalled through the

end of last year, but since January 2014 the unemployment rate has decreased from 7.3% in January to 6.2% in July.

Arkansas business leaders are certainly seeing those numbers as 49% say that their companies expect increased employment during the last six months of 2014. That is a 23% increase from our last survey at the end of 2013. That’s good news, but read on to see why that may not translate one to one with new employees.

REVENUES ARE STRONG We also had good news in the sales revenue category. Overall, 69% of Arkansas business leaders say that their companies

expect increased sales revenues during the last six months of 2014. Those numbers are up from 64 percent at the end of 2013. In our survey at the end of 2013, the healthcare industry was holding us back as the majority of those industry leaders had a very negative view on future sales revenues.

This time around a large majority of the health-care business leaders indicated sales revenues would increase for the remainder of 2014. What’s changed?

It seems at least for-profit hospitals that care for Americans insured under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) are seeing a boost in revenues and earnings, according to a recent Wall Street Journal article. These

SURVEY SAYS:

BUSINESS LEADERS OPTIMISTIC A survey of more than 150 Arkansas company leaders indicates an improved outlook for the rest of 2014 on the sales and hiring front, as well as expectations that economic conditions will improve in the last half of the year.

Talk Business & Politics — in conjunction with the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries of Arkansas and consulting group CEG Partners – in August released its second Business Leaders Confidence Survey, which captures opinions on the future direction of Arkansas economic conditions.

The Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce also 8

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

aided in the survey.

“There is a lot of good news from this survey and nationally, but it’s kind of like pedaling a bike in the Ozarks. As soon as you make it over one hill, there seems to be another one in front of you,” said Mike Stafford, managing partner with Little Rock-based CEG Partners, which conducted and analyzed the mid-year report.

CEG Partners received results from 154 state business leaders representing top executives in all major industry categories, such as manufacturing, health care, finance, energy, construction and utilities.

ACA enrollees tend to be sicker than other patients and therefore require more hospital care. In addition, these hospitals are seeing less uninsured care costs, resulting in improved earnings.

Unfortunately, these increased revenues for our business leaders don’t seem to be changing their sentiment toward capital spending – yet – as 51% expect capital spending to increase the last half of 2014.

That’s a 2% decrease from our last survey.

Several respondents cited too much uncertainty at the state and national government levels for businesses to commit to long-term capital improvements at this time.

TALENT CRISIS As stated earlier, overall business leaders are bullish on employment for the remainder of 2014. However, when asked to rate criteria based on its impact to their company’s workforce growth, the top three concerns were candidates’ lack of skills, lack of available candidates and candidates’ lack of education/training. One respondent stated, “We saw a significant shortage of available CDL drivers. … We were forced to use (third-party) trucking. ... Our overall cost increase was almost 30% more than last year.”

Some key takeaways:

So while business leaders expect to hire more, they are desperate to find the right talent.

Although we continue to see cautious optimism at work here, we are starting to see a very positive trend in the data: 47% of our respondents said conditions are better than six months ago, up from only 25% at the end of 2013. Furthermore, 51% feel conditions will be better over the next six months. That’s a 46% improvement from our last survey.

So what can local businesses here in Arkansas do to control their own destiny?

At CEG Partners, we believe identifying, recruiting and hiring the best talent should not be left to chance. Companies should either hire an in-house recruiter or a third-party professional recruiting/staffing firm. This will allow them to tap new sources for talent (i.e., military vets, colleges, etc.) as well as refine how they match candidates to available positions.

Relocating national level talent to Arkansas is also a unique challenge. We have a wellkept secret in this state related to quality of life, and we need to get that message out.

In addition, it is vital that Arkansas employers partner with local universities and colleges. For example, implementing an internship program allows companies to

69 47 % % 49 51 %

%

of respondents EXPECT SALES AND REVENUES TO INCREASE slightly or significantly during the next six months – an 8% improvement from January 2014.

said ECONOMIC CONDITIONS ARE BETTER TODAY than six months ago – an 88% improvement from our last survey.

expect HIRING TO INCREASE slightly or significantly – a 23% improvement from the number we saw in our last survey six months ago.

said they EXPECT CONDITIONS TO IMPROVE in the next six months – a 46% improvement from six months ago.

train future potential employees so that they are able to be more productive immediately after graduation. In lieu of a university or college that trains the skills your company requires, consider using online courses, creating an in-house training program or engaging third-party consulting/training companies.

I would like to see Arkansas businesses thrive in this new economy and get a head start on other parts of the country. We should all expect and demand more support and less obstruction from our state level government leaders as we find ways to pull ahead on the economic highway of 2014 and beyond.

ABOUT THE SURVEY From June 9 to July 28, 2014, CEG Partners along with Talk Business & Politics, the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce and the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce surveyed CEOs, presidents, plant managers and other business leaders in Arkansas across all major industries including, manufacturing, health care, technology, finance, utilities and others.

More than 150 leaders responded to the survey. It is the only forward-looking economic confidence survey of its kind in Arkansas.

“There’s no question that the economy, at long last, in this now five-year old recovery seems to be getting some legs, so this is good news,” State Chamber/AIA CEO Randy Zook said. There was one negative highlight in the report related to capital spending. Despite the optimism for employment, revenue increases and the overall economy, business leaders are still cautious regarding capital expenditures.

About 51% of business leaders surveyed expect capital spending to increase in the second half of 2014, a 2% decline from six months ago.

Stafford said that capital expenditures remain a long-term investment, and there is lingering uncertainty for the long-run even though short-term conditions look positive.

Zook added there is still a lot of “slack capacity” in industry statewide and nationally, which could explain the hesitation in this category.

Editor’s note: If you are a company leader and wish to participate in the next Business Leaders Confidence Survey, submit your name, company title and a phone number to Roby@TalkBusiness.net. www.talkbusiness.net

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Profiles Service PHOTOS BY BOB OCKEN

The Domino Effect Sherman Tate on Breaking Barriers, Life Lessons and Effective Leadership

By Casey L. Penn

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

I

t’s difficult to separate a man from his upbringing. Tate & Associates CEO Sherman Tate is just fine with that.

Tate, 68, grew up in the humble farming town of Marvell, in what he calls a “Leave It to Beaver” environment. He was raised by a mom and a dad who loved him and taught him life lessons that helped shape him into the business leader and entrepreneur that he is today.

Such life lessons are noticeably absent from some of today’s typical business leaders, according to Tate, speaking from 30 years of experience working in corporate America. “Many do not lead by example,” he explained. “Companies fall victim to what I call ‘unintended arrogance.’ The mentality is, ‘I got promoted. I’m the boss. I’m going to call my secretary and issue directives. You guys better get it done.’”

Ultimately, that approach doesn’t work, Tate said, citing a better example in leaders like Jack Welch, former CEO of GE. Tate recalls a legendary story that has stuck with him through the years.

“Welch came down out of his office to the assembly line. He said to those guys, ‘Here’s an idea I have in terms of a new product line. What do you think?’ Imagine. The men and women on the line. And they told him,” he said.

Like Welch, Tate has put himself out there among those working for him. “I’ve read meters and worked services – not because I had to. I wanted folks to know that I wanted to hear what they had to say. That doesn’t mean you’re going to do everything they say, but you do have to be objective enough that when someone gives you a good idea, you hear it. All it takes is one or two, and all of a sudden, people realize ‘hey, the boss listens.’”

Observations like these are a big part of what led Tate to start two management consulting firms: The Domino Effect and HT & Associates (Tate & Associates being the holding company).

The Domino Effect, fully operational since 2011, helps clients identify and correct shortfalls by assisting them in every area of management – from the most mundane (writing job descriptions, performance evaluations and salary surveys) to the more demanding (branding and marketing,

customer service, governmental affairs and lobbying).

“We’ll look at what they’re doing, and refine it,” said Tate, whose largest customer to date is SAS, a large, privately owned software analytics company headquartered in Carey, N.C., that is relying on The Domino Effect for help with business development and governmental affairs as it transitions into Arkansas.

A sports consulting firm, HT & Associates, began shortly after Tate’s colleagues Corbin Cobb and Scott Hamilton told him an alarming statistic.

“They told me that 75% of pro athletes are broke shortly after retirement. That blew me away,” said Tate, who developed HT & Associates to work mostly with pro athletes,

“You have to look somebody in the eye and talk effectively about what it is they want you to do and what you can do for them.”

– Sherman Tate some collegiate athletes and a few high school athletes who look to go pro.

“Most of these guys, once they go pro, have old buddies, relatives and others who latch onto them. These people travel all over the country with the athletes, who then provide them with hotel rooms, sometimes cars, and more,” he said.

HT helps athletes learn to treat themselves like successful companies, complete with a business strategy, branding, a portfolio and a long-term plan. Tate has helped his clients realize what it means to sign a $120 million contract.

“Uncle Sam takes a chunk of that. We

look at what’s left, what they need – do you need a house in Atlanta plus the one on the West Coast – and then give them options on investing the remaining money,” Tate said. “We don’t want to manage their money.

Instead, we teach them to manage their own money.”

BLAZING TRAILS ONE AT A TIME Tate didn’t set out to break numerous color barriers throughout his career. But he has by simply living the values his parents taught him.

“Mother promoted education. Dad promoted strong work. There was no exception,” he said. “Nowhere in there – and I’m a product of the ’60s and came up through the civil rights movement – nowhere ever did my father or mother teach me prejudice. What they taught me is that there are good and bad people – people you can trust and people you can’t trust – in every color known to man.”

As a freshman at Philander Smith College in the fall of 1964, Tate was part of a group of protestors who peacefully integrated the cafeteria at the state Capitol. It took four days of sit-ins, but eventually Tate and his colleagues made sure the historic Civil Rights Act, which had passed earlier that summer, was properly enforced and that they were served.

The law and that historic year “slowly started a cascade of changes,” Tate said.

As he grew up, Tate began to internalize and appreciate his parents’ profound lessons.

He graduated from Philander Smith with a job lined up, thanks to then-Vice Mayor Charles Bussey, with the consulting firm General Behavioral Systems (GBS) working with the City of Little Rock. From that point on, each new step on Tate’s career path – which centered heavily on human resources and personnel management – seemed to be a series of firsts for people of color.

After he left GBS, Tate worked in state government, first for the Arkansas Office of Personnel Management (OPM), a division of the Department of Finance and Administration, and later for the Bureau of Legislative Research. The latter position was offered to him by Marcus Halbrook, the first and longtime director of the bureau.

“At that point, the bureau had never had a person of color in any staff position,” www.talkbusiness.net

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Profiles: Tate Tate said. “I was the first African-American to walk through those doors. My job was in budget and personnel.”

Tate’s career continued to be a series of job offers from those impressed with his work. The next offer was no exception. It came in 1976, from then-UALR Chancellor Bob Ross for the position of personnel department manager for the university.

“He asked me to develop and manage the department,” said Tate, who, upon taking on the challenge, became the first man of color to be over the university’s hiring of nonfaculty staff.

Clearly, a pattern was developing. Tate heard next from Gov. David Pryor, who asked him to come back to OPM, this time as administrator. He did, and he continued to excel – and get noticed. “During my time with OPM, I joined the Little Rock Jaycees. I was not the first African-American member of the Jaycees,” Tate said with a smile. “There were three before me.”

The Jaycees may not have been another first for Tate, but the introductions and friendships he cultivated there would soon lead him in the trailblazing direction once again. As he came into the group, Sheffield Nelson was transitioning out. The two visited only briefly until a few years later when their paths crossed once again at a local restaurant. Nelson was chairman, president and CEO of Arkla Gas Co., and he needed someone who knew personnel to manage Arkla’s Arkansas Division. He offered the job to Tate.

As manager of human resources for Arkla’s Arkansas Division, Tate was Arkla’s first person of color in management and over the company’s largest division. This particular “first” proved to be both challenging and rewarding for the young businessman. Even with his strong upbringing, Tate found he was not immune to the challenges of being a black executive in a sea of largely white colleagues and employees.

“I heard some of everything. I was called some of everything. It got to the point where it really got to me,” Tate admitted. “I called my dad one day, and I said, ‘Daddy, I don’t think I can do this any longer. I’m tired, I’m hearing the N word, and I hear it every day.’

12

He said, ‘So let me ask you this, has anybody put their hands on you?’ I said ‘No.’ So, he says, ‘So, you just dealing with words?’ I said, ‘Yeah, and I’m tired of it.’ And then my Daddy, with a ninth-grade education, says to me, ‘Son, the man hired you ‘cause he knew you could do that job. If you walk off, nobody else that looks like you or me will have that opportunity.’ And he hung up the phone.”

His father’s tough love worked. Tate stuck with the job and, supported fully by his boss, began to change the culture of the company for the better.

While working for Arkla, Tate was promoted first to vice president of consumer and community relations and later to vice president of distribution and operations. “I was the guy running everything in Arkansas. That was a first, too,” he said.

In what was by then his typical Jack Welch-esque style of management, Tate approached his new position of power not from the corner office but from down in the trenches. Dressed in company uniform rather than a suit and tie, he visited his districts and, taking on the duties of an employee, the boss began learning from his employees what he could do to make their jobs easier.

Simple gestures, like providing his crew with the parts they preferred to use, established trust quickly between himself and his workforce. “I was one of them,” he recalled. “They knew they could approach me, and that made all the difference.”

Tate stayed at Arkla until the company was bought out in 1997. He then served as vice president and general manager of operations for Alltel from 1998-2011. Tate and businessman Frank Fletcher also co-owned Fletcher-Tate Ford in North Little Rock from 1996 until its sale in 2002. Today, Tate and Mack McLarty are co-owners of Hope Auto in Hope.

MAKING A DIFFERENCE IN THE COMMUNITY Outside of his professional obligations, Tate was the first black man to be elected chairman of the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce. He has served numerous other local boards over the years, among

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

them Philander Smith College, St. Vincent Health System, the United Negro College Fund and the Pulaski County Facilities Board. Currently, he is on the board of Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield and serves as chairman of the Southern Bancorp Bank Governing Board.

Tate is also the current president of the Quapaw Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America. He believes in spending time as a mentor both to children and to young entrepreneurs. To the latter, he stresses the importance of not letting today’s technology isolate you from your business surroundings.

“Yes, we live in the technology age,” he readily admitted. “But even in 2014, you must effectively interact and interface with people, which demands good people skills and good communication skills. You have to look somebody in the eye and talk effectively about what it is they want you to do and what you can do for them.”

In late 2011, Tate left his position at Verizon to turn his full attention to his own companies.

Being an entrepreneur and now leader of his own companies suits him, he says.

“I love it,” he said. “I know we make a difference with every client we serve. When a company hires us, the last thing they have to worry about is the quality of our product.

We’re going to give them what they want and need. Consistent with that, we’re not ‘yes’ people. We do our research and our homework. We don’t tell them what they want to hear. We tell them what they need to know.”

Looking back over his career to date, Tate attributes many of his achievements, including all of his “firsts” as an AfricanAmerican, to being a good listener and a hard worker – just two of many lessons he learned back home in Phillips County.

“Again, it goes back to something my dad taught me.” He said, “‘Son, if you accept a job, regardless of what they’re paying you, you show up every day and do what you were hired to do. You don’t sit back and complain. You took the job. Give it 100% effort every day.’ I never forgot that, and [as a result], I never had a job I didn’t like.”

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Profiles Service PHOTOS COURTESY OF FAYETTEVILLE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, FIRST THURSDAY FAYETTEVILLE

A Square Deal The Fayetteville Square continues to represent the heart and soul of downtown.

By Rex Nelson

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

F

rom 1947-72, Wes Gordon led the Fayetteville Chamber of Commerce. He took over the organization at a time of rapid growth for the city. World War II veterans headed to the University of Arkansas in droves to take advantage of the GI Bill. In the 1940 census, Fayetteville had just 8,212 residents. By the 1950 census, the city’s population had grown to 17,071.

When Gordon retired, there were more than 30,000 people living in Fayetteville. The home of the state’s flagship university now has more than 75,000 residents, making it Arkansas’ third-largest municipality behind Little Rock and Fort Smith. One thing hasn’t changed, though, since the Wes Gordon era at the chamber. The Fayetteville Square continues to represent the heart and soul of downtown.

When chamber officials decided more than a decade ago to present an annual award to honor those who have contributed significantly to the quality of life in Fayetteville, they chose to name the honor the Wes Gordon Golden Deeds Award. A rail bordering the gardens surrounding the Old Post Office building in the middle of the square was constructed to honor award recipients. Honorees receive medallions along the railing that are inscribed with their names. Past recipients include such noted Arkansans as Frank Broyles, John Lewis and Fred Vorsanger.

“I used to worry about my dad when I was young because I thought all he did was drink coffee at the dime store,” says Nancy Allen, Gordon’s daughter. “I didn’t realize at the time that it was a big part of his job.”

Allen is among the many longtime Fayetteville residents who have a special affinity for the square. Her wedding reception (her husband is the well-known Arkansas sportswriter Nate Allen) was in the Old Post Office building. There’s life again in that building following the decision last year by Fayetteville-based online retailer Acumen Brands to place an apparel store known as Country Outfitter there. The Old Post Office building was on the market from 2009-13, when it was purchased by Jim Huson, a Heber Springs native who owns Doe’s Eat Place franchises in Northwest Arkansas. Huson bought the 102-year-old building from Ron Bumpass for $1.5 million

and then leased it to Acumen Brands.

John James started Acumen Brands as a way to pay for medical school. The company has boomed, raising more than $90 million in venture capital last year.

The Old Post Office building is the company’s first brick-and-mortar retail location. Acumen’s Country Outfitter western clothing and accessories brand has built a Facebook following of millions of “likes” and is believed to have grown its fan base faster than any retailer in the history of the site. Acumen has been touted by Google as one of the principal drivers of economic development in the state. James, in fact, gave up his medical career to concentrate on growing the business.

“We want to create a $1 billion business,” James told Google. “We want to create something that is of significance for Arkansas.”

Certainly his presence downtown is significant for the future of the Fayetteville Square.

“I’m not moving,” James says of the place he calls home. “I can’t move. Fayetteville is home. It’s an honor to open our flagship store downtown. The square is one of my favorite places in Northwest Arkansas, and the Old Post Office is my second favorite building next to Old Main at the University of Arkansas.”

The Fayetteville Square – which is bounded by Center, East, Block and Mountain streets – has been a hub of commercial activity since the city was founded. What’s now known as the Old Post Office building was constructed in the center of the square in 1911. When the Fayetteville post office moved to the intersection of Dickson and St. Charles streets in 1974, the building on the square was put up for sale. A local investor purchased it in 1979, and it has housed a succession of restaurants through the years.

The center of the square was the home of the county courthouse from the 1830s until 1905. A brick courthouse that was built in 1854 was burned during the Civil War. A new brick courthouse was built in 1868 and was used until the present Washington County Courthouse at the intersection of College and Center streets was completed in 1905.

“The worst years were those when it was

empty,” Nancy Allen says of the Old Post Office building. “We just hated not having that building used.”

The Fayetteville Advertising and Promotion Commission had attempted to purchase the building in March 2012 for $730,000, but the offer was rejected by Bumpass. Prior to Acumen Brands moving its Country Outfitters retail operation there, the building had most recently been occupied by a restaurant called Urban Table.

That restaurant closed in January 2009.

The Old Post Office building had been slated for demolition in 1974 as part of an urban renewal plan, but a group of Fayetteville residents began a petition drive to preserve the structure. They succeeded in having it placed on the National Register of Historic Places in August of that year.

A project began in 1977 to transform the building into a restaurant and club. It later housed everything from the Hog City Diner to Stogie’s Fine Cigars & Tobacco.

The Fayetteville Square has had its ups and downs through the decades. A document from the Fayetteville Advertising and Promotion Commission notes that the square has been “burned down, shot at, blown away and even deliberately destroyed in the name of progress.”

In the 1960s and 1970s, retailers began deserting downtown for strip shopping centers and the Northwest Arkansas Mall.

Urban renewal resulted in the loss of a number of historic buildings in downtown Fayetteville. There are still gaps, even in buildings built after the demolition debacle.

For example, the ground floor of the East Square Plaza building, commonly known as the Bank of America building though it was long ago abandoned by the bank, remains largely unoccupied. The University of Arkansas has plans to utilize the space eventually. Just off the square, the lot where the Mountain Inn once stood (the hotel closed in 1998) remains vacant.

Fayetteville historians will tell you that the square had two periods of destruction.

The first was in 1862 when Confederate Gen. Benjamin McCulloch ordered all commercial buildings to be burned. The second came in the 20th century due to urban renewal.

“To be fair, in the 1970s the square was dying,” reads the document from www.talkbusiness.net

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Profiles: Fayetteville Square the Fayetteville Advertising and Promotion Commission. “Many retail businesses had moved out to Highway 71 (College Avenue), and new suburban developments like the Evelyn Hills Shopping Center made the old square seem antiquated and useless. At one point the occupancy rate on the square was said to be only 20 percent. Buildings were empty, windows were boarded up and some had already been demolished, creating giant gaps.

“Thinking the old, long, skinny spaces would be hard to fill with modern retail, the federal urban renewal program decided to tear down buildings and clear lots in hopes that they could be sold and redeveloped by private interests. But that didn’t happen. The vacant lots only made the area less desirable, especially for the few remaining businesses.

The city’s business leaders decided to take drastic action, starting with McIlroy Bank.

Its decision to stay on the square was seen as a watershed moment. The University of Arkansas and First National Bank also committed to building new facilities on the square. … Buildings were purchased and torn down to make way for what they hoped would be a revival of the square.”

The McIlroy Bank building was completed in 1977. In 1986, what’s now Arvest Bank made its first foray outside of Benton County by purchasing McIlroy. Five buildings had once occupied the space now used by Arvest.

The facility built to house the University of Arkansas Center for Continuing Education was completed in 1981. It was designed by modernist Fayetteville architect Warren Segraves, who designed several public buildings in the area. Segraves had graduated with a degree in architecture from the UA in 1953 and established his own firm in 1956. He was a champion of the International Style of architecture, and more than 4,000 of his drawings are stored at the university.

Also in 1981, First National Bank (later to be purchased by Bank of America) completed its building. Two additional stories were added to the building in 2006 to create downtown living spaces.

At the time, Lewis was a proponent of urban renewal. Years later, he said the city’s

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business leaders thought they were doing the right thing but later came to realize just how wrong it was to demolish so many historic structures.

In 1979, a group of Fayetteville’s leaders developed a plan to beautify downtown.

Don McEneny was hired to design, plant and maintain gardens around the Old Post Office building. Following McEneny’s death in 1985, Susan Regan began managing the gardens. In 1995, the Fayetteville Advertising & Promotion Commission took over funding for gardening supplies and Regan was hired by the city.

The gardens were placed under the control of the Fayetteville Parks and Recreation Department in 2002. In 2007, a deteriorating water feature was replaced with an upgraded version resembling a real waterfall. Brick retaining walls were redesigned and replaced with natural stone.

Sidewalks were enlarged and electrical systems were updated to accommodate new landscape lighting. Benches and trash receptacles were replaced.

Alan Hill, a 37-year-old Fayetteville native, manages the business Terra Tots on the square and is the president of the Block Street Business Association. Terra Tots offers everything from cloth diapers and baby clothing to toys and baby carriers.

“It is the community,” Hill says of the Fayetteville Square. “I’ve see the square at some of the highest points and lowest points in regard to traffic, revenue and events. I think that right now the square is probably as strong as it has ever been as far as the mix of vendors, shops and restaurants. … I actually got married just across the street from my store. I love looking out the window and seeing where I got married. The retailers down here take the time to not only sell you an item but also explain where it

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

came from and how it’s made.”

Liz Fulton owns the Town & Country Shop, a well-known women’s specialty store, on the west side of the square.

“The square is truly the heart and soul of the community because there are events such as our farmers’ market that draw attention to the square,” she says. “When this store opened, there was no mall. This was the only shopping area. When the mall opened, a lot of businesses moved that direction. Now we kind of have this resurgence of interest in and appreciation of the square. It’s exciting to see that, especially among the younger generations. This is what people are looking for today – something more than just a place to hang your hat.

They want a place where you can feel a part of a community.”

Each Saturday morning from April through November, the Fayetteville Farmers Market brings thousands of visitors to the square. There are people walking dogs, pushing strollers and filling baskets with their purchases. On the first Thursday of each month from March through October, the square is transformed into an arts district featuring live music, street performers and the work of dozens of visual artists for what’s known as First Thursday Fayetteville. The farmers’ market began in 1973. It now offers fruits, vegetables, flowers, crafts, fine art, eggs, honey, baked goods, plants, meats, jams and jellies. It has received national awards in recent years.

“The farmers’ market has been an important part of the downtown economy for more than four decades,” says Teresa Maurer, the market coordinator. “Growing from just six vendors per market day to 70 on Saturdays, the market attracts thousands of residents and visitors to downtown. In the past two years, several businesses have relocated to the Fayetteville Square just to take advantage of the market’s draw.”

In 2002, the $8.2 million Fayetteville Town Center was completed on the square.

It included 25,000 square feet of new construction, 14,000 square feet of which is exhibition and convention space. A 200-car parking deck was constructed below the building.

Another positive step for downtown

came in the fall of 2012 when the 15-story hotel just off the square that first had opened as a Hilton in 1981 reopened as the Chancellor Hotel following a $15 million renovation. The Hilton had given way to a more downscale brand, the Radisson, in 2001. The Radisson, in turn, became known as the Cosmopolitan in 2006. With each change, the hotel lost more of its luster. By the time the hotel fell into receivership in 2010 when financing dried up for owners Richard Alexander and John Nock, six of its 15 floors were unusable.

As the Great Recession began to wind down, developer Ike Thrash of Hattiesburg, Miss., teamed up with construction executive Sam Alley of Little Rock to redevelop the hotel. Alley and Thrash were both bidding on the hotel when they decided to join forces.

One of the top restoration efforts on the square is the building that houses the Bank of Fayetteville. The building, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, was constructed between 1904 and 1908 and housed Lewis Brothers Hardware for many years. The hardware store was owned by the family of John Lewis, a former chief executive officer of First National Bank of Fayetteville. Lewis, who often was referred to as Mr. Fayetteville, was among the organizers of the Bank of Fayetteville in 1986. Following extensive renovations, the bank moved into the building on the square in December 1987. The building had been designed by New York native A.O. Clarke, who moved to St. Louis to study architecture and then moved to Rogers in 1904 to help Coin Harvey build the Monte Ne resort.

Clarke went on to design buildings in downtown Rogers. Thirteen of his buildings are listed on the National Register.

Lewis stepped down as bank president in 2004, and Mary Beth Brooks took over.

“The square always has been and continues to be the heart of our community,” Brooks says. “Some of the businesses and events may come and go, but the square remains a place that makes you feel at home.

Whether you come to the square for events or for shopping and business, you get a true sense of what it means to live and work in Fayetteville.”

Brian Bailey owns The Mustache Goods & Wears at 15. S. Block St. It’s a boutique shop that features shoes, T-shirts, books, local art and jewelry.

“The square is like connecting back to what cities were like when people walked everywhere and knew their neighbors,” Bailey says. “We live two blocks from the square. It’s where we want to live. It’s the lifestyle we want to be a part of.”

Bailey said he’s not about to criticize the businesses that line College Avenue and

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other parts of town: “They’re vital to our economy, but that just doesn’t attract us as a family.”

So what’s the future hold for the Fayetteville Square?

“There are only so many buildings, and there’s not much occupancy available,” Bailey says. “I think that as we continue to go back to that era when people wanted to know the owners of the places they shopped and contribute to the local economy, stores like ours will thrive.”

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Profiles Service PHOTOS BY BOB OCKEN

Sabin Takes on Another Role, Another Challenge Progressive lawmaker’s day job puts him at the epicenter of Central Arkansas’ burgeoning startup community.

By Wesley Brown 18

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

T

here’s been many a story written about bright kids leaving the rural South hoping to find fame and fortune in the bright lights and big cities to the East and West. Yet, one of Arkansas’ “most interesting men” – a Clinton protégé and former New Yorker – came to his current station in life by starting down a more unconventional path that began 20 years ago.

Born and raised in New York City, Warwick Baron Reid Sabin left the comforts of the nation’s largest metropolis in 1994 to come to Arkansas as a 17-year-old college student at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, partly because of the influence of his boyhood hero, then-President Bill Clinton.

Now, at 37 years old, Sabin probably could not have imagined even a few years ago that he would be sitting where he is today. On the second floor of his Main Street office in the Argenta Arts District in downtown North Little Rock, the smartly dressed Democratic lawmaker, businessman, scholar and converted Southern gentleman took time recently from his busy schedule to talk as he nears his first full year as the executive director of the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub. “I have spent more years in Arkansas now that I have in New York. It will be exactly 20 years (this month) that I came to Arkansas.

This is where I chose to come as soon as I had anything to say about it,” Sabin reflected, laughing about first telling his parents on his decision to come to Arkansas. “This is where life is. I married a girl from El Dorado, and I love living in Arkansas and I don’t expect that to ever change.”

According to Sabin’s bio, he first met Bill Clinton at the White House Rose Garden after he was chosen to represent New York State at Boys Nation. Leaving the urban surroundings of New York City to attend college in Fayetteville, he quickly adapted to life in Arkansas and went on to add a long list of academic, student government and public service accomplishments to his resume – including leading a successful campaign to have all schools in the University of Arkansas System officially observe the federal holiday honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. While in college, Sabin was awarded

the Harry S. Truman Scholarship and was named to the USA Today Academic All-Star Team. He also won the Marshall Scholarship for study at the University of Oxford. While in England, Sabin was the speechwriter to U.S. Ambassador Philip Lader. He also was an intern at Foreign Affairs magazine and left Oxford with an M.A. in philosophy, politics and economics.

Then the Arkansas grad went from Oxford to Washington, D.C., where he was press secretary for former Arkansas Congressman Marion Berry. In March 2002, he was named director of development for the William J. Clinton Foundation in Little Rock. Two years later, he became associate editor of the Arkansas Times, where he wrote cover stories and a weekly opinion column. During this time, he co-hosted a program on Arkansas public television

“I think a lot of life is identifying those opportunities that are put in front of you.”

– State Rep. Warwick Sabin called “Unconventional Wisdom” with friend and political rival David Sanders, who is now a Republican state senator.

Then in 2008, Sabin’s career took an unusual detour when he took over as publisher of the Oxford American at a time when the magazine was in bankruptcy and flailing from an embezzlement scandal.

Under his helm, Sabin said he guided the monthly literary publication into the digital world, grew its circulation and brought some stability to the magazine that is dedicated to documenting the sights, sounds, food and culture of the American South. The publication, which was founded in Oxford, Miss., in 1992, also expanded its offerings to include a new restaurant and nightclub in the old Juanita’s building on Main Street in Little Rock.

Sabin said after spending five years at the prestigious publication, he found himself at a crucial crossroads in his professional, private and public life. A Democrat, he was elected to the state House of Representatives in 2012 for District 33, a political hotbed that includes the Hillcrest, Leawood, Briarwood, Hall High and Capitol View/Stifft Station neighborhoods as well as many of the oldest downtown neighborhoods of Little Rock.

Sabin also joined the 89th Arkansas General Assembly during a historic moment when the Republican Party took control of the state House and Senate for the first time since post-Civil War Reconstruction. Add to that, he was winding down a troubling and public period at the magazine that the Little Rock lawmaker admits taxed him personally after he replaced founding editor Marc Smirnoff in August 2012, following accusations of sexual harassment against Smirnoff.

Despite the lows, there also came some highs. Sabin married longtime girlfriend Jessica Deloach in October of that year.

“She is amazing, by the way,” he adds. Not long after becoming a newlywed, Sabin said he became familiar with the planned Argenta Innovation Center in his role as a state lawmaker. When plans for the center were announced in February 2013, Sabin spoke at the center’s unveiling and joined a long list of public and private officials to throw their support behind the unfamiliar nonprofit.

Shortly after, Sabin said he was approached by a few board members who were involved in the development of the new Argenta venture, and they asked him if he would be interested in taking over the unfilled leadership post.

“At the time it felt right, and I can’t necessarily put my finger on it, but the opportunity seemed unique and interesting,” the well-traveled Arkansas lawmaker said.

“I think a lot of life is identifying those opportunities that are put in front of you.

And this one was risky because I was basically being charged with creating a new organization from scratch.”

Meanwhile, Sabin said he also struggled with the decision to leave the Oxford American, but felt he left it in better financial position, adding “there really www.talkbusiness.net

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Profiles: Sabin was not a lot left there that I felt I needed to do.” In hindsight, Sabin said once he settled into his new job at the Innovation Hub he found it to be a perfect match for both his professional and public service experience and talents. He said he has always felt a debt of obligation to the state of Arkansas for giving him a scholarship 20 years ago to attend college in Fayetteville, and now he feels he has a perfect vehicle to further the development of the state – especially through education and economic development.

“I don’t consider the path that I have taken very linear or very conventional, but looking back I feel very lucky for the opportunities I had,” the youthful lawmaker said. “And a lot of it is starting to make sense now as my professional and public life dovetail to some degree. There are things [at the Innovation Hub] that I am very interested in and passionate about that center around creating opportunity for everyone in our community.”

WHAT IS ALL THE HUB ABOUT? Today, Sabin said part of his job at the Innovation Hub is explaining the newly created organization’s mission and vision to the public. For example, the North Little Rock nonprofit’s formal name will be called the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub, yet the actual renovated building that will house the organization’s offices and programs will be known as the Argenta Regional Center.

Sabin and others who are involved in the ongoing activities at the North Little Rock nonprofit now commonly refer to the neophyte Argenta venture as “The Hub.” “When I took the job, I don’t think it was very well defined to the general public, so it seemed very amorphous, and I even had to explain what exactly I was doing to my parents,” Sabin joked. “But it is also not the first time I have done that. When I was asked to take over the Oxford American after it was bankrupt and dead, I had to figure out how to correct that organization when I was never a publisher of a magazine before.

It was both a challenge and an opportunity, and that is how I saw this.”

However, Sabin won’t have to deal with budget woes and some of the dysfunction he

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ran into at the literary magazine. The center’s 16-person board, which is organized as a 501(c)3 nonprofit, has also reached nearly half of its $2.5 million fund-raising goal from private sources. This will go toward completing the first phase of the renovated 17,000-square foot meeting space.

The renovated urban center will house three inter-connected ventures that will work together to provide education, training, prototyping and startup and entrepreneurial opportunities.

Also, at its formal “wall-breaking” ceremony in February announcing the center’s new headquarters, the nonprofit received the support of Gov. Mike Beebe and received a $575,000 grant from the Arkansas Economic Development Commission to help kick-start renovations at the former North Little Rock police substation at Broadway and Poplar – located right across the street from Verizon Arena.

“We strongly believe that by creating the Argenta Innovation Center, we are taking a significant step toward creating cutting-edge jobs that not only attract new talent to the area but also help us keep our brightest and most inventive entrepreneurs right here in Central Arkansas,” Barry Hyde, the campaign committee chairman, said earlier

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

this summer.

Established as a board-governed nonprofit to increase entrepreneurial and startup activity in Central Arkansas, the so-called “Hub” is modeled after New Orleans’ Idea Village, which has provided direct support to more than 3,000 entrepreneurs, generated more than $100 million in annual revenue, and created more than 2,000 jobs in New Orleans since its inception in 2000.

Sabin said when the Hub moves into the new location later this summer, the renovated center will have four key components.

They include: • The Launch Pad, a “makerspace” that will provide cutting-edge tools and technology for professionals and amateur tinkerers alike. There will be 3-D printers, laser-cutting machines and other equipment that can be used to prototype inventions and refine products. Educational opportunities will be provided for people of all ages as well as support for local manufacturers and corporations that want to solve problems or provide additional training.

• The STEAM Lab, which will be operated in partnership with the EAST Initiative to offer STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) education across a variety of ages and disciplines. Expertise in these areas is critical for Arkansas’ workforce to be prepared for jobs in the 21st century.

The “A” will signify the arts, because design and aesthetic expression are important parts of this mix. This classroom and laboratory will have advanced equipment and technology along with the nationally recognized training in computer coding, programming and computer-aided design (CAD) that EAST has provided to Arkansas students for the last 20 years.

• The Silver Mine, a co-working space for entrepreneurs and small business owners looking for networking and enrichment activities. It will also be the home to vertical business acceleration programs that will seed and mentor promising new enterprises from Arkansas and around the world.

Through events and education programs, and by providing a venue where ideas can connect with capital and other resources, the Silver Mine will be able to incubate and give birth to a steady stream of new businesses.

• The Art Connection, an after-school and summer work program for high school students designed to develop leadership and innovation through hands-on training in the visual arts industry. Modeled after the successful Artists for Humanity program in Boston, the Art Connection works with arts organizations, local artists, business owners, city government and others in the community to provide practical skills for under-resourced youth.

And to make sure all these ventures have the necessary support to grow, Sabin and the Innovation Hub board have brought together an A-list of partners and collaborators from both the public and private sector. They include the Delta Regional Authority, East initiative, Arkansas Stem Coalition, Kiva Zip, the Arkansas Science and Technology Authority and Arkansas Manufacturing Solutions.

Sabin also said the Argenta nonprofit networks with other like-minded organizations in Arkansas and across the nation, including Southern culture online retailer Bourbon & Boots, The Seal Corporation and Noble Impact – a local nonprofit that teaches youth to pursue public service through entrepreneurship.

Still, even before Sabin celebrates his first year as executive director in September, the Argenta center will have already launched a number of successful events in its short history.

In June, Gov. Beebe hosted an invitationonly event for a new program called the Arkansas Fellowship. Like other planned Innovation Hub programs, it is modeled after a successful program in Indiana called the Orr Fellowship.

Sabin said the Arkansas Fellowship offers a two-year fellowship program to a select group of graduating college seniors and focuses on developing the next generation of entrepreneurs and business leaders in Arkansas. He said it will help to keep

some of the best and brightest college graduates from leaving Arkansas for better opportunities and higher-paying jobs out of state.

“By pairing them with some of Arkansas’ top companies, Arkansas Fellows will have the opportunity to build a reliable and meaningful network of business leaders, co-workers and peers for the future,” said the Hub director, who will oversee the program.

And late in July, the nonprofit hosted the Young Makers Camp – a week-long summer camp for budding entrepreneurs and whiz kids in Arkansas held at a location on Main Street in downtown North Little Rock. Led

by Launch Pad director Joel Gordon, the camp for kids ages 8 through 12 introduced the “young makers” to electronics, 3-D printing, programming, coding, laser cutting and the Raspberry Pi computer – a low-cost, credit-card-sized computer that plugs into a computer monitor or TV and uses a standard size keyboard and mouse.

Sabin said he is excited about bringing all these varied people, business partners, mentors, venture capitalists and organizations from both the public and private sector together into the Hub’s “collaborative ecosystem of innovation” to create something that has never been done before in Arkansas.

Along with the other major developments and entrepreneurial activity under way in Central Arkansas, including the unveiling of the Arkansas Venture Center at The Little Rock Chamber of Commerce and the recent hiring of a new director at the Little Rock Tech Park Authority, Sabin envisions Central Arkansas becoming a place where new companies and innovations will boost the local economy.

“Right now, I know there are a lot of entrepreneurs with startup ventures that are starting to get traction here,” he said. “And I definitely think we are going to see more success stories, specifically in the startup technology realm here in Arkansas because there has been an organized and concerted effort to support that sector of the economy.”

PROGRESS, NOT POLITICS The progressive Democrat also said that even though his politics may not be the

same as many of the people he works with, as the Hub’s spokesman he tries to make sure that he doesn’t come across as promoting his work at the State Capitol.

“Basically, I find that through my work at the Innovation Hub I am able to find a lot of common ground with people that may not share my political outlook,” Sabin said of being one of the few “progressives” in the Arkansas Legislature. “But I think that, in general, we as Arkansans prefer to work together, like to find common ground and judge people on who they are and their actions.”

Sabin continued, “And as a student of political history in the state of Arkansas, there is just a lot of evidence that [Arkansans] look for opportunities to build bridges rather than find divisions. I try not to bring politics into my work, to put it very simply and bluntly, because I would rather not create any doubt what my intentions are.”

Still, the always-positive lawmaker admits that both his political and professional goals are the same. “The relationship that politics have to my work is that in those broad goals of increasing opportunity and improving education and economic development in the state, I am achieving those things through my job.”

Sabin added that just as voters judge politicians on their work through the ballot box, his work at the Innovation Hub likewise will be measured by how well he enables and helps to accelerate the area’s mushrooming startup activity and whether or not he hits the forward-thinking targets he has for the fledgling nonprofit.

“I believe you prove yourself through your actions,” Sabin said, choosing his words carefully. “I can tell anyone all day long how great my intentions are – but in the end I am going to be judged on what I actually do.

“I like to think in the relationships I have and the work that I have done so far, at least people know that I am coming at this work honestly with the best of intentions without regard to having a political agenda, one way or other.”

And, he added, “If I don’t do a good job of that,” he said, “I am sure someone will let me know.” www.talkbusiness.net

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Profiles Service PHOTO BY BOB OCKEN

In the Driver’s Seat New Arkansas Trucking Association President Shannon Newton is taking life as it comes.

By Jeanni Brosius

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

S

hannon Newton’s career in the trucking industry happened purely by accident and being selected as the president of the Arkansas Trucking Association wasn’t on her road map either. The appointment happened on the heels of welcoming a new son into her family. Shannon and her husband, Josh, recently adopted a teenage boy out of foster care, making her a mom of three.

Newton, a Saline County native, graduated from the University of Central Arkansas with a double major in accounting and computer information systems.

“Trucking was not an obvious choice or field of industry that was even on my radar,” Newton said. “However, I met a recruiter from Maverick Transportation that was on campus promoting some openings in the corporate office, and the story becomes somewhat predictable after that.”

Just out of college, she was hired by Maverick to work in the payroll department, where she stayed for about a year before she was offered a position at the ATA. She’s been with the association since 2003, and she was appointed president in June, replacing Lane Kidd, who stepped down after serving 22 years as president.

She said her No. 1 goal in leading the association is to meet the needs of its membership.

“There are general ideas and themes that I personally believe will help the association serve as a vehicle for its members,” she said.

“But essentially, if the industry’s interests are being served, issues like membership and engagement and morale tend to take care of themselves.”

The ATA is administered by more than 300 trucking companies, and according to the ATA’s website, members range from self-employed owner operators to some of the country’s largest freight and logistics companies.

THE TRUCKING INDUSTRY ATA board member Al Heringer IV said he is looking forward to working with Newton.

“She was the only choice as far as I am concerned,” said Heringer, who is vice president of sales at Star Transportation, Inc., in Jonesboro. “I am looking forward to working with her for years to come. She understands what we do in the trucking

industry and works hard to make sure we are successful in this industry.

“All the years that I have been a member of the board of directors, she has always had the answers to any questions that I needed to make a decision.”

Newton also believes in educating the public and making people aware of the economic impact of the trucking industry in Arkansas. The industry employs 86,000 people in Arkansas, that’s one in every 13 working people; it pays $2.5 billion in wages to support Arkansas families; 90% of the state’s towns depend exclusively on the trucking industry to deliver necessary items.

And the demand for trucking will likely increase by 20% over the next 10 years, according to the ATA. “[The public] is grossly unaware of the exorbitant taxes that we pay to support Arkansas government and infrastructure,” she said. “As an industry, we haven’t done a good enough job convincing the public that our industry places a huge amount of effort and expenditures to ensure that we are operating as safely as possible on our roads and highways. And that we are doing all of these things in an environment calling for increasingly high capital expenditures and an incredible amount of regulation.”

According to the American Transportation Research Institute, the top four issues for the trucking industry are hours of service; compliance, safety and accountability (CSA); a shortage of drivers; and the economy. Newton said those issues haven’t changed much in the past few years; however, other items on that list are fuel supply and prices and the lack of spending for infrastructure and the cost of congestion.

“When the economy is steady or improving, workforce – specifically the driver shortage – is the number one economic issue,” she said. “When the economy is not good or declining, a lackluster economy is the number one issue. It’s a very, very slow revolving door.

Currently, the industry is facing a huge driver shortage that is only expected to get worse.”

With an aging workforce, Newton said the industry isn’t attracting young drivers at the same rate that current drivers are retiring or leaving the trucking business.

“All of this is overlaid on the fact the bar is being raised with regard to the requirements

and qualifications for individuals to qualify to become drivers,” she said.

NEWTON: FAMILY OF FIVE Just as Newton wants to increase understanding of the trucking industry, she also has a passion for raising the awareness of the need for adoptive families in Arkansas.

The Newtons recently became parents to their third child, David, who just turned 17.

The couple has two other children, Nash, 7, and Nyla, 5. But Newton says she was moved when she learned that teenage boys are the least likely to be adopted out of foster care.

“I was truly broken once I became aware of the need,” she said. “These waiting kids are not just numbers or statistics; each one is a real kid with hopes and dreams just like all of the other children I knew.

“My husband is a wonderfully magnificent man, and we decided very early on that our family had something to offer those children that might not otherwise have the opportunity to be part of a family. … We were up for the challenge.”

After searching available children through the Department of Human Services’ Arkansas Heart Gallery – which introduces prospective adoptive families with children in need of homes – Newton said there were six boys for whom she and her husband began praying, and David was one of them.

The Newtons had met David at several events, and he compared his adoption to winning the lottery on a Today’s THV news segment.

David had not had a family in 10 years, and he lived in a group home for six years.

This is the first time he’s had his own room.

Newton says David has been with their family since November 2013, and he has excelled in school and will be playing football for the first time this fall.

Although David’s adoption isn’t final yet, the Newtons still consider him their son.

Through the adoption process, Newton said she became very involved with Project Zero, which is a nonprofit organization that promotes awareness of the need for adoptive homes for children in foster care.

“I am honored to now serve on the board of Project Zero, forwarding their mission until no child is waiting in Arkansas for an adoptive home,” she said.

For more information on Project Zero, visit www.theprojectzero.org. www.talkbusiness.net

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Feature

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Democrat Mike Ross and Republican Asa Hutchinson compete to be the next governor of Arkansas.

By Roby Brock Editor-in-Chief

ILLUSTRATION: SHAFALI ANAND PHOTOS COURTESY OF CANDIDATES CAMPAIGN

www.talkbusiness.net

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Feature: Battle For Governor Asa Hutchinson is fond of saying that he hasn’t changed, but the state has. And he’s right, at least on his analysis of Arkansas’ political landscape.

Since 2010, Arkansas has shifted to a lean Republican electorate thanks to an unpopular Democratic president, Barack Obama, and a nearly as unpopular health care law that continues to stoke political backlash across the state.

The battle to fill the shoes of Gov. Mike Beebe – who mystifyingly hovers nears 70% with his approval rating – will be one for the ages in Arkansas politics. Many observers see the 2014 election cycle shaping up like the 1990 classic that featured Bill Clinton, Sheffield Nelson, Tommy Robinson, Steve

Pryor versus the quick ascension of Congressman Tom Cotton has added another layer of personality and intrigue to this year’s political season, but unlike 1990, all of 2014’s political action is not crowded into one race.

After the jockeying, the trial balloons, and this year’s political primaries, the Arkansas governor’s campaign has come down to two capable politicians with solid backgrounds of public service.

MEET THE CANDIDATES To be fair, there are actually four candidates in this year’s field.

Libertarian Frank Gilbert of Tull (Grant County) and Green Party nominee Joshua

Mike and his wife, Holly, on announcement day.

Clark, Jim Guy Tucker and Tom McRae. That year’s races had strong personalities and the Clinton re-election certainly fed the narrative that defined a generation of politics throughout the 1990s at the state and national level.

This year’s cycle has some qualities of that epic year considering the governor’s race has seen the entry and exit of Attorney General Dustin McDaniel and former Lt. Governor Bill Halter, and the quick re-emergence of former Congressman Mike Ross, the Democratic nominee. Several Republicans, including House Speaker Davy Carter, flirted with potential runs after Hutchinson staked an early claim as the GOP frontrunner.

The U.S. Senate race pitting Sen. Mark

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Drake of Hot Springs will be on the ballot, but their long-shot candidacies won’t likely mount to much more than single-digit gains.

Political polling shows that they are alternatives to the major party candidates – they each poll in the two to three percent range – but their most likely effect on the race is that they may keep the eventual winner from receiving a majority of votes.

In all of the political polls that have been released in the last year, neither Republican Asa Hutchinson nor Democrat Mike Ross have broken the 50% threshold. Could this year’s gubernatorial winner only receive a plurality of votes? It’s possible.

Ross, the former Fourth District Congressman from Prescott, survived

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

the GOP tidal wave year of 2010 winning re-election by a solid 17-point spread.

That was the year Republicans made gains everywhere.

They won the Lt. Governor, Secretary of State, and Land Commissioner offices with underfunded, unknown candidates over establishment Democrats. They took open seats in the First and Second Congressional Districts and knocked off incumbent Sen. Blanche Lincoln in a landslide. While they didn’t take control of the state Legislature in 2010, they made huge gains that positioned them for majority control in 2012.

But they didn’t come close against Ross or the man he hopes to succeed, Gov. Mike Beebe.

Michael Avery Ross was born in 1961 in Texarkana. The son of public school educators, Ross graduated from Hope High School and earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

He and his wife, Holly, have two grown children. The Ross’ owned a pharmacy in Prescott where they raised their family.

Ross cut his teeth early in politics as a driver for a guy named Bill Clinton, who was making his big comeback as governor after a stinging defeat to Frank White in the early 1980s.

Ross’ public service included a stint on the Nevada County Quorum Court, serving as chief-of-staff for then-Lt. Governor Winston Bryant, and 10 years in the Arkansas State Senate.

In 2000, Ross pulled off an upset and knocked off incumbent GOP Congressman Jay Dickey in a race that was decided by 4,000 votes in a 51-49% nailbiter.

He survived a rematch in 2002 against Dickey and went on to serve six terms in Congress before announcing his retirement at the end of 2012.

His successor is this year’s GOP Senate nominee, Tom Cotton. That unfolding of events led Ross to receive an unexpected primary challenge from Lynette Bryant, a substitute teacher who partially blamed Ross for Cotton’s opportunity.

Despite the surprise, Ross easily dispatched Bryant (85-15%) in the only major race on the statewide ballot for

Democrats.

Ross was lured out of political retirement – he had joined regional electricity transmission operator Southwest Power Pool – when Attorney General Dustin McDaniel dropped out of the race after admitting to an affair with a Hot Springs attorney. Ross was only out of the public eye for about four months between ending his Congressional term and formally announcing his intent to run for Governor.

He quickly amassed a $2 million war chest and set the tone that he would be an “independent voice” for Arkansas and run as a centrist Democrat, true to his years in Congress as a leader in the Blue Dog coalition.

Ross has a solid rating from the NRA and often broke ranks with national Democratic leadership. He’s the kind of rural Arkansas conservative that Democrats need to have a shot at holding statewide seats. Those who know Ross will attest to his tenacity, stamina and campaign discipline.

His years in Congress allowed Ross to become well-known in the Fourth District he represented, but in 2014 he’s still introducing himself to three-fourths of the rest of the state.

Asa Hutchinson says he hasn’t changed, but he has.

The former Third District Congressman hasn’t altered any of his major positions on big picture issues. He’s an unwavering pro-gun, anti-abortion, tax-cutting conservative.

But he has found a way to soften his image. After three statewide runs and notoriety as an impeachment manager of then-President Bill Clinton, Hutchinson has found a voice to appeal to a much wider swath of voters. One of his recent ads featuring his granddaughter, Ella Beth, may best capture who Asa has become: a politician you can call by his first name, a “Pawpaw,” and a candidate with an easy-to-understand policy goal of expanding computer science to school children.

Hutchinson is also benefitting in this election cycle by not being the challenger. In his previous races, he’s always seemed to be the outsider challenging the establishment candidate, even if it was for an open seat.

His previous opponents – Dale Bumpers, Winston Bryant, Mike Beebe – all had some semblance of a political machine and name ID that Asa would have to overcome.

This year feels different.

William Asa Hutchinson was born in Bentonville in 1950 and graduated high school in Springdale. He finished his undergraduate degree at Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina and then received a law degree from the University of Arkansas. He and his wife, Susan, have four children and five grandchildren.

After a stint practicing law in Fort Smith, he was appointed at age 31 as U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas. After

his 2006 gubernatorial challenge to Mike Beebe.

Last year with rumors circulating, Asa Hutchinson told reporters he planned to announce to run for Governor in 2014.

Other names floated, but in the end only Hutchinson and Tea Party conservative Curtis Coleman filed for the GOP nomination.

Hutchinson had an easy time in the Republican primary with Coleman, winning by a 73-27% margin. The layup opponent allowed Hutchinson to spend about a half million dollars in the spring on positive commercials boosting his name ID and projecting an air of confidence headed into the general election.

Asa and his wife, Susan, with supporters at Fairfield Bay.

two failed attempts at statewide office, he was elected as Third District Congressman to follow in his brother Tim’s footsteps after Tim was elected to the U.S. Senate. In between losing contests and being elected to Congress, Hutchinson served for nearly five years as the co-chair of the Republican Party of Arkansas.

Hutchinson resigned from Congress to serve in the administration of President George W. Bush. He was named head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and, after the 9-11 attacks, he became the first Undersecretary for Border & Transportation Security at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Eventually, he retreated back to a private law and lobbying practice during and after

FORCES AT WORK In any election year, a race for Governor would typically dominate news coverage and political appetites.

This year, however, the U.S. Senate race and its national importance has nearly drowned out coverage of all the other contests on the ballot including Governor.

Both Hutchinson and Ross have sought to define their candidacies – Hutchinson wants to be the “jobs governor” to Ross’ “education governor” – but neither of those monikers has become a household staple.

In 2006, Mike Beebe defined the race early with his “born in a tar paper shack” biography and his clearly defined goal of wanting to eliminate the sales tax on groceries. Neither Ross nor Hutchinson www.talkbusiness.net

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Feature: Battle For Governor have had such clearly defined messages despite opposing positions on tax cuts, the Private Option, education, and public safety.

Poll numbers in the Governor’s race have bounced around somewhat, but by and large, Hutchinson has consistently led.

Talk Business & Politics-Hendrix College polling has shown Asa Hutchinson leading

last two cycles. He has also performed better with men and held his own with female voters, a key demographic with which Ross hopes to improve. Hutchinson – and other Republican candidates – are faring better with African-American voters at this juncture of the campaign than historical numbers would reflect.

Ross and supporters at Race for the Cure.

Hutchinson on the campaign trail.

in October 2013 in a hypothetical matchup, Mike Ross leading by one point in April 2014, and Hutchinson with a five-point lead (46-41%) in late July 2014.

The crosstabs of that last poll tell you what’s at work in the GOP’s favor.

Hutchinson is winning with independent voters 50-33%, a trend that has been a blueprint for success for Republicans in the

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Some observers have speculated that the longtime grip of Democrats with minority voters may be loosening a bit as Republicans have made political gains and as Democrats have consistently run from the policies of President Obama.

Ross has to turn some of that crosstab data around to win the election.

Republicans feel like they still have

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

weapons to work with in undermining any advances Ross may make in the final weeks.

While he voted against the final version of Obamacare in Congress (and he voted to repeal it), he did cast a vote for a version that was once being considered for the federal health care overhaul.

It requires complicated and precise descriptions to lay out either sides’ arguments. In a political environment couched in 30-second TV ads, simple and blunt messages are likely to prevail.

There’s plenty to work with regarding Hutchinson, Democrats contend. From his votes in Congress to his work at Homeland Security to some of his private consulting and legal work, Democrats have an arsenal of stories to introduce to voters on Hutchinson.

The Clinton factor hasn’t really come into play yet. With Hutchinson serving as a prosecutor in the impeachment of Clinton in the 1990s, voters have yet to be reminded of his role in what many now view as an embarrassing moment in U.S. history. Democrats will no doubt rely on the popular ex-President to motivate voters who still feel a deep connection to Arkansas’ native son.

Democrats are also relying on a behindthe-scenes effort to register, identify and motivate “non-likely voters” to become “likely voters.” This Herculean effort is similar to the micro-targeting push the GOP made in the 2006 mid-terms. At the time, Republicans said identifying issue voters would make the difference and surge the GOP to victory despite the unpopularity of President George W. Bush.

It didn’t work in 2006 and Democrats would reshape Arkansas political strategy if they’re successful with their current effort.

The fall debates offer additional opportunities for either candidate to seal the deal or blow it completely. If early forums are any indication, the two men can be expected to fiercely attack and defend. Who comes across as the “most gubernatorial” will clearly be the choice for voters to make.

With two months to go, the political fate of the state is in play. On November 5th, the world will know.

• • •

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Commentary

Why Asa Hutchinson Will Win the Governor’s Race

By Jason Tolbert Jason Tolbert

T

he race for the Governor’s Mansion could prove to be a pivotal race in the history of Arkansas politics. Democrats seek to hold onto a position they have held for more than a century dotted with three notable exceptions.

Republicans hope to continue to ride the rising tide of a changing electorate and further cement their majority status in the state. The signs point to a November victory for the Grand Old Party’s nominee, Asa Hutchinson, over the Democrat’s last best hope, Mike Ross.

There is little dispute that Hutchinson enjoys the headwinds of a shifting political landscape. Republicans began a shift from a solid blue state to a red state in the 2010 election. That year, the congressional delegation flipped from one Republican and three Democrats in the House to three Republicans and one Democrat. A year later, Ross, the sole remaining Democratic congressman, announced he would not run for re-election, and in 2012 Republicans turned this last remaining congressional district red with the election of Congressman Tom Cotton.

In 2012, the reddening of the state penetrated down to state legislative races with Republicans winning majorities in both the Arkansas Senate and Arkansas House of Representatives for the first time in two centuries. Even local county races saw Republican victories in areas that had only seen token opposition in the past.

Early in the 2014 gubernatorial race, Democrats hoped to fight the rising tide with a combination of a fundraising advantage and a popular, albeit termlimited, Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe, but neither of these advantages appears to be

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working coming into the final stretch.

Although Ross quickly raised a million dollars within a month after jumping into the race last year, Hutchinson has steadily narrowed the gap on this cash advantage.

As of the end of July, Ross had raised just over $5 million. He had around $340,000 left in the bank, but spent more than a million dollars on television ads that will run between now and Election Day. Hutchinson has raised over $3 million and has enough cash to keep pace. He has over $820,000 in cash remaining and had several large fundraisers set for August hosted by well-known GOP names such as Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan and Chris Christie. In addition, the Republican Governors Association has made it clear that winning in Arkansas is a priority and they have proven they will spend the funds to support Hutchinson.

Ross also appears to be showing little if any coattails from the still popular incumbent. Despite appearing with Beebe in early ads and throughout the campaign, a recent Talk Business-Hendrix College Poll indicates that voters have not connected the two. The poll in July found that Beebe enjoyed a positive approval rating of an astonishing 52-point spread (67.5/15.5), while the same poll found Hutchinson leading the race to replace Beebe by five points (46/41).

The headwinds and lead in the polls have also translated to a Hutchinson campaign that has an air of confidence. A friend commented the other day after watching Hutchinson’s latest ad that he simply “looks like a winner.”

The Asa for Governor campaign has run a series of ads that focus both on the biographical sketch of the candidate as well

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

as achievable policies once in office. For example, in one of his recent ads Asa appears with his granddaughter, Ella Beth, where he discusses his education plan to teach computer programming in high schools.

His campaign is focusing on these types of “pragmatic” plans – as Gov. Beebe referred to them last fall – that sound like a man who believes he will soon be tasked with the job of following through with implementation. By contrast, the Ross campaign seems to be swinging for the fences with big campaign promises that do not stand much chance of ever happening.

In addition, the Ross campaign will continue to be weighed down by the national political landscape. Millions of dollars will flood the state, as the outcome of the Cotton-Pryor race could determine majority control in the U.S. Senate. And as much as Ross tries to finesse them, some of his votes while in Congress will come back to haunt him – such as the much-debated vote in committee to advance a version of Obamacare.

With the shift of Arkansas voters from Democrat to Republican, a full tank in his campaign war chest and a set of issues that Arkansas can buy into, Hutchinson heads into the final months of the campaign with front-runner status. Barring some dramatic shift in the dynamics of the election, Asa Hutchinson will be the next Arkansas governor.

Jason Tolbert is a blogger for Talk Business & Politics and is the moderator for his opinion blog, The Tolbert Report. He can be reached by email at Jason@TolbertReport.com. Follow him on Twitter: @TolbertReport.

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Commentary

Why Mike Ross Will Win the Governor’s Race

By Michael Cook Michael Cook

3

8%, 46%, 41%. What do these percentages have in common?

They are the vote percentages former Congressman Asa Hutchinson received for the three times he has run, and lost, for statewide office. Eight years after losing badly to Mike Beebe, he now faces Mike Ross in a gubernatorial race that will have long-term implications for Arkansas’ political future.

A Talk Business-Hendrix College Poll conducted in late July showed Hutchinson leading Ross 46% to 41%.

While Hutchinson was leading, notice how he’s still stuck at 46% after running for statewide office for years? Polling throughout the race has shown either Ross or Hutchinson leading at various points and internal polls taken by various Democratic campaigns show the two candidates to be within one or two points of each other. I believe currently it’s a tossup.

When reviewing polling cross-tabs, it appears Ross still has significant room to increase his vote share in the First Congressional District, among AfricanAmericans and female voters.

I believe Ross will be Arkansas’s next governor due to three main factors: issues, campaign tactics and Hutchinson’s failings as a candidate.

Ross has the advantage of being on the right side of issues important to Arkansans, while Hutchinson either refuses to take a clear stand or opposes them outright.

A proposal to raise Arkansas’ minimum wage to $8.50 an hour will be on November’s ballot and the Talk Business-Hendrix College Poll showed 79% of Arkansans support the increase.

Ross supports the popular proposal, and Hutchinson, well, we’re not quite sure where he stands since he says it should be up to the

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state Legislature to raise the minimum wage and not the voters. I guess we’re not smart enough to make up our own minds.

Another important issue is the private option, which is Arkansas’ version of expanding Medicaid using funds made available by the passage of the Affordable Health Care Act. The private option is increasing in popularity as it becomes clear that the new health-care program is working and providing Arkansans with much-needed health insurance. Arkansas is a national success story by cutting in half the number of people without health insurance in just six months.

Once again, we know where Ross stands as he’s stated numerous times that he supports the continuation of the private option. Hutchinson has tied himself into a pretzel over this issue since he’s refused to say whether he’s for it or against it.

Hutchinson knows the program is working, but he’s terrified of alienating his base.

Increasing access to Pre-K programs is another winning issue for Ross and once again Hutchinson opposes a popular proposal. Ross’ plan calls for providing every Arkansas child the opportunity to attend Pre-K and in response Hutchinson called it “the wrong direction.”

Ross had a good August with reports showing him having outraised Hutchinson by approximately $2 million. Ross’ financial advantage will be felt in the last eight weeks on television when he will spend roughly $1.1 million on television to Hutchinson’s $485,000. That’s a significant disadvantage for Hutchinson to be outspent during the period when undecided voters begin making up their minds.

Ross will benefit from the numerous contested statewide and congressional races, which will drive turnout among Democrats

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

who have a tendency to stay home in midterm elections. The higher the turnout, the better it is for Ross.

For the past year, Ross’ campaign has been building the narrative that Hutchinson is disconnected from average Arkansans and is too out of touch to fight for working families. Two events occurred in August to help solidify that narrative.

First, in a forum hosted by the Arkansas Farm Bureau in Springdale, the moderator asked Hutchinson if he was a member of the Farm Bureau. Hutchinson literally had no clue if he was a member of Arkansas’ largest agricultural organization or even how to become a member.

Second, it came to light that Hutchinson was apparently cheating on his taxes by illegally taking the homestead tax credit on two homes. It was a damaging almost weeklong story with Hutchinson providing an evolving explanation of how he came to take two tax credits.

Expect both issues to be used in upcoming campaign commercials.

These recent candidate mistakes by Hutchinson make him appear aloof and out of touch, two traits that Arkansans typically don’t reward on Election Day. Arkansans are just not wild about Hutchinson. He’s run and lost for statewide office by significant margins three times before and this year should be Hutchinson’s fourth loss in a row.

Ross is a strong, independent leader and I believe he’ll be our next governor.

Michael Cook is a blogger for Talk Business & Politics and is the moderator for his opinion blog, Cook’s Outlook. He can be reached by email at Michael@CooksOutlook.com. Follow him on Twitter: @MCookAR.

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Cover Story

Marlon Blackwell’s Approach to Architecture and Life

By Ben S. Pollock

Marlon Blackwell has built a number of contrasts into his life. It’s deliberate.

The most recent world-renowned architect to call Fayetteville his personal and professional hometown – after E. Fay Jones and Edward Durell Stone – teaches on campus as well as hangs a shingle just east of downtown.

PHOTO BY KAT WILSON

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Cover Story: Blackwell There’s a salesman in him – a good one, judging by his success – as well as something of a literary philosopher. The last was striking in a long conversation.

Of course references to Frank Lloyd Wright and Mies Van der Rohe would be expected from an intellectual builder, but Southern novelist Walker Percy?

“I think it’s key that you’re pursuing something, you’re pursuing a way by which you can enrich the experience of being in a world for those who engage our work,” he said in his office in Vol Walker Hall, which he renovated and to which he with the firm Polk Stanley Wilcox added a wing, the Steven L. Anderson Design Center,

dedicated in 2013.

“Walker Percy talked about the search, ‘Not to be onto something is to be in despair.’ For me, that’s an important and dignified pursuit, to enrich people’s daily lives. The other thing is, that makes it vital, you’ve got to be attentive to the world around you. So the challenge is: how do you embrace the world and not be consumed by it?”

EMPHASIS ON HEART Why would a middle-aged architect who’s had a good deal of success think like this?

He would say it’s because of his emphasis on heart.

PHOTOS BY TIM HURSLEY

The topic came up because of a naive design lover’s question: How is an architect different from say, a civil engineer or even a general contractor who’d have little need for a credentialed designer when it comes to, oh, converting a garage to a man cave?

This produced a lengthy exposition. It fit right into his indirectly but well-lit, sleek office in the old part of the school. It was a rainy summer afternoon, and Blackwell sat focused yet relaxed in a black hoodie, black jeans and red New Balance shoes, looking through black-framed eyeglasses.

“An architect would argue that if a civil engineer should be able to convince you that he’s an architect, then I should be able

Gentry Library

Gentry Library

Crystal Bridges Museum Store

The Fulbright Building renovation

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

to convince you that I’m a civil engineer.

I think it’s really hard to be convincing. I think we’re willfully complicit with that,” he said.

“We just do different things. I think we’re interested in things like scale, proportion, composition and kind of a more thoughtful distribution of materials, and sequence, how spaces relate to one another and stuff. Most of what I know about civil and those kinds of ... function. They can make it function.

I would use Le Corbusier’s thesis, which is the idea of being an architect at heart. Yes, these folks can provide you shelter in the same way that a plumber can fix your pipes.

But what have they done for you right here

[points to chest] in the heart? Nothing.

“I would argue, yes, they can make shelter, they can make a structure, but in terms of the things that elevate you spiritually, emotionally, I really challenge them to succeed in that,” he said. “They’re making buildings but not architecture. That’s the difference.

“That’s the utility, that’s the instrumentality. But the criticality, the ability to make commentary on the world, they don’t do.

Architecture for me is the necessary unit of what it is to be critical, and what it is to be instrumental. So if I can make commentary on the world and I can demonstrate its usefulness in and on the world, that’s to me,

architecture. That’s being an architect. And mostly others are primarily instrumental, which is important.”

AMBASSADOR TO THE WORLD Even across a small table, Blackwell talks like a lecturer. He teaches University of Arkansas students in halls or classrooms, he said, and he delivers about 28 speeches a year nationally, either at schools or talks hosted by the American Institute of Architects.

UA Professor Tahar Messadi, holder of the 21st Century Chair in Sustainability, has taught alongside Blackwell for 11 years.

In particular, he noted Blackwell’s “recent

Montessori School

Steven L. Anderson Design Center

Montessori School

Steven L. Anderson Design Center

St. Nicolas www.talkbusiness.net

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Cover Story: Blackwell project, the extension and renovation of Vol Walker Hall, is being hailed as a chef d’oeuvre [masterpiece] of architecture because he has managed to combine architectural elegance with the skillful integration of all constructional elements.”

Messadi called him the “ambassador” of the Fay Jones School, explaining, “He is the sole faculty that is constantly in demand by many institutions to give lectures, workshops, to be a visiting critic or to participate

work at the end of each semester. The panel includes three professionals, not just academics, to handle the critiques.

Even as Blackwell doesn’t seem to hold back, how does he win clients? He cites selling Bibles door-to-door for five summers to pay for his undergraduate education at Auburn University.

“I learned a lot about people, how to communicate, know when to close, when to back off. It wasn’t a religious endeavor, but

“I always tell my students to be sure to sleep well at night. Usually that comes from working really hard, playing hard, knowing that you’re onto something much larger than you.”

– Marlon Blackwell in design charrettes. His broad reaching network of acquaintances is impressive. I have never met anyone who did not know and speak highly of Marlon Blackwell – professionals, faculty and students alike.”

Blackwell’s motivation as department head is his “desire to educate future architects who can effectively design and make buildings, and to make the institution a stronghold for community outreach,” Messadi said.

Messadi cited an innovation of Blackwell’s, a “superjury” review of student

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an endeavor of self-discipline. It’s helped a lot, in that ability,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what you’re selling.”

Blackwell is 57 and was born to a military family, so he moved around a lot as a child.

“My father was in the Air Force,” he said.

“I was born in Germany; we lived in the Philippines, lived in Alabama, Colorado, Montana. Did my last year of high school in Florida.”

His family hails from the Birmingham area.

Blackwell earned a bachelor’s in

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

architecture from Auburn in 1980 and a master of architecture degree in 1991 from the Syracuse University Florence Center in Italy.

During those intervening years, Blackwell worked in design. He spent about four years in Lafayette, La., then another five in Boston.

He uses his life as a lesson to his students.

‘YOU CAN WILL YOURSELF TALENT’ “I try to get them to be patient, to work through it, it’s a lifelong thing,” he said. “It just takes time. You can will yourself talent. I tell students, it’s not all about being talented.

I never made a single A in the design studio as an undergrad. I was a relatively poor student. I was a good design student, but not stellar, not an A student [but] a B student. I kept working.

“The thing I learned is that everyone’s dealt a different deck of cards. Some people get it, in those first few years of college [snaps fingers]. And others don’t. They don’t have that a-ha moment. They don’t discover what their true capacity can be until they’re two or three or four, five or 10 years out.

They keep pursuing it, and it happens.

“And the key is to stay onto something, stay in the search. I call it the search for truth and true things. You can do that. It’s a great ride.”

Going to Europe was the “best decision I ever made,” he said, traveling throughout the continent to see its architecture. Indeed, family trips now are similar busman’s holidays, with his wife of 20 years, Meryati Johari Blackwell, and their 15-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter.

Blackwell joined the School of Architecture in 1992. His title is distinguished professor as well as chair (since 2009) of the Department of Architecture within the Fay Jones School of Architecture of the University of Arkansas. Its other departments are landscape and interior design.

On the commercial side of the profession, Marlon Blackwell Architects – located in the Fulbright Building on East Dickson Street, which formerly housed the Fayetteville Public Library – was named 2011 Firm of the Year by Residential Architect magazine. His design of St.

Nicholas Eastern Orthodox Church in Springdale earned a 2013 National Honor Award from the American Institute of Architects.

Blackwell’s intention for his commercial work evolved over time, out of necessity. It, too, has a thoughtful evolution.

“My goal after [Syracuse] was – you come to the realization that you’re talented but you’re not the most talented,” he said.

“What do you do? My thinking was that I’m not independently wealthy, I’m not well-connected. I don’t have pedigree, blood or education. What am I to do? I came to the conclusion that life is short, that I really like to practice and teach. Self-select a few projects each year. Maybe by the time I kick the bucket I’ve got 30 good projects or something like that. And that was the basis.”

For a while, the dream worked.

“I had in mind being a sole proprietor, the noble savage sitting in his spare bedroom.

Then the digital age came in, and then there was this desire to look at the public realm, the civic environment. ... I decided to raise my own aspirations and decided to make my own model, decided to have a staff. My wife, who is a wonderful architect, and I decided we could work together. So I’ve been working for a while ... and I realized I couldn’t be Fay Jones.”

The economic downturn that began in late 2007 further changed his thinking.

“I modeled my firm on [Jones’]; there is no marketing. Your work is your calling card. That worked well until about the recession. The phone quits ringing, and you think, we’ve got to get another model. We’re going to go after bigger projects, we’re going to team up with people, too. That’s where the [renovation and expansion of Fayetteville] High School came about, working with others. We’re just going to be, to become, more entrepreneurial about how we approach things.”

Among recent projects, Blackwell cites the Gentry Public Library, as it has come to function as a civic center for the Benton County town, and the new building for Fayetteville Montessori School, which is nestled in the Colt Square commercial development.

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Cover Story: Blackwell working, he said. “Our clients come to us because of what we do. We’re not out there marketing, trying to lasso some ... we’re invited in. But at the same time, we have a deep and profound respect for the ideas and the wishes and how to translate [them] into something distinctive.”

MAINTAINING QUALITY AND INTEGRITY Blackwell is proudly a modern architect.

Potential clients don’t necessarily want all those angles and hard surfaces, yet they want his name attached.

Not going to happen.

“What I do is refer them to other architects, my friends, my colleagues. We may do a different kind of architecture, or different sensibility about how we deal with people. I have some architect friends who’d love to deal with developers and stuff. I’ve had [potential clients] come to me, and you can tell they really want that interpretation of the Greek, antebellum. ‘I’m not the right architect for you. Let me find someone.

Have you seen our website, have you seen the work that we do?’”

Once they agree on general ideas, money comes into play. Blackwell says he doesn’t charge top dollar because of his reputation – if he wants projects, he can’t.

“We work with the clients. We work within a budget. We don’t get crazy money.

It’s Northwest Arkansas, it doesn’t matter who you’re working for.”

“We have to compete. ... There is always somebody there cheaper,” he said. “We ask for what we think we’re worth, but we’re willing to negotiate. I’m not going to be low-balled. Look, if it’s just about the fee, again, you’re not the right client for us.

Go to somebody cheaper, because you can always find somebody to do it cheaper.”

When a client signs, though, they get the works.

“We are not bean counters. We are full-service. We don’t just give you a set of drawings. We’re there.” Blackwell noted that indeed his firm’s drawings go down to the last electric outlet. If something runs over-budget, the firm will revise as needed.

“We’re there,” he said. “Again, our goal is to maintain quality. The design integrity must remain intact. Are there ways to

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do that, less expensive than the original intentions? Yes. Everybody works together on that, not just us but the clients. ‘Maybe I don’t need this,’ and you work it back and forth. And we find a way to make it work, yeah. And that’s what makes us very competitive.’

Yet Blackwell always returns to the classroom, training the next generation.

“It’s a lifelong pursuit, and design is a part of all aspects of life. It’s a way of life,” he said.

“I find a high level of job satisfaction with

architects. You know, not every architect designs. There’s different things to do. They manage, or they are more involved with construction or specifications. But they’re all part of a process that’s much larger than they are, a pursuit of this really great project.”

“I always tell my students to be sure to sleep well at night. Usually that comes from working really hard, playing hard, knowing that you’re onto something much larger than you.”

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

ARCHITECTURE AND LIFE Marlon Blackwell applies his principles to everything. That perhaps is because for a time as a youth he was under the spell of libertarian writer Ayn Rand, whose first major book was, after all, about an architect, “The Fountainhead.”

“I believed every word of it, and as I’ve grown up and matured, I’ve found that the core has significance, but a lot of it is bullshit. ‘Atlas Shrugged’ is the same thing, the same story. She retells it,” he said.

“It’s like the difference between a Rolling Stones song and a U2 song.” Yes, Blackwell makes that leap. “’U2 makes you feel good about others. The Rolling Stones make you feel good about yourself.’ Ayn Rand makes you feel good about yourself.”

He says he found the quote in the 2008 rock documentary, “It Might Get Loud,” which features guitarists Jack White, Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page and U2’s The Edge.

He repeats the quote “to architects, because it’s creative genius, and the varieties of ways it can be channeled through an instrument is just phenomenal.”

One source of the quote is U2’s Bono, who’s not in the movie. The singer in praising Mick Jagger quoted music critic Robert Hilburn as having said, “The Rolling Stones make you feel very good about who you are and U2 make you feel very good about the person you are standing next to.”

“I tell students that, in architecture it is very important to have principles that you work by and that you live by,” Blackwell said.

“When I talked to Fay Jones, he said, ‘I have principles I live by and principles I work by, and they’re not that different.’

“What you do with principles is that you overcome circumstance. If you don’t understand what the principles you are operating by are, and put them into use, then circumstance directs you, rather than the other way around. And that’s what often happens.

“I’m talking about the principles of design, but how they might can translate to how you live. Simple principles like working hard, playing hard, in that order. Principles about what you’ll do and what you won’t do.

Here’s to knowing what you want to be and knowing what you’re not.”

Industry

Sustainability, Technology: Trends in Architecture That Will Be Sticking Around

Architects see the industry moving away from style for style’s sake and into more of an emphasis on function and reduction of construction costs.

By Jeanni Brosius Minimizing a negative environmental impact while saving money and living a greener lifestyle are in the headlines, so it only makes sense that new structures are built with these aspects in mind. As architects lead the way to expand the view of safety, health and welfare, the trend of sustainability seems to be sticking around.

Architects across Arkansas are seeing clients who are seeking sustainable designs, especially in schools and other public buildings. Leadership in Energy and Environment Design (LEED) is a green building certification program. New building projects are rated and given points for four levels of certification: certified, silver, gold and platinum. LEED certification is globally recognized as the primary award of achievement in green building.

“Architecture is moving away from style for style’s sake,” says Galen Hunter, principal architect at MAHG Architecture, Inc., in Fort Smith. “The design of buildings is being informed by how do you best provide for the function of the building while reducing the initial construction costs, energy consumption and providing a healthier learning or working environment?”

Hunter’s firm is currently working on King Elementary School in Van Buren. This school building has not only achieved the LEED Gold status, but it is helping to teach the next generation to be responsible as well.

“Architecture is moving away from style for style’s sake.”

– Galen Hunter MAHG Architecture King Elementary School in Van Buren

LEED-certified library at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith

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Industry: Architecture Trends “What sets it apart is that the teachers of that school took the sustainable building as a jumping off point to teach the students about how to save on natural resources, grow their own food, save rainwater for irrigation, reduce waste,” Hunter says. “The new building and its design became a way of life for teachers to give students handson experience to the concept they had only been teaching before.”

CONSUMERS WANT CHOICES Clients are spending hard-earned money for buildings that will remain significant and responsive for many decades to come.

“The fun thing about architecture is that we don’t make widgets.

Every project has unique aspects if you listen to your client.”

– Eldon Bock WER Architects/Planners “In our opinion, first and foremost is a push to make interior environments more flexible and adaptable,” says Eldon Bock, principal and COO at WER Architects/ Planners in Little Rock. “We find this true in kindergarten through 12 education facilities, institutional medical and corporate design.

Sustainable design only works if your facility can transcend short-term trending. Focus on the building user has never been more intent. Bottom line, users want to be offered choices – choices about how to teach, how to learn, how to work, how to communicate and how to collaborate.”

Bock says the trend toward more contemporary design and use of quality materials, locally sourced products, craftsmanship, natural lighting and connection to exterior space is what WER’s

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Founders Hall, University of Arkansas Eco Modern Flats, Fayetteville

clients are seeking.

“The fun thing about architecture is that we don’t make widgets,” Bock says. “Every project has unique aspects if you listen to your client. Quite a few of our projects involve education or campus student life. … If the environments we help create can enhance the learning experience of a child or help a college freshman become a better citizen in a larger community, we have successes in doing our job.”

Throughout the design process, Bock says, architects grab on to the client’s needs or notions that begin to shape the human experience and meet their individual requirements.

One of WER’s unique projects is Founders Hall, which is student housing on the campus of the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. The hall is an urban infill project in the middle of the campus that is designed to blend in with adjacent historic collegiate gothic residence halls.

HOW INDIVIDUALS USE SPACES Kyle Cook is a principal architect with Brackett-Krennerich Architects in Jonesboro, and he says he isn’t seeing any particular “trends” in architecture in Northeast Arkansas, but he agrees that sustainability is more than just a passing fancy.

“As a whole, I would say that as this area grows, there has become more interest in sustainable options, contemporary materials and design, and more focus by clients on what is working in other parts of the state or country,” Cook says.

He says technology has become a predominate factor in architecture design as well as sustainability.

“Technology has always played a role in forming architecture to some degree, for example, newer, better, more durable building materials,” Cook says. “But another trend that technology imposes is how individuals use spaces and what their needs are in regards to this new technology.”

An example Cook shares is that the dormitories his firm has designed on college campuses have had less emphasis on group rooming conditions and more emphasis on individual or single room layouts.

“Each room would have all data requirements needed for smartphones, laptops and other devices. Also, younger generations seem to be less likely to desire the layout of older living conditions, which include gang showers, three to four to a room, computer labs, etc.,” Cook says.

In addition to school campuses, churches also cater to technology. The audio/visual, lighting and sound needs are important to many church services.

And one of the more unique designs by the firm is a new corporate office building for Ritter Communications in Jonesboro.

This building has LEED Silver certification, and the construction combines sustainability and technology – befitting for a company that delivers technology to its customers.

CROSSROADS OF DIVERSITY Fayetteville is steeped in tradition and its architecture reflects that heritage.

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Industry: Architecture Trends “Fayetteville has a rich tradition of interesting architects and buildings, but the state and region in general has a strong establishment of traditional norms in architectural style,” says Chris Baribeau, who is a principal architect with Modus Studio in Fayeteville. “We are at a crossroads of diversity between our university and the nearby headquarters of the largest corporation in the world – both of which inspire a multitude of architectural forms –

yet we are easily plagued by a less-thaninteresting build environment that all too often is decidedly suburban in nature. Our role in the built environment is to provide new models for walkable, urban and sustainable projects that are rooted in this place.”

One of Modus Studio’s projects is Fayetteville’s Eco Modern Flats, which is the first project in Arkansas to receive the LEED for Homes Multifamily Platinum rating.

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Baribeau says this project re-imagines space in a palette of steel and cedar to breathe new life into an otherwise ordinary, layered construction system.

The four existing apartment buildings were constructed between 1968 and 1972, and they are located adjacent to the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. By creating elegant armatures through smart and low-tech sustainable design solutions, Baribeau says his firm overhauled and enhanced the living spaces of each unit.

“The existing topography and residual spaces between the buildings were optimized into various courtyard spaces as well as public and private terraces, patios and rooftop decks,” Baribeau says. Each space was delineated by a kit-of-parts panel system combining the modern durability of steel with the natural warmth of cedar.

Hunter says the economy also has played a role in the decisions clients are making in architecture, but he says clients are rethinking their design options.

“Before the economic slowdown, a lot of clients made the assumption that sustainable design would cost them more at the time of construction and therefore, the discussion never moved past that point, except with a few forward-thinking clients,” Hunter says.

“Since the economy has picked up again, many of these same clients are more willing to talk about and even embrace the idea of designing projects that not only reduce their future energy and operating costs but also provide a healthier environment for their employees.”

Whether by trend or force of economics and society, Baribeau believes there will inevitably continue to be a movement toward more sustainable and urban design.

“In this type of build environment and the demand for ever-increasing speed of design and construction, more streamlined, modern and less fussy architectural styles will evolve,” Baribeau says. “Traditional styling, trimming and detail will give way to raw simplicity and technologically understood ornamentation.”

With ever-changing technology and more clients moving to a greener way of thinking, what were once architectural trends are becoming mainstays in the industry.

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Insights

APEI’s high-performance, silicon carbide-based plug-in hybrid electric vehicle battery charger.

SAFETY IN NUMBERS

Among the 11 Domtar facilities recently recognized for safety performance excellence at the Pulp and Paper Safety Association’s annual awards ceremony in St. Petersburg, Fla., is the company’s Ashdown Mill. Tucked away in Southwest Arkansas, the mill, which is one of the largest communication papers complexes in North America, was honored in the Best Record: Fine Paper Mills – Large category. That award, one of many the mill has won over the years for its safety performance, environmental commitment and community support, gave us a good reason to take a brief look at the facility by the numbers.

985

Number of EMPLOYEES today.

The number of TONS OF BUSINESS COMMUNICATION PAPER the mill’s three paper machines produce per day (680,000 tons per year), some of which is converted into sheets in the mill’s sizable converting operation.

1,900 1968 2,553 175,000 The YEAR it began operation.

Number of ACRES the mill, which is a unit of Domtar’s U.S. Pulp and Paper Manufacturing Group, occupies at Ashdown.

Number of TONS PER YEAR OF MARKET PULP that the mill also manufactures.

APEI POWERS INTO THE R&D TOP 100

Known as the “Oscars of Innovation,” the list of the world’s top 100 technological product innovations compiled by R&D Magazine is prestigious. Esteemed.

Celebrated. Well, OK, you get it – it’s an impressive list to make.

And for the second time in the company’s short history, Arkansas Power Electronics International, Inc., of Fayetteville has been included on the list, which in the past has included such cutting-edge technologies as the flashcube, the ATM, the fax and high-definition TV. Founded in 1999, APEI – the largest company affiliated with the University of Arkansas at the Arkansas Research and Technology Park – specializes in advanced, high-performance electronics for a variety of customers and applications, including the defense, aerospace and hybrid/electric vehicle markets. The magazine based its latest R&D 100 award on APEI’s high-performance, silicon carbide-based plug-in hybrid electric vehicle battery charger.

“Receiving an R&D 100 award is a major accomplishment that recognizes world-class technology and products,” Arkansas Sen. John Boozman said. “The innovation at APEI can drive technology manufacturing job creation in our state. The APEI team is well deserving of this recognition, and I congratulate them for their hard work, dedication and commitment to advancement in power electronics.”

At the core of the on-board charger unit is one of APEI’s power modules, which will be released as a standard product later this year. The module’s high-speed switching capability and hightemperature packaging enabled the company to create a battery charger that is more efficient and more powerful than the current commercial technology.

The battery charger represents a major advance in power electronics. It meets the increasing demands of the plug-in hybrid electric vehicle and electric vehicle markets and plays a vital role in allowing these markets to experience continual growth. The new technology can also be utilized across a wide variety of different applications, such as renewable energy battery charging, distributed grid storage, material handling equipment, boats, handicap mobility vehicles, commercial hybrid vehicles and future military tactical vehicles and systems.

APEI led the development of the battery charger in a collaborative research partnership that includes four other entities – Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc.; the National Center for Reliable Electric Power Transmission, an academic research center based at the University of Arkansas; Oak Ridge National Laboratory; and Cree, Inc. In 2009, APEI received its first R&D 100 award for a high-temperature silicon carbide power module that can greatly reduce the size and volume of power electronic systems.

Insights is compiled by Talk Business & Politics Editor Bill Paddack. Possible items for inclusion can be sent to him at wbp17@comcast.net.

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Entergy Arkansas’ rates are lower than the state and national averages.

And here’s our plan to keep them low.

At Entergy Arkansas, we work not only to ensure reliable power, but also to make sure that power remains affordable.

That’s why Entergy Arkansas customers have rates below the average for Arkansas and the nation – and why we are committed to keeping costs down while creating value for customers now and for years to come.

1. Providing reliable power.

Our plan includes strengthening the electric grid from transmission lines to substations to transformers – to prevent storm outages by planning and maintaining a more robust network.

2. Lowering costs.

Keeping a balanced mix of energy resources is an important ingredient to providing customers with clean, reliable, and affordable electricity. Entergy Arkansas also joined the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO). This provides us access to a large power market that presents opportunities for Entergy Arkansas to further reduce costs.

3. Generating jobs.

Entergy Arkansas is reaching out to major companies around the world to put Arkansas on the top of their lists for new facilities. Then we work with them to make sure we have the infrastructure they need to power their business – adding more customers to share costs and putting more Arkansans to work.

4. Investing in sustainable communities.

The health of our local communities drives our quality of life as a state. Training, education and infrastructure are vital not only for economic development, but also for building a stable society for generations to come. We’re committed to helping our state grow, strengthening communities, supporting non-profits and improving education.

To learn more, visit EntergyArkansas.com.

A message from Entergy Arkansas, Inc. ©2014 Entergy Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Hometown, Arkansas

Statehouse Convention Center

Old State House Museum

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

River Rail in the River Market

William J. Clinton Presidential Library & Museum Junction Bridge

Peabody Park

Revitalizing The Capital City

By Steve Brawner

As Little Rock pursues high-tech jobs, the Clinton Presidential Center and the River Market District demonstrate how Arkansas’ largest city continues to grow, change and thrive.

La Petite Roache - “Little Rock”

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ARKANSASMEDIAROOM

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Craighead County courthouse veterans memorial

Hometown: Little Rock For a big chunk of the 20th century, Little Rock’s Main Street, home of Gus Blass Department Store, Pfeiffer Brothers Department Store and M.M. Cohn, was a bustling center of commerce.

Those three establishments long have

Little Rock Zoo

Big Dam Bridge

Two Rivers Bridge

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been out of business, and for years, Main But that’s changing, as is much of the Street gave travelers little reason to stop as capital which last year was declared Trim size is 8”city, x 10.8125 they traveled from I-630 to the Statehouse

by Kiplinger’s magazine as the nation’s best Convention Center, except for the Arkansas midsize-to-small city to live in. According Where We Live: Full Page 7” x 9.875” Repertory Theater and Bennett’s Military to Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola, $76 Full Pagemillion w/Bleed is 8.25” x 11.125” Supplies. in private dollars have been invested in Main Street, along with grants. The building where M.M Cohn was housed has been bought by Starwood Hotels & Resorts to build an Aloft Hotel. The street will boast 256 apartments by early spring.

The Little Rock Technology Park, funded by $22 million in voter-approved sales tax dollars, will bring high-tech jobs to the area.

A pedestrian- and-environmentallyfriendly Creative Corridor plaza is planned to gather the city’s currently scattered artistic offerings, including the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, into one four-block stretch alongside The Rep. “It’s going to be an amazing transformation,” said Jay Chessir, president and CEO of the Little Regional Chamber of Commerce.

It might be tempting to dismiss all this as pie-in-the-sky thinking – but that would require pretending the last couple of decades didn’t happen.

Consider that travelers on Interstate 30 through Little Rock once saw to the east a collection of decaying warehouses. Then former President Bill Clinton decided he would build his library there. Some in the city were opposed, and when it was built, it was derided by some for looking too much like a mobile home.

Now look at the area. In addition to the $165 million Clinton Presidential Center, it’s also home to Heifer International’s headquarters. Across the interstate is Acxiom’s headquarters, and nearby are the Holiday Inn Presidential and the Comfort Inn & Suites Presidential – all of which Clinton helped recruit, according to “friend of Bill” William J. Clinton Skip Rutherford. “I think all these other Presidential Park investments were stimulated in large part Wetlands because they knew the library was here, and it was going to be permanent,” Rutherford said.

Rutherford is dean of the Clinton School of Public Service, which is located on the grounds of the Clinton Center. Since opening in the fall of 2004, it has graduated Pinnacle Mountain 250 students in the nation’s first masters

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

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Hometown: Little Rock of public service program. Students have volunteered 200,000 hours and completed more than 550 projects, about half in Arkansas. Meanwhile, the school has welcomed a parade of big-name honorariafree speakers, including seven Nobel Prize winners, Sen. Bob Dole and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin, the second man to walk on the moon.

Other areas of Little Rock have seen revitalization and growth. The River Market District encompasses a 10-block area and includes the River Market itself, the Witt Stephens Jr. Central Arkansas Nature Center and the Central Arkansas Library System’s Arkansas Studies Institute. Farther west off University Avenue is the 540,000-squarefoot Park Avenue open-air lifestyle center.

West Little Rock continues to boom, most prominently with The Promenade at Chenal, another open-air, upscale shopping center.

The south of town features the Gateway

Town Center, home of the newly opened Bass Pro Shop and, in the summer of 2015, the Outlets at Little Rock.

The city’s transportation infrastructure also has been transformed in recent years and will continue to be transformed. Work is continuing on the $125 million Big Rock Interchange, which will extend Interstate 630 over Shackleford Road to connect with Financial Center Parkway. Coming soon are the dreaded replacement of the Broadway Bridge and improvements to Interstate 30’s Arkansas River Bridge.

Pedestrians can traverse the Arkansas River Trail, a 15.6-mile loop bordering Little Rock and North Little Rock that includes the Clinton Presidential Bridge and the Big Dam Bridge – the 4,200-foot span that is the world’s longest pedestrian/cyclist bridge built solely for recreational purposes.

So, yeah, Little Rock probably can handle Main Street.

Arkansas Arts Center

STRENGTHS & WEAKNESSES The city boasts a lower unemployment rate than the national average and avoided recent booms and busts thanks to its base of stable industries, including state government and health care. Nearly 11,000 work at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. The Baptist Health Medical Center complex employs more than 4,000 with more than 600 doctors on staff, according to Doug Weeks, executive vice president and chief operating officer.

Its nursing school educates 250 nurses a year.

CHI St. Vincent, which employs 4,500 systemwide, has its flagship CHI St. Vincent Infirmary campus in Little Rock. The system is growing after acquiring what is now CHI St. Vincent Hot Springs. CEO Peter Banko said the system’s strategy is to grow its local facilities rather than bring patients to Little Rock, but the Infirmary will have to be Central High School

Farmers Market

Little Rock Port Authority

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Cathedral of St. Andrew

Like the embrace of a warm summer breeze, our trip to Little Rock was a delight we will always remember. Enjoying the charm and convenience of riding the trolley to the museums within the vibrant River Market District. Taking in the lush Southern scenery while hiking the Arkansas River Trail. Discovering the best local restaurants and the city’s artisanal food scene, and then settling down into the city’s most comfortable hotels. These are the memories of a new Southern style. You can see it all here. You can see it all in Little Rock.

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Hometown: Little Rock expanded and retooled because of the growth. Arkansas Children’s Hospital employs about 4,000 and had 343,821 outpatient visits and 14,840 inpatient visits in fiscal year 2013.

Another strength of the city that can’t be taken away is its geographic location. While Pulaski County has grown slower than the suburbs, there’s no doubt Little Rock is the center of the metropolitan statistical area.

As the Chamber’s Chessir described it, “Just

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this morning, over 104,000 woke up in a county other than Pulaski and drove here to work. That represents about 40-plus percent of the jobs in Pulaski County.”

Regionalism is an important tool in Little Rock’s arsenal. Prior to leading the Chamber of Commerce, Chessir was head of the Metro Little Rock Alliance, which involves 12 counties and is managed by the Chamber. The city’s economic developers believe so strongly in the regional approach

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

that they respond to any site selection request by alerting the entire region – even if Little Rock has a competitive site available. For example, when HP contacted Little Rock about locating a facility there, the request was immediately forwarded out, and the company ultimately chose Conway.

To Chessir, that’s a gain, not a loss. To outsiders, the entire Central Arkansas area is “Little Rock.” That means economic developers can tout 22 institutions of higher education in the region rather than those in Little Rock alone. The 12-county region’s labor shed involves a workforce of half a million people. Little Rock’s population is 200,000, which would not have been enough to attract the attention of an employer like Welspun Tubular, which ultimately landed at the Little Rock Port. For those employers who choose an outside community, Little Rock inevitably will enjoy some of the spillover.

Other strengths include the port, where about 40 companies employ 4,000 to 4,500.

The Port Authority is almost out of additional land, but it has $10 million to buy more thanks to a penny sales tax passed by voters in 2011. The University of Arkansas at Little Rock enrolled 12,377 students in fall 2013 and employs 1,852 full- and part-time employees. Its George W. Donaghey College of Engineering and Information Technology is a must-have, Chessir said.

“If you do not have an engineering school within your region, then today that’s a checkoff,” he said. “You either have it, and you’re still in the mix. You don’t, you’re out of the mix.”

When touting Little Rock’s strengths to economic developers, quality of life is a big issue, which is why the Main Street revitalization is so important. The 20something and 30-something techies who now run the world are looking for communities that are walkable, sustainable and fun. Chessir can point to the fact that an area resident can live in an urban, suburban or rural environment within 20 minutes of downtown Little Rock.

There’s also this hard to quantify fact: Little Rock is pretty. It rests alongside the Arkansas River and has an abundance of trees so that it’s not, as Chessir said, a

“concrete, asphalt jungle.” Prospective employers often are treated to a meal at the Little Rock Club on the 30th floor of the Regions Bank building so they see out the glass windows in every direction.

Challenges? Little Rock certainly has them. Areas south of I-630 continue to languish. Crime is a problem, although major crime has fallen nearly 40 percent from 12 years ago despite the city’s population growing by 22,000 residents.

Still, Mayor Stodola, a former prosecuting attorney, points out the city is far from the days when it was the subject of the HBO documentary, “Gang War: Bangin’ In Little Rock.”

The home of the 1957 Central High crisis continues to struggle with racial issues.

Dr. Dexter Suggs, Little Rock School District superintendent who came here from Indianapolis, said segregation remains a problem. “Everything’s black and white or Hispanic. If we’re going to do something, if we’re going to move this city, we’ve got to get past that as a city.”

Suggs leads a district that educates 25,547 students and employs 3,800. Managing an urban school district brings with it certain challenges, including poverty. The city has five high schools, so there’s no football team for everyone to rally around.

But having a large district with 48 schools gives administrators the ability to experiment. The newly converted Forest Heights STEM Academy will focus on science and math courses in a school where enrollment and achievement were declining. The Little Rock School District Virtual Academy will provide digital learning classes for students throughout the district and potentially in other districts.

The Metropolitan Career Technical Center, a partnership with Pulaski Technical College, prepares students for a variety of fields that don’t require a college degree so they can enter the workforce right out of high school. Last year, the district piloted a one-to-one initiative where students in four schools were given laptops. This year, students at another 12 schools will receive Chromebooks. “This is basically where we’re moving to: We want to get to a point where

we no longer have to use those textbooks,” Suggs said.

PROACTIVE VS. REACTIVE Around 2005, a decision was made to target the site selectors who help major employers choose a location.

At the time, Little Rock did not seem to be on their radar screens. Chessir remembers picking them up at the airport and driving them through the city. They

seemed disinterested at first, but that would change as they glimpsed what the city had to offer.

Since February 2005, the Metro Little Rock Alliance has had a hand in $1.6 billion in new and expanded projects.

“What’s happened is, now they’re coming back,” he said of the site selectors.

“Now they’re calling us, as opposed to us always constantly trying to get in front of them.”

Heifer International Headquarters

Arkansas State Capitol

Union Station

Arkansas State Fair

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Industry PHOTOS: DOLLARPHOTOCLUB

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Taking the Initiative The private option and payment restructuring headline Arkansas’ health-reform efforts.

By Steve Brawner Arkansas learned some good news in August, when the Gallup organization released the results of a survey showing the state rose from number 49 in its percentage of uninsured residents in 2013 (22.5%) to number 22 (12.4%). No other state reduced its uninsured population so much.

The change largely can be attributed to the so-called private option, which has enrolled 163,480 as of July 31. Another 20,335 who started the enrollment process have been assigned to traditional Medicaid because they were found to be “medically frail.”

While those numbers seem encouraging, the private option remains on shaky ground.

Opponents question its long-term financial sustainability.

The private option is just one of several reforms being implemented in Arkansas.

Among the others is the Arkansas Health Care Payment Improvement Initiative, which changes how medical providers are paid. Instead of a “fee for service” model, they are paid based on “episodes of care.”

A DIFFERENT APPROACH It’s all pretty complicated. Let’s start with the private option.

Under the Affordable Care Act that created Obamacare, states were required to make Medicaid available to residents earning up to 138% of the poverty level.

The U.S. Supreme Court threw a monkey wrench in this provision by declaring, in the same decision that OK’d Obamacare’s individual insurance mandate, that states could opt out of expanding Medicaid. Many Republican-controlled states did.

Arkansas, whose Medicaid rolls would have expanded by nearly 40%, took a different approach. Three Republican

legislators – state Sen. Jonathan Dismang, R-Beebe; state Sen. David Sanders, R-Little Rock; and state Rep. John Burris, R-Harrison – worked with Gov. Mike Beebe’s administration to create the private option in 2013. Instead of expanding Medicaid,

“We have to take into account the fact that we’ve got a lot of people in Arkansas who are playing by the rules and who are working hard, and to just yank that away from them without any consideration is not something that I think is the right thing to do.

– State Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Gravette Arkansas would use those dollars to purchase private insurance for enrollees.

The Obama administration granted the waiver allowing this. Funding requires a three-fourths vote of each chamber. The Health Care Independence Act creating the private option passed, barely, in 2013 and was reauthorized, barely, in 2014.

The private option is expected to require $47 million from the state in fiscal year 2015, when the feds are paying for practically all of the costs. It will cost the state $275 million starting in fiscal year 2020, when Arkansas will be responsible for 10%. But because of the additional federal revenues and the reduction in uncompensated care, the state is expected to gain $670 million over 10 years. The cost to the federal budget, on the other hand, is expected to be $1.59 billion in fiscal year 2015 and $2.35 billion in fiscal year 2020.

Early results seem encouraging. In 2015, five insurance companies will offer coverage throughout Arkansas – Arkansas Blue Cross/Blue Shield, the national Blue Cross/ BlueShield multi-state plan, QCH Health Plan, Qualchoice Life and Health and AMbetter. In 2014, southern Arkansas was covered by only two plans.

The Arkansas Center for Health Improvement, a health policy center that employs the state surgeon general, Dr. Joe Thompson, points to an Arkansas Hospital Association survey comparing the first three months of 2013 and 2014. That study found a 30% reduction in uninsured hospital admissions, 24% fewer uninsured emergency room visits and 2% fewer total ER visits.

Doug Weeks, Baptist Health executive vice president and chief operating officer, said Baptist Health provided $50 million in uncompensated care in 2012. This year, it’s hoping to reduce that by a third. “It’d be disastrous to have [the private option] go away,” he said.

The private option is meant to reduce costs in part by placing hundreds of thousands of Arkansans who would have been in Medicaid or uninsured into the www.talkbusiness.net

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Industry: Health Care private insurance pool. The program screens potential enrollees to determine which are “medically frail” and enrolls those in Medicaid. That means the insurance pool is being infused with young, healthy enrollees who shouldn’t require much health care. In 2015, the same process will happen when 40,000 children in families earning 138 to 200% of the federal poverty line will begin moving from ARKids First B onto the private option. Like adults, the medically frail will remain in Medicaid.

“What you’re looking at doing is putting another huge pool of healthy lives into the private option at a very young age. Kids are cheap,” Sanders said.

So far, the cost of the private option has been $491.17 per month per individual – higher than the federal waiver Arkansas originally obtained for $477.63, a number that rises over two years. If Arkansas is unable to come under the waiver over an average of three years, it will be responsible for the difference.

But Sanders doesn’t expect that to happen, and neither does the Department of Human

Services, which does not plan to ask the federal government for an increase in the spending cap. Under the Affordable Care Act, insurance companies must spend 80% of their premiums on care, a percentage known as the medical loss ratio, and return the difference to ratepayers if they don’t.

Sanders believes the young, healthy population that has been enrolled through the private option is not costing insurance companies 80% of their premiums. The difference will be paid back to the federal government in 2015, and when it is, the costs of the private option will meet the waiver’s targets.

CONSUMER-DRIVEN REFORMS Moving forward, the emphasis will shift to enacting consumer-driven reforms. The Health Care Independence Act requires enrollees with incomes of 50 to 138% of the federal poverty level starting in 2015 to contribute to health-care independence accounts that they keep if they leave the program. Those with incomes of 50 to 100% of the federal poverty level contribute $5

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a month; those with higher incomes contribute more. The state also will contribute federal dollars into the accounts.

Enrollees will be required to swipe a card at the doctor’s office that will deduct a co-pay from their account. According to Sanders, this will help recipients develop a consumerdriven mindset.

If this all sounds bigger than just expanding insurance coverage, it’s meant to be. The private option’s framers intend to reform the entire health-care system so that it’s more individualized and consumer-driven. Other states have followed Arkansas’ lead and are considering similar programs. For Sanders, the future of health care is clear: the nation will move toward a single-payer system where the government pays all the bills, or toward consumerism.

“We are going in the direction of consumers,” he said.

Opponents of the private option question its success. It’s still funded with federal dollars coming from a debt-ridden Uncle Sam, with uncertain costs for both the state and nation in the future. As a state appropriation, it requires three-fourths of both houses of the Legislature to approve it, which means nine senators and/or 26 representatives can kill it. While all Democrats support it, Republicans are split.

State Sen. Bryan King, R-Berryville, an opponent, said he remains “pro-repeal.”

“If they gave you and me a $1.5 billion Obamacare credit card, we could get some good news out of it for a while,” he said. He later added, “We’ve turned into Washington, D.C., where today’s solutions are paid for by future generations.”

Another opponent, state Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Gravette, the newly elected Senate majority leader, said the news of Arkansas’ reduction in its uninsured did “not really” change his opinion. However, while he still opposes the program, “I’m one who believes you’ve got to be fair with people,” he said.

“So anything that’s done, we have to take into account the fact that we’ve got a lot of people in Arkansas who are playing by the rules and who are working hard, and to just

yank that away from them without any consideration is not something that I think is the right thing to do,” Hendren said.

“We’re going to have to look at how we can find some middle ground, or find some sort of process that gets us to a program that’s more sustainable.”

COORDINATED CARE While the political future of the private option has attracted most of the headlines, Arkansas health care has been undergoing other significant changes during the past four years through a process coordinated by the Arkansas Center for Health Improvement and Thompson, Arkansas’ surgeon general. The federal stimulus package provided $260 million for health information technology that is being adopted in hospitals and clinics. Meanwhile, the state has emphasized patient-centered medical homes, where participating primary care physicians receive money to coordinate patient care with other providers.

The centerpiece of the efforts is the Arkansas Health Care Payment Improvement Initiative, which reforms how providers are paid. Under the traditional fee-for-service system, doctors are paid for treating patients, not for curing them or keeping them well, creating what’s known as a “perverse incentive.” Representatives with the Department of Human Services, Arkansas Medicaid, Blue Cross, Qualchoice, the Arkansas Hospital Association and the Arkansas Medical Society began coordinating reform efforts in 2011. The initiative began with a series of meetings with health-care providers. Thompson said audience members typically agreed that 20 to 30% of all care added no value to the patient. Arkansas providers also were charging wildly varying fees.

The groups working with the initiative mapped out what should happen in a given “episode of care” and created lists of quality indicators and acceptable cost ranges.

Five episodes were chosen as a pilot project: pregnancy-related claims; total hip/knee replacements; ambulatory upper respiratory infections; congestive heart failure admissions; and attention hyperac-

tivity disorder, or ADHD. Since then, others have gone live.

A principal accountable provider is assigned to lead the efforts in a patient’s case. Every 12 months, incentive payments are calculated based on average costs. If a provider’s average costs are below what the Initiative calls “commendable” levels, the providers are financially rewarded by the payers. Those whose average rates are above

“acceptable” levels must pay back part of the excess costs. Doctors receive quarterly reports showing how their performance compares to their peers, helping them find inefficiencies.

According to Thompson, a pediatrician, the key was “to get all the payers pushing in the same direction.” When he was practicing medicine full time, the state’s varied providers did not give him a

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2014 Governor’s Quality Award & 20th Anniversary Celebration Honoring the recipients of the 2014 Governor’s Quality Awards and celebrating 20 years of recognizing excellence in Arkansas.

September 15, 2014 Marriott Hotel, Little Rock Reception 5:00 P.M. Banquet 6:00 P.M. Business Attire For more information, contact Sue Weatter at 501-372-2222 or sweatter@arkansasstatechamber.com

Governor’s Award for Performance Excellence Recipients 1995

2006

Bekaert Corporation Rogers

Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System Little Rock

FutureFuel Chemical Company Batesville 1996 and 2008 Baxter Healthcare Corporation Mountain Home 1997 CARTI Little Rock Kraft Foods - Planters Fort Smith 1998 Tenneco Inc. Paragould 2001 Danfoss, LLC Arkadelphia 2002 and 2012 White County Medical Center Searcy 2004 and 2008

Lockheed Martin Camden Operations Camden 2009 White River Medical Center Batesville 2010 Tyson Food Safety and Research Laboratory Springdale 2011 Arkansas Department of Information Systems Little Rock Baptist Health Rehabilitation Institute Little Rock

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2013 Veterans Healthcare System of the Ozarks Fayetteville

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Recognizing Excellence in Arkansas

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

2014 Board of Examiners

Industry: Health Care clear direction.

“Qualchoice would tell me to do one thing,” he said. “Blue Cross would tell me to do a different thing. Medicaid would tell me to do a third thing, so I’m sitting here, deer in the headlights, I don’t do anything. I don’t change the way I’m practicing.”

During the program’s first year, there was a 19% decrease in unnecessary antibiotic prescriptions for unspecified upper respiratory infections and a 29% drop in the cost per episode of ADHD. There has also been increased screening for diabetes, HIV and other conditions among pregnant women. A total of 489 providers were receiving $396,103 in financial incentive payments. Another 278 providers were reimbursing Medicaid $594,191 because their costs were too high.

Before the initiative began, patients were receiving antibiotics half the time for cold symptoms, even though antibiotics have no effect on a cold. That’s dropped by 19% because doctors now have a financial incentive not to prescribe. As a pediatrician, Thompson said, “It was easier for me to write the prescription for the mom whose kid had a cold than it was for me to spend the 10 minutes telling her why she really didn’t need the antibiotic.”

BUNDLED PAYMENTS According to Thompson, the Payment Improvement Initiative works hand-in-hand with the private option because costs had to come down in order to make the private option work.

The federal government also is seeking ways to cut costs by changing the way providers are paid. St. Vincent Infirmary has been participating since last October in a Medicare pilot program, the Bundled Payments for Care Initiative. All of St. Vincent’s joint replacement procedures are reimbursed using a bundled payment system where the hospital is paid a set amount for the procedure and must control costs to make a profit.

When it decided to participate, the hospital worked with joint replacement surgeons to map out new processes. Since it started participating, the hospital has

reduced its readmissions by two-thirds. The overall cost has been reduced by almost $1 million – and that’s just for 1,500 of the hospital’s 30,000 admissions. “Imagine if we did that across the board for all care,” CEO Peter Banko said.

Why did it take a Medicare initiative to inspire the hospital to change its processes?

Banko is blunt and honest in his answer: “There was no financial incentive to.”

In the past, while hospitals have been paid

by Medicare on a fixed price, doctors have been paid on a fee-for-service basis. That meant hospitals were paid for more efficient care but doctors were paid for providing more care. With bundled payments, everyone has the same incentives.

“Until you change how we’re being paid, you’re not going to see changes in the system,” he said.

Success.

After beating liver cancer, UAMS has Carroll Martindale back in the swing of things.

I

n 2010, Carroll Martindale should have been waiting for a tee time at his favorite golf course.

Instead, he was waiting for something entirely more important: a new liver.

After being diagnosed with liver cancer, Carroll was told he was a candidate for a transplant. While waiting for a donor, he underwent life-prolonging chemotherapy and radiation treatment at the UAMS Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, Arkansas’ official cancer research and treatment facility.

Three years later, the call came and Carroll returned to UAMS for a successful liver transplant.

Today, he is healthy, back on the course and thankful that the best things in life are worth waiting for.

Visit cancer.uams.edu or call: 501-526-2272

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Industry PHOTO COURTESY OF CTEH

CTEH employee on the scene

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

An Environmental Niche

UAMS’ business incubator helped lift CTEH into the disaster response field.

By Ryan Saylor

COURTESY OF THE CITY WIRE

When disaster strikes anywhere in North America, from a train derailment in Quebec to an oil spill in Mayflower, it is more often than not an Arkansas company that is the first disaster response team on the scene.

CTEH, the Center for Toxicology and Environmental Health, is a North Little Rock company that saw a need in the market and filled it. In doing so, it has become a global leader in disaster response consulting and has created a high number of jobs requiring advanced education, according to Dr. Phil Goad, a partner and principal toxicologist at the company.

In all, the company has 140 employees and of those, 14 hold Ph.D.s, one is a medical doctor, two are attorneys, one is a registered nurse, and 15 have master’s degrees. About 84 percent of its workforce holds at least a bachelor’s degree with 27 percent of those having an advanced degree.

Goad said prior to the company’s founding in 1997, the four who would eventually become partners were doing consulting work in toxicology.

“We would deal with issues that would come our way that were related to what are the potential effects of chemicals in the workplace or in the environment,” he said. “And then somewhere around 1990 or so, while we were still with these previous organizations, we began to do emergency response beginning with the railroad industry.”

It was the work in emergency management consulting in the early 1990s that led to the creation of CTEH and its quick growth as a global leader in the field.

According to Goad, one of the services most often provided in disaster response is air quality monitoring, where the company detects chemicals that may have been released in a train derailment or other

emergency situation. Air quality determines a disaster’s impact on the area for emergency personnel responding to the situation and provides in-depth analysis and understanding from near the beginning of the disaster until cleanup is complete.

“There was no organization that did that,” Goad said. “And so we were able to come in and begin to learn on the fly if you will, developing what have now really become standards around North America for responding to chemical release emergencies and how to perform the monitoring, how you collect the data and disseminate the data.”

CTEH is able to conduct its air monitoring using a variety of methods without having to put its own staff or others at risk, such as aerial balloons and quad copters that collect the data for analyzing.

And the work is done not just in emergencies, but at major sporting events and other locations where large numbers of people could be gathered, Goad said.

THE UAMS CONNECTION The company’s founding, while possible in large part due to the educational and professional backgrounds of Goad and the original staff of nine, owes a lot of its ability to getting off the ground and becoming a long-term success to the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences’ BioVentures business incubator.

According to Christopher Fesel, associate director and intellectual property counsel at UAMS BioVentures, the program is a technology licensing and business incubator that helps create jobs in Arkansas based around skills learned at the medical school and how those can be applied in life-saving ways.

“Basically, our goal is to ensure that the technological advancements that are a

result of the research undergone here at the university and the hospitals, the VA hospital and at Arkansas Children’s, are used to the benefit of the public as soon as possible.

We’re trying to save lives here,” Fesel said.

“The secondary purpose is trying to encourage the economic development of Little Rock and Arkansas as a whole by creating new companies and creating new job opportunities, as well as bringing some more financial revenue to the state and the region at the same time.”

Goad said the BioVentures program was a tool to help professors and employees “of the state to start businesses that would provide technology, jobs, opportunity and resources to the state of Arkansas.”

Fesel noted that each startup facilitated through BioVentures has a different business establishment with the business incubators, whether it be partial ownership of the companies or profit sharing, which would allow the university to see a return on investment and invest in additional startups that could also have a positive influence on the local economy.

According to Goad, CTEH’s partnership did not cede any ownership to UAMS but instead was based on a profit-sharing model.

“The services they provide to us included being able to rent offices from the campus there – the VA campus there adjacent to UAMS. We had access to the UAMS computer system and our phone system was through UAMS. They provided some assistance in developing business plans and communicating what we were doing. So they were an incubator for a new business that was forming, and we consider that program to have been a vital important part of our success.”

Fesel said what is so unique about the success of CTEH is how quickly the www.talkbusiness.net

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Industry: CTEH company was able to go from four cofounders and a startup staff of five additional employees to today’s current level of 140. He said much of it has to do with CTEH’s ability to create a service versus some of the biotech startups that have taken far longer to realize profits and establish a foothold in the market.

“Because we almost exclusively work in the biotech space, the timeline between company startup and profitability is longer than in almost any other industry due to the fact that we’re dealing with human health and that obviously means that virtually any activity or product that comes out of this technology has to be vetted and approved by the Food and Drug Administration, the FDA. And that, as you know from any experience in reading the news with regard to pharmaceuticals, for example, just takes quite a long time,” Fesel said.

“CTEH is probably our most successful with regard to employment as well as at this point most likely pure profitability, as well, partly because they’ve really seized the market and also because they’ve had quite a

number of years of experience.”

Fesel said while many companies supported by BioVentures have had a difficult time with regulatory hurdles to overcome in attempts to get to market. It is estimated that the business incubator has had between an $80 million to $90 million economic impact on Central Arkansas.

As long as companies such as CTEH continue to thrive, the impact would only grow as more well-educated individuals stay in Arkansas, shop in Arkansas and invest in Arkansas, he said.

Grant Tennille, executive director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, said CTEH’s success within a relatively short amount of time – 17 years – shows that Arkansas is able to support businesses with a global reach.

“You can succeed here,” Tennille said.

“You can become a global leader from Arkansas and obviously we have some enormous examples of that, the two most famous being Wal-Mart and Tyson. But this is an example on a smaller scale where Arkansans, or people who were educated or

working here, saw an opportunity and have risen to the top of the profession right here in Central Arkansas.

“This company coming out of BioVentures is an enormous success story.”

WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS As for the future of CTEH, Goad said he feels confident that the sky is the limit for the company as it approaches its 20th anniversary in just less than three years. He said the key was having the right people and servicing an industry that is still wildly underserved.

“And to this day, we’re really the only organization in North America that is able to provide the kind of resources we do on a 24/7, 365-day basis. Within two hours of a call, we can be in the air and sending our teams of toxicologists, industrial hygienists, problem specialists, if need be occupational health specialists, information technology specialists to respond to the site and begin collecting the kind of data that’s important for decision-makers in a chemical-release emergency.”

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In and Out of Africa

With fast-growing economies, Africa holds promising growth amid Wal-Mart, U.S. investments.

By Kim Souza

COURTESY OF THE CITY WIRE

Wal-Mart took part during August in a three-day U.S.-African Business Forum in Washington, D.C., where business and government leaders discussed investment and economic opportunities.

Wal-Mart CEO Doug McMillon helped open the forum on a panel moderated by former President Bill Clinton. McMillon and the CEOs of Dangote Group, General Electric, The Dow Chemical Company and Shanduka Group identified ways to strengthen their business ties and generate economic growth with African connections.

Over the past decade, six of the 10 fastest growing economies are in Africa, which has already prompted some of the country’s largest firms like Wal-Mart, Procter & Gamble and General Electric to invest in sub-Saharan regions. Africa’s GDP is expected to rise 6% annually over the next decade and real income has increased more than 30% over the last 10 years, according to economists.

The conference was expected to spur investments from U.S. companies to the tune of $14 billion in deals that would benefit Africa but also enhance U.S. profits of the giving companies.

“I want Africans buying more American products. I want Americans buying more African products,” said President Barack Obama, who also addressed the forum.

McMILLON NOTES Wal-Mart owns a majority stake in Massmart, a large retailer based in South Africa it purchased for $2.4 billion in 2011 and the retailer continues to invest in Sub-Saharan Africa.

“We’re investing for the long term, empowering African producers through hands-on training and using our global supply chain to connect them with our businesses around the world,” McMillon said. “Everywhere we operate we see that our customers have so much in common.

Our customers in Africa want to spend less on everyday needs so they can provide more

for their families.”

He also referenced the success of Seven Sisters Wines, a South African wine producer that supplies a range of wines to 500 U.S. stores. Seven Sisters CEO Vivian Kleynhans took part in Massmart’s Developing Wine Brands Program, which helps local suppliers grow their business in South Africa and beyond.

WAL-MART INVESTMENT Wal-Mart and its foundation announced a $3 million investment in three farmer training programs in Rwanda, Zambia and Kenya.

As part of Wal-Mart’s commitment to train one million small farmers in emerging economies, the Walmart Foundation is working in partnership with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to fund training in agricultural best practices for 135,000 farmers, including more than 80,000 women, according to Maggie Sans, vice president of international corporate affairs at Wal-Mart.

Walmart Foundation funding in Rwanda is supporting expansion and providing training to 50,000 farmers on agricultural techniques, emphasizing the production of corn, beans and dairy farming.

Sans said an additional 45,000 farmers

will be trained in business skills and leadership in agriculture in Zambia as part of Agribusiness Systems International’s Women’s Improved Marketing and Asset Control (WIMAC) project.

In Kenya, Walmart Foundation funding will support the expansion of the One Acre Fund program to improve agricultural practices and market access for 40,000 farmers, which will see them receive high-quality inputs such as seed and fertilizer, as well as post-harvest support.

This process is expected to result in a higher crop yield that could double incomes in one planting season, she said.

Sans said women in emerging markets typically invest more than 90% of their income back into their families and communities. She ended by reiterating that Walmart is committed to empowering supply chains in Africa, particularly women farmers.

U.S. PLAN President Obama outlined a series of steps the U.S. is taking to boost economic ties with Africa.

• As part of the “Doing Business in Africa” campaign, the President announced an additional $7 billion in new financing to promote American exports in Africa.

• The U.S. will continue to partner with Africa to build the necessary infrastructure for a flourishing economy. It aims to bring electricity to more than 60 million homes and business with a total commitment of more than $26 billion to Power Africa.

• The President called on Congress to renew and enhance the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA).

• The United States is going to continue to help more Africans trade with each other — because, as the President noted, “the markets with the greatest potential are often the countries right next door.” www.talkbusiness.net

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Regional: Northwest Arkansas

Immigration A Hot Topic At Womack Town Hall Meeting

By Ryan Saylor

COURTESY OF THE CITY WIRE

Immigration, the federal budget and national defense were among the most discussed topics in a late August town hall event held by Congressman Steve Womack, R-Rogers, at the Blue Lion (formerly Second Street Live) in downtown Fort Smith.

The topic of immigration saw a frank discussion between Humberto Marquez, who described himself as the child of immigrants who was brought to the United States when he was young and does not know life outside of the United States, and Womack.

“I study international business. I hope to bring more business here in Arkansas, I want to create more jobs for Americans.

So you’re limiting our potential, the 3,800 young people who are living here in Arkansas [who could benefit from immigration reform], you are limiting the potential of them,” Marquez said of Womack’s vote against a program known as the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).

According to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services website, the program has been around since 2012.

“On June 15, 2012, the Secretary of Homeland Security announced that certain people who came to the United States as children and meet several guidelines may request consideration of deferred action for a period of two years, subject to renewal.

They are also eligible for work authorization.

Deferred action is a use of prosecutorial discretion to defer removal action against an individual for a certain period of time.

Deferred action does not provide lawful status,” the website reads.

Womack explained to Marquez that his vote against DACA was more about standing up to what he sees as an overreach of executive power by President Barack Obama.

“I want you to look at that vote from purely the perspective of the concept of do we have an imperial government? Is the president of the United States such the

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supreme leader that if he doesn’t agree with the laws passed, duly passed by both chambers and signed into law by any president, that he has the single ability to change those laws to fit whatever objectives that he might have – political or otherwise.

I want you to look at that vote not in terms of whether it’s against you, but whether it’s a vote to send a message to the president that he does not have the executive power to just basically ignore the laws of the land of the United States of America that for too long have been ignored by the administrations.

And not just his, but previous administrations, both parties are affected here,” Womack said.

Womack continued by saying he believes the issues brought up by undocumented teens and college-aged students, also known as “dreamers,” should be addressed. But the issue of immigration reform can only be addressed once the border is secured.

As he spoke on the topic, Dr. Paul Beran, chancellor of the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith, spoke up and said based on his 45 years as a Texas resident, he did not believe the border would ever be secured.

He said as long as individuals believe there would be economic opportunity in America, individuals would continue attempts to cross the border.

“These kids here, and the ones that fall

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

into that category, we can argue about all day long. About President Obama, I don’t disagree with the construct of your argument. I really don’t disagree with that. But beyond how many angels can dance on the head of a pin kind of question, which I think that is essentially, what you’re dealing with are people,” Beran said, adding that he saw no reason Womack and Congress could not address the issue of what to do about dreamers and border security at the same time.

No one came out of the meeting with changed opinions, but as Beran told Womack after the meeting, “at least we’re having the discussion.”

When the topic of the budget was discussed, Womack said the only vote he regrets during his time in Congress was the vote that authorized the sequestration that forced massive budget cuts across all areas of government, including national defense.

“I voted for the Budget Control Act. Now, keep in mind, this is 2011. I’m [in my] second year in Congress. I’m still wet behind the ears, a little naive. Never in the wildest dreams did I think that the super committee [charged with finding budget cuts] would fail to get at least a substantial percentage of that $1.2 [trillion] in cuts. And I believed that in my heart and because I believed that in my heart, that rendered the sequestration piece of the law kind of moot, that it wouldn’t be triggered. And if it did, it would be sort of inconsequential in size. But the super committee got nothing done. Zero.

And that triggered sequestration and I had this great sinking feeling in my heart. I just voted for a bill … it’s the one regret that I have,” he said of the 2,700 votes that he has cast. “[I regret it] not because I don’t believe we need to pay our creditors and raise the debt ceiling, but because of the realization that the defense department was going to be the recipient of such drastic cuts in their budgets.”

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Regional: Northwest Arkansas

The Compass Report: NWA, Fort Smith Region Stable, Improving

By Michael Tilley

COURTESY OF THE CITY WIRE

Economic conditions in the Northwest Arkansas and Fort Smith metro areas continue to be stable or improving, according to The Compass Report’s analysis of first quarter 2014 data.

The quarterly Compass Report is managed by The City Wire. The report is the only independent analysis of economic conditions in Arkansas’ three largest metro areas. The Central Arkansas metro area slipped slightly compared to the first quarter of 2013.

To underscore the impact of the three largest metro areas, for March of this year the unemployment rate for the rest of the state was 8%, down 0.5% from March 2013 to March 2014. The statewide unemployment rate with the three largest metros added back in was 7%, down 0.5% Marchon-March.

NORTHWEST ARKANSAS Continued gains in key employment sectors and building activity helped the Northwest Arkansas economy begin 2014 with a strong quarter. The first quarter 2014 grade of B- was slightly off compared to the first quarter 2013 grade of B and reflected a slight decline from the fourth quarter of 2014.

While the regional economy slowed compared to the first quarter of 2013, the grade reflects an economy in expansion mode. For example, non-farm employment in the region was 217,400 in March, well ahead of the 213,600 in March 2013.

Building permit values in the region totaled $126.551 million in the first quarter, up over the $100.803 million in the first quarter of 2013.

Economist Jeff Collins, who conducts data collection and analysis for The Compass Report, said the Northwest Arkansas economy may have slowed but the pace of growth continues to outpace the state’s largest metro economy.

“Despite being roughly two-thirds the size of the Central Arkansas economy, non-farm employment grew at three times the rate

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of the state’s largest MSA,” Collins noted in the analysis. “Looking at the real estate data for the two regions, building permits in the third quarter for Northwest Arkansas were roughly 87% of the total for Central Arkansas. However, the value of the permits during the period was roughly 151% of that for Central Arkansas.”

A potential problem on the horizon is the connection between regional employment and housing sector growth.

“There has been considerable development of residential real estate in the last two quarters which may cause disequilibrium in the housing market given slowing employment growth rates,” Collins wrote.

FORT SMITH REGION The Compass Report for the first quarter of 2014 in the Fort Smith area shows gains compared to the first quarter of 2013, but a small decline from the fourth quarter of 2013. A first quarter 2014 grade of C was better than the C- of the first quarter of 2013 but below the C+ of the fourth quarter of 2013.

Collins said regional economic conditions were “somewhat encouraging given the national statistics.”

Non-farm employment in the metro area hit 116,600 in March, up from 116,000 in March 2013. And although the metro jobless rate fell from 8.1% in March 2013 to 6.9% in March 2014, the number of employed did not gain. That was partially reflected in continued pressure on metro sales tax

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

collections. For example, tax collections in Fort Smith totaled $10.246 million in the first quarter, below the $10.377 million in the same quarter of 2013.

“The number of employed was basically unchanged year-on-year. These data indicate the local labor market is improving primarily due to people either leaving the area or choosing not to look for work. Either way, it would be difficult to conclude the employment situation is improving in the Fort Smith area despite the declining unemployment rate,” Collins wrote.

And while the employment picture in the Fort Smith region is not pretty, Collins said “the region has performed relatively well compared to most other metros and the state as a whole.”

RISKS TO THE U.S. ECONOMY Quarterly analysis within The Compass Report also includes a look at risks to the national economy. Following were some of the risks noted in the first quarter report.

• Persistent elevated unemployment, weak job growth, and most importantly poor wage growth are impacting demand.

• Long-term structural changes in the labor market imply unemployment will remain stubbornly elevated. Workers seeking to compete in the post recession economy will have to invest in skills and training. This is increasingly difficult as higher education costs continue to rise at a rate above general inflation.

• Weak job growth and an uneven pattern of recovery across the U.S. have deepened the divide between prosperous and poor regions.

• Washington, D.C., remains dysfunctional. There is no reason to expect improvement in an election year where posturing rather than governing is the norm.

• Unrest in the Middle East and Ukraine could lead to regional de-stabilization impacting trade and energy prices.

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Regional: Northeast Arkansas

Greensborough Village Revealed A 201-acre master-planned, mixed-use upscale development is coming to Jonesboro.

By Talk Business Staff A 201-acre site in the Hilltop area of Jonesboro is on track for development as a major upscale, multi-use neighborhood to be called Greensborough Village.

The project, which could take a decade to fully develop, will be a “city within a city” with boutique retail outlets and residential living space for nearly 2,000 people.

The Jonesboro City Council is studying a zoning change to the area to green light the project or to put it on hold. It is near the Arkansas State University campus starting at Red Wolf Boulevard/Stadium Boulevard and then heading north to Johnson Avenue and Arkansas 351.

“We are truly building a city inside a city. Greensborough Village will be a place that you can live, work, shop, eat and play,” said developer Gary Harpole, managing partner with Halsey Thrasher Harpole, which is overseeing the project.

“Greensborough Village will redefine how development is done in Jonesboro and Northeast Arkansas,” Harpole said.

“This is the region’s first true master-planned, mixed-use development. The attention to detail, quality of life, complimentary amenities and community impact have never been greater. There has been a significant amount of time and money spent in advance solely on land use and traffic impact studies and planning. The investors in this project are adamant that we deliver a final product to the market that will set new standards in every category. This will become a true destination point in Northeast Arkansas.”

Chuck Downham, an engineer on the project, said the village would promote retail and residential opportunities as well as being close to Arkansas State University.

Downham also said a village green would

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be created in the proposed project, allowing residents to tailgate during ASU football games as well as having a place where families can go for recreation.

While little has been made public about the project until now, Harpole said that hasn’t done anything to wane interest. If anything, it may have fueled it.

“We get asked about it everywhere we go,” Harpole said. “Whether it’s Jerry (Halsey), Roddy (Thrasher) or myself, if we are in a meeting or making a presentation to an individual or a group, this development

eventually comes up. We have had some very informal, focus discussions with a broad range of residents about the development. Younger, older, families with children, families without children, retired, professional, student ... you name it.

Without fail, somebody wants to know when they can buy a lot and move.”

PLANNING Harpole said the development has been in a study phase for nearly two years and at least $150,000 in pre-planning expenses have been spent.

He said his firm went through an extensive process in identifying, vetting,

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

interviewing and ultimately securing the services of the planning partners associated with this project.

The firm of Littlejohn and Associates, headquartered in Nashville, Tenn., was brought on board for land planning.

Littlejohn is a multi-disciplined engineering and planning firm with over 125 employees in eight offices located in four states.

“They understand communities like Jonesboro; our size, our limitations, our geography. They have a unique skill set attuned to working in southern communities and creating an exemplary sense of place and quality of life,” Harpole said.

For traffic planning, developers will use Peters & Associates out of Little Rock.

Associated Engineering of Jonesboro has been added to manage the shaping and contouring of the site, building the infrastructure, and coordinating the expansion of utilities.

Likewise, Harpole said that Arkansas State University has been very good to work with throughout the planning process.

“No matter where the road goes, it comes through ASU,” Harpole said. “They own all four corners of the interchange, so any study of that intersection would require their cooperation. They were very generous to give the planners the freedom to essentially ignore property boundaries for the purpose of vision-casting its best use as well as studying the intersection.”

But Harpole made it clear that ASU has been a passive participant. “ASU has not been asked for nor have they spent any money on this project at any stage,” Harpole said.

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Regional: Northeast Arkansas

Osceola Organizing For Opportunities

By Michael Wilkey Osceola Mayor Dickie Kennemore said it was a quiet Saturday morning in fall 2012 when Big River Steel CEO John Correnti first visited him, looking to build a $1.3 billion steel mill south of town.

By all indications, city officials are hoping that the next two years are not as quiet as construction begins on the steel mill superproject and Blue Oak Arkansas, a new $35 million e-waste recycling facility announced in June.

Blue Oak Arkansas, which counts Correnti and former Vice President Al Gore as investors, will focus on recycling metals from discarded circuit boards and other electronics. The project is expected to create 75 new jobs.

Kennemore said the city’s fortunes began to turn when the Plum Point Power Station – a billion-dollar coal-powered plant south of town that provides energy for Osceola and several Arkansas cities – was being built in 2006.

The construction workers spent nearly four years building the power plant, adding to the town, Kennemore said.

“The construction (numbers for Big River Steel) is about the same size as Plum Point. When they left, all that was left was 150 jobs which were filled by construction workers. With Big River Steel, there should be at least 500 jobs left over.

Not to mention all of the ancillary jobs, like maintenance, barge and scrap — we should have between 2,000 and 3,000 jobs in the next 10 years,” Kennemore said.

The city’s sales tax revenues also increased by nearly $2 million a year during the time Plum Point was being built, Kennemore said.

“Merchants and restaurants saw a spike.

And we expect to see a spike the next two years,” Kennemore said.

PLAYING TO STRENGTHS The Mississippi County town and others like it on the mighty Mississippi River have

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seen their populations and business opportunities come and go in the past 30 years.

Osceola’s population actually held steady from 1980 to 2000, hovering around 8,880 residents, but in the last decade, the Delta town’s population slipped to 7,553 as of 2012.

Kennemore said city officials have worked a lot to build on the city’s positives, which include the nearby location of two other steel mills run by Nucor Corp.

“I have been told for many years that Jonesboro, it was a 360-degree turnaround — and Osceola, it was 180 degrees. So, we

began playing to our strengths,” Kennemore said. “Just a few miles from here, there is the biggest waterway in the world. We have Big River Steel, Indigo and all of the steel companies in Blytheville. We have a river, a railroad and a 500-KV [kilovolt] line here.”

Speaking of electricity, Kennemore said the city has renegotiated the utility rates for the city-owned light company.

Pending approval from the Arkansas Public Service Commission, Osceola Light and Power will be entering into a three-year contract Jan. 1 with the Mississippi County Electric Cooperative (MCEC).

Kennemore told members of the Osceola Kiwanis Club last month that the change to MCEC from Constellation Energy will provide a 17% reduction in monthly bills to residents.

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

OPPORTUNITIES FOR PEOPLE WITH A PLAN Don Lindsey, an official with Manpower Staffing Services, said he expects the next several years to be big in Osceola with the new economic development projects underway.

“It is such a great thing for Osceola. I would say that anyone who wants a job here can definitely find one,” Lindsey said.

Lindsey, whose company works on employment-based issues, said the construction workers who will build Big River Steel and Blue Oak Arkansas will be in a good position to land full-time jobs.

There is also the opportunity for people with a plan.

“All of the ancillary stuff, like grocery stores, gas stations and convenience stores [will land employees]. You could even start your own business. A good idea for someone is to go into catering.

If you’ve got a catering truck, you could definitely work yourself to death feeding all those folks [construction workers],” Lindsey said.

While not discussing specifics, Kennemore said several retail businesses have expressed interest in locating in Osceola. There will also be more need for construction workers.

A construction official working on the major projects declined to comment for this story. However, Kennemore said he has been told there will be a need for welders, pipe fitters and dirt loaders.

Donald Burton, an assistant manager at the Walmart Supercenter in Osceola, said the store would also benefit. “It will obviously be an impact,” Burton said.

The supercenter, with a grocery store, right now serves a lot of customers from Osceola and south Mississippi County, Burton said.

“It will help our store. It will help our community. It will also provide good, stable jobs,” Burton said.

Northeast Arkansas A ‘Battleground’ In 2014 Races

By Michael Wilkey There is one thing that Republicans and Democrats in Arkansas might agree on: Northeast Arkansas could make or break both parties’ 2014 fortunes.

David Ray, communications director for Senate candidate Congressman Tom Cotton, R-Dardanelle, said the area has changed politically in the past several years.

“Historically, Northeast Arkansas has always been solidly Democratic. But you have seen since 2010, a strong shift in party preference,” Ray said. “There has not been a shift in ideology. Northeast Arkansas has always been conservative. But with the Democrats in Washington, they [local Democrats] do not recognize their values.”

Former Democratic Sen. David Pryor, who was in Jonesboro, Newport and Paragould last month to campaign for his son, Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Little Rock, said the area has been receptive to the Democratic message.

David Pryor and his wife, Barbara, went to local senior centers and civic clubs to meet with potential voters.

“There is not much question it is a battleground,” the elder Pryor said. “It is a part of Arkansas that is vibrant and prospering. There is a lot of energy and a lot of young people with new ideas.”

Both Ray and David Pryor said the two Senate campaigns will definitely be looking to Northeast Arkansas as a possible path to victory this fall.

“We have campaigned relentlessly here,” Ray said. “We have been to Jonesboro at least a dozen times, Lake City, Mississippi County, Poinsett County, Sharp County and Independence County. It shows at least how important [the region] is to our campaign.

We have also had a field operation and have knocked on doors since January.” “[Today’s campaign] is different with electronic, Facebook and Twitter. We do a lot of door-to-door, street-by-street,” Pryor said. “We have worked on a 75 organized county approach, with phone banks and walking through neighborhoods. We have also had a large number of volunteers.”

NEA BATTLEGROUND A map released last year by Republican consultant Clint Reed with Little Rockbased Impact Management Group measures political strength by county. Reed’s analysis showed that Craighead, Cross, Greene, Independence and Sharp counties are considered “purple,” or toss-up, counties this year.

“These counties have a tendency to split their preference between Republican and Democrat. How these counties break in 2014 could very well determine which political party controls the U.S. Senate or who the next governor is,” said Reed, who was part of a June panel at the Northeast Arkansas Political Animals Club.

Each of those “purple” counties have some sort of county race this year.

Craighead, Cross, Greene and Sharp have contested county judge races this year, while each have five justice of the peace races.

Turnout will also be boosted in these and other Northeast Arkansas counties by an abnormally high number of municipal races, especially for mayor.

As for statewide races, most if not all candidates on the ballot have spent time in those counties this year. The two top candidates for governor – Republican Asa Hutchinson and Democrat Mike Ross – campaigned at July 4th events in Corning, Piggott and Caraway and are scheduled to make more appearances in the coming weeks.

Former Massachusetts governor and 2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney campaigned Aug. 20 for Hutchinson in

Jonesboro.

Meanwhile, some of the other statewide candidates have personal ties to the area.

GOP Attorney General candidate Leslie Rutledge grew up in Batesville while Jacob Holloway, a Libertarian candidate for Secretary of State, grew up in Jonesboro.

ON THE BALLOT With the exception of a controversial vote on veterans, the First District Congressional race has so far been fairly quiet.

Incumbent Republican Congressman Rick Crawford faces Democratic nominee Jackie McPherson, the current mayor of Heber Springs.

Crawford was first elected in the historic 2010 election cycle that brought Republican representation to the district for the first time since Reconstruction. He has been working the district with constituent services, but campaign rallies and political appearances have been limited.

McPherson, who is campaigning in parts of the district for the first time this year, has made appearances in Jonesboro and other parts of Northeast Arkansas. He faces the uphill battle of raising his profile and name identification against a two-term representative.

Libertarian Brian Scott Willhite is also vying for the Congressional seat.

A Talk Business & Politics-Hendrix College Poll released in late July showed Crawford with a comfortable 47.5%-33% lead over McPherson. Willhite garnered 3% of the vote and the remaining 16.5% were undecided.

All told, there are 12 state legislative races in Northeast Arkansas this fall, several that are considered highly competitive.

Four of the contested state house races this year are in Craighead County, with two other contested races in Greene, Independence and Poinsett counties each.

Republicans currently hold a 51-48-1 margin in the State House and a 22-13 majority in the State Senate. www.talkbusiness.net

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Point Counterpoint The Most Important Issues Facing Arkansas

By Sen. Mark Pryor

I

Sen. Mark Pryor

’ve always felt that the most important thing I can do as a senator is to listen to people.

And that’s why as I travel from Paragould to DeQueen, from Rogers to Monticello and every town in between, I’m always humbled by the strength of our state’s rural character and the Arkansas values we cherish so much.

Whether I’m in East Camden or West Memphis, one thing I hear from Arkansans is they’re sick of the drama in Washington. I am too. Too often folks feel like most politicians aren’t listening to them and instead care more about partisan games and gridlock than about solving problems, finding consensus and getting things done.

Isaiah 1:18 teaches, “Come, let us reason together.” That’s a lesson I’ve always carried with me as Arkansas’ U.S. Senator.

Not everyone agrees. We all remember the government shutdown last year that cost our economy $24 billion. My opponent, Congressman Tom Cotton, was one of its cheerleaders. At the same time, he was willing to plunge our economy into chaos by defaulting on our obligations just to prove to the ideologues in Washington that he’ll always toe the line.

Congressman Cotton voted to give special tax breaks for billionaires, even as he supported devastating cuts for everyday Arkansans – cuts to Medicare and Social Security, affordable student loans, Arkansas Children’s Hospital and disaster relief to help families recover after devastating storms.

Arkansans are better than that, and the people of this state deserve a senator who will always look out for them.

I’ve always said that no political party has all the answers. When I first ran for the this office, I promised I’d be a senator who

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understands that just because it’s a Democratic idea doesn’t mean it’s a good idea, and just because it’s a Republican idea doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea – instead let’s take the best ideas, no matter where they come from, and put them to work for Arkansas.

That’s why I’ve often stood up to party leaders and the president, whether it was President Bush or President Obama. I opposed burdensome EPA regulations that threatened to hurt Arkansas’ family farmers and small businesses. I support building the Keystone pipeline because it means good American jobs. And I voted against President Obama’s gun control legislation last year, which was a major priority for the president but didn’t, in my view, address the problem of senseless gun violence and instead infringed on Arkansans’ cherished Second Amendment rights.

Congressman Cotton has been in office for only a short while, but in that time he has recklessly voted against the best interests of Arkansans time after time.

No other Arkansas Republican or Democrat in Congress was irresponsible enough to support a fringe budget proposal that raises the age to 70 for Medicare and Social Security, cuts benefits for seniors today and begins turning Medicare over to the insurance companies. Only Tom Cotton.

Just like he was the only member of Arkansas’ congressional delegation to vote five times against disaster relief after Hurricane Sandy, one of the most deadly and costly storms in recent memory. Tom Cotton said at the time that it’s not Arkansas’ job to “bail out” the East Coast, apparently forgetting that our state is tragically prone to natural disasters. And as it turns out, the funds Cotton opposed replenished the emergency recovery pool and were later spent on the ground in

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Arkansas helping families and businesses get back on their feet after ice storms, floods and April’s devastating tornado.

Another real concern for families across Arkansas is access to a college education for our kids. Tom Cotton voted against affordable student loans that help thousands of young Arkansans go to college. He has even argued for eliminating federal student loans entirely, the very same loans he used for his own education. That’s called climbing the ladder and pulling it up after you.

Arkansas voters are smarter than Tom Cotton gives them credit, and they know how to spot a young politician driven more by ambition than principle. Knee-jerk partisanship might make for a good appearance on cable news, but this my-way-or-the-highway approach doesn’t solve problems or do anything for Arkansans who are looking for steady and responsible leadership.

We’ve already seen $19 million spent

by Washington special interest groups on Congressman Cotton’s behalf. These groups, which are largely funded by out-of-state billionaires, don’t care one bit about Arkansas. They’re spending a fortune to elect someone who has consistently carried their water, but Tom Cotton’s ambition is no excuse for voting against Arkansas seniors, students, women and working families.

When I say “Arkansas comes first,” it isn’t just a slogan. It’s what I’m about, and it’s what this race is about. Arkansans deserve a senator who listens to them, understands our state and works with anyone to find real solutions for Arkansas families.

Mark Pryor, the senior U.S. Senator from Arkansas, lives in Little Rock. He is father to a son and daughter, both students at the University of Arkansas.

Point Counterpoint The Most Important Issues Facing Arkansas

By Congressman Tom Cotton

T

his election is about which candidate will put Arkansas first.

When he campaigned for the U.S. Senate in 2002, Sen. Mark Pryor promised Arkansans that he would always put Arkansas first. Unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case during the last six years under President Obama. During that time, Senator Pryor has consistently put President Obama and his agenda first, voting over 90% of the time with President Obama’s big-spending, big-government agenda. I will be a senator who fights for lower taxes, less spending and less regulation. I won’t just say Arkansas comes first – I’ll vote that way, too.

I’m currently traveling across our beautiful state on my “Arkansas First” tour, and along the way, I hear a common refrain from voters: Arkansans need a senator who is looking out for us, not rubber-stamping President Obama’s agenda.

Sixty-three percent of Arkansans (including nearly one-fourth of Democrats) disapprove of Obamacare, and for good reason. This law has driven up the cost of health insurance, increased taxes on working families, caused millions of Americans to lose health-care plans they liked and were promised they could keep, and continues to hamper job creation and hold back our economy with its massive regulatory burdens.

Yet Senator Pryor cast a deciding vote for Obamacare, and he insists that it has been “an amazing success.” Obamacare hasn’t been “an amazing success.” It’s been a failure, especially for Arkansas’ seniors and Medicare recipients, who are having to endure $700 billion in cuts that Senator Pryor voted for in order to pay for Obamacare. I believe we need to start over on health-care reform and enact patientcentered solutions that give individuals and families more choices, including allowing

Congressman Tom Cotton

consumers to shop across state lines, just like we currently do for car insurance.

Arkansas families and businesses balance their budgets, but Washington doesn’t play by those rules. While we work hard and pay our taxes, Washington takes an increasingly large chunk of our paychecks because liberals like Mark Pryor think they can spend our money more wisely than we can.

So when Senator Pryor voted to bail out Wall Street banks and Detroit automakers, it

“Arkansas needs a senator who will be an independent fighter and who will mean it when he says he will put Arkansas first. I will be that senator.”

– Congressman Tom Cotton

was Arkansans who got stuck with the bill.

Senator Pryor’s entire campaign is based on the fact that I’ve supported budgets in the House that balance over a period of years. I won’t apologize for meaning it when I say that I support a balanced budget. For far too long, Washington politicians in both parties have spent too much money, and we’re now mortgaging our children’s future to countries like China who hold much of our debt. A politician is always worried about the next election; I’m worried about our next generation.

Arkansas values run deep in our state, even though the cultural elites in

Washington don’t always understand those values. That’s why I was so disappointed to see Senator Pryor support a so-called “assault weapons” ban in 2004 that would ban many guns commonly used by Arkansas sportsmen. We also value the sanctity of life in Arkansas. Our state was recently ranked as the third most pro-life state in America, yet our senior senator refuses to take a stand on legislation passed by the U.S. House (and 80% of the Arkansas House of Representatives) that would stop gruesome abortion once an unborn child can feel pain.

And one of the most important of all Arkansas values is hard work, which I learned from my mother and father growing up on our family’s cattle farm in Yell County. So when Senator Pryor stood with Harry Reid and President Obama to block common-sense work requirements for food stamp recipients, he once again chose to put President Obama ahead of our Arkansas values.

Traveling our state on my “Arkansas First” tour, I’ve shaken the hands and listened to the ideas of thousands of great Arkansans.

I’ve met people from all walks of life with very diverse views and opinions, but I still have yet to meet an Arkansan who agrees with President Obama over 90% of the time. The only time I see 90% support for President Obama is when I see Senator Pryor cast votes against our interests in the U.S. Senate.

The contrast in this election couldn’t be clearer: Arkansas needs a senator who will be an independent fighter and who will mean it when he says he will put Arkansas first. I will be that senator.

Congressman Tom Cotton of Arkansas’ Fourth District is a native of Dardanelle. A U.S. Army veteran and lawyer, he married Anna Peckham earlier this year. www.talkbusiness.net

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PHOTO: DOLLARPHOTOCLUB

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Feature

Women At Work

Report finds progress, but still disparities, in achieving gender equality.

By Kerri Jackson Case Two things happened in May 2012 that changed my career path significantly. My son was cast in the school play as Cow #3.

An important client meeting was changed at the last minute to conflict with the play. I wasn’t a physics major, but I knew I couldn’t be in two places at once.

I knew that choosing to be at my son’s play would be problematic at work. It didn’t matter that I’d prepped a co-worker to give my piece of the presentation. www.talkbusiness.net

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Feature: Women At Work I knew going to the client meeting would be problematic for my son, who was already having moderate behavior issues because he was not getting enough face time with his parents, who both worked 50 hours per week or more. The suggestion from management that I get a nanny felt like lemon juice in a paper cut.

I made my choice. I went to the play.

In case you’re wondering, Cow #3 in Old McDonald’s Farm killed it that morning.

Two weeks later I resigned. Never say never, but I suspect I’m done with straight jobs. I honestly can’t figure out a way to follow so many of the arbitrary rules associated with most of corporate life.

It’s not like I didn’t try. I’ve worked for small family-owned companies, Fortune 100 companies, mid-size companies and nonprofits. Those jobs and people taught me so much. Some were genuinely wonderful experiences. I remain close friends with several of the co-workers. But for one reason or another, the jobs themselves never quite fit properly.

I genuinely like working. So for the past two years, I’ve been working for myself. I’ve

been picking up freelance clients. It’s been going well.

My story is not unique. Almost every professional woman I know has a similar tale of making Sophie’s choices. One friend was asked to come back from maternity leave far too soon. The nurse she was promised to watch her infant at the office because she was too young for daycare, turned out to be an intern with no childcare experience. She recalls giving a presentation while listening to her baby screaming on the other side of the conference room wall.

Another woman friend agreed to come in during her maternity leave for a meeting projected to last one hour. Four hours later, without a breast pump, she’d soaked through her suit. When she tried to excuse herself to manage her mortification, her boss, having never looked at her, asked why she thought she was so special to leave the meeting early.

These are the kinds of stories women tell each other over wine, sitting on the back porch trying to figure out what part of their lives they have to screw up today in order

to get the rest at least partially right. We rarely, if ever, share these stories with male colleagues. If we do, we are often tagged as hysterical, angry, entitled or just bitchy. As one man told me, “Anger is not an attractive accessory on a woman.”

That’s why reading a new report released in August by the Women’s Foundation of Arkansas, Voices of Women Report, felt so very familiar. The report is follow up to a study issued last year by the Women’s Foundation in conjunction with the Clinton School of Public Service and state Rep. Kathy Webb, 1973/2013: A Then and Now on the Status of Women in Arkansas.

The Women’s Foundation then conducted seven focus groups across Arkansas to get richer data about how women received the information in the 1973/2013 report and what they believed were the reasons for the persistent gender gap.

SURPRISING RESULTS According to the Voices of Women Report, many focus group participants were surprised or even “shocked” by the data.

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The 2013 report found significant disparities remain between men and women in the areas of employment, income and political involvement, though the gap has been closed to some extent in some areas.

“In 1970, 38 percent of Arkansas women, and women working full-time and full-year earned 60 percent in comparison to wages earned by male counterparts. In 2011, women comprised 47 percent of the labor force in Arkansas, and women working fulltime and full-year earned 82 percent compared to men,” states the 1973/2013 report.

Lynette Watts, executive director of the Women’s Foundation of Arkansas, didn’t expect some of the reactions the focus groups revealed. “I think what surprised me the most was how much women are still struggling with just what their ‘role’ is. One caveat is that many women do not have the luxury to struggle with defining their role; they have no other choice but to work. But, for those who have the ability or opportunity, it was surprising that women seem uncomfortable making a decision to stay home, go to work, or even advance in their careers. You could hear that they were reasoning with themselves in justifying their decisions.”

The caveat Watts is referring to is one of the stated limitations of the study: approximately 70 percent of the focus group participants reported household incomes of more than $50,000, which is above the average Arkansas household income. Also, 65 percent of the women hold a bachelor’s degree or higher.

Median household income in Arkansas is $40,531, according to the latest Census data.

That same data indicates 25.9 percent of Arkansans hold a college degree, the lowest percentage in the nation.

I fall in to the privileged group that made up the majority of these research groups.

I recognize I am in an enviable position.

For starters, I hold a master’s degree, which means I have more education than 94 percent of the state of Arkansas. I also do a kind of work that lends itself to freelance projects. Even though my income can be highly variable from month to month, my husband’s income is steady and keeps us comfortable. As a modern dad, he pulls his weight on parenting duty. Most women in Arkansas don’t have those kinds of luxuries, so they end up making unwinnable

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Feature: Women At Work choices every day to try and balance their work and their families.

One of my dear friends who worked for a Fortune 500 company was ordered to breast pump in her car, rather than the ladies’ room, after she came back to work from maternity leave. Some of the male managers could hear the pump, and found it uncomfortable. She was also made to store her breast milk in a cooler she brought from home every day in dry ice, rather than the break room fridge.

Even well-labeled brown bags were just too upsetting for others.

Her job was never specifically threatened.

But as the person whose job provided the insurance for her family, she felt she couldn’t do anything to jeopardize her situation.

Presumably, women in lower-income jobs face the same fear of job loss, but most likely for different reasons.

The report states it does not adequately address women with low-income or loweducation levels and recommends more research addressing what would be considered closer to “average” Arkansas women to learn what attitudes and barriers they face.

MINIMUM WAGE One of the most obvious barriers to income parody when looking through various reports is that professions that tend to be highly feminized are some of the lowest paying professions: leisure and hospitality, education and health care, and retail. These sectors employ a disproportionate number of women, and have the highest percentage of workers making minimum wage, according to an Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families report.

Arkansas Advocates is part of the “Give Arkansas a Raise” coalition. The coalition has collected signatures to get a measure to increase the minimum wage in Arkansas on the ballot in November. The state minimum wage is currently $6.25 per hour. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour. A variety of metrics determine which wage an employer must pay. The coalition would like the state minimum wage to increase to $8.50 per hour.

An increase in minimum wage is one of the recommendations from the 1973/2013 report. It’s estimated 75,000 women in Arkansas would get a pay increase if that happened.

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“For most of us working on this, it’s a moral issue,” said Ellie Wheeler, senior policy analyst for Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families. “If you play by the rules and work hard, you should be able to make it. Do we want to live in a state where people are working at two or three jobs, and still have to choose between food and the electric bill?”

That kind of choice is played out daily in food distribution centers across the state.

“Every day I hear stories of moms who are working two jobs, and they’re at the food pantry to feed their kids. The stories are just heartbreaking,” said Webb, now executive director of the Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance, an umbrella group for food banks and hunger relief agencies across the state. “Our public discourse tends to almost vilify low-income people as lazy or as takers, but that is just not the case for people we serve. They just can’t make enough money to get by.”

Webb pointed out that in producing the 1973/2013 study, it became clear, that while some women are choosing to opt out of the workforce or politics, many are steered from very early on in life toward jobs that pay less. Once in those female-dominated sectors, women are still often passed over for department-head and boss positions.

MO MONEY, MO PROBLEMS Determining where the income breakpoint is between minimum-wage female workers and high-earning female workers in terms of role-related stress is difficult to quantify, according to Dr. Margaret Reid, chair of the Department of Political Science in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas.

Her emphasis of study includes female work patterns.

She says most female workers feel significant tension between work and family, but for different reasons. The tension many middle-income women feel depends on what the money they make is supposed to buy. “The perception of why one struggles is quite relative and depends on household circumstances. So the actual income is not as important as what that income needs to support.”

Meaning, the higher a household income goes, the more that income is socially expected to buy, including better schools, a house in the right neighborhood, a

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

particular class of car, braces for kids and any myriad of extracurricular activities and trips for personal and family enrichment. It doesn’t take long for money to get tight.

This is where deeply entrenched social expectations for women derived from religion and long-held traditions can get difficult. She said it’s much more common in the South or the Bible Belt for women to be torn between careers and families because of what they’ve been taught most of their lives about appropriate roles.

In fact, several women in the focus groups cited their religious views for why they did not pursue careers outside the home. “In our faith we believe that men are to preside over their families and provide for them, while mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children. They help one another as equal partners, but the roles are very different,” said a Little Rock woman, whose name was withheld for privacy.

Reid said the dilemma of choosing between family and career doesn’t have to be this hard. “Most work places have been normed to the male ideals of workers in the 1950s. There’s no reason it still has to be that way. For lots of jobs, you don’t have to be sitting at a desk in an office to get things done. And if there was more flexibility about things like that, more women could participate fully or even move up in seniority.”

Freelancing gives me the ability to change the entrenched rules that existed at former jobs. I decided if I worked for myself, then I was going to be the kind of boss I always wanted. I schedule all meetings during school hours, and I make no secret about why. I work after my son goes to bed if I need to, but I’m available to take him to math tutoring, swim and soccer practice and sometimes a Sonic slushy after school.

Reid also indicated the notion of a “second wife” comes up often with professional women in interviews and focus groups. Men often have wives who will take care of lots of details for them at home, particularly those details associated with child-rearing, so they can focus on work. So a nanny or assistant becomes desirable to take over errands and tasks that would traditionally be handled by a wife. Rarely does a middle-class income support that desire.

Several years ago, after a kind, older man I worked for tried to solve a logistical dilemma for me, he seemed flummoxed why

he was able to do this when his kids were young, but couldn’t seem to figure it out now. “Sir,” I finally said. “I don’t have a wife.

That’s how you worked out these details.

Your wife made this part of your life happen for you.” He thought for a few moments more, then agreed, a wife would be very nice for me.

Another friend was listening to her male boss complain about a female employee who took another day off to care for her sick child. “She has a husband, you know. Why doesn’t he take some time off?” My friend agreed. Then she asked how many days he’d taken off when his kids were sick. The conversation ended abruptly.

WINNING A DIFFERENT WAY Because of the institutional barriers noted by women in the focus groups, some said they’ve opted to make a difference in arenas outside business and politics.

In the political arena, the 1973/2013 report indicates that women are still underrepresented, but there have been significant increases in women in politics. It states, “As of October 2012, there were eight women in the 35-member state Senate (compared to one in 1973) and 22 women in the 100-seat state House of Representatives (compared to two in 1973.)”

Many participants sited the ruthless nature of politics as a reason many women are reluctant to run for office. “Women want to do what’s logical and what’s best for everybody and if you’ve got to fight the people who don’t want that, it’s just not worth your time. You can spend your time making a difference in another area, like through foundations or doing volunteer work,” said an El Dorado woman who participated in the study.

In the 40 years since the original state of Arkansas women report was released, there is no doubt women in Arkansas have made progress in some important areas. I certainly have more career options and entrepreneurial support than women before me.

But there is also no doubt that complex socio-economic structures, ideologies and power systems govern many aspects of these issues. It will be interesting to see what corporate culture with regard to parents will look like once the last group of hold-outs from previous administrations has retired.

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In-Depth

Building A New Workforce Arkansas leaders are engaged in a major rethinking of the state’s workforce education and training network in an effort to better match industry, education and the labor force.

We’ll look in-depth at where some efforts are focused, what leaders are saying, and how some regions of the state have responded to the challenges. In this issue, we examine what the Delta Regional Authority has been undertaking with respect to workforce readiness in Arkansas and in the context of its eight-state footprint.

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In-Depth

Ensuring a Resilient Region by Training a Skilled Workforce

By Chris Masingill

PHOTOS COURTESY MID-SOUTH COMMUNITY COLLEGE

Federal Co-Chairman, Delta Regional Authority Throughout the history of the Mississippi River Delta region, one thing has always been constant: a hard-working people ardently dedicated to the land they call home. In support of this population, the Delta Regional Authority has been focusing on bolstering our region’s workforce in recent years, investing more than $8.8 million and leveraging an additional $23 million in public and private investment since 2010 in 72 workforce development programs across the region. Furthermore, the DRA has made available this summer $1.7 million in funding for technical assistance and capacity building at the local level—to bring leaders in government, business, and education together to strategize regional and systemic workforce development. This funding ties in directly with eight state-specific summits held across the region to focus attention on rethinking and enhancing our workforce training sytems.

In partnership with Ted Abernathy, the Southern Growth Policies Board, and the Delta Regional Authority, we have released a publication entitled Reimagining Workforce Development: 2013 Report on the Future of the South, which identifies further workforce development as a great potential for our region’s economic opportunity. The report provides a framework for how we as community leaders can build upon the successful models we already have in the region and continue to build an education pipeline that provides our workforce with the skills needed to compete for both basic and advanced manufacturing jobs and attract outside business investment.

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Since its emergence as an American economic powerhouse in the 19th century, the Mississippi River’s Delta region has experienced economic booms but also many busts. Economic, natural, and social hardships and catastrophes have dotted the Delta’s history, such as the Civil War and agricultural mechanization but most recently the growing exodus of manufacturing jobs from America, Hurricane Katrina, and the 2008 financial crises.

In the face of all these hardships, however, the Delta region and its constant—the Delta people—have proven resilient, identifying lessons learned from what was lacking before and during these catastrophes and looking to the future as an opportunity to bounce back and emerge not only alive but stronger. And it is through this resilience that the Delta and its leadership have made stronger the necessary infrastructure, social capital, and intellectual capacity to weather the next storm.

As an example of this resilience, our region has taken major strides to reform our workforce system and grow an increasingly skilled and employable workforce, a fact that positions the Delta for economic growth in the near future. The past couple of decades have not been kind to the Delta region’s economy. One of the greatest economic expansion in the history of the world occurred during the 1990s, yet the Dot-Com era quickly passed over our region; and the first decade of the 21st century saw two recessions and two slow recoveries that pegged the Delta as a lowcost, low-wage alternative to the rest of the country, yet not competitive enough to stop

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

the flood of jobs to lower-cost, lower-wage Asian markets.

From these setbacks, communities and regions within the Delta learned from this oversight and job loss, identifying the necessity in strengthening the skills and abilities of our workforce in order to compete for the next opportunities for investment and economic growth.

MANUFACTURING RENAISSANCE There is now a burgeoning sector—along with automakers, petrochemical, and many manufacturing sectors—in the Delta region that has emerged from the past decade ready to thrive, and it is our labor sector— our workforce. States, counties, and communities across the region have recognized the manufacturing renaissance taking place in this country and know we can no longer survive simply as the center for low-cost American labor and must focus on building a workforce that meets the needs of business and industry.

The tide of outsourcing American jobs is turning and the jobs that fled our borders in the past decade are now slowly coming back to our country and region. This is seen in recent investments such as the 363 manufacturing projects announced in 2012 with 200 jobs and/or $30 million investment—projects that have generated $715.4 billion, nearly 40 percent of the manufacturing-generated U.S. GDP that year. Along with this magazine, other publications and economists are predicting that the future of U.S. manufacturing growth will be centered in the American South, and we believe that the Delta region is and will continue to be

a major player on the South’s job creation team.

In recognizing this, community leadership, economic development organizations, and educational institutions have positioned their communities with programs and education systems that are producing and will continue to produce a strong pipeline of skilled workers. The Delta region sees its workforce as the key component to advancing local economies and expanding

skills needed for high-demand jobs at MBUSI’s production plant in Tuscaloosa, which recently invested $2.4 million for expanded operations.

Next door in Mississippi similar programs are in place through Mississippi State University that are connecting manufacturers with the local educational institutions and workforce needed to meet investment and expansion plans head on.

With support from Holmes Community Instrumentation

investment and opportunities for its communities and people.

Communities and regional entities across the region are doing a great job at building a strong workforce to directly meet the demand of local businesses and investors.

And other communities are noticing the success of these programs and jumping on board. With this programming and future development, workforce training in the Delta is producing a workforce that centers on the needs of business and industry and meets the demands of 21st century jobs.

STATE SPECIFICS States and localities in our region boast innovative and award-winning programs that directly tie worker training to specific industry or business needs, incorporating industry leadership or incoming business in the curriculum development and training process. Deep in the Alabama Black Belt, the University of West Alabama (UWA) is working with Mercedes-Benz U.S. International (MBUSI) in developing the curriculum for UWA’s fledgling automotive technician certification program, connecting rural residents of West Alabama to the

College in Ridgeland and the Japanese automaker Nissan, the Enhancing On-theJob Problem Solving Program has provided employees and suppliers of Nissan and other advanced manufacturers in the area with critical skills training in industry and diagnostics, problem-solving methodologies, and teaming strategies.

Recognized with a 2012 Innovator Award by the Southern Growth Policies Board, this training cites 100 on-the-job projects, direct savings of more than $2 million, and wage increases for 70 percent of the students as a result of the program—a prime example of the success a manufacturer can achieve through strategic partnerships with Delta communities.

In the Delta region, we as regional leaders recognize that we are competing with the rest of the world for these investments and jobs. And so DRA’s vision for the region’s future workforce is a comprehensive, systematic approach to training that builds upon the models that are working across the world—best practices that emphasize dedicated commitment of stakeholders from federal, state, and local government and education of all levels—and transcends state

and local borders to share resources, ideas, and talent to advance opportunities for job creation, business investment, and high quality of life for all Delta communities.

States and regional clusters are already working toward this goal and seeing success in efforts scaled beyond singular communities and programs. Louisiana’s FastStart program, described as “the gold standard for workforce training solutions” by Business Facilities’ Editor-in-Chief Jack Rogers, Diesel tech

works directly with incoming manufacturers to identify workers in Louisiana already equipped with the necessary skill level and tailor further training to the specific needs of that new business. FastStart brings training resources from throughout the state to one program that provides confidence in the workforce and tailor-made service for investors in Louisiana.

Kentucky has approached statewide workforce efforts similarly to state site certification programs, building a framework for identifying, evaluating, and eventually designating counties and their populations as “Work Ready.” The Work Ready Communities program, one of the country’s most rigorous workforce certification processes, evaluates county workforce readiness and capabilities based on high school graduation rates, National Career Readiness Certificate holders, community commitment, educational attainment, soft skills development and Internet availability. The steps that county workforce investment boards must take to meet these standards are creating vibrant, skilled workforces, and western Kentucky—part of our Delta region— www.talkbusiness.net

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In-Depth: Skilled Workforce boasts seven of the state’s 25 Work Ready communities.

ARKANSAS AND ITS BORDER STATES One of the most innovative and expansive programs happening on a regional scale is the Arkansas Delta Training and Education Consortium (ADTEC) in East Arkansas.

Incorporating five community colleges throughout the Arkansas Delta, ADTEC synthesizes the faculty, curricula, equipment, and intellectual capital of these five schools to provide skills training and certification to students based on the needs of local sector clusters in eastern Arkansas and western Tennessee such as Advanced Manufacturing, Allied Health, Aviation Technology, Renewable Energy, and Transportation Technology. In its Advanced Manufacturing program alone, ADTEC has trained nearly 10,000 new and incumbent workers.

This award-winning program is a model for how to pool resources for a regional program. In only 7 years ADTEC has captured nearly $70 million in workforce

training and infrastructure investment from state, federal and private partners allowing East Arkansas community colleges to develop technology and training so cutting-edge that major universities in the area are partnering to train their own university students.

In partnership with FedEx, Mid-South Community College in West Memphis, Ark.—one of ADTEC’s anchor institutions—provides employer-specific training to meet FedEx’s demand for current and future Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) mechanics recognizing that a majority of current A&P mechanics will be retiring over the next ten years. ADTEC emphasizes the importance our education institutions have in providing degree programs that ready their students academically while directly connecting industry to the students and training that it demands.

Three Rivers College (TRC) in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, has recognized this need among the Missouri Bootheel’s most rural communities and has taken its training programs on the road with two 40 by

Advanced manufacturing

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36-feet mobile training labs. Through direct investment from the Delta Regional Authority, TRC provides skills training to area employers in fields from leadership to specialized pneumatics and electronics. The labs also have the capacity for small computer lab settings that allow businesses already equipped with training modules to host software-based and online training on site.

Additionally, Southwest Tennessee Community College (SWTCC) in Memphis, Tenn. provides direct training and job placement for technical skills in the local manufacturing sector. A central program of the Made in Memphis initiative, SWTCC’s Industrial Readiness Training program teaches and measures foundational technical, academic, and interpersonal knowledge and skills that have been identified by local manufacturers as critical to long-term employee success.

Graduates from the program receive National Career Readiness Certification and often job placement with Memphis area manufacturers.

Many of these programs have the support

of community organizations and private industry as well. In direct support of the local workforce investment board and community leadership, ManTraCon in southern Illinois provides broad-based training, recruitment, and placement services that directly connect the workforce of five counties with the employers in its area. ManTraCon has proven especially helpful in assembling cross-sector partners to address job creation and workforce development needs in the face of facility closures and new investment.

‘POCKETS OF INNOVATION’ These are just a handful of the innovative, model programs throughout the Delta region that are meeting the demands of the 21st century job market: using publicprivate partnerships to link institutions of higher education with the businesses in their communities; cutting down training cost and lost work hours; supporting direct mentorship between business leaders and students in the local education system; creating sector-specific collaborations that link industry to communities and academics so that they may co-develop training curricula; and building programs that are crossing local borders and traditional barriers to increase access to education and training opportunities in some of our more rural areas.

We must take these pockets of innovation that are emerging in states, communities, and individual schools across the South and extend throughout the region. These individual programs are capitalizing on local expertise as well as using statewide support towards the goal of systemic workforce development. However, they are currently only the models for the greater system we need, the bricks for the foundation, a few pieces of the larger puzzle.

The next step with these programs is to expand to new communities and share between states across the region as a coordinated approach to workforce development. This is already beginning to take form, as nine community colleges in eight states have received funding from the U.S. Department of Labor to develop the Mississippi River Transportation, Distribution and Logistics Consortium (MRTDLC).

With nearly $24 million in grant funding, MRTDLC’s member institutions—five of which are in the Delta region—will collaborate to train and place dislocated

that these leaders are coming together to discuss workforce development, we have $1.7 million available to continue the conversation through technical assistance

Advanced manufacturing

and other workers in high-wage, high-skill occupations in transportation, distribution, logistics and other related industry sectors that are a major foundation for economies along the River.

We’re doing a lot of things right across the region. Through eight state-specific Reimagining the Delta Workforce summits from July to October we are bringing the right players in government, business & industry, and education together to identify and promote

and capacity building among communities and regions. These are the steps the Delta Regional Authority is taking to ensure a workforce for current and future businesses and to boost opportunities for Delta residents. With a skilled and adaptable workforce comes a resilient, strong, and ever-growing economy that can weather any storm of the future. A resilient region makes for a positive and safe place to invest. That is the Delta region.

Advanced manufacturing

new models so that they will become the new norms in our region, focusing on strategies and programs that allow the entire region to tap into an integrated system that provides career pathways to trained and educated Delta citizens and creates a pipeline of skilled workers for our region’s businesses. Now

Chris Masingill was appointed by President Obama and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2010, and serves as the Federal Co-Chairman of the Delta Regional Authority, a federalstate partnership whose mission is to help create jobs, build communities and improve lives in the 252 counties and parishes in the eight states of the Delta region. www.talkbusiness.net

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In-Depth

Workforce Efforts Must Move At ‘The Speed Of Business’

By Paul Holmes

Arkansas must make changes now in its workforce education system not just to fill current jobs, but also to prepare the next generation of workers, speakers at a roundtable discussion during an Aug. 13th workforce summit in Pine Bluff said.

“You must begin to move at the speed of business, not at the speed of academia” to give jobseekers the skills they need within weeks, not months, Randy Zook, president of the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries of Arkansas, told educators and lawmakers at Reimagining the Delta Workforce, a session convened by the Delta Regional Authority at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff.

Zook called for a greater effort to familiarize junior high and high school students to a broader range of career possibilities including manufacturing, saying most “have narrow exposure” to technical careers.

Michael Garner of Haas Automation, the largest machine tool builder in the Western world, said the top concern of manufacturers is the ability to hire and find a trained workforce.

“It’s all about recruitment,” Garner said, a process that he said should start in the schools.

Annette Kline, co-owner of Strong Manufacturing Co. of Pine Bluff, told the audience, “We gave up on getting kids from the technical schools. There has to be a change in junior high and high school.”

Tim McKenna, director of recruiting

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for Acxiom Corp., said that the Little Rock market is one of the most difficult for the company to recruit. The data and analytics firm uses internships as part of its recruitment effort, he said.

In response to a question from the audience regarding the possibility of exposing students to manufacturing via apprenticeships, Kline said “it’s a problem” to put high school students in apprenticeships because government regulations require workers to be at least 18 before stepping on the manufacturing floor.

One way that manufacturers and students can connect, Zook said, is through the Young Manufacturers Academy sessions that have been conducted at a number of locations around the state in August through a partnership with the state’s twoyear colleges. The sessions were designed to reach students from grades 6-11 who may be interested in manufacturing. The Gene Haas Foundation is underwriting the academy.

Zook lauded the efforts of Shelle Randall, director of workforce education and existing industry with the Jonesboro Regional Chamber of Commerce.

If you want to know what to do in a community to pique students’ interests, Zook advised following Randall’s example.

“Shelle Randall does more singlehandedly that has a direct impact on helping kids see the opportunity offered by manufacturing than virtually anyone else,”

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Does Arkansas Need

A Workforce Czar?

Talk Business & Politics has been asking workforce leaders if Arkansas needs a “workforce czar” — an individual with the authority to cut bureaucratic red tape who could also flex enough political muscle to make changes quickly, efficiently, and in the best interests of industry. Here’s what several state leaders had to say.

Gov. Mike Beebe - D

“If a governor is not going to do it, a czar certainly could. But you could also have an agency that with a cabinet head that you designate as a lead to go get it done,” Beebe said. “Right now, the Legislature is doing a good job of being a czar on this expanded and collaborative effort. So I expect you’ll see, you may end up with, a bunch of czars which may be as problematic as not having one at all.”

he said. Jonesboro’s Chamber of Commerce sponsors a number of business-education partnership programs with K-12 schools to develop future leaders and members of the workforce.

Zook, Garner, McKenna and Kline spoke at the roundtable discussion moderated by Roby Brock of Talk Business & Politics. Talk Business & Politics was a convening partner for the daylong DRA summit.

FUTURE GOVERNOR SHARES VISION Earlier in the day, both candidates for Arkansas governor, Democrat Mike Ross and Republican Asa Hutchinson, addressed the summit separately. While they agreed that workforce education needs to be improved, they differed on how that should be accomplished.

Ross called for statewide adoption of pre-kindergarten education. The voluntary program should be offered universally across the state, not just to those who qualify because of low income, he said.

“Before fourth grade,” he said, “children learn to read. After fourth grade, you’re reading to learn.” Students without reading proficiency by fourth grade will continue to struggle, Ross said.

Hutchinson, meanwhile, said that Ross is proposing a new program and that the existing program should be fully funded first.

Hutchinson proposed that “two-year colleges have the lead in career education” in the state, pointing to Mid-South Community College in West Memphis and NorthArk Community College at Harrison as examples. High schools and community colleges should partner to offer students concurrent credit, he said.

PERFORMANCE PANEL Shane Broadway, director of the Arkansas Department of Higher Education, said that those responsible for training and educating Arkansas’ workforce are cooperating now, though that was not the case when Gov. Mike Beebe first convened a workforce cabinet.

“Silos went up pretty quickly. But the governor said, ‘If you don’t work together,

I don’t need you.’ Now they’re working together,” said Broadway.

The colleges are ready, but there is a lot of infrastructure that is “old and outdated” and money is needed to improve the education infrastructure. The state does not have a capital improvement fund for higher education as it does for K-12, Broadway noted.

State Sen. Jane English, R-North Little Rock, who chairs the Legislature’s Joint Performance Review Committee, said, “We still have a lot of silos.” She said the state spends a great deal of money on education and training without knowing the results of those expenditures.

English called for “equal paths ... equal diplomas” for students whether they choose a traditional high school course of study or one that focuses on technical skills.

When she worked for what was formerly the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission, since renamed the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, companies sought to locate in Arkansas because it was a low-wage, low-tax state, she said. They managed their Arkansas operations from outside the state during that time, but in the 1990s, that began to change, she said.

“Now, companies’ Arkansas operations are in many cases managed locally, so they need skilled managers and workers,” she said.

Under English’s guidance, the Joint Performance Review Committee is conducting an inventory of existing workforce education programs. That inventory includes the two-year and four-year higher education institutions to determine what partnerships exist between those institutions and high schools.

“It’s a long-term process that won’t be finished in January” when the General Assembly convenes, she said. While she is hopeful that meaningful legislation may help change the current workforce training system for the better, a particular bill may not be needed to resolve any issues.

“By and large what we need to do is change attitudes.”

State Sen. Jane English - R

“Yes, I do believe we do. I think while everybody is working very hard at trying to do a good job at what they do, unfortunately, we don’t have the kind of coordination that we really have to have.”

Dr. Glen Fenter

Mid-South Community College President “I know a number of states and large communities across the nation that are adopting just that model saying we can’t continue what we’re doing and expect different results, and understanding that the bureaucracies can’t just fix themselves.”

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In-Depth

Delta Regional Authority Report:

‘Ramp Up’ Workforce Efforts

By Paul Holmes Reforming the state’s workforce education system is the single most-important issue in economic development, Chris Masingill of the Delta Regional Authority, said in August at a DRA-sponsored summit that brought together leaders of the business community, educators and officeholders at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff for a wide-ranging, day-long discussion of how Arkansas trains its workers.

Arkansas must seize the opportunity while it exists, Masingill said. “We’ve got 10 years to capture re-shoring, right-shoring” of jobs that were moved overseas, he said.

In order to do so, he said, “We need fundamental, holistic change in our system.”

The August 13th summit, one of eight state-specific meetings being conducted in the Mississippi River Delta states, used Re-imagining Workforce Development, a report produced in 2013 by the Southern Growth Policies Board, and updated in July and August of this year.

Report co-author Linda Hoke of Durham, N.C., told attendees that “the rate of change has accelerated in the world,” and therefore education must adapt to meet the needs.

States should promote alternative partnerships in education and business must play a key role in designing the education and training needed to fill current and future jobs and success “requires a system approach,” she said.

To be competitive in the global environment, the report said the Delta region must re-imagine workforce

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preparation in three key areas: re-imagining readiness, re-engaging adult learners and disconnected youth, and re-aligning relationships and resources.

Key actions for re-imagining readiness include strengthening the connection between education and job skills, rethinking credentials and their value in the workplace and giving students more exposure to the world of work.

More than two-thirds of the workforce in 2020 and nearly half of the workforce in 2030 are already working today, while at the same time, more than one in seven young people age 18-24 are neither working nor in school, the report noted.

In order to re-engage both adults and youths in the education system to update their skills to meet the need for a trained and educated workforce in the future, the system should target workers with some credits, no degree or credential, help dislocated workers rejoin the workforce and recover disconnected youth, DRA said.

The Delta must better align education, workforce and economic development assets to create clear pathways and smooth transitions to facilitate lifelong learning, according to the report. Key actions in that regard include creating continuity in education and workforce development from early childhood through career paths; aligning and tracking data across the educational and workforce pipeline; and engaging business in a meaningful way.

And, Hoke said, there should be a

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Does Arkansas Need

A Workforce Czar?

Bill Walker

Arkansas Department of Career Education director “I think the concept of a czar is a good concept somebody that becomes a central person, a point of contact for business and industry, to go to so that we can ease the process. I think that because of all the various rules, regulations, laws, etc., that person might be perceived as being able to do more than they can actually deliver. I would be afraid, to some degree, that they may get frustrated. I do think it’s something we have to look at seriously because I believe we do have to do things differently.”

“fourth R” along with the three Rs of re-imagine, re-engage and realign. That fourth R, she said is “Ramp up.” Rather than seek more innovation, “we need to scale them up. We don’t have to re-invent the wheel.”

How Arkansas reforms its workforce education efforts “will define … the shape of the Arkansas economy for the next 20 to 30 years,” said Randy Zook, president of

the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce/ Associated Industries of Arkansas. “We’re spending plenty of money. We’ve just got to spend it in the right way.”

The day-long conference where the updated report was revealed also included two gubernatorial candidates, Republican Asa Hutchinson and Democrat Mike Ross.

Both candidates touted their jobs and workforce education platforms.

Re-imagining Workforce Development Framework 1) Re-imagine Readiness

With businesses saying they are unable to find skilled workers, even as unemployment persists, many say that we have lost a strong connection between education and jobs; that education needs to be recoupled with work in a more systemic way.

Key Actions: • Strengthen the connections between education and job skills • Re-think credentials and their value in the workplace • Give students more exposure to the world of work • Scale technology so that every student can benefit from a high quality, personalized learning experience

Asa Hutchinson

Republican candidate for Governor “I would not designate a ‘workforce czar’ or assign the leadership role to the Lt. Governor. The Governor is the right person to lead this effort toward effective workforce education. Improving workforce education is such a priority that the direct leadership of the Governor is essential to success.”

2) Re-engage Adult Learners and Disconnected Youth

More than two-thirds of the workforce in 2020 and nearly half of the workforce in 2030 are already working today. At the same time, more than one in seven young people are disconnected from the foundations for future success—neither working nor in school. We need to re-engage both adults and youth in the education system to continuously update their skills in order to meet our need for a talented workforce in the future.

Key Actions: • Target workers with some credits, but no degree or credential • Help dislocated workers rejoin the workforce • Recover disconnected youth

3) Re-align Relationships and Resources

We need to better align education, workforce and economic development assets to create clear pathways and smooth transitions that will facilitate lifelong learning.

Key Actions: • Create continuity in education and workforce development from early childhood through career • Align and track data across the educational and workforce pipeline • Engage businesses in a meaningful way

4) RAMP UP!

Mike Ross

Democratic candidate for Governor “Instead of having a single czar, Mike Ross has already announced his plan to create the Governor’s Cabinet for Economic Development, a statewide coordinated effort made up of key agency representatives that will provide better coordination, increased communication and a stronger, more unified strategy for our state’s workforce services and economic development efforts,” said Ross spokesman Brad Howard.

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In-Depth

Arkansas Workforce Statistics Unemployment Rate Trends

Arkansas Labor Force Trends

Arkansas

6.2 6.3 7.7

% JULY 2014 % JUNE 2014 % JULY 2013

U.S.

6.2 6.1 7.3

JULY 2013

2013* Arkansas Labor Force

Data Demographics *Most current statistics available

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31.6 16-19 Years 15.6% 20-24 Years 6.1% 25-34 Years 5.1% 35-44 Years 5.7% 45-54 Years 5.5% 55-64 Years 7.4% 65+ Years

July 2013

-26,800

2,959,373 %

July 2014

Total Civilian Labor Force

% JULY 2014 ANNUAL DECLINE % JUNE 2014 1,217,200 July 2014 Total %

State Population

Unemployment Rate By AGE

1,298,200 1,325,000

Employed 1,223,200 July 2013 Labor Force

-6,000 81,000 101,800

July 2014

-20,800

Unemployment Rate By

GENDER

7.9

%

Male

7.8

%

Female

TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

July 2013

ANNUAL DECLINE

Total Unemployed Labor Force

ANNUAL DECLINE

Unemployment Rate By

ETHNICITY

% 6.4 Caucasian 8.0 %

Latino

16.5 African-American %

The Mississippi River serves as the economic artery of a region poised for growth and economic success.

Creating Jobs.

Building Communities.

Improving Lives.

The DRA plays a crucial role in ensuring safe and modern public infrastructure and greenfields for some of the Delta’s leading manufacturers.

Every day at the Delta Regional Authority, we work to create the infrastructure, workforce, and entrepreneurial environment to support job creation and prosperity for the 10 million people across the Delta region. Investing in these projects means that we can continue to make the Delta a great place to live, work, and succeed.

Through programs such as the Three Rivers College mobile training labs, DRA has invested nearly $12 million in training a strong Delta workforce.

/Delta.Regional.Authority @DeltaRegional

236 Sharkey Avenue, Suite 400, Clarksdale, MS / 1-888-GOTODRA / www.dra.gov ALABAMA • ARKANSAS • ILLINOIS • KENTUCKY • LOUISIANA • MISSISSIPPI • MISSOURI • TENNESSEE www.talkbusiness.net

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Leadership

Sixth Sense:

Embracing Change In a fast-paced, highly competitive world, companies must change to meet the needs of an evolving client base. We asked six leaders for tips and strategies in transforming workers’ attitudes regarding workplace changes.

By Talk Business Staff

Ed Bashaw, Ph.D.

Lou Ann Nisbett

Bryan Smith

Dean of the College of Business Professor of Marketing Arkansas Tech University Russellville

President/CEO Economic Development Alliance for Jefferson County Pine Bluff

Alliance Rubber Company Chairman of the Board Greater Hot Springs Chamber of Commerce Hot Springs

I’ve noticed that change is not always accepted graciously – a great understatement. If I’m honest, when change initiatives are greeted ungraciously and they do not go over well, it is usually because I violated one or more of my three biggest keys to helping people embrace change.

(1) Over-communicate everything – the issues and problems, why we should make changes, what change we should make, how those changes will help and the expected results of change.

(2) Gain as much consensus as you can before moving forward to the action/ behavior required of the change. When people have input they tend to take ownership.

(3) Make change bigger than one person.

For us that usually means a result that is good for students. Most people will respond appropriately to the “greater good” when they believe the “good” is something or someone for which or whom they care.

Change is something that happens whether we are ready or not. We can embrace change in our workplace by developing confidence in ourselves and others. Focus on individual and team strengths, not weaknesses. Emphasize optimism and focus on opportunities that come with change.

In working with the amazing Alliance staff, I am surrounded by passionate people with a heart for our community. Our days are filled with challenges, yet we find ways to encourage one another and develop plans to tackle them. This staff embraces change by gaining knowledge that fuels creativity.

It is important to show respect for their accomplishments as this builds confidence in our team, creating success in our workplace.

What I like about change is that it causes us to think and stretch ourselves. When things are changing, we cannot get stuck in a rut and it causes us to push and learn something new every day.

Whether it’s tying your shoes or cooking your favorite foods, most of us do things a certain way, because it’s what we’re accustomed to and change is not always easy. I’ve found that, for me, communication is the key in transforming your workers’ attitudes, helping them to embrace change.

Change sometimes involves the unknown, which can cause concern for those affected by it, but I’ve noticed that when you communicate with everyone, explaining why change is needed, most are receptive to it.

It’s also important to remember that in most situations, there’s a learning curve associated with change, and my approach is to try to always have a positive attitude about it. It’s key that you assure your workers that you understand their concerns and any assistance needed will be provided to them, helping them to make the transition as smoothly as possible.

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Larry Foley

Marla Johnson Norris

Clif Chitwood

Emmy-Winning Filmmaker Professor and Chair Lemke Department of Journalism University of Arkansas, Fayetteville

CEO Aristotle, Inc. Little Rock

Mississippi County Economic Developer Mississippi County

As I contemplated tackling a new challenge this summer, becoming chair of the Journalism Department, a former student sent me this Eleanor Roosevelt quote: “Do one thing every day that scares us.” After doing the same thing for 21 years – teaching and producing documentaries – changing career directions meant embracing big change.

My challenge is to create a new model for our faculty and students. We can’t keep doing things the way we’ve always done them if we’re going to survive and thrive in this world of exploding media messages.

It’s important to do research and plan before launching into something new. But, we rarely end up exactly where we thought we were headed. While planning is vital, so is being responsive to roadblocks, speed bumps and opportunities.

Passion for change is contagious. Above my desk hangs this quote from Founding Father Ben Franklin, “Energy and persistence conquer all things.”

Because Aristotle is in an Internet industry defined by change, from the very beginning we knew it was important to create a workplace culture of learning by doing, keeping good energy and keeping the ride fun.

We look for employees who love to learn and who have a passion for technology – people who like to be “in the know” with the latest … everything. We encourage staff not to define their creativity simply by job description, but to stay open to new opportunities to expand their skill sets within the workplace.

Adapting to change in the workplace is always a challenge, and companies must maintain a center that provides stability. At Aristotle, that hub is made up of our core values: practice active compassion, value excellence in craftsmanship, act with integrity and responsibility, place innovation and creativity at the center of our work, and believe in the power of synergy and collaboration.

I am an economic developer and change is both the challenge and the reason for my profession. Change, both positive and negative is also unending and constant.

I grew up during the 1950s and ’60s and these were exciting and prosperous times for most mid-size communities in Arkansas.

Our towns were in full bloom and boom.

Growth was statewide and not confined to one or two communities.

Now, with the exception of Little Rock, which was founded as the seat of state government, no single town in Arkansas can rely on its original purpose as an engine for ongoing growth.

Towns of cotton, lumber, rivers, local market places are gone or going. They will be missed.

But we must move – from cotton to steel – from lumber to manufacturing – from market town to corporate headquarters. It is hard … it is also inescapable if we are to survive.

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Executive Q&A PHOTOS: STEPHANIE DUNN

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

A Long Ride Mayor Chris Claybaker, Camden’s chief executive since 1995, has a passion for motorcycles and public service.

By Bill Paddack Ask Camden Mayor Chris Claybaker what he likes to do in his spare time and he answers quickly and decisively.

“I’ve got a Harley, and I put about 15,000 miles on it every year,” he said. “That’s my stress relief.”

Claybaker, 63, was elected mayor in October 1995 when Camden changed from the city manager form of government. He’s served ever since and is seeking reelection this year. He’s the city’s first – and only – popularly elected mayor since 1959.

He and his wife, Cindy, have two children and six grandchildren.

After graduating from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1976 as a political science major with a minor in journalism, Claybaker worked as a reporter for the Camden News, covering city council and the police beat. He later was editor of the Magnolia Banner-News before working in the oil and gas industry, providing a range of land services to independent and major oil companies. But for almost 19 years now, he’s served as chief executive of the southern Arkansas city that is the county seat of Ouachita County. We asked him to share some thoughts about his role as mayor.

You’re a longtime mayor and former president of the Arkansas Municipal League. What kind of personal characteristics make a good mayor?

This should be an easy question; however, one that is often overlooked when running or voting for the position. I’d say the most basic characteristics should be integrity, character, a desire to help people and vision.

Of course, there are secondary characteristics that help in serving as mayor, such things as thick skin and a slowness to anger.

I imagine being mayor is kind of a 24/7 position. How do you balance your administrative and executive duties and your commitment to the community with your personal and family life? And any advice along those lines for new mayors?

When I was first elected, the then-mayor of Magnolia, George Wheatley, gave me two pieces of advice: get involved with the Arkansas Municipal League and take vacations – out of town when possible. Well, I got involved with the Municipal League, which helped me become a better mayor and helped me understand that I was not in this by myself. And through my involvement with the League, I was able to experience one of the top five events of my life.

I became president of the Arkansas Municipal League.

The vacation part of the advice took a little more effort. I was mayor for two and a half years before I took a day off. I thought that I had to stay close. I guess I feared that the town would fall apart if I was not there to hold it together. When I finally was convinced to take some time off, I went to Hot Springs for a long weekend during the horse races. During the sixth race at Oaklawn on Saturday, my name was called out over the loudspeaker. When I reported to security, I was told that Camden was flooding. The State Police ferried me back home. It was another year before I ventured away from Camden for some more time off.

I now take at least 10 days off each year on a motorcycle trip, usually to the Smoky Mountains in North Carolina or the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. I will also take three- and four-day weekend trips to see

the grandkids in Little Rock and Nashville, Tenn.

Talk a little if you will about your role.

I assume there’s a lot of working to get grants for infrastructure needs and improvements, working with economic development officials to attract and maintain businesses, etc.

My job is to provide the best basic services possible for the least cost to the taxpayers, making sure they get the most out of local government with minimal interference in their everyday lives. Those

basic services include police protection, fire protection, streets, parks, solid waste and utilities.

If that were not enough, a good mayor is deeply involved in economic development.

We are currently working on three prospects that could make a major impact on South Arkansas for years to come. We have been working on one of those projects for almost three years. I also spend a lot of time on grants. Grants give you the flexibility to do those extra things that tax revenue won’t allow. I’ve been pretty lucky with the grants, obtaining almost $20 million in the last www.talkbusiness.net

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Executive Q&A: Claybaker 18 years, which has allowed us to develop our riverfront along the Ouachita River with a boat ramp, boat docks, a waterfall and an amphitheater, where we sponsor “Movies on the River” every summer.

What do you consider to be your biggest achievement as mayor?

When campaigning for re-election, I always talk about the Riverfront Develop-

ment and the Adams Avenue Redevelopment Project that was accomplished through our Brownfields Initiative, an initiative that we undertook with partnerships and grants from state and federal agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, the Economic Development Administration, the Corps of Engineers, the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department, the Arkansas Department of Environmental

Quality, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission and the Ouachita River Commission.

Adams Avenue is one of the main entrances into Camden from El Dorado where most of the crime seemed to occur and that was lined with dilapidated structures. Through these state and federal partnerships we were able to transform this area of Camden – our economic development agency [the Ouachita Partnership for Economic Development] is located in a state-of-the-art building that was built in the center of the redevelopment, and we saw a 74 percent reduction in overall crime in Camden from 1996 to 2012.

What’s the best business advice you’ve ever received?

Don’t be afraid to show initiative or to try something new. Or as I tell my department heads, “Don’t box me in.” But probably the best practical business advice I received was found in an old Harvard Business School textbook my dad had that said a business should have at least 10 percent of its budget in reserve. That’s probably pretty good advice for government, too.

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TALK BUSINESS & POLITICS | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014

Bold Profiles:

Bonnie Swayze, Alliance Rubber “Our company began with my father cutting rubber bicycle inner tubes by hand,” says Bonnie Swayze, President of Alliance Rubber. “Today, we’re marketing products in 34 countries!”

Alliance was founded in Ohio, but when Bonnie’s father fell in love with The Natural State, he began a plant in Hot Springs. When Alliance consolidated plants, they chose Arkansas. It’s a relationship that Bonnie is happy to continue.

“What you find in Arkansas is a work ethic like none other,” she says. “That, and a government that really supports manufacturing.”

Alliance Rubber manufactures 2,200 products, all created by Arkansans who roll up their sleeves and get things done. It’s a quality that Bonnie appreciates in her workforce, and it’s led to facility expansion and more hiring.

“We’re going to be in Arkansas for a long time,” says Bonnie. Arkansas favors Alliance Rubber with a dedicated workforce and low business costs. How can Arkansas favor you? Learn how at ArkansasFavorsTheBold.com.

Arkansas Economic Development Commission

ArkansasFavorsTheBold.com