The City Wire Person of the Month: Maureen DeCora

Editor’s note: The City Wire highlights each month a person in the Fort Smith region. Special recognitions, accomplishments, philanthropic support and input from The City Wire readers are considered when selecting a person to profile.

story by Aric Mitchell
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It has always been the mission of chambers of commerce to promote development, new jobs, expansion, and to create for existing industries an economic climate conducive to growth.

This is a mantra that Fort Smith Chamber’s CEO and President Paul Harvel has always believed in. But how does a group take that mission statement and turn it into a viable plan of action?

For Harvel, the answer owes a lot to the efforts of Maureen DeCora.

“She makes me and the town of Fort Smith look good,” Harvel explains. “Maureen has been our office manager since March 2004, but she has had a loyalty to this area her whole life, and it shows in the way she does her job. And that’s a job that too often goes unnoticed for how important it really is.”

According to Harvel, that importance is about more than just planning travel schedules and meetings, and making copies.

“Her voice is often the first impression an outsider will get of the community. She is very knowledgeable about the area, and is such a people person. She serves the greater good of what we do by the way she presents our town.”

Harvel notes that after six years in the position, DeCora has never been the subject of a complaint or a mistake in judgment. Not only does she help outsiders to better know the area, but she also directs inquiries directly and exclusively to chamber members. No matter what the need is, whether one is looking for a doctor, a church, or a financial analyst, DeCora’s referrals point the way to qualified professionals with solid reputations within their respective industries.

Each day, DeCora schedules her workday around what the town needs rather than her own comfort. At noon while most are eating lunch, she is usually at the office answering the large volume of calls and providing information to any person or business with an interest in making Fort Smith their home. She also facilitates the daily afternoon meetings and prepares Harvel for the days ahead.

“It’s not unlikely for Maureen to put in a 10-hour day and then call me on her own time at 6 or 7 in the evening to remind me about an important meeting that I may have forgotten about. Her heart is always in what we do, and she makes sure we do it well,” Harvel explained.

Despite the fact that her chamber duties take up a large portion of the day, DeCora also finds time to help the State Department of Parks and Tourism through her commitment to the Western Arkansas Mountain Frontier (WAMF) travel organization. Led by former Fort Smith Chamber Executive Vice President Janie Glover, WAMF is one of 12 chapters set up by the Department to promote tourism throughout the state. WAMF covers communities from Mountainburg to Mena as well as the Altus area. Towns such as Booneville also fall within their grasp, as does Mount Magazine State Park.

“I first started working with Maureen on a resource campaign we (the Chamber) were performing to raise funds for economic development in Fort Smith. She was always pleasant and determined and that made her a natural choice for the office manager position once it (resource campaign) was over,” Glover said. “Since I retired from the chamber three years ago, she has been a great help to Western Arkansas Mountain Frontier, handling much of our correspondence as we reach out to over 65,000 potential tourists each year.”

While anyone who has shared interactions with the chamber know DeCora’s pleasant attitude and work ethic well, the lady herself believes her work wouldn’t mean anything at all if not for the efforts of her co-workers. When contacted about the July Person of the Month honor, she politely declined to a lengthy interview.

“Something like this is hard for me to accept. It’s not that I don’t appreciate it; I really do. But the Chamber works because of the efforts of so many others who are just as deserving,” DeCora said.

Still, you will hear no objections from her co-workers, most of all Harvel.

“Maureen is a super person, and if you asked anyone at all around this office, they’d all say the same thing: I don’t know what we’d do without her.”