Fort Smith Regional Alliance will require patience

Paul Harvel had a clear message for the more than 300 gathered Tuesday at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith for the formal rollout of the economic development strategy of the Fort Smith Regional Alliance.

“Be patient. It takes a while for these things to work,” said Harvel, president of the Fort Smith Regional Chamber of Commerce.

Harvel should know. During his tenure as president of the Greater Little Rock Chamber of Commerce, Harvel worked with former Alltel chief Joe Ford to create what is now the Metro Little Rock Alliance.

“It took us about four years to see results from that,” Harvel said of the central Arkansas effort.

Audience members included Gov. Mike Beebe, U.S. Sens. John Boozman, R-Ark., Mark Pryor, D-Ark., U.S. Rep. Steve Womack, R-Rogers, Maria Haley, executive director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, and Sandy Pratt, deputy director of the Oklahoma Department of Commerce.

Pryor praised the Arkansas and Oklahoma business leaders and city and chamber officials who organized the alliance, saying their unity “would be a great lesson” for politicians in Washington. Boozman likened the alliance to a football team, with all members of the team realizing they “must play together” to improve the regional economy.

Womack used his time to express his sadness over the passing of Fort Smith banker Sam M. Sicard. Womack said Sicard’s passing follows the recent passing of other influential area leaders, including former Fort Smith Mayor Ray Baker, Fred Baker Sr., Jim Hanna, H.L. Hembree, and Collier Wenderoth Jr.

“We owe them our very best as we chart that next course forward,” Womack told the crowd.

ALLIANCE HISTORY
Efforts at a third attempt to create a regional economic development alliance began in early 2010 with regional meetings with chamber and city officials conducted by Rob Ratley, Arkansas manager for OG&E and chairman of the Fort Smith Regional Chamber of Commerce Economic Development division, and Harvel.

Those meetings resulted in the formation of an alliance that gave all member cities two votes. The regardless-of-size voting structure helped convince smaller communities in the area that the alliance would not be dominated by larger towns.

On May 3, an executive committee for the alliance was formed, with Harvel serving as the interim executive director in addition to his chamber duties. Also on the executive committee are: Ratley, chairman; Fred Williams (Van Buren), vice chair; Lundy Kiger (eastern Oklahoma), vice chair; Jerrod Yarnell (First National Bank of Paris), treasurer; Kay Johnson (superintendent, Greenwood Public School District); and, Linda Hixson, (Paris Chamber of Commerce); and Dr. Jo Alice Blondin (Ozark, Arkansas Tech University-Ozark campus).

FIVE-YEAR STRATEGY
The alliance is now expected to move forward with a plan to produce a website and other marketing opportunities to recruited targeted industry to the Arkansas and Oklahoma portions of the Fort Smith region. With more than 350,000

The plan will cover Crawford, Franklin, Johnson, Logan, Sebastian and Scott counties in Arkansas; and Le Flore and Sequoyah counties in Oklahoma.

Harvel and Ratley said the region has a population of more than 350,000, which improves the chances being an attractive location in the recruitment of business and industry.

Some of the ares of work include:
• Work with cities/counties in the region to gain support for the potential passage of an economic development sales tax;

• Explore with the middle and high schools in the region the possibility of adding entrepreneurial classes to the curriculum; and,

• Identify and understand roles of all critical entities that are active in entrepreneurial development in the state and region and coordinate efforts with such entities to eliminate overlap of services.