New Day At Little Rock Port Authority

Bryan Day is taking leadership of the Little Rock Port Authority at a time of transition and opportunity.

The incoming executive director is inheriting an operation that under the retiring Paul Latture has grown to 2,640 acres with about 40 employers and 4,000-4,500 mostly skilled employees. About half a billion private dollars and about $30 million in public money has been invested during his tenure, Latture said. Day will occupy a beautiful new, $2 million office complex overlooking the Arkansas River.

But the port has all but run out of land to play with. All that is left is one 155-acre site and one 22-acre site on the dry side of the levy. Land is available on the wet side, but only for lease, and it’s susceptible to flooding.

Day, currently Little Rock’s assistant city manager, has $10 million to buy more land thanks to a sales tax passed by city voters in 2011. Just south of the port is about a 1,000-acre parcel under single ownership, but negotiations haven’t begun. Other nearby land would have to be raised from a floodway and has no infrastructure.

“We get one shot to get it right, and the land we purchase, it’s going to have to hold us for the next five, 10, 15 years,” he said.

Before becoming assistant city manager, Day spent about a decade as director of the city’s Parks and Recreation Department. The Parkview High School graduate earned a degree in criminal justice from UALR and then went to work for the Arkansas State Parks system – first at the Ozark Folk Center and then at Historic Washington State Park, where he was the superintendent. Twenty years ago last March, he came back to Little Rock to work for the city.

Day, who officially starts his new job June 23, said it will be an adjustment leaving an organization of 2,000 people and a $220 million budget for one with a staff of eight and a $3 million budget. But he said the port opportunity will give him a chance to expand on his relationships with government officials, business leaders and private developers.

“It’s not broken now,” he said. “The staff and board have done a good job. The potential’s there to just build on it and make it even better than it already is.”

In addition to purchasing the land, Day’s other goals include finding new moneymaking opportunities within the existing operations of the port, which is not supported by tax dollars and stays in business by unloading barges and moving railcars. Infrastructure improvements will have to be made on existing and new property. Also, Day plans to emphasize public relations – among potential tenants, of course, but also within the city of Little Rock.

“Several people have said to me, ‘You’re going way out there? What’s out there?’ And what people don’t realize is that what’s out here are thousands of jobs, hundreds of millions of dollars in private investment, and great opportunities for additional investment, and I think that one of the immediate goals has to be to get that message out to the community somehow,” he said.

For now, Day plans to spend his first few weeks learning about the job with help from Latture, traveling to other ports, and meeting folks in the industry. Then he’ll start trying to follow in Latture’s footsteps.

“I hope that coming out here as the director, I can really leave a positive mark on the community,” he said. “I hope that in 15 years, when someone replaces me, that they can look back and say, ‘Well, during Bryan’s tenure, look at all that – maybe all these lots are sold and we’re out of land and we’re building our existing businesses or we’re building a larger harbor.’”