Fort Smith chamber up to $1.812 million for job fund (Updated)

Editor’s note: This story is updated to reflect that Cheryl Garner was not fired by the board of directors of the Fort Smith Regional Chamber of Commerce. However, Garner nor the chamber will explain why she no longer is employed at the chamber.

The Fort Smith Regional Chamber of Commerce has raised $1.812 million toward its self-imposed goal of raising $2 million by the end of September for an economic development fund.

“And we’re going to get there,” Harvel said Tuesday.

During the past week, the chamber raised $80,000 in commitments, including a $50,000 pledge from the Fort Chaffee Redevelopment Authority that will be paid out over a four-year period.

The fund will replenish the about $2.7 million raised in 2005. That fund helped provide incentive match money to recruit hundreds of jobs to the area, including Mitsubishi and the expansion of Golden Living.

Harvel was hired as the chamber president in April 2009 to restore a measure of credibility to an organization that struggled under previous leadership. At the time, Harvel was a member of the politically-connected Arkansas Economic Development Commission.

In his 20 years as head of the Greater Little Rock Chamber of Commerce, Harvel was instrumental in raising $8.6 million to build a new chamber building. And beginning in 1992, Harvel said the Little Rock chamber raised $2 million every four years to support economic development efforts.

His past fundraising efforts were conducted without using a national fundraising firm. He stuck with his direct approach on the economic development fund campaign.

“Nearly all chambers use one (fundraising firm) but I do not prefer that route,” Harvel said. “I prefer to raise the money and build the relationships at the same time. That way, we all know who we are accountable to.”

Also, he said the fund campaign will not end after September.

“This will be ongoing. Always. I can tell you that this work really has no stop or starting point,” Harvel said.

Harvel said the economic development fund is critical in the Fort Smith region because many cities competing with the region have access to tax proceeds to bolster their incentive packages. He said access to land and other resources through the Fort Chaffee Redevelopment Authority and several large, private development sites help offset the disadvantage.

“But you have to have the money to be in the game. … And we need to show the Governor (Mike Beebe) and Maria (Haley, executive director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission) that we are serious about matching whatever they can do to help us bring jobs here,” Harvel explained.

Of the money raised, 75% will be used for incentive funds, Harvel said. The remaining 25% may be used to help support economic development operations, such as personnel, equipment and technology required to respond to economic development inquiries. On projects with which secrecy is required, the chamber’s five-person executive committee will make decisions on how the incentive funds are spent. The full chamber board will consider how the fund is used on less sensitive projects.

Harvel resigned in April as an AEDC Commissioner — a post that required 2-3 days a month — to spend more time focused on chamber and economic development efforts.

Recruiting jobs has taken on even more importance in the Fort Smith region, with jobless rates frequently above 8% and concerns that Whirlpool — once the largest employer in the region with more than 4,500 jobs at its Fort Smith refrigeration plant — may close its Fort Smith operations. The June jobless rate in the Fort Smith region was 8.4%, a big increase over the 7.7% in May and above the 8.1% in June 2010.