Marshals Museum to get new project director

He’s climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, hiked 155 miles of the Ozark Highland Trail in 13 days, backpacked through five national parks — including the Grand Canyon — and floated the Colorado River twice through the Grand Canyon.

JIm Dunn’s next task is to try to help build a $50 million national museum on the Fort Smith bank of the Arkansas River.

Dunn, a Fort Smith attorney for the past 35 years, will soon be the new project director for the U.S. Marshals Museum, with current director Sandi Sanders moving to a a post that will allow her to focus full-time on fundraising.

The U.S. Marshals Museum board of directors approved the addition of Dunn on Thursday (July 9) in a move that will see Sanders’ annual salary of $85,000 split evenly between her and Dunn (Sanders’ salary was $0 a majority of her first year on the job.). The change is effective Aug. 1, according to board chairman Jim Williamson.

“We’ve got two very talented people to move this forward,” Williamson said after the board vote.

Dunn told the board he felt some reluctance in following in Sander’s footsteps, but believed it important for someone to focus on fundraising.

“She’s got it set up. Just don’t screw it up,” joked board member Jim Spears.

Dunn will manage the day-to-day operations of leading the development of the museum with Sanders directing the effort to raise upwards of $50 million to build the national museum dedicated to the U.S. Marshals Service.

In January 2007, the U.S. Marshals Service selected Fort Smith as the site for the national museum. Sanders was hired in April 2007 to direct efforts to devise and implement plans for the design, construction and funding of the museum. To fund the effort to get the museum built, the project received $100,000 from the city of Fort Smith, $115,000 from Sebastian County, $200,000 from the state Legislature and $2 million from Gov. Mike Beebe.

Dunn, who practiced with the Fort Smith law firm of Warner Smith & Harris since 1974 and was approached by Sanders and the board about the new position, said the position was attractive in that “it crossed the lines” of his interests with history, the law and serving Fort Smith.

“This is a natural outgrowth of my interest in the rule of law,” Dunn told board members.

He said his “love of the law firm” and his “love of practicing law” made for a tough decision.

Sanders said she and Dunn are serving in “bridge positions” that will likely go away when a museum is built and the focus turns to operating and maintaining a museum. For now, Dunn’s arrival will narrow Sanders’ focus.

“I’ll think of nothing else than that (fundraising),” Sanders said.

The museum board on June 9 took a major step in the process to build the national museum by approving a building design, and by formally transitioning to the national fundraising effort.

“Our exhibit design and building designs are now in place. … Now we have a product for that (fundraising) effort,” Sanders told the board at the June 9 meeting.

Sanders would not disclose details of the ongoing fundraising campaign other than to say, “Things are going well.”

Dunn, a 1966 graduate of Booneville High School, graduated Hendrix College in 1970 and earned a juris doctorate at the University of Arkansas School of Law (Little Rock) in 1974. Dunn and wife Suzanne Vinson Dunn have three children (Amy Dunn Johnson, Julie Dunn Stewart and Matt Dunn) and four grandchildren. (Link here to his bio on the Warner Smith & Harris Web site.)