Stadium Shuffle

UA trustees deal with football issue

The ten University of Arkansas trustees are about to decide whether to move any of the Razorbacks’ football games from War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock to what will be Reynolds Stadium in Fayetteville. Their decision will be the biggest in Arkansas sports history since Dec. 7, 1957, the day then-athletic director John Barnhill chose a red-headed Frank Broyles to be the Hogs’ new football coach.

Broyles’ hair is snow white today. But the heated stadium debate has kept his face and many others around the state as flush as the Razorbacks’ cardinal-colored uniforms for nearly a year.

The UA athletic director for the last 26 years, Broyles wants to move at least one of the three games played annually in Little Rock to the UA system’s flagship campus. He says the move is necessary to help pay for Fayetteville’s $65 million stadium renovation and expansion, which includes a $30 million bond issue, a $20 million gift from the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation — prompting a name change for Razorback Stadium — and additional money still being sought from private donations.

He says the long-term ability of the athletic department to compete financially in the Southeastern Conference, plus the ability to recruit top players, depends on making in-state games home games by playing them all on campus. It’s been well documented that the program makes less money when it has to charter flights for players, coaches, staff and administrators to fly 200 miles to the southeast.

Gov. Mike Huckabee and numerous business leaders from Little Rock want to keep three games in central Arkansas. That camp is trying to raise $44 million to renovate the 52-year-old War Memorial Stadium. Broyles needs the UA board of trustees’ approval to move any of the games, which are not only statewide events, but economic windfalls to the cities in which they’re held.

How the political cards fall won’t be known for certain, barring any additional postponements, until Feb. 11, when the trustees are scheduled for a final vote. In the meantime, a look at the backgrounds and affiliations of the people making this decision may be the best clue as to the fate of one of Arkansas’ biggest economic engines — Razorbacks football — for decades to come.

The Northwest Arkansas Business Journal recently polled six of the 10 trustees. Jim Lindsey, Gary George and Frances Cranford couldn’t be reached for comment and Dr. Joe L. Hargrove of Little Rock declined to be interviewed.

Of those who were contacted, the majority had some kind of opinion on the issue but were waiting to ponder the matter completely until sometime after independent consultant Chuck Neinas presented his findings Jan. 20.

Trustees’ background

Of the 10 trustees, seven earned at least one degree from the University of Arkansas. Just one, Cranford, is a graduate of University of Arkansas at Little Rock, but another, Hargrove, teaches at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences campus, also in Little Rock. At least seven have children or spouses who earned degrees on the Fayetteville campus.

Four of the trustees (William E. “Bill” Clark, Cranford, Gary C. George and J. Thomas May) were appointed by Jim Guy Tucker, while he was governor, and two (Hargrove and Frank W. Oldham Jr.) were Bill Clinton appointees. Gov. Mike Huckabee also appointed four of the trustees (James E. Lindsey, Ned Ray Purtle, Stanley E. Reed and Charles E. Scharlau).

Huckabee weighed in on the issue with a four-page letter to trustees in which he argued that moving games from Little Rock could destroy the Fayetteville campus’ standing as flagship campus for the university system, a role the campus has held since the system’s inception. A letter of that length and tone from the governor on any issue was unprecedented, some people familiar with the university say.

Speculation abounds that the governor’s letter may actually have the opposite of its intended effect. At least one trustee who previously favored Little Rock was said to be considering switching positions, but whether that was anything more than wishful thinking from Fayetteville supporters couldn’t be determined.

But other than the strongly worded letter, it didn’t appear that Huckabee had called on his appointees to vote his way.

“He has not put any undue pressure on his appointees,” said Reed, who recently went duck hunting with Huckabee in rural Lee County. “He’s not going to try to pull our strings.”

Reed added, “Mike Huckabee says it’s the biggest issue he’s had to face in his administration.”

Three trustees live in Little Rock, three live in Northwest Arkansas and the others have homes in Hope, Marianna, Pine Bluff and Jonesboro.

Although it might seem safe to assume that the Northwest Arkansas and Little Rock residents will vote to support their home regions, leaving the other four as wild cards of a sort, people familiar with the board members and the university say it’s not a safe bet.

Purtle’s family has raised registered Hereford cattle in Hope since 1927, but he has attended games in both Little Rock and Fayetteville for years. Purtle says he’s still “straddling the fence,” which makes him one of several possible swing votes.

“I’m having serious problems moving all three games to Fayetteville,” Purtle says. “And I have serious problems signing a long-term contract to keep at least some games in Little Rock. I’m looking for something in between.”

Remaining neutral

The trustees contacted by the Northwest Arkansas Business Journal did their best to remain neutral and open to additional information. They were all contacted prior to the Jan. 20 meeting. Most of them indicated they have been under siege.

“If I had [made up my mind], I wouldn’t tell you,” Scharlau said. “I need to listen to everything that’s going to be presented.”

May took a similar tack. “I honestly don’t know. I’m looking forward to our meeting … to listen to the various proposals, both from the Little Rock group and the Northwest Arkansas group, and to hear the information that the consultant has to provide.”

May, a banker and admitted “fanatic” Razorbacks fan, added, “The No. 1 issue is the economic issue and that requires our attention. There are many other sub-issues to that … the potential divisiveness … what’s convenient to the students …. recruitment.”

Clark, reportedly one of the more outspoken members of the board, also declined to voice his opinion.

“I’m staying with the politically correct answer: I have not made up my mind.” He added, “I’m going to weigh everything equally. … There are a lot of important factors, monetary being one of them.”

Reed noted that the trustees hadn’t talked among themselves.

“There’s going to be some people upset either way we go,” he said. “I think anything’s a possibility. As board members, we haven’t talked about it, but we’ve been bombarded with letters. I’m going to worry about one vote and that’s mine.”

The waiting game

UA head football Coach Houston Nutt, a Little Rock native, had not addressed the issue publicly before the Jan. 20 meeting. But he apparently feared the board’s decision would be so volatile that he recently asked the trustees to delay their vote until after the NCAA’s Feb. 2 national signing day, lest the outcome upset any potential football recruits.

According to the book by Orville Henry and Jim Bailey, “The Razorbacks: A story of Arkansas Football,” Broyles was on a recruiting trip for the University of Missouri the week before he was named football coach at Arkansas. He rested in a East St. Louis, Ill., movie theater to calm his stomach while awaiting word from Fayetteville that he would replace Jack Mitchell.

When the news comes Feb. 11, Broyles’ appointment schedule says he will be at the Broyles Athletic Center in Fayetteville. One can only imagine that he’ll be sitting nervously or tapping golf balls across the thick carpet in his office that overlooks Reynolds Stadium.

It’s been a long time since he hasn’t gotten his way.

“We are trying to do what is going to be the best for the university in the long term,” Broyles says. “We want what is very best for the program, and I believe the board will consider the information put before them and make the best decision.”

Oldham, the board chairman, says he believes political, economic and emotional pressures will all play a role in the vote. He says the thing the board should keep in mind is that Arkansas is in the unique situation of having one main athletic program that draws support from all over the state.

Only national powerhouses like Nebraska and, to some extent, Tennessee and Ohio State, have a similar luxury.

“We’re trying to preserve statewide support and meet economic challenges, many of which were brought on by Title IX,” Oldham says. “I would hope that regardless of what this board does, that the people of Arkansas would love the Razorbacks enough to continue to support the Razorbacks. But we have no control over that. The only thing I can assure you of is we really have a good board and we are really studying this issue.

“I don’t know that I’ll know what I’m going to do for sure until the day of the vote.”