Depending on the actions of the Hot Springs Board of Directors on Tuesday, a commitment made to the residents of District 2 three decades ago will remain intact.
The board, with approval of its consent agenda, will appoint newly elected District 2 Director Phyllis Beard to one of the two board positions on the Hot Springs Advertising and Promotion Commission. Beard was the only applicant for the position.
Elaine Jones, who held that seat on the ad commission for 24 years, decided to not seek reelection last year. Prior to Jones, the seat was held by another District 2 director, Aaron Gordon.
The significance of keeping the District 2 city director on the ad commission is immense, as far as the residents of the area are concerned. Their homes surround the single-largest capital project managed by the ad commission, an entity of the city government that has its own independent taxing authority and self-appoints five of its members (with the OK of the city board).
To understand the depth of that concern, you only need to turn the clock back to 2011, when the Hot Springs Board of Directors debated a measure to reduce the standard terms of city directors on the Hot Springs Advertising and Promotion Commission to two years.
The board, in 1995, established a term of office on the A&P Commission of four years, or until the director's term on the city board expired. The proposed resolution would have capped that at two years, ensuring that Jones, who was reappointed unanimously later in the same meeting, would be off the commission, removing District 2's hold on the seat.
It's interesting to note that, according to the minutes, current Mayor Pat McCabe, who was a city director at that point in time, pointed out there is nothing in writing that said there would always have to be a representative from District 2. He commented there is no guarantee that District 2 will always be held by someone of a minority background.
Ironically, it was Beard's father, Elmer, a former city alderman, who eloquently reminded the board at the time how the construction of the Hot Springs Convention Center in the mid to late 1980s came at a cost to District 2, the city's minority-majority district.
The existing Hot Springs Convention Auditorium, which stood at around 70,000 square feet, ballooned to 240,000 square feet, mainly to the east.
Physically, the project made dramatic changes to the District 2 neighborhood. Formerly, the area immediately to the east of the center included its sole parking lot, Pleasant Street, and the Hot Springs Police Department, which was relocated to Malvern Avenue.
The center's exhibit hall essentially bisected the neighborhood, eliminating its major north-south connection of Pleasant Street, which now dead-ends at Church Street, across from the loading dock of the convention center's exhibit halls.
Since more land was also being taken up by the widening of Convention Boulevard all the way to East Grand, the residents of District 2 understandably wanted to know what they were going to get in return for giving up part of the fabric of their neighborhood.
The late city Director Bob Wheeler, the driving force behind the convention center expansion project and, later, the construction of what is now Bank OZK Arena, met with the neighborhood representatives and assured them they would always have a seat on the advertising and promotion commission.
Beard referred to Wheeler during the meeting as a "man of his word." If you knew Bob, you would know just how true that statement was.
Wheeler and I had that conversation numerous times, about the impact on the neighborhood. He had noted more than once that no one else in the city was being asked to put up with the noise, the congestion, the loss of buildings that District 2 was being asked to put up with, yet they would reap the great economic benefits of the project.
I vividly recall standing next to Wheeler and other commission officials on the uncompleted upper bowl of the new arena, its steel framework still exposed, offering a stunning view of Convention Boulevard and Hot Springs Mountain, in 2002. The fact that some people viewed the project as an improvement to the area, while others vehemently viewed it as an intrusion, was not lost on Wheeler. He viewed that District 2 seat on the commission as paramount to closing that divide.
Elmer noted in 2011 that the citizens of District 2 trusted Wheeler, who led the city into one of the "greatest projects it has ever had" and the city should not forget that, according to the minutes from that meeting.
Beard, at the time, noted it was "inconceivable" that the citizens of District 2 would not have a person on the ad commission as they try to keep things fair and balanced.
Those seeking the change, Beard noted, who want to make it fair and equitable have forgotten the role District 2 plays in the heart of the city.
He stated his request was being made "based on geography rather than personalities," according to the minutes of the meeting.
Now, 12 years later, his daughter is poised to have the chance to continue that legacy.