Support for Arkansas Week provided by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, the Arkansas Times and Little Rock Public Radio.

And hello again, everyone, and thanks very much for being with us.

A rare difference of opinion involving our two U.S. senators and national security policy.

In the Arkansas capital, a commitment to upgrade two institutions that advocates argue have been too long neglected and a possible detente between the Sanders administration and the state prison board.

That's on our roundtable in just a few moments.

First, Black History Month.

It was not so terribly long ago that African-American elected officials in Arkansas could be counted on one hand with maybe several fingers to spare.

Well, things change.

And if choosing men and women of color for public office is not necessarily routine, it is certainly no longer rare At the county and municipal level.

The challenges and the rewards of local governance is our focus now.

Joining us are Mayor Jalen Smith of Earl, who has made history in his own right and justice of the peace.

Michael Acton of the Clark County Quorum Court.

Gentlemen, thanks very much for being with us.

Mayor, we'll begin with you, because the history that I referred to you were, if not at one time, a point at your election, you were not maybe the youngest mayor in the United States, but she was certainly the youngest African-American mayor.

Yes, sir.

Thank you so much for having me on.

Again, my name is Mayor Julian Smith.

I was like at the age of 18 when elected, I was the one of the youngest mayors in the country.

But the first African-American, the youngest mayor in the entire country.

At the age of.

87.

Upon your election and you had just a couple of birthdays, I think, on the mayor when you joined the Clark County Quorum court.

Yes.

And again, thank you for also having me here.

I was 21 when I was elected, but by July, I had aspirations of running when I was a little bit younger.

Why did you run?

I have people surely telling you you're too young.

Right.

We'll start with you, Michael.

Okay.

I did have people who told me that I was too young.

I plan to run a little bit earlier the first time around, but I was told that I was, again, too young to run.

So I kind of waited.

And I learned the I learned the office.

I learned those responsibilities of the office that I'm in now.

And then I took that leap to run for office because I felt not as the people in that office doing a bad job, but I thought I could do a different job and bring shed light to people that weren't represented on the court, putting more people of color, putting younger people.

A college student at the time, you know, representing a large part of Clark Kent, we had those two universities in Arkadelphia alone.

So I feel like, you know, the caucus should reflect more of the people that we serve.

And so I felt like I was the person to make that to.

Yeah, Mayor.

Well, for me, I like justice.

I want to look a little bit farther ahead and have people tell me that I was too young, that I didn't know anything, or I just rather high school.

But I didn't allow what people tell me negatively to define who I've tried to become at 18 because I know that running for this position as mayor.

People want to talk about you if you do do good or bad, and regardless if they talk about you, do a good or bad.

I believe if they're not talking about you can be doing something right.

So at the time when I was running for office, I ran against four other people plus me.

So I was five and everybody else was a bit older than me.

But I'm sorry, it wasn't it wasn't about the youthfulness.

It was about who's who's able to bring the change to our community and also be the voice for the people.

What did you I have a sense, anyway, that the two of you in your in your seeking public office, you had common values, common goals.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Mayor, we'll start with you.

Yes.

Yes.

My goal was pretty much whoever my community number one was, bring the change to the community.

Be the change how change?

What needed change and what there in Earl anyway.

Right.

As far as public safety, economic development, infrastructure, education, supporting small businesses.

Like at the time before I took office, we didn't have a functioning police department.

When I came into office, we hired some people to run our police department.

As far as economic development, we were suffering with housing, which we still are, but we have developers.

They're coming in to build housing apartments for our people because we have a school district that serves a house over 400 students in the district.

And so our school was is in state takeover.

So we want to prove to the state that we're capable of managing our own by bringing more housing, more good paying jobs and more teachers to the community about what the housing.

And in Clark County.

Well, for me, when it comes to values, education is a top one for Clark County because there's so many schools.

But I wanted to be the person to bring not necessarily I don't want to just say change, but to bring that difference of opinion.

I felt like for a long time younger people were forgotten in the discussion of the future.

It felt like future was always talked about.

But those people that would take part of the future weren't necessarily going to be there for the future that they were planning.

So I felt like it was important to bring younger people to those discussions and those tables, talking about what we were face and what we needed to succeed and what we plan to see in the future for ourselves.

That's why when I ran for office, my slogan was The future Leading the Future, because I want to.

People understand that as a young person, I was planning for a world.

I would still be here to see that I wanted to see the fruits of the labor.

Everybody put in.

What have you.

We'll start with you.

What have you learned since taking office?

What I have the.

Process about what constitutes a win and what.

Right.

I've only served for just one year.

I'm already having a run for reelection because of the way that the laws are set up.

So I spent this year not only learning, but doing my best in advocating for what I wanted to advocate for, which, number one was transparency.

It was one of the things I ran for.

And so I've been trying to start a livestream service for our residents.

They cannot come to our meetings there on Mondays at 530.

And so as a school teacher myself, we have an after school program that I helped us get started.

I mean, a lot of people have a lot of things going on at 530 on a monday afternoon, so I feel like it's important that we let people know what's going on and give them the opportunity to see what we're doing.

So number one is doing that and that was passed an ordinance that I passed and a quorum court.

And so that's something that we have in the works.

We're working with our Economic Development Council, trying to get advocacy for small businesses, which was a big thing in Clark County, getting small business support.

So those are the two main things on my plate right now.

Well, it's it can be difficult to move the ball.

Mayor, You.

Yeah, it can.

For me, pretty much my terms four years.

And so honestly, to get the ball going for me was I really focus on the people I knew I didn't have versus the people I knew I did have with for my election.

Getting the young people while getting them registered to vote was a priority and getting this seat.

I didn't think that.

I really didn't think that I would have more of the singers when I was running for my election, but I knew I would have for the most of the young people to really move to, well, elect me in this seat for the mayor position and also what I've learned within my year.

Honestly, it has been a challenging one year, but honestly, learning that challenges and obstacles that will arise.

But learning.

We have a city council of eight there.

Some of them are difficult and some are like the challenge, the challenge of mayor.

But the thing is, if you don't have those people on your council, how can you grow as a person?

So with them we have like we're like, we're like just as trying to get our our technology of this, like for, like livestreaming and different things for people to really see what's going on.

But inclusiveness is really what we're targeting.

Yeah, a big win for you is just simply get a grocery store back and yes.

Yes, we when I, when I was running for my campaign, Marcus's, it was like, we need a grocery store, we need this.

And I was like, okay.

And so like I told them that, I can't promise you that because I'm not our creator.

But what I can say is I will work hard to get that grocery store.

And so what happened was when I first took office, I had a conversation with Dollar General Staff and the corporate people about bringing a DG Well, I just had a grocery store, but they called it a DG Market.

But as I was on my adventure for in my first year in office, they had like DG markets like in Augusta, Harrisburg.

And so I said, Why not?

You know, And so they came in and they done what they needed to do too.

And so we just waiting on the door open.

Starting with with our justice of the peace.

How do you what's the formula that you use?

How do you young people are notoriously difficult to get involved in civic life and even go to the polls.

What's what's your formula for me?

I think there is a disconnect on what government can do for young people and how young people as a whole can move government to work for them.

I think traditionally we're used to seeing older people in office and older people talking about politics, and young people think that's just not for me.

That's not that's not a seat for me at that table.

One there, in fact, is having more young people together voting on causes together makes the changes that we want to see.

Like I said, I'm a school teacher.

And so for the example that I use when I'm teaching civics a captive.

Audience, that.

Yes, I have seventh and eighth graders.

And so I just kind of teach them, I say, hey, when we had student council elections, if somebody says that, you know, they're not going to make you have homework, you know, how can you make sure that they do that?

Well, let them know if they don't, they won't be in that office anymore.

Everything that you do should be about serving the people.

And so for me, I let them know, yes, I'm young.

Yes, we want somebody this young, but you have to support me as support as further than I support you.

You have to, like Mayor Smith said, get people registered to vote, remind them to vote consistently and make sure that you follow through with them and going to the polls.

So I think having young people run in general puts them in the mindset of, okay, so we do have a seat here.

And so just us doing this in front of everybody encourages more young people to vote, because when I ran, I had the highest voter turnout out of all the districts for the county, and I flipped my seat when our when as well.

I ran against an incumbent of multiple terms and I flipped the seat just simply because I went out there, said, hey, I'm a young guy running and I want to work for you.

This is who I am.

Let me do what I can.

Give me a shot and I'll I promise to work my butt off.

And that's what I've been doing since then.

Yeah.

Mayor, let's go to you.

We've got about a minute.

Okay?

Okay.

Well, I honestly agree with Justice 19.

You know, we oftentimes have people that are in positions say, well, are the kids the students or the kids are 100% our future.

But there's no there's no opportunity.

We say that we want we oftentimes say, well, we want to do everything in our power to make sure that our future, our reaching the goals that they're trying to reach when in reality they're not.

And so that the tare students and what children really for actually going to vote because thing is they're they're wondering why am I voting for them?

What are they're doing for me.

And so it's like now since I've been in a position for me, a lot of more young people will be coming out to vote because it's the years they know someone is young, someone can relate to them and someone can really help them and show them that, well, there is potential, there is opportunity and there is more than you you think there is.

But the thing is this leaders, we have to really put action into work.

I mean, less talking, more action.

And so I think oftentimes if we do that, that's will get more young people involved.

And also getting young people to understand that when you're running for office, you're going to have obstacles, challenging, distraction, but it's nothing but prepare you for the better day.

Got into there because we're simply out of time.

Gentlemen, good luck to both of you.

Thank you very much for coming in and come back soon.

You said.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for having me.

In a moment, our roundtable.

We are back.

Advocates of the Arkansas Schools for the Blind and Deaf have insisted for years that both facilities are in desperate need of repairs and upgrades.

There was little disagreement, but even less money.

This week, a pledge from Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who spoke alongside School for the Blind board chair, Robert Fagan.

Arkansas is going to keep its promise and we are going to fix these schools.

To begin, we will invest significant resources to build a new state of the art facility on the current campus, combine administrative functions and provide additional high quality instruction on a regional basis.

And we're going to prioritize students safety and happiness so that Asti and ISB will thrive as they were intended to.

You know, our schools are old.

They were built in the late 1800s, early 1900s.

I've heard stories of using duct tape and paper clips to fix things around there.

So it's it's a tremendous gift that and I see a bright future for the school.

More on that now and other stories with our roundtable.

Jocelyn Nora joins us from Little Rock Public Radio test version of the Arkansas Advocate.

And Andrew DeMello, capital bureau chief of the Associated Press.

Thanks to everybody for coming in, Jose.

There was never any dispute about what needed to be done.

Millions of dollars worth of improvements, upgrades, whatever, to both campuses.

You can hear in this clip that the governor referred to the deaf and blind schools as a promise.

She said it was a promise that was made to students years ago and it's time to follow through on that.

Whole bunch of legislatures have been to visit the school.

There was a Twitter thread written by Senator Clark Tucker talking about how the pool was so bad when he went visited it because they were worried they would let kids swim in it because they were worried the ceiling was going to fall into the pool.

And the governor said when she went visited, she was very impressed by the staff, but she was not impressed by the facilities and was really concerned about it.

There has been discussion, Andrew, over the years in committee in the general Assembly about what needs to be done there, but it never got past the talking stage.

Yeah, that's right.

And she, the governor even referred to there's been money set aside in the past for improvements at the school.

This still leaves a lot of or leaves some big unanswered questions, including the timeline for when this is going to be done, what the total price tag is going to be.

But the governor at least provided some reassurances about the future of the school, about the location of the school.

And I think for a lot of the family members there and a lot of the community members there, that it was the assurance they needed, especially as we head into the fiscal session later this year on kind of the parameters of what that discussion is going to be.

Yeah, it would appear anyway that at a minimum, you know, we got the ball off the tee on that subject.

Anyway, stay with Andrew because there is more.

It's never been out of the news over the last couple of three months and that's the prison system.

Andrew.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's, that's correct.

You know, we're starting to see, you know, possibly, you know, a little bit of a cooling off of the very public dispute between the governor and the Board of Corrections over who runs the prison system.

The governor has not there has nominated Lindsey Wallace to be the new corrections secretary.

The caveat being that they're meeting this afternoon on Thursday to take up that appointment.

But there were, you know, very seemingly supportive comments from the chairman of the board of Corrections about this nomination and, you know, it's it's been kind of a change, at least from what we've seen previously, where the governor talked with the board there, talked with board members and talked with the chairman of the board about this nomination.

We're making it.

Yeah.

Is there a jokey kind of a detente here between these two?

One side blinked, maybe.

Well, it's interesting because right before they appointed Lindsey Wallace, they had an interim secretary who only served in the job for less than a week.

He said it was too challenging.

It's a really interesting problem because the governor wants to add more beds and there just isn't necessarily the space of the staff to do that for now.

And so Lindsey Wallace has really got her work cut out for this expensive.

Yes, it's incredibly expensive.

And there just isn't necessarily the staffing capabilities based on what I've heard from people who've worked for the board.

Andrew, both sides want to get out of the headlines, we assume, but neither side necessarily wants to concede if that's the right term.

And you know, the even with this out of the way now, there still is the bigger issue of the litigation over this law and the dispute over who has the ultimate hiring and firing authority over the secretary of corrections.

You know that we still have that litigation going right now.

And, you know, the future of that is going to be a big question going forward with us.

Yeah, this is a breakthrough here.

That there could be you know, there's a new member of the Board of Corrections that was just appointed last night, actually by the governor.

It's which is a joint appointment to the state parole board.

A lawyer from Texas named Lona McCaslin.

I think I'm pronouncing that correctly.

Prosecutor.

Yes.

So things do seem to be cooling off a little.

There was, if you remember, there was a lawsuit that Attorney General Tim Griffin filed against against the board over executive session where they had hired an attorney and he said that it was an illegal executive session and therefore an illegal hiring.

But that lawsuit was dismissed without prejudice in Pulaski County Circuit Court.

So it remains the story that will continue to follow Joint audit.

Andrew is still holding fire on another problem, a potential problem anyway.

Certainly it's been a public relations problem for the governor.

And we at least have kind of a timeline of where this is headed at this point.

The head of Legislative Audit, Roger Norman, told lawmakers recently that they're nearing the end of their work on the audit into this $19,000 lectern that was purchased for the governor's office.

That has been the focus of this audit, folks.

A lot of scrutiny and a lot of national attention.

So they're wrapping up work on that.

He's expecting them to finish their report on it by the end of March.

The big question now is going to be how and when it's going to be released to the public.

He walked through kind of the three scenarios on how that could be released to the public.

The you know, the it could be released early in a special release or they could hold a special hearing on it.

Or the third option, which I think would be kind of the least palatable option for a few people who've been awaiting this for a while now, is they could wait until their next audit meeting, which is not until June.

No tests.

Yeah, it depends on what is in that report.

I think whether they decide to release it in March or any time before that meeting in June, the legislature will have their hands full in April because that's when the fiscal session is.

But it's going to be in the hands of the chairs of the Legislative Joint Audit Committee, and they have the authority to call a special meeting if they so choose.

And last week, when Roger Norman told the committee that they were going to wrap up work on that report by the end of March, Representative Jaime Gasaway, a Republican from Paragould, said that they'll just decide when they get the report, when they're going to release it.

So there's a lot that remains to be seen.

Yeah, that remains to be quite the possibility of some pushback no matter what happens, because this was after this audit, after all was requested by senior members of the General Assembly.

Yes, it was.

And that was back in November, the legislative Joint Auditing Executive Committee approved the request and the full committee approved it.

This request came from Senator Jimmy Hickey, who is a Republican from Texarkana.

He used to be president pro tem of the Senate, and it was an all Republican group on the committee that approved it in the first place.

And yeah, it was it was a big headline maker Last September when the lectern purchase became public.

And Senator Hickey had said at the time, we just want to make sure all of the processes that are in place were followed and just get clarity on were they or weren't they?

Yeah, it has also, Andrew been Mr. Hickey, who has perhaps more than any member or as much as or more than any other member of the General Assembly, has put a bit of distance between himself and the administration.

You know, Senator Hickey.

But by requesting this and there's still a second part of the audit or a second audit that we don't know what the timeline is on this that he had also requested dealing with records that previously had been open to the public that were closed off because of changes to the state's open records law dealing with travel of.

So there's still some question about what's going to happen with that review, what's the timeline on it.

And also, we don't know, you know, are we going to get a definitive answer on a lot of the questions that have been raised about electronic purchase and about the open records surrounding it?

Or, you know, are there going to be some some areas where they just don't get a definitive answer?

Open Records is our Segway test, the process of amending the Constitution.

We've got to work out how many I've lost track a dozen or so.

Yeah.

We have a lot of potential ballot measures this year.

Arkansas Citizens for Transparency, which is a nonpartisan group of government transparency advocates, they did get ballot language approved for signature collecting.

This was in this is in January.

After several tries, Attorney General Griffin approved a potential constitutional amendment and a potential change to the freedom of Information Act itself.

So these are these are two potential measures that they're going to be marketing as a package deal in their efforts to get signatures.

Now, to get signatures for a potential statutory change, you need about 75,000 For a change to the Constitution, you need about 90,000.

So they they have then they have until July 5th to get all of those.

And there was a lawsuit, that complaint that they filed with the Arkansas Supreme Court, that complaints has been dropped because after one of the AG's rejections of their ballot language, they they they challenged that they thought it was a misuse of the AG's office, but then the AG later approved, tweaked version of that language and Arkansas Citizens for Transparency decided to drop that suit and the the Supreme Court agreed to drop it so that they can focus their energy on getting those signatures.

And as the week drew to a close, a new proposal anyway involving the voucher program.

Yes, a group of public education advocates have been trying for several weeks now to get an approval from the AG for a proposed amendment to the Constitution's education clause.

They've just submitted actually their fourth version of the ballot language earlier today.

So AG Griffin has about two weeks to approve or reject it.

I know that the the coalition the called for our kids they've met with the AG staff multiple times to try to come up with acceptable language.

All right, Josie.

This comes after failed attempts by a different group called Caves to overturn the learned law entirely.

So what this bill would do is it would basically just integrate a couple of things that the big critics have learned have problems with.

They want universal preschool for places that are getting voucher money, and they also want afterschool programs and services for kids with disabilities.

So I talked to April from Air Kids and she said it doesn't have everything in it that they want, but it has enough that they can solely kind of roll back parts of the world.

That.

Yeah, that they can live with.

It.

Yeah.

And finally, we had two important votes in the Congress this past week.

There was unanimity on the part of our House delegates on an almost unprecedented impeachment motion against a cabinet member, our two U.S. senators, as they rarely do, split on a national defense issue.

And it's kind of interesting because both men voted for to Ukraine and Tom Cotton voted against it.

Right.

And one kind of went with the administration position and the other or the Senate majority leader and minority leader anyway, stayed with the party position.

The other one with Mr. Trump's position.

Yeah.

And Tom Cotton has endorsed Donald Trump, who's been critical of some of the legislation that they're trying to pass right now.

So it'll be interesting to see what happens going forward.

Got to end it there because we're out of time.

Tess and Jose and Andrew, thanks for coming in, as always.

As always, we thank you for joining us.

See you next week.

Support for Arkansas Week provided by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

The Arkansas Times and Little Rock Public Radio.