$2.3M Whistleblower Payday

The List [P13]

Baptist-UAMS deal

prompts questions

Whispers [P3]

Exec Q&A

With Chip

Blanchard

 e president of First

State Bank in Russell-

ville says that in local

economies, commu-

nity banks have “more

skin in the game.” [P22]

VOL. 35, NO. 3 JANUARY 15-21, 2018 $1.50

UPDATED DAILY: ArkansasBusiness.com

Business

Arkansas

Largest Mortgage

Lenders in Arkansas

THE STATE’S BUSINESS NEWS AUTHORITY.

NSAS BUSINESS

PUBLISHIN

GROU

Wait and See

Razorback Foundation braces for fallout after tax reform axed

the deduction for gifts to university athletic foundations. [P9]

Truckers Hail Tax Cuts

Executives and drivers at a couple of Arkansas trucking

companies are expected to benefit. [P15]

By George Waldon

George@ABPG.com

INVESTOR DEBTS CONTINUED ON PAGE 8

Little Rock businessman

John Taylor Lewis is no stranger

to debt collection lawsuits and

bankruptcy court thanks to the

collapse of his Ram Venture

Holdings effort in 2005-06.

After resurrecting his finan-

cial fortunes through oil and gas

investments, Lewis once again

is attracting debt-driven legal

action associated with upwards

of $6 million in claims.

Locally, Raymond Remmel,

Wesley Clark and Walter Quinn

are part of a collection party

that includes the taxman and

Texas interests. His leveraged

oil and gas holdings, dependent

on higher market prices, are

said to be the biggest problem.

Woes Dog

Investor

As Debts

Pile Up

When IberiaBank Corp.

agreed in December to pay $11.7

million to settle allegations by

Arkansas whistleblowers that it

filed false claims for mortgage

loan guarantees, it became the

first lender working in the state

to join a lengthy roster of lenders

that have settled similar allega-

tions with the U.S. Department

of Justice since 2011.

IberiaBank and IberiaBank

Mortgage Co. of Lafayette,

Louisiana, allegedly violated

the False Claims Act between

2005 and 2014 by falsely say-

ing they were complying with

federal requirements in order to

obtain insurance on mortgage

loans from the Federal Housing

Administration, part of the

U.S. Department of Housing &

Urban Development.

Kelley R. Shackleford and

Karen Mills, who worked for

IberiaBank Mortgage in Little

Rock, filed the lawsuit in 2015

in U.S. District Court in Little

Rock. As whistleblowers, they

will receive $2.34 million from

the settlement with the federal

government. The case had been

under seal until August.

IberiaBank said in a state-

ment to Arkansas Business last

week that it “made a business

decision to settle this matter,

without admitting liability, in

order to avoid the time and

expense of potential litigation.”

IberiaBank also said that no

By Mark Friedman

MFriedman@ABPG.com

$2.3M Whistleblower Payday

WHISTLEBLOWERS

CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

Federal crackdown

on false loan claims

ensnares IberiaBank

The Mortgage Market

Eagle Bank & Trust is ramping up its mortgage lending division while Bank of the

Ozarks is shutting its down. What’s going on with home loans? [P10]

Matthew Lewis, president of the Mortgage Bankers Association of Arkansas, sees no alarming trends, but

the mortgage banking industry has certainly changed in the past 10 years. [PHOTO BY JASON BURT]

View the 2018 Arkansas Business of the Year Finalists. Pg. 2 for details.

www.ArkansasBusiness.com/ABOY

SPOTLIGHT: Banking & Finance

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FEBRUARY 22, 2018

STATEHOUSE CONVENTION CENTER

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Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

and CEO Matthew Troup said

he thought the arrangement

between UAMS and Baptist

Health Medical Center-Conway

was unfair competition.

“It turned UAMS from an

educator into a competitor,”

said Troup, of the nonprofit

Conway Regional, which oper-

ates a hospital with 150 beds.

Lowery said the commit-

tee hearing also probably will

allow testimony from some of

the entities that have concerns

about not being allowed to par-

ticipate in arrangements with

UAMS.

UAMS spokeswoman Leslie

Taylor

said on Thursday that

UAMS is aware of the meeting

and plans to work with the com-

mittee.

Bad News for Acumen

Stockholders in Acumen

Brands Inc.

, the one-time

Fayetteville startup phenom-

Legislators to Quiz UAMS

Members of the Legislature’s

Joint Performance Review Com-

mittee

have questions about

the University of Arkansas for

Medical Sciences

’ contract for

emergency room and orthope-

dic services at Baptist Health

Medical Center-Conway

The arrangement was the

subject of a Page 1 story in

Arkansas Business last week.

The committee wants UAMS

to appear on Jan. 25 and “answer

questions about the nature of

the contract,” said Rep. Mark

Lowery

, R-Maumelle, who is a

co-chair of the committee.

There are also questions

about the taxpayer-supported

teaching hospital’s relation-

ship with Arkansas Blue Cross

& Blue Shield

, he said. UAMS

and Baptist Health of Little Rock

are also working with Arkansas

Children’s Hospital

, ABCBS and

Bost Inc. in a program called

Arkansas Advanced Care to serve

Medicaid recipients with behav-

ioral health and developmental

disability needs. That program

would operate as a Provider-

owned Arkansas Shared Savings

Entity

, but most people call it

PASSE, under legislation estab-

lished last year by the Arkansas

General Assembly.

“We’ll be asking UAMS to

give us more clarity about those

kinds of participations, espe-

cially the aspect where we feel

like that they’re creating unfair

competitive advantages for the

hospitals they’re contracting

with,” Lowery said. “If it’s going

to be opened up, it ought to be

opened up to all entities.”

In last week’s Arkansas

Business article, Conway Re-

gional Health System

’s President

For daily news, register at ArkansasBusiness.com/Enews

Whispers

WHISPERS CONTINUED ON PAGE 4

Business

Arkansas

What You Get

A renovated house in Little

Rock’s Heights neighborhood

was scheduled to be part of

the “What You Get” feature

in the real estate section of

Sunday’s New York Times.

The article, which was

online last week, looks at

houses that sell for about

$250,000 in Ohio, Iowa and

Arkansas. The 1,150-SF cot-

tage at 1901 N. McKinley St.

is actually listed for $221,000.

It is smaller than the compa-

rably price homes in Cleve-

land and Cedar Rapids and

therefore more expensive per

SF at $193.

The two-bedroom, two-

bathroom bungalow, built in

1930, was renovated by Laura

Arnold

. She and her husband,

Steve, own Cantrell Furniture

Design Center

and Arnold’s

Flooring America

The house is owned by Ar-

tois LLC

. The listing agent is

Carol Jenkins of Adkins Mc-

Neill Smith & Associates

Little Rock. ■

This house at 1901 N. McKinley St. in the Heights neighborhood is getting

The New York Times treatment. [PHOTO BY ANDREW ARNOLD]

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

WHISPERS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3

WHISPERS

enon, received bad, but probably not

unexpected, news in the mail.

General Atlantic, a private equity

firm, told investors in a letter received

Jan. 8 that their shares were valueless.

Former Acumen CEO John James and a

former Acumen executive who asked to

be anonymous confirmed the receipt of

the letter and that all stockholders were

told their shares were worthless.

James said he couldn’t give details

about the letter because he merely

skimmed it before throwing it away. In

the past, James has declined to say what

ownership percentage he has retained in

Acumen, although he apparently would

have to have some if he received the

notification.

James and Terry Turpin co-founded

Acumen Brands in 2009, and the compa-

ny rose to prominence on the strength of

such brands as Country Outfitter, which

sold country wear and boots, and Scrub

Shopper

, which sold medical wear. The

pinnacle of Acumen’s rise was when

General Atlantic invested $83 million

and took a 60 percent ownership stake

in 2013.

Turpin, when contacted by Arkansas

Business on Thursday, said he could

not comment on the letter stockholders

received. Turpin was COO of Acumen

but became CEO when James left the

company in 2014.

“I really can’t comment on that right

now,” Turpin said. “I’d love to be able to

but, at this point, I can’t. I’m not trying to

be difficult. I’m under some obligations

where I can’t comment on things.”

James resigned from the company to

focus on his startup support company

Hayseed Ventures but remained a mem-

ber of Acumen’s board of directors until

2016.

Acumen’s fortunes soon soured after

the General Atlantic investment, though

information about its problems has been

hard to pin down on the record.

Acumen sold Scrub Shopper to James

in 2016; he operates it under the Hayseed

Ventures umbrella. It sold Country

Outfitter, its customer list and social

media assets to a subsidiary of Boot Barn

Holdings Inc.

for $1.8 million in June 2017.

Turpin said Thursday that Acumen

had also sold its country lifestyle web-

site One Country to a undisclosed private

investor at the same time it sold Country

Outfitter.

“It was [to] a different group of inves-

tors,” Turpin said. “I can’t reveal that

one.”

At the height of Acumen’s success, the

company moved into a 200,000-SF facil-

ity on North Shiloh Drive in Fayetteville

where, officials said in 2014, they were

filling 7,500 orders a week for its online

brands. The lease for Acumen’s 76,000-

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Business

Arkansas

Seven-Digit Construction

Indoor Practice Facility $5,067,587

Little Rock Christian Academy

19010 Cantrell Road, Little Rock

Clark Contractors LCC, Little Rock

Peggy Bosmyer

Christian Formation Center

$2,210,186

St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church

20900 Chenal Parkway, Little Rock

Bell Construction Co., North Little Rock

Renovation $1,534,737

Martin-Brower Co.

1302 Henderson Drive, North Little Rock

Trane US Inc., Nashville, Tennessee

Renovation $1,000,000

United Parcel Service

5501 Fourche Dam Pike

Catamount Constructors Inc.,

Lakewood, Colorado

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

5WHISPERS

An ISO 9001 Company

SF headquarters across the street was

taken over by Kimbel Mechanical Services

in May 2017.

Seven-Digit Deals

Hospitable land in west Little Rock,

retail space in Jacksonville, a future tire

center site in North Little Rock, furniture

room in Conway and residential prop-

erty in Bryant form this week’s quintet of

million-dollar transactions.

◗ Deltic Timber Corp. of El Dorado sold

4.8 acres on the west side of Rahling

Road between Chenal Parkway and La

Grande Drive for $3.4 million.

Buyers: James and Terry Barnes and

their Promenade Hospitality LLC.

The deal included transferring a 2.91-

acre site near the southeast corner of La

Grande Drive and St. Vincent Way back

to Deltic.

The Barneses and Promenade

Hospitality acquired that property from

Deltic for $2.28 million in December

2016.

◗ ATF Greenwood LLC, led by Mark

Watson

, bought the 35,912-SF Waterford

Creek

retail project at 140 Marshall

Road and 140 John Harden Drive in

Jacksonville for $2.1 million.

Seller: Hanner Properties-Arkansas

LLC

, led by Mike Hanner of Atlanta, Texas.

◗ Cuatro Hermanos Inc., led by Jose

Perez

, sold the 1.4-acre El Porton devel-

opment at 5021 Warden Road in North

Little Rock for $1.3 million.

Buyer? Halle Properties LLC, an affili-

ate of Discount Tire of Scottsdale, Arizona.

◗ Future elbow room for Hank’s Fine

Furniture

in Conway was purchased in a

$1.1 million deal.

HCB LLLP, an affiliate of Hank’s,

acquired a 3.1-acre parcel adjoining the

south side of its 800 Museum Road proj-

ect.

Seller? CM 2016 Trust, led by Samuel

McFadin II

◗ Four homes and 14 residential lots in

Bryant’s Andres Gardens were recovered

at a $1 million foreclosure sale by Little

Rock’s Heartland Bank, owned since

August by Simmons Bank of Pine Bluff.

The former owner of the residen-

Correction

There were three data entry errors in last

week’s list of the number of doctors in

each county of the state:

Faulkner County has 207 doctors, ac-

cording to the Arkansas State Medical

Board, of which 194 are medical doctors

and 13 are osteopaths. It should have

ranked No. 7 among the counties on last

week’s list.

Drew County has 16 MDs and three

osteopaths, for a total of 19 doctors. It

should have ranked No. 31.

Desha County has nine physicians, eight

MDs and one osteopath. It should have

been tied for 50th. ■

tial property was Conway’s Touchstone

Developers LLC

, led by Robert and Susan

Etters

Bruno’s Ends Lunch

Bruno’s Little Italy, the venerable res-

taurant whose resurrection in 2013 con-

tributed to the resurgence of great dining

in downtown Little Rock, has discontin-

ued lunch, which was offered first in a

separate deli space, Bruno’s Little Deli,

next door and then in the restaurant

space, at 310 Main St., itself.

Owner Gio Bruno explains: “Because

we do everything from scratch, the

amount of extra prep and the amount

of payroll to accomplish that (as well as

having line cooks, servers and hosts each

day) has never allowed for a profit to be

made in our year-long experiment with

lunch. I do also believe that our numbers

have not increased due to no available

parking in the daytime. At night we have

free valet parking, but in the daytime if

there is the slightest bit of weather, we

lose all our walk-in business.”

U.S. Pizza in Texas

U.S. Pizza, the 46-year-old local chain

based in Little Rock, expects to open

its first out-of-state location, at 4206

Gibson Lane in Texarkana, Texas, in late

February or early March.

Sam Dickens is the franchise owner,

says Drew Weber, chief operating officer

of U.S. Pizza.

The 4,497-SF restaurant will employ

50-55 workers.

U.S. Pizza opened its first franchise

last summer in Jonesboro, and the Texas

shop will bring U.S. Pizza’s locations —

either franchisees or licensees — to 16.

Business continues to thrive, says

Weber, with sales hitting $18 million last

year.

Stay tuned for more news, he says. ■

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

Arkansas’ governor proposed a $5.6

billion budget on Tuesday that increases

funding for the state’s Medicaid program

while setting aside surplus money for

future tax cuts and highway needs, and

the Republican asked the state’s four-

year colleges and universities to freeze

tuition rates for in-state residents.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson proposed

increasing state

spending by about 3

percent for the fiscal

year that begins July

1. Hutchinson said

the proposed funding

increase is $100 mil-

lion less than what he

originally proposed

more than a year ago.

The bulk of Hutchinson’s proposed fund-

ing increase, nearly $138 million, would

go toward Medicaid.

“This budget is conservative in spend-

ing, increases our savings and invests in

the future,” Hutchinson told members of

the Joint Budget Committee. Lawmakers

are set to return to the Capitol in

February for a session focused primarily

on the state’s budget.

The Medicaid increase comes from

the expected rise in the state’s share of

the cost for the hybrid Medicaid expan-

sion under the federal health overhaul.

The federal matching rate for tradition-

al Medicaid has also decreased due to

improvements in the state’s economy.

The budget plan was presented days

after Hutchinson said he was seeking

less than originally planned in Medicaid

funding after the program’s enrollment

dropped by 117,000 from 2017 to 2018.

Hutchinson said the drop came from

better reviews of the program’s eligibility

and participants finding work.

Republican Sen. Bryan King com-

plained that Hutchinson is touting the

trimmed rolls after he and other sup-

porters of the program said ending or

winding it down could hurt the state’s

finances.

State finance officials said they expect-

ed moderate job gains and rising wage

income, predicting the state’s net avail-

able revenue will rise by about 4 percent.

Hutchinson projected the state would

have a $64 million surplus, and proposed

that nearly $48 million of that go toward

a reserve fund that he said could be the

foundation for future income tax cuts.

Hutchinson proposed setting the roughly

$16 million remaining from the surplus

aside for highway needs.

Hutchinson also asked the state’s

four-year colleges to freeze tuition rates

for in-state residents, citing a $10 million

increase in performance-based fund-

ing for higher education. Hutchinson

requested that two-year schools limit

their increases to the Consumer Price

Index

or below.

Democratic Sen. Joyce Elliott ques-

tioned whether the state was building a

surplus at the expense of other needs,

noting the budget proposal came a

day after the University of Arkansas for

Medical Sciences

announced it was lay-

ing off 258 people.

— The Associated Press

For daily news, register at ArkansasBusiness.com/Enews

Weekly

Report

Business

Arkansas

Asa

Hutchinson

Governor Floats $5.6B Budget,

Seeks College Tuition Freeze

Government

Timber Automation of Hot Springs

said Wednesday that it will spend more

than $3.5 million to expand customer

support, engineering and manufactur-

ing at its 145,000-SF facility. The move

includes hiring 50 people.

John Steck, Timber Automation’s presi-

dent, said the company, which provides

custom equipment and control systems

for woodyards and sawmills, aims to keep

pace with demand. “By creating more than

50 new jobs, we will ensure that Timber

Automation can continue to design, man-

ufacture, sell and support industry-lead-

ing equipment for our customers,” he said

in a news release. “Additionally, capital

improvements like our new CNC boring

mill will allow us to increase our produc-

tion capacity and improve product qual-

ity while also creating more high-skilled

manufacturing jobs.”

— Arkansas Business Staff

WASHINGTON — Republican Rep.

Steve Womack of Arkansas has been

tapped to chair the House Budget

Committee

The House Republican Steering Com-

mittee

chose Womack to replace Rep.

Diane Black, who has stepped aside to focus

on a gubernatorial run in Tennessee. The

steering committee is a leadership group

generally aligned with top Republicans

like House Speaker Paul Ryan.

The budget panel’s chief job is to draft

an annual budget document that out-

lines GOP priorities and can set a fast-

track path for legislation such as last

month’s tax overhaul.

“There’s no doubt it’s a huge chal-

lenge. I’m excited for the chance to lead

such an important committee in pursuit

of a budget resolution that will address

our nation’s priorities while putting

America on a sustainable fiscal path,”

Womack said.

Republicans have sometimes strug-

gled to produce budget plans in elec-

tion years, and the challenging political

environment and narrow 51-49 Senate

majority only make the prospect more

challenging.

Womack is a member of the

Appropriations Committee, which focus-

es on writing agency budgets. Previous

GOP chairmen such as Black and Ryan

have hailed from the powerful Ways &

Means

panel, which has jurisdiction over

taxes, Social Security and Medicare.

“I believe Steve Womack is the right

man for the job of chairman of the Budget

Committee,” Ryan said. “Steve’s experi-

ence in the House, commitment to fiscal

conservatism, and relentless pursuit to

safeguard taxpayer dollars make him

extremely qualified to lead this impor-

tant committee.”

The selection must still be ratified

by the full GOP conference, but that’s a

formality.

— The Associated Press

Manufacturing

Government

Womack to Lead

Budget Panel

In U.S. House

Timber Automation

Plans to Add 50 Jobs

At Hot Springs Site

A New Economic Reality

Per Capita Income 2016

There’s a “new economic reality in the state

of Arkansas,” according to Metroplan, the

planning agency for central Arkansas.

Benton County, with per capita income in

2016 of $71,787, is far and away the county

leader in Arkansas in that measure. Pulaski

County, which was long No. 1 among Arkan-

sas counties in per capita income, stood at

second place in 2016, with per capita income

of $45,862.

The ﬁ gures were contained in Metroplan’s

recently released “2017 Economic Review

& Outlook,” reporting on economic trends

in the region. The report examines the

economy of the Little Rock-North Little

Rock-Conway Metropolitan Statistical Area.

The shift has been apparent for several

years. “Benton County’s income in 2015 was

nearly $72,000, not far from twice as high as

the state average of $38,000 and substan-

tially higher than Pulaski County (about

$46,000),” the report said.

“While the Little Rock metro remains larger

overall in both population and economic

terms, this change is suggestive of things

to come,” Metroplan said. “It is important

to remember that the economies of the

Northwest and Little Rock regions are struc-

turally diﬀ erent, more complementary than

competitive.”

Per Capita Income 2016

$80,000

$70,000

$60,000

$50,000

$40,000

$30,000

$20,000

$10,000

Benton U.S. Metro Pulaski Little Rock

County Average County MSA

Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Benton U.S. Metro Pulaski Little Rock

$71,787

$49,827

$45,862

$42,582

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

The University of Arkansas for

Medical Sciences said last week it is

reducing its workforce by 600 posi-

tions, which include 258 positions

that are occupied.

The move is projected to lower

expenses by between $26 million

and $30 million for the fiscal year

that ends June 30, UAMS spokes-

woman Leslie Taylor said. For the

entire fiscal year that starts July

1, the savings will be about $60

million.

Arkansas Business reported

in December that the university

was looking for ways to cut costs

amid a projected a deficit of $72.3

million for the current fiscal year,

which ends June 30. At the begin-

ning of the fiscal year, UAMS had

projected a deficit of $39.8 mil-

lion. UAMS said it had to cut more

than $30 million in expenses in

the current fiscal year to comply

with its budget as approved by the

University of Arkansas’ board of

trustees.

“Everything is on the table,”

Stephanie Gardner, interim chan-

cellor of UAMS, told Arkansas

Business last month.

“Over the last several weeks,

UAMS leadership has been con-

ducting a comprehensive review

of all programs to identify cost

savings and make adjustments,”

Taylor said in a statement last

week. “However, personnel is our

largest expense and we have come

to the extremely painful realiza-

tion that we can’t meet our budget

without also eliminating jobs.”

Taylor said in an interview with

Arkansas Business that jobs were

being eliminated “across all areas

of UAMS.” Taylor said she doesn’t

expect there to be more layoffs,

but she added that UAMS would

continue trying to cut expenses

and increase revenue.

UAMS is the state’s larg-

est public employer with 10,900

employees working in nearly every

county in Arkansas. UAMS’ physi-

cians see patients at places such

as Arkansas Children’s Hospital,

the John L. McClellan Memorial

Veterans Hospital and in clinics

across the state.

The bulk of UAMS’ revenue

doesn’t come from the state but

from providing clinical services.

Taylor said in the statement

that, like other academic medi-

cal centers around the country,

UAMS has had financial challeng-

es for many years, but has always

made up for any shortfall by using

reserve funds. “However, we are

depleting our resources and can-

not continue to do that and sustain

UAMS into the future,” Taylor said

in the statement.

At the end of June, UAMS’ unre-

stricted net assets, which would

be used to cover a deficit at the

end of the fiscal year, were about

$77 million. (The deficit includes

depreciation, which for the fiscal

year that ended June 30 was $66

million.)

— Mark Friedman

WEEKLY REPORT

Albert Rogers Yarnell, who helped build his father’s

Yarnell Ice Cream Co. of Searcy into a regional success and a

name synonymous with Arkansas and ice cream, died Jan.

7 at the age of 94.

Yarnell, who was also a civic leader

serving his hometown of Searcy and the

state, spent more than 75 years at the

company bought by his father, Ray Yarnell,

in 1932, the height of the Great Depression

in Arkansas. Albert Yarnell oversaw the

company’s first major plant expansion in

1951 and became president in 1974 after

his father’s death.

He was an inductee in the Arkansas Business Hall

of Fame at the University of Arkansas and was among

Arkansas Business’ 25 Living Legends in its 25th anniver-

sary issue in 2009.

And even after the privately held Yarnell Ice Cream Co.

closed in 2011, later declaring bankruptcy, Yarnell served

as an adviser to the new owners, the Schulze & Burch Biscuit

Co. of Chicago, which bought the assets of the company in

2012. “He has been a tremendous resource,” Kevin Boyle,

the president and CEO of Schulze & Burch, told Arkansas

Business in 2014. “He’s provided invaluable counsel to us as

we’ve brought the brand back.”

Among his civic pursuits, Yarnell served as chairman of

the Baptist Medical System board of directors in 2000 and

was a member of the board for more than 40 years. He was

a past president of the Searcy Lions Club and a former mayor

of Searcy.

— Jan Cottingham

State’s King of Ice Cream,

Albert Yarnell, Dies at 94

The changes we

make today shape

the possibilities

of tomorrow.

Sometimes, one small change can

create an echo that impacts the entire

community. That’s why U.S. Bank

proudly supports, invests and volunteers

in communities like yours. Because we

believe the changes we make today will

inspire even greater change tomorrow.

usbank.com/communitypossible

U.S. Bank

One Riverfront Place

North Little Rock, AR 72114

501.688.1000

Notable Death

UAMS to Cut 600 Jobs,

Put 258 Out of Work

Health Care

Albert

Yarnell

Job cuts at UAMS could save some $60

million in the next full fiscal year.

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

Kim Lewis finds herself

among this growing cast of

creditors in search of money

from her ex-husband.

Court filings indicate John

Lewis is delinquent on $1.3 mil-

lion owed in the 2012 property

settlement from the divorce.

Another $1.5 million, the last

installment on the $3.5 million

property settlement payout,

comes due in November.

“Now, he’s not even honor-

ing his monthly alimony pay-

ments,” Kim Lewis said. “I have

no choice but to go after him

in court, and I’m watching all

these other suits, too.”

The couple’s divorce was

finalized five years ago, but the

case has remained active as she

has battled to enforce its finan-

cial terms.

For the third time, Kim Lewis

is asking that delinquent prop-

erty settlement payments be

brought current. She also asks

that John Lewis be found guilty

of criminal contempt of court

with the possibility of imprison-

ment.

According to court filings,

he was found in contempt

of court in 2015 and 2016 for

failing to honor the terms of

the property settlement.

In addition to divorce court

issues, Lewis has federal tax

problems hanging over him.

A 2015 audit by the Internal

Revenue Service produced a

$1.7 million lien for 2013-14

taxes. The lien is attached to

his prized possession: a one-

third stake in the 300-acre

Quacker Jack Hunting Club,

about 5 miles southwest of

Stuttgart.

Despite his inability to make

good on his financial obliga-

tions in divorce court and else-

where, Lewis was able to repur-

chase ownership in Quacker

Jack in a transaction valued at

$1.3 million in July 2015.

“He’s in default on the prop-

erty settlement to me,” Kim

Lewis said. “He’s trying to dis-

pose of the duck club. That’s an

issue, and I’ll have to take that

before the judge.”

A court order, in place since

2016 after John Lewis was

found in willful contempt of

court, prevents him from sell-

ing or mortgaging his interest

in Quacker Jack or any other

asset without judicial approval.

Smoke Dog LLC, led by Steve

Creekmore of Fort Smith, claims

a security interest in the hunt-

ing club tied to a $1.4 million

loan currently in default. That

debt predates the court order

and IRS lien as does the 2015

sale and repurchase of the club

by John Lewis.

If Smoke Dog successfully

foreclosed on Lewis’ duck club

mortgage, that would wash the

property free from the IRS tax

lien as well as a $460,000 second

mortgage held by his ex-wife

reflecting delinquent money

owed on the property settle-

ment.

“There’s a lot of shenanigans

going on with that whole thing,”

Kim Lewis said. “Here we are

again. He sold the hunting club,

bought it back, but he can’t pay

for it. He will do anything to

hold onto it.”

Other Litigation

Walter Quinn’s RX Finance

LLC sued John Lewis in No-

vember to collect $1.3 million

allegedly owed on a loan to

Rock Exploration, a Quinn-

Lewis venture. According to

the lawsuit, the debt represents

money guaranteed by Lewis on

the 2011 loan.

The former friends and busi-

ness associates shared a lever-

aged lifestyle that now has cred-

itors knocking on their doors.

Both Quinn and Lewis are

dealing with foreclosure suits

that threaten their Little Rock

homes.

Quinn’s Riverview Point

mansion is days away from a

foreclosure auction after com-

bined judgments of $7.5 mil-

lion were awarded on Jan. 2 to

a pair of lenders with security

claims on the residence.

First in line is Malvern

National Bank with a $1.3 mil-

lion judgment. The $6.2 million

judgment in favor of Prosperity

Bank of El Campo, Texas, re-

flects the ballooning of a 2015

consent judgment of $4.9 mil-

lion from Tulsa’s federal court.

Lewis, meanwhile, steered

his JKL Investment Partners

LLC into Chapter 7 bankruptcy

on Dec. 11, following a fore-

closure action linked with his

Round River home. JKL lists

assets of $274,000 and liabilities

of $241,208. According to the

bankruptcy filing, Community

State Bank of Bradley holds a

$234,419 first mortgage claim

on the residence.

The JKL bankruptcy trailed a

$197,000 foreclosure action ini-

tiated by the bank in November

2016. After winding its way

through Pulaski County Circuit

Court for the better part of a

year, Community State dis-

missed the case and launched a

non-judicial foreclosure action

in connection with the loan that

originally totaled $215,000 in

2011.

Lewis creditors linked with

his failed Ram Venture Hold-

ings have stepped up pursuit

of $556,085 owed on loans that

he unsuccessfully tried to shed

in his 2005 Chapter 7 bankrupt-

cy.

Rebsamen Investments Ltd.,

led by Raymond Remmel, and

River Investments LLC, led by

Wesley Clark, were allowed

to maintain financial claims

against Lewis because he mis-

represented his financial condi-

tion in order to obtain the loans.

Collection efforts indicate

they believe Lewis might be

using his mother’s trust to hide

assets. Rebsamen Investments

and River Investments served

a writ of garnishment on the

Lynda M. Lewis Revocable Trust

as part of a ramped-up collec-

tion effort to start the new year.

So far, 16 writs served on

banks, businesses and the trust

have produced one hit among

three responses, all from banks.

The writs located $1,956 held in

a Bank of England account.

The Bellomy Group LLC,

a Dallas oil and gas consult-

ing firm, registered a $150,000

summary judgment against

John Lewis after he failed to

respond to its 2016 lawsuit in

Texas.

Little Rock’s First National

Title Co. is suing Lewis to

recoup $100,000 from the sale of

rice acreage adjoining the hunt-

ing club. He failed to disclose

that Kim Lewis held a second

mortgage on the property.

First National paid $100,000

to make good

on her finan-

cial claim from

the sale when

Lewis would

not.

“My hopes

and a lot of

people’s hopes

are that oil

prices come back and that his

fortunes are restored,” said Jim

Pender, president of First Na-

tional Title. ■

The Rock Plaza office building in Little Rock was once among the shared investments of John Lewis and Walter Quinn.

[PHOTO BY GEORGE WALDON]

Walter Quinn’s Riverview Point home is headed toward a foreclosure auction

in the wake of his diminished oil and gas wealth.

“There’s a lot of shenanigans going on with that whole thing.

Here we are again. He sold the hunting club, bought it back,

but he can’t pay for it. He will do anything to hold onto it.”

[KIM LEWIS]

Investor Debts:

Attract

lawsuits,

foreclosure

Continued From Page One

SPOTLIGHT: Banking & Finance

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

Member FDIC

Subject to credit approval

simmonsbank.com/borrow

Failure is not

an option.

You’ve fought hard for your gains and

know the importance of a well-developed

strategy. Whether you’re looking to avoid

tax landmines or planning a regulatory

compliance offensive, our bold, battle-

tested pros can help your financial

institution win the day.

Everyone needs a trusted advisor.

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bkd.com/fs | @bkdFS

Failure is not

an option.

You’ve fought hard for your gains and

know the importance of a well-developed

strategy. Whether you’re looking to avoid

tax landmines or planning a regulatory

compliance offensive, our bold, battle-

tested pros can help your financial

institution win the day.

Everyone needs a trusted advisor.

Who’s yours?

bkd.com/fs | @bkdFS

Failure is not

an option.

You’ve fought hard for your gains and

know the importance of a well-developed

strategy. Whether you’re looking to avoid

tax landmines or planning a regulatory

compliance offensive, our bold, battle-

tested pros can help your financial

institution win the day.

Everyone needs a trusted advisor.

Who’s yours?

bkd.com/fs | @bkdFS

Failure is not an option.

Everyone needs a trusted advisor.

Who’s yours?

bkd.com | @bkdFS

It didn’t take long for Arkansas Rep.

Steve Womack to hear from his friends

and fellow Arkansas Razorback fans.

Womack, a Republican who has rep-

resented the state’s 3rd District since

2011, voted for the tax bill that President

Donald Trump signed into law in

December. One of its provisions elimi-

nates the deductions for contributions

to university athletic foundations; the

donations provide major bucks for ath-

letic departments and give fans an inside

track to buy tickets. (Unlike most chari-

table donations, only 80 percent of such

gifts were deductible.)

Several athletic directors told ESPN in

December that eliminating the deduc-

tion would cost universities hundreds

of millions of dollars as donors lost an

incentive to give. Womack, who was a

colonel in the Army National Guard,

heard concerns from West Point Athletic

Director Boo Corrigan before the vote; he

heard more from others after.

“I had a text message one day from one

of my closest friends

who is a big supporter

of Razorbacks athlet-

ics that was like: ‘What

the heck?’” Womack

said. “As I explained to

him, there are going to

be casualties of a tax

reform plan this big.

We think the greater

good of our country is

served by passing what we passed.”

Womack said the tax plan, the first

major alteration since 1986, was meant to

eliminate the “hundreds and hundreds”

of special-interest deductions that have

been added to the tax code during the

past 30 years. Womack said he didn’t

agree unconditionally with all of the new

tax provisions, but he favored ending the

ticket-donation deduction.

“In order to accomplish the broader

goals of our tax reform agenda … obvi-

ously you’re going to have to eliminate

special interest credits and deductions

that have appeared in the tax code over

the last several decades,” Womack said.

The congressman said the deduction for

gifts that facilitate better tickets to sport-

ing events “was a victim of this particu-

lar tax reform.” He added that he didn’t

think everyday taxpayers should have to

“provide the subsidy necessary for peo-

ple to be able to have that kind of access

to certain athletic foundations.”

Razorback Foundation Executive

Director Scott Varady said 13 of the 14

SEC schools — excluding only Vanderbilt

— sent a letter to members of the U.S.

Senate in an attempt to save the deduc-

tion. He said the tax law is only a few

weeks old, so it’s impossible to determine

what the actual effect on fans’ contribu-

tions will be.

“I think a lot of our members of the

Razorback Foundation and supporters

of Razorbacks athletics understand the

true philanthropic purpose of our orga-

nization in terms of helping our student-

athletes all they can;

they support it for that

reason,” Varady said.

“We do not know with

any certainty what the

overall impact would

be any more than any-

one else does at this

point across the coun-

try. We are looking at

the best way to struc-

ture our program so that our donors can

maximize — whether it is tax deductions

or benefits they receive — to thank them

for what they do.

“We are in the wake of the tax law and

we are re-examining all aspects of that

and looking to see what the best way to

proceed is. I know my colleagues in the

Southeastern Conference are doing the

exact same things.”

Womack said the tax bill put “the ball

in the court” of the universities to figure

out how to proceed without the special

interest provision in the code.

He and other supporters of the tax

bill argue that by cutting rates and rais-

ing the standard deduction, it will leave

people with more money to spend.

“Far be it from me to predict or direct

where the discerning citizen is going to

take the windfall they are going to keep

in their paycheck,” Womack said. “That’s

a decision they have to make, and it’s a

case any university will have to make

in order to attract the fan base they’re

looking to attract: how to appease them

in the selection of seats. No question that

allowing people to keep more of their

paycheck is going to enhance their abil-

ity to enjoy a lot of things.”

Varady said he has heard that argu-

ment as well.

“Some have made the point to me

that once the tax cuts are implemented

people will have more money to pay for

their tickets rather than having to use it

through a deduction,” Varady said. “That

point has been highlighted to me, and I

suppose that is true. They’ll say people

will have more money in their pockets

and, if they truly want to do that, they

can still afford to. Is that accurate or

inaccurate? It remains to be seen.”■

Razorback Foundation

Braces for Tax Impact

By Marty Cook

MCook@ABPG.com

SPOTLIGHT: Banking & Finance

Scott

Varady

Steve

Womack

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

As ArkansasBusiness.com’s Dec. 19

scoop on Bank of the Ozarks’ decision to

shut down its mortgage operation drew

notice, a jolt of shock and fear spread

among the state’s mortgage bankers.

“This is mighty close to home and

scary. I’ve been doing mortgages for 25

years. Have never lost my job,” a mort-

gage banker at a different bank said in

an email.

Bank of the Ozarks, the state’s largest

bank and one of the most efficient profit-

generators in the country, said originat-

ing mortgages for resale on the secondary

market, as is typical, had become “chal-

lenging from a profitability perspective”

under the burden of new regulations. It

will continue to make select home loans.

Bank of the Ozarks reported $163.2

million in residential mortgage origi-

nation revenue in the first three quar-

ters of 2017, down 20 percent from the

same portion of 2016. But whether BOZ,

a multistate bank headquartered in Little

Rock, is a coal-mine canary or an outlier

is not clear — not even to other bankers.

Its decision came shortly after anoth-

er Little Rock lender, Eagle Bank & Trust,

went the opposite way; it snatched up

several veteran mortgage bankers from

IberiaBank (see story, Page 1) to expand

the home loan department established

under Lee Welfel three years ago.

“It does seem to be a little contradic-

tory trend there,” said Steven Plaisance,

president and CEO of Arvest Bank’s

mortgage division and Arvest Central

Mortgage Co., the biggest mortgage

operation in the state.

“We have not seen any kind of trend

that is alarming or would constitute

concern,” Matthew Lewis of Little Rock,

the current president of the Mortgage

Bankers Association of Arkansas, said in

an interview last week.

George Gleason, CEO of Bank of

the Ozarks, “is a smart guy,” said John

Allison, chairman of Home BancShares

Inc. of Conway, the holding company for

Centennial Bank. “Maybe he is seeing

something we are not.”

Eagle Bank declined to talk about its

strategy following the hiring last fall of

Bill Edwards, Chuck Quick, David Bryles

client had been “negatively affected.”

Iberia, which in 2017 had deposits of

$21.3 billion and offices in eight states,

said it is committed to providing loans,

including FHA loans, to homebuyers.

Since 2011, when the Justice

Department began its mortgage lending

crackdown, nearly two dozen lenders

have settled cases brought under the

federal False Claims Act. The fallout

has meant that mortgage lenders are

staying away from FHA lending, fear-

ing that errors will cost them millions,

said Laurie Goodman, co-director at the

Housing Finance Policy Center at the

Urban Institute of Washington, which

researches economic and social policy.

Mortgage holders have a no-loss

guarantee in handling FHA-insured

mortgages, but they have to certify that

“every line in a loan file is absolutely

correct and the loan complies with all

FHA rules,” Goodman said.

If either of those conditions turns out

to be false, she said, the fine could be

triple the loss amount. “And some of the

errors can be very, very small,” she said.

Some lenders have concerns about

participating in the FHA program

because the regulations aren’t clear,

Goodman added.

Ben Carson, HUD secretary, told

the Mortgage Bankers Association in

October that he was aware of lenders’

concerns about the FHA program.

“Lenders have rightly pointed out

that absolute perfection in the lending

process cannot be achieved, and that

borrowers bear the costs of compliance

through higher mortgage rates,” he said

in a speech documented on HUD’s web-

site. “We have heard these concerns,

and today I am pleased to announce

that HUD, in consultation with the

Department of Justice, is committed to

reviewing and addressing them.”

He asked for the association’s recom-

mendations.

“HUD’s objective ... simple,” Carson

said. “We want every good lender who

makes responsible loans, and services

them well, to feel confident that they can

participate fully in HUD’s programs,

serving borrowers and enabling hous-

ing to continue to spur our economy.”

Since the Great Recession and the

housing bust, most of the top mortgage

lenders in the United States have faced

charges of violating the False Claims

Act. For example, all five of the top

2011 lenders — Wells Fargo, JPMorgan

Chase, Bank of America, Quicken Loans

and Citibank — have been sued over

allegations of violating the False Claims

Act, Goodman said in a 2015 report.

This has resulted in billions of dollars

in settlements. (Quicken Loans’ lawsuit

remains open.)

In April, Jamie Dimon, chairman and

CEO of JPMorgan Chase, told share-

Whistleblowers:

$2.3M payday

reﬂ ects a trend

Continued From Page One

End of BOZ Mortgages May Not Signal Trend

By Gwen Moritz

GMoritz@ABPG.com

SPOTLIGHT: Banking & Finance

U.S. Properties with Foreclosure Filings

1,000,000

900,000

800,000

700,000

600,000

500,000

400,000

300,000

200,000

100,000

Source: Attom Data Solutions of Irvine, California:

900,000

800,000

700,000

1,000,000

600,000

500,000

400,000

300,000

200,000

100,000

Q1 2005

Q2 2005

Q3 2005

Q4 2005

Q1 2006

Q2 2006

Q3 2006

Q4 2006

Q1 2007

Q2 2007

Q3 2007

Q4 2007

Q1 2008

Q2 2008

Q3 2008

Q4 2008

Q1 2009

Q2 2009

Q3 2009

Q4 2009

Q1 2010

Q2 2010

Q3 2010

Q4 2010

Q1 2011

Q2 2011

Q3 2011

Q4 2011

Q1 2012

Q2 2012

Q3 2012

Q4 2012

Q1 2013

Q2 2013

Q3 2013

Q4 2013

Q1 2014

Q2 2014

Q3 2014

Q4 2014

Q1 2015

Q2 2015

Q3 2015

Q4 2015

Q1 2016

Q2 2016

Q3 2016

Q4 2016

Q1 2017

Q2 2017

Q3 2017

Q4 2017

IberiaBank

of Lafayette,

Louisiana, agreed

in December to

pay $11.7 million

to settle allega-

tions by Arkansas

whistleblowers that

it filed false claims

for mortgage loan

guarantees.

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

and James Quick. “I can say we are still

bullish on the Secondary Mortgage

Market and believe there is a good future

for Eagle Bank in this market,” Chairman

Cathy Owen said in an email.

More, More, More

This is not up for debate: Regulations

have changed the industry since the

financial crisis that will mark its 10th

anniversary this year.

In explaining its exit

from secondary market

mortgage lending, BOZ

specifically mentioned

QM, TRID and HMDA,

acronyms for the

regulations designed

to protect consum-

ers from unsuitable or

predatory mortgages

and the investors who buy securities

made up of bundles of mortgages.

“There’s no question that the cost of

running an appropropriate mortgage

banking division is different today than

it was five years ago or 10 years ago,”

Plaisance said. “Oversight is much more

significant, and it’s not surprising to see

people decide to step by the wayside,

particularly as the outlook on mortgages

is finally starting to shift away from all

those refinances and to a purchase-ori-

ented market in the years to come.”

Mortgage bankers acknowledge that

the practices — from juiced appraisals

to “liar loans” and incentives for steering

borrowers into predatory rates — that

combined to create the mortgage crisis

had to be reined in. But cheaper and

easier are not part of the formula.

“The cost of doing a loan continues

to go up,” Lewis said. “There are extra

steps. There are extra ways that we are

doing homework on the borrower, on all

parties involved in a transaction.”

Even the seller of the property now

gets checked out to make sure that there

is no pattern of scam transactions. And

a borrower may be asked to explain any

unusual checking account activity.

“Ten years ago, there were about five

ways you could end up not closing a

loan,” Lewis said. “Now we believe it is

closer to 30 or 45 data points.”

The additional costs, he said, are

being shared by the borrower in the

form of higher fees and the originating

lender in the form of a tighter margin —

too tight, it turned out, for Bank of the

Ozarks.

For that extra cost, the borrowers

and investors are getting more protec-

tion while the loan originator takes on

more liability. An unsuitable mortgage or

one made incorrectly can come back to

haunt the originator at any point before

it is paid off, Lewis said.

And the mortgages being made are

better. In the third quarter of 2017, fore-

closures nationwide fell back to 2006

levels, according to Attom Data Solutions

of Irvine, California.

Leveling the Playing Field

One benefit that the regulations have

brought to mortgage bankers, Lewis said,

is a level playing field. Because every

loan sold on the secondary market must

fit in the same box called QM, qualified

mortgage, originators can generally trust

that competitors must go through the

holders in the bank’s annual report that

it exited FHA lending because of the

“aggressive use of the False Claims Act.

“Overly complex regulations have

made FHA lending risky and cost pro-

hibitive for many banks,” Dimon said.

“In fact, FCA settlements wiped out a

decade of FHA profitability, and sub-

sequent losses have kept returns on

capital solidly below our target. This

has led us to scale back our participa-

tion in the FHA lending program ... and

we are not alone.”

He said FHA loans from lenders

other than banks have increased from

about 20 percent in 2011 to 80 percent

in 2016.

In 2014, JPMorgan Chase agreed

to pay $614 million for submitting

false claims for FHA-insured and

Department of Veterans Affairs loans.

“There’s no question that there were

some loans made that shouldn’t have

been made,” Goodman said about the

settlements.

Lenders who have the authority to

originate and underwrite mortgages

for FHA insurance have the benefit of

a no-loss guarantee. If a homeowner

defaults on an FHA-insured mortgage,

the mortgage holder can file a claim

with HUD for the losses tied to the

default.

Leading up to the Great Recession,

lenders were encouraged to help peo-

ple “live the American Dream,” said

William H. Byrnes, a law professor at

Texas A&M University School of Law.

As the country would learn after

2008, several lenders failed to conduct

due diligence when approving loans,

he said.

A number of banks decided to “turn

a blind eye” to the regulations because

other lenders were approving loans

without verifying applications, Byrnes

said. The lenders’ thinking was “what

could go wrong?” he said.

A lot, it turned out.

Since 2008, Fannie Mae and Freddie

Mac, which bought single-family resi-

dential mortgages from mortgage com-

panies and other banks, have reported

net losses of $208 billion in their single-

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MORTGAGE CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

WHISTLEBLOWERS CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

George

Gleason

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

family mortgage business, according

to a 2013 whistleblower lawsuit filed in

New York against PHH Mortgage Corp.

and PHH Corp. of Mount Laurel, New

Jersey. PHH settled the False Claims

Act allegations tied to mortgage lend-

ing in August for $74.4 million.

Iberia’s Allegations

The allegations in the whistleblow-

er case against IberiaBank echo simi-

lar charges against other lenders: that

it certified mortgage loans that did not

meet HUD underwriting and origina-

tion requirements, making the loans

ineligible for FHA insurance.

Shackleford, one whistleblower,

began working for IberiaBank in

August 2010 as its controller. She

stayed in that position earning about

$72,000 annually until February 2013,

when she resigned to work part time as

an executive administrative assistant

to Iberia’s Little Rock branch president

and CEO at the time, Bill Edwards. She

earned $48,000 in that position but left

the company in January 2015, accord-

ing to the lawsuit.

The other whistleblower, Mills,

started in 1991 and worked for

IberiaBank until August 2015 as a loan

servicing manager. (Edwards has since

joined Eagle Bank & Trust of Little

Rock. See story, Page 10.)

“During their employment at Iberia,

[Shackleford and Mills] became privy

to intimate details regarding Iberia’s

mortgage lending and payroll prac-

tices,” the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit, however, didn’t offer

many details about the allegations.

The whistleblowers alleged that

when IberiaBank submitted mortgag-

es to the U.S. government for FHA

insurance, IberiaBank said the loans

met HUD requirements when it knew

they didn’t, the suit said.

The whistleblowers also alleged

that IberiaBank committed other HUD

violations, including continuing to pay

commissions to its underwriters after

it had been warned not to in 2010.

A HUD review of IberiaBank in 2010

said the bank was not in compliance

with the underwriters’ commission

prohibition, according to the Justice

Department’s Dec. 8 news release.

IberiaBank told HUD that it wasn’t

paying the underwriter commissions,

the news release said.

But Shackleford said in the suit that

after a December 2014 IberiaBank

management meeting she saw “cer-

tain payroll records and documents

showing calculations of underwriter

commissions based on loan volume,

confirming that Iberia’s underwriters

were paid commissions based upon

the number of loans they approved.”

As a result, the FHA paid insurance

claims on numerous defaulted mort-

gage loans that “IberiaBank knew,

or should have known, did not meet

HUD’s requirements and were ineli-

gible for FHA insurance.”

One of the whistleblowers’ attor-

neys, Joel Hoover of the Little Rock

law firm Newland & Associates, said

his clients didn’t want to comment

and declined to provide more details

of the alleged wrongdoing. The Justice

Department also declined to com-

ment.

Iberia said in a press release in

October that it estimated the potential

damages were between $6 million and

$17 million. It said it entered into a

settlement agreement for $11.7 million.

The Justice Department seemed

pleased with the settlement.

“This settlement demonstrates

HUD [Office of Inspector General’s]

commitment to work with our partners,

under the False Claims Act, to combat

fraud against the Government,” Jeremy

Kirkland, acting deputy inspector gen-

eral for the HUD OIG, said in the news

release. “Today’s settlement should

serve as a cautionary tale that we will

continue to aggressively utilize it in

pursuit of those that seek to under-

mine federal housing programs.”■

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MORTGAGE CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11

WHISTLEBLOWERS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11

same steps and reject the same unquali-

fied borrowers.

“Being a loan officer has changed,”

he said. “It has basically forced loan offi-

cers to become masters of their trade.”

And educating them, as well as custom-

ers, is a goal of the Mortgage Bankers

Association of Arkansas, Lewis said.

While the bottom line might not be

attractive enough for Bank of the Ozarks,

Allison still likes what he’s seen at

Centennial Bank.

“We are committed (at least for now)

to continued growth in the space,” he

said in an email. “When done properly

the space is very profitable.”

Mortgage banking accounted for

about $8 million in profit in 2017, which

Allison said was about 4 percent of Home

BancShares’ net income.

At Arvest, which did almost $2 bil-

lion in mortgages in

2017 and services $53

billion in mortgages in

all 50 states, the flood of

refinancing has slowed;

Plaisance expects refis

to be 30 percent or less

of total originations this

year. But the thought of

not making home loans

is, well, unthinkable.

“We love the mortgage business.

Getting out of mortgages would be almost

like getting out of ATMs,” he said. ■

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

Largest Mortgage Lenders

Ranked by total value (in millions) of Arkansas mortgages originated in 2017

Company

Address

Phone, Fax, Website

Total 2017 Value

% Change from

2016

No. Originated

Average Origination

Value

No. of

Locations

Mortgages

Serviced

No. Serviced Top Mortgage Executive

Arvest Bank

106 Parkwood St., Lowell 72745

(800) 232-5524, (479) 770-8527, www.Arvest.com

$771.9

-6.4%

4,546

$169,798

60 $8,824.0

72,398

Steven Plaisance

President & CEO, Arvest Mortgage Division and

Central Mortgage Co.

IberiaBank Mortgage Co.

12719 Cantrell Road, Little Rock 72223

(501) 537-8400, (501) 537-1160, www.IberiaBankMortgage.com

$388.2

-11.2%

2,238

$173,457

12 — Ryan Atkins

EVP & Director of Mortgage Production

Simmons Bank

501 S. Main St., Pine Bluff 71601

(870) 541-1000, (870) 541-1154, www.SimmonsBank.com

$377.1

-18.7%

2,228

$169,258

11 $0.0

Rick Anderson

Senior Vice President

Bank of Little Rock Mortgage Corp.

15909 Cantrell Road, Little Rock 72223

(501) 219-9100, (501) 224-8597, www.BLRMortgage.com

$318.8

4.6%

1,780

$179,119

7 $0.0

Scott McElmurry

President & CEO

Regions Mortgage

400 W. Capitol Ave., Little Rock 72201

(501) 371-7005, (501) 371-7020, www.RegionsMortgage.com

$289.6

16.8%

1,746

$165,883

85 — Keith Smith

SVP

U.S. Bank Home Mortgage

821 W. Main St., Heber Springs 72543

(501) 362-7346, (501) 362-2132, www.USBankHomeMortgage.com

$282.9

-13.4%

761

$160,870

44 $2,597.9

25,735

Brandon Clemons

Regional Manager

First Security Bank

314 N. Spring St., Searcy 72143

(501) 279-3400, (501) 907-4131, www.FSBank.com

$216.6

-13.0%

1,375

$157,507

19 $2.5

Gwen Anderson

SVP

Mike Milner

Mortgage Operations Manager

Eagle Bank & Trust Co.

650 Shackleford Road, Suite 150, Little Rock 72211

(501) 362-5821, (501) 362-9348, www.EagleBank.com

$148.6

44.5%

—

6 — Lee Welfel

President of Mortgage Lending

Bear State Bank

1401 Hwy. 62-65 N., Harrison 72601

(479) 718-2226, www.BearStateBank.com

$124.2

-22.9%

687

$180,719

5 — D.J. Wells

President Mortgage Loan Division

BOK Financial (dba Bank of Arkansas Mortgage)

1401 SE Walton Blvd., Suite 101, Bentonville 72712

(479) 254-2840, (479) 271-2431, www.BankofArkansas.com/

Mortgage

$107.4

-32.2%

709

$151,519

3 $23,099.2

140,754

John Curreri

Regional Manager

First Financial Mortgage

12921 Cantrell Road, Suite 105, Little Rock 72223

(501) 227-7087, (501) 228-6159, www.FFB1.com

$104.8

-18.3%

690

$151,905

7 $0.0

Rod Beckham

Mortgage Division President

Arkansas Federal Credit Union

2424 Marshall Road, Jacksonville 72078

(501) 982-1000, (501) 982-3299, www.AFCU.org

$85.2

20.0%

513

$166,079

7 $119.5

1,051

Jeff Vint

VP of Mortgage Lending

Riverside Mortgage Co.B

1001 W. Markham St., Little Rock 72201

(501) 614-6161, (501) 614-6162, www.RiversideBank.com

$56.4

—

218

$258,716

2 $0.0

Stephen Davis

President

Carroll Mortgage Group Inc.

9101 N. Rodney Parham Road, Suite 1, Little Rock 72205

(501) 228-9797, (501) 228-4588, www.TCMGI.com

$32.4

-40.8%

208

$156,428

3 $0.0

James R. Carroll

President

First Arkansas Bank & Trust

2200 Wildwood Ave., Sherwood 72120

(501) 985-4055, (501) 833-1870, www.FirstArkansasBank.com

$32.0

-30.1%

—

1 — Mark T. Wilson

SVP & Chief Credit Ofcer

Sources: the companies. Other companies failed to respond to repeated survey requests. 1 Includes mortgages originated by parent company,

Riverside Bank of Sparkman

Researched by Roxanne Jones

Largest Mortgage Lenders

The List

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

TCB Investments LLC, led by James

Hoffman

and Brian Teeter, purchased

the Linda Lane Apartments at 2213 Linda

Lane. The seller is BNT Properties Corp.,

led by Bill Cobb.

The deal is financed with a one-year

loan of $488,000 from BancorpSouth

Bank

of Tupelo, Mississippi.

The 1-acre development previously

helped secure a March 2015 mortgage

of $1 million held by Central Bank of

Little Rock.

BNT bought the project for $450,000

in December 2007 from Oregon Trail

Properties Inc.

, led by Lawrence Mulloy.

Sultan Sale

A 3,000-SF convenience store and

eatery in North Little Rock is under

new ownership after a $370,000 transac-

tion.

Lake Lane LLC, led by Naser Abed and

Asim Awad, acquired the Chism Trail

Cafe & Store

at 300 Lake Lane. The seller

is Sultan Inc., led by Chodry Cheema.

The 1.77-acre development previously

helped secure a December 2014 mort-

gage of $1.1 million held by Centennial

Bank

of Conway.

Sultan purchased the project for

$300,000 more than three years ago from

First Security Bank of Searcy.

Edgehill Manor

A 6,187-SF home in Little Rock’s

Edgehill neighborhood weighed in at $2

million.

Russ McDonough III and his wife,

Kimberly, bought the residence from the

Jane Hunt Meade Revocable Trust.

The property was acquired for $1.4

million in March 2005 from the E.

Sheffield Nelson Revocable Trust

Country Club House

A 3,229-SF home near the Country

Club of Little Rock sold for $655,000.

Meredith and Colin Pelton pur-

chased the house from William Edwards

Jr.

and his wife, Cynthia. The deal is

funded with a 30-year loan of $355,000

from Gateway Mortgage LLC of Jenks,

Oklahoma.

The property was bought for $185,000

in August 1991 from Watson Arnold Jr.

and his wife, Tricia.

Mirabel Abode

A 4,353-SF home in the Mirabel

Court neighborhood of west Little Rock’s

Chenal Valley development changed

hands in a $572,000 transaction.

Mohamed Kamel and Hoda Aref

acquired the house from Turner & Sons

Construction Inc.

, led by John Turner.

The deal is backed with a 30-year

loan of $515,250 from U.S. Bank of Cin-

cinnati. The residence previously was

linked with a February 2017 mortgage of

$420,000 held by BancorpSouth Bank.

The site was purchased for $80,000

in February 2016 from Byron Holmes

Construction Inc.

Ensbury Residence

A 3,600-SF home in the Ensbury

Place neighborhood of west Little Rock’s

Chenal Valley development drew a

$550,000 deal.

Paul and Kathy Young bought the

house from Liberty Construction LLC, led

by Mark Shepard.

The residence previously was tied to

a December 2016 mortgage of $416,000

held by First Security Bank.

Liberty acquired the site for $90,000

13 months ago from Deltic Timber Corp.

of El Dorado.

Heights Home

A 2,206-SF home in the Heights area

of Little Rock rang up a $515,000 sale.

Jamie and John Bizzell purchased the

house from William Rolston IV and his

wife, Candace. The deal is financed with

a 30-year loan of $515,000 from Regions

Bank

of Birmingham, Alabama.

The residence previously was linked

with a November 2013 mortgage of

$365,000 held by Riverside Mortgage Co.

of Little Rock.

The Rolstons bought the property

for $457,000 in October 2014 from DKB

Construction LLC

, led by William Wrape III

and Joseph Prause.

Condo Space

A 2,115-SF condo in downtown Little

Rock is under new ownership after a

$508,000 transaction.

Workroom Investments LLC, led by

Brad and Kathy Workman and James and

Gloria Croom, acquired the 15th-floor

space in the River Market Tower at 315

Rock St. The seller is RMT II LLC, led by

Jimmy Moses and Rett Tucker.

RMT purchased 757 SF for $220,000

in November from Rodney Watson Jr.

The balance of the space was owned by

RMT since the project was developed.

This 1,358 SF helped secure April 2014

mortgages of $18.6 million held by First

Security Bank and $3.3 million held by

Citizens Bank of Batesville and a June

2015 mortgage of $132,817 held by First

Security.

Pine Manor Dwelling

A 3,846-SF home in Little Rock’s Pine

Manor neighborhood sold for $506,500.

Theresa McCallie bought the house

from Guillermo Escobar and Alison Gi-

zinski

. The deal is funded with a 25-

year loan of $506,500 from Regions

Bank.

The property previously was tied to

a June 2013 mortgage of $417,000 held

by Arkansas Federal Credit Union of

Jacksonville.

The residence was acquired for

$462,000 more than four years ago from

Rush & Co., led by Ben Rush. ■

A 260-unit apartment complex in

North Little Rock weighed in at $12.7

million.

SCBP Lake Associates LLC, an affiliate

of Spring Capital in Philadelphia, bought

Lakewood Hills Apartments at 2400

McCain Blvd. The seller is RCP Lake-

wood LLC

, an affiliate of RCP General Inc.

of New York.

The deal is financed with a $15.8 mil-

lion loan from Latitude Management

Real Estate Capital III Inc.

of Beverly

Hills, California.

The 14.4-acre development previous-

ly was tied to a September 2007 mort-

gage of $9.5 million held by Capmark

Bank

of Midvale, Utah.

RCP Lakewood acquired the project

for $8.8 million in November 2002 from

Waterton Lakewood LLC of Chicago.

Breastaurant Buy

The Little Rock Hooters changed

hands in a $3.3 million sale-leaseback.

Hagop and Christiane Kouyoumdjian

of La Verne, California, purchased the 6

Anglers Way project from HOA Restau-

rant Holder LLC

of Atlanta.

The deal is funded with a two-year

loan of $2.1 million from Stearns Bank of

St. Cloud, Minnesota.

HOA Restaurant Holder bought the

1.7-acre location for $1.35 million in

September from Bass Pro Outdoor World

LLC

of Springfield, Missouri.

Taco Acquisitions

Tandem Taco Bell transactions tipped

the scales at a combined $3 million.

Realty Income Properties 22 LLC,

an affiliate of Real Income Corp. of San

Diego, acquired the 0.71-acre develop-

ment at 1809 N. First St. in Jacksonville

for $1.74 million and the 0.64-acre de-

velopment at 7201 JFK Blvd. in Sher-

wood for $1.25 million.

The seller is KMAC II LLC of Lafayette,

California. The properties previously

helped secure a November 2011 mort-

gage of $4.6 million and a January 2017

mortgage of $9.3 million held by Wells

Fargo Bank

of Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

The eateries were purchased in No-

vember 2007 from CPCG KM AR 2 LLC

of Los Angeles: $1.42 million for the

Jacksonville project and $962,000 for the

Sherwood project.

Multifamily Purchase I

Apartment property in south Little

Rock drew a $1.36 million transaction.

Van Geuns Properties LCC, led by Noel

Muller

, bought the 24-unit Mabelvale

Apartments

at 7414 Mabelvale Pike, an

adjoining 1.2-acre parcel and nine units

at 3518 Arapaho Trail and the neighbor-

ing six units at 3426 Arapaho Trail.

The seller is Town Creek LLC, led by

Rick Ferguson. The deal is backed with

a three-year loan of $1 million from Lit-

tle Rock’s Bank of the Ozarks.

A year ago, Town Creek acquired the

Mabelvale units and land for $435,000

from 133 LLC, led by Keith Jackson, and

the Arapaho Trail units for $250,000 from

Elgin and Anita Junior.

Multifamily Purchase II

A 20-unit apartment project in Jack-

sonville rang up a $610,000 sale.

Lakewood Hills Hosts

$12.7M Transaction

Real Deals

George Waldon

Geor[email protected]

Lakewood Hills Apartments at 2400 McCain Blvd. in North Little Rock. [GRAPHIC BY TRE BAKER]

$12.7M Transaction

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

The trucking industry was one of the

stronger proponents of the tax overhaul

that President Donald Trump signed into

law in December.

The American Trucking Associations

joined Trump at an event in Harrisburg,

Pennsylvania, in October to call for a

new tax plan before the end of the year.

On Dec. 20, the day the Tax Cuts & Jobs

Act

was passed by Congress and sent to

the president, the ATA issued a celebra-

tory news release.

“America’s economic engine has been

ignited,” ATA President and CEO Chris

Spear

said in the statement. “President

Trump has said that ‘when trucks are

moving, America is growing.’ With his

signing of this bill into law, there will

be more trucks on our roads, making

the deliveries fueled by an expanding

economy.”

At least two Arkansas trucking com-

panies already have responded to the tax

reform plan.

The executive compensation com-

mittee of USA Truck Inc. of Van Buren

voted Dec. 29 to guarantee bonuses for

its executives. The company’s award of

what are, in essence, 2018 bonuses before

the end of the year helped USA Truck by

allowing it to claim deductions in 2017,

before a reduction in corporate tax rates.

The beneficiaries of the early bonus-

es were CEO and President James Reed,

Chief Commercial Officer Jim Craig and

CFO Jason Bates. USA Truck said Reed

would receive $200,588, Craig would get

$131,636 and Bates would get $84,623.

USA Truck reported third-quarter

profits of $409,000 in November, which

snapped a string of six consecutive los-

ing quarters. Reed said he expects the

company’s performance to continue to

improve.

The company created a bonus pool

that it said would allow it to deduct the

amount in the pool for the 2017 tax year.

By March 15, the company said, it will

award the bonuses — provided that cer-

Transportation

Marty Cook

MCook@ABPG.com

Truckers Toot Horn for Tax Cuts

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tain performance standards are met.

If any of the executives’ performances

exceed the standards, the executive will

be paid more than the bonus already

set aside; if any of the executives fail

to achieve the performance standard,

they will receive the guaranteed amount

regardless.

If any executive leaves the company

and forfeits a bonus, the amount forfeit-

ed will be distributed to the remaining

executives.

PAM Transport Inc. of Tontitown

announced last week that it will bump up

its pay per mile for company-employed

drivers and independent drivers. The

increase could be as much as 40 percent

but will be weighted according to the

driver’s experience and route, the com-

pany said.

PAM CEO Dan Cushman said the com-

pany has wanted to raise pay for a while,

but tough market conditions stood in the

way.

“We anticipate the strengthening cus-

tomer demand will drive rate improve-

ment in 2018 and, coupled with ben-

efits from recent tax law reform, allow

us to give this long-overdue increase,”

Cushman said.

Coincidently, of course, Spear

appeared in front of a Senate subcom-

mittee on Dec. 20 — the same day the tax

bill passed — to call for more highway

infrastructure investment. Any regular

reader of this space or anyone who has

ever driven anywhere should be familiar

with the massive and expensive prob-

lems bedeviling the country’s infrastruc-

ture.

“ATA’s proposed solution is the

Build America Fund,” Spear told the

Transportation & Infrastructure

Subcommittee

of the Senate Environment

& Public Works Committee

. “The fund

would be supported with a new, indexed

20-cent per gallon fee built into the price

of transportation fuels collected at the

terminal rack, which will generate nearly

$340 billion over the first 10 years. This

proposal will stabilize the trust fund for

many years and provide the resources

necessary to reduce the project backlog.”

The federal fuel tax hasn’t been

raised since 1993, and the Highway Trust

Fund

spent more than $9 billion more

than it raised in 2016. The American

Transportation Research Institute

, which

collects and analyzes data for the truck-

ing industry, released a 63-page report on

Nov. 8, “A Framework for Infrastructure

Funding

,” which said a 20-cent fuel tax

increase would still leave the Highway

Fund short by $730 billion by 2026.

Trump spoke of a massive infrastruc-

ture program while campaigning, but

the idea has since lost steam as a White

House priority. For trucking companies,

an improved infrastructure could result

in drastic expense savings on fuel, main-

tenance and delays. ■

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

Most Read Stories of the Week

ArkansasBusiness.com’s most popular stories for the week ending Jan. 11:

1. UAMS to Cut 600 Positions, Including 258 Occupied

Move projected to lower expenses by between $26 million and $30 million for current ﬁ scal year.

2. UAMS Shakes Up Conway Hospital Rivalry

Conway Regional sees Baptist Health partnering with state-supported UAMS as unfair competition.

3. Capital Bank CEO Kyle Patton ‘On Leave’

Banking insiders say Capital SVP Tracy Duke may be replacing Patton as CEO.

4. Group Proposes Casino Amendment to Fund Highways

Amendment would authorize three casinos, allocate 65 percent of tax revenue to state highway fund.

5. Asa Hutchinson, Others React to DOJ Policy Change on Marijuana

Governor wonders whether DOJ will distinguish between medical and recreational marijuana.

“If it generates $45 million a year, that’s roughly 10 per-

cent of our shortfall, but we have also said all along that

if something’s going to be done to generate an addition-

al $400 million a year for highway improvements, that

it’s not all going to come from the same source.”

— SCOTT BENNETT, director of Arkansas Department of Transportation

Marci Manley was holed up at home

taking Tamiflu, determined to shake her

symptoms before the first day of her new

job, new career, new life.

After nearly a decade in TV news,

including three years as a top investiga-

tive reporter at KARK/Fox 16 in Little

Rock, Manley left her first love, journal-

ism, for a state PR job that better suits her

marriage and family plans.

She started Jan. 4 as deputy chief of

communications at the Department of

Human Services

, where she’ll work for

Amy Webb, the agency’s chief of commu-

nications and community engagement,

and another reformed reporter.

“A lot of the decision stemmed from

personal timing and family obligations,”

said Manley, 30, who made her bones

with deeply reported investigations like

her collaboration with the Huffington

Post

on the resurgence of gang violence

in Little Rock.

“Journalism is a noble profession,

despite all you hear, but it takes a lot of

time, especially to do the kinds of stories

I was doing. People expect you to be

available pretty much 24/7, and in the

context of starting a family, that was less

attractive. I want to give everybody in my

life a fair shake.”

That would include her fiance and

his 5-year-old daughter. Better pay was

another factor; DHS offered Manley a

$69,776 salary.

“That’s way more than she was likely

making in TV news,” said

Amy Barnes,

the University of Arkansas at Little Rock

public relations professor who was a top

local anchorwoman, producer and assis-

tant news director before making a deci-

sion much like Manley’s. She left KARK

in 1990 to oversee communications

for Dr. Joycelyn Elders at the Arkansas

Department of Health

. She later worked

at AETN, Arkansas Children’s Hospital

and UALR’s communications office.

Barnes enjoys teaching and has pub-

lished a new book, with

Baylor University

Professor Marlene S. Neill, “Public

Relations Ethics: Senior PR Pros Tell Us

How to Speak Up and Keep Your Job.”

“The reason I made the job shift was

that TV journalism will chew you up

and spit you out,” Barnes told Arkansas

Business a week ago. “I didn’t have a life

otherwise, and I was fast approaching

40. The hours are long and demands are

great, and of course you don’t get rich. So

journalists have left for PR jobs for years

and years.”

With many news organizations laying

off reporters and many PR firms hir-

ing, anecdotal evidence suggests that the

trend is accelerating. The latest numbers

Barnes has seen show that PR is one of

the 10 fastest-growing professions in the

country, and the pay gap between report-

ers and PR pros continues to widen. In

2004, a reporter made 71 cents for every

dollar earned by a PR specialist, accord-

ing to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

A decade later, that figure was 65 cents to

the dollar, with an average reporting sal-

ary of $35,600 compared with PR salaries

averaging $54,940.

“I’ve talked to other journalists who

have gone to PR, and the first reaction

is to fight wanting to run home and

take a bath every five minutes,” Barnes

said with a laugh, quickly adding that

the revulsion stems from a basic mis-

understanding of PR’s highest goals.

“They come in thinking the job is mak-

ing somebody look good no matter what.

But that’s not what we’re here for. Our

book shows that top PR professionals

use influence strategies to coax senior

people into making the right decisions.”

The change won’t be the first PR

foray for Manley, whose Arkansas roots

were a selling point in KARK promo-

tional ads. (She was a teenage columnist

at the

Brinkley Argus, a top graduate at

Lee High School in Marianna and later a

Chancellor’s Scholar at the University of

Arkansas

. She now attends the Bowen

School of Law

at night.)

After years of general-assignment

reporting in Little Rock and earlier at

KNWA in Rogers, Manley spent eight

months as a nonprofit

communications spe-

cialist for the American

Red Cross

. KARK soon

lured her back with a

made-to-fit investiga-

tive position, but after

three more years in the

spotlight, Manley is

clearly ready to ply her

storytelling skills for DHS, the state’s

largest agency with 7,500 employees

serving 1.2 million Arkansans a year.

Manley hopes to help modernize the

department’s messaging, producing

explanatory content, including video

and digital media that isn’t “bogged

down in alphabet soup or departmental

lingo.” She’s wants stories that are “shar-

able, informative and geared to telling

people that there’s a wide range of servic-

es available to make their lives better.” ■

Reporter Turns to PR;

It’s Not Shocking News

ArkansasBusiness.com

DAILY ONLINE NEWS

With You On the Go

KMas[email protected]

Outtakes

Kyle Massey

It’s Not Shocking News

Publisher Editor Online Editor Print/Digital Reporter

Mitch Bettis Gwen Moritz Lance Turner Sarah Campbell-Miller

@mitchbettis

@gwenmoritz

@LT

@ArkNewsGirl

Marci

Manley

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

The would-be buyers of the smallest

bank in Arkansas have withdrawn their

application to acquire Community State

Bank

of Bradley.

However, the move reflects a reshuf-

fling of players, not a waning of the

group’s interest in the $14.5 million-

asset lender.

“We’re not done with it,” said Jeff

Hobbs

, who is leading the purchase

effort. “We’ll regroup and refile.”

The acquisition group intended to pay

$2.35 million for the Lafayette County

bank, which operates with a staff of six.

Community State recorded a $14,000 loss

through the first nine months of 2017.

The proposed investors included

Hobbs, a branch manager for First Na-

tional Bank

of Hughes Springs, Texas,

and former president of Bloomberg

State Bank

in Atlanta, Texas; Taylor

Chandler

, senior vice president and

commercial loan officer at City Bank

in Plano; and

Derick Murway, president

of Montage Development, an upscale

homebuilder in Southlake, Texas.

Hobbs said a new investor will be

joining the group, and the acquisition

will now involve acquiring the stock of

the bank’s parent company, Allcorp Inc.

Allcorp entered bankruptcy court 18

months ago, filing Chapter 11 to stave

off a foreclosure by Little Rock’s Heart-

land Bank

. Allcorp owes Heartland $1.3

million, a debt secured by the holding

company’s ownership of Community

State Bank.

If the $2.35 million price holds and

the Heartland debt is repaid, about $1

million would remain for Allcorp share-

holders.

Most of the stock is owned by Alex

Golden

, president of the holding com-

pany, and Lex Golden, Allcorp chair-

man and CEO. Each owns 39.28 percent,

worth a combined $785,600 after the

Heartland loan is repaid.

Most of that money would go to re-

pay two loans totaling $537,037 and

secured by the Allcorp stock. The loans

are held by

Riverside Bank of Sparkman

(Dallas County), which also holds a sec-

ond mortgage of $208,714 on Lex Golden’s

Little Rock home.

All three Riverside loans are linked

with the Chapter 7 bankruptcy of Golden

and his wife, Ellen, listing assets of $1.9

million and total liabilities of $7.7 million.

Simmons Bank of Pine Bluff stepped

into the shoes of Heartland in August

after taking over the $182 million-asset

bank’s capital stock through a foreclo-

sure auction.

The stock was collateral for a Sim-

mons loan to Heartland’s parent com-

pany, Rock Bancshares Inc.

“We think we can have this done

by March,” Hobbs said of the Allcorp-

Community State deal. “It’s going to ben-

efit Simmons. I appreciate them being

patient with us.”

Heartland Deconstruction

The countdown to folding Heartland

Bank operations into Simmons is under

the 60-day mark.

“That transaction won’t close until

February,” said

George Makris, chairman

and chief executive officer of Simmons

First National Corp.

The sale of three Heartland branches

to Relyance Bank of Pine Bluff is expected

to close during the first quarter as well.

The offices are at 4937 Hwy. 5 N. in

Bryant, 610 W. Fourth St. in Fordyce and

108 S. Main St. in Sheridan.

“Our guys have done a good job of

going in and shoring up the bank,”

Makris said. “Heartland had their prob-

lems, but they also had some really good

business, and we hope to keep that busi-

ness.”

Still taking shape is the sale of

Heartland’s biggest real estate asset:

Rock Plaza, the 54,772-SF office build-

ing at 1 Information Way in Little Rock’s

Riverdale area.

“We’ve had several parties express an

interest in that building,” Makris said.

Simmons is focusing its office efforts

on occupying the 188,460-SF

Acxiom

headquarters at 601 E. Third St. in down-

town Little Rock.

The 12-story office building and sup-

porting five-story parking deck were

purchased by Simmons last year for $25

million.

About 100 Simmons staffers are work-

ing there in advance of a floor-by-floor

renovation to be completed this year. ■

Banking

George Waldon

Geor[email protected]

George Makris, Jr., CEO of Simmons First

National Corp. [PHOTO BY KAREN E. SEGRAVE.]

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PRESENTED BY:

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VIEW FINALISTS AT

WWW.ARKANSASBUSINESS.COM/HEALTHCARE

MARCH 28, 2018

11:30 AM - 1:00 PM

EMBASSY SUITES, LITTLE ROCK

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

everal widely different news reports

last week came together for us to

form a single question: Are upper-

level education administrators paid too

much?

First, the University of Arkansas for

Medical Sciences announced it was cut-

ting 600 jobs, a move that included laying

off 258 people, because of a $72.3 million

deficit.

Then, Gov. Asa Hutchinson unveiled

his $5.63 billion budget for the next fis-

cal year, and though he’s seeking an

additional $12 million for higher educa-

tion in the state, the governor is asking

the heads of the four-year institutions in

Arkansas to freeze in-state tuition rates.

He’s asking that two-year schools limit

their increases to the Consumer Price

Index or below.

Last April, Arkansas Business Editor

Gwen Moritz reported on what appears

to be a higher education “bubble,” writ-

ing: “Runaway inflation in the health

care sector is obvious to every American

family, but when a kid heads to college,

this fact hits home: The consumer cost of

higher education has inflated even faster

over the past quarter-century.”

And in August, Senior Editor Mark

Friedman reported on accelerating com-

pensation for executives at Arkansas

four-year public colleges and universi-

ties. Between fiscal 2012 and fiscal 2017,

he wrote, the typical compensation

increase for Arkansas university admin-

istrators was between 10 and 20 percent,

while inflation in the United States from

June 2012 to June 2017 was 6.7 percent.

The reasons for UAMS’ budget prob-

lems are complex, as are the reasons

for the ever-increasing cost of higher

education. But like Deyshia Hargrave

— Google her — who wondered why

a Louisiana school superintendent was

getting a $30,000 pay raise while rank-

and-file teachers hadn’t seen a pay

increase in years, we think it’s worth-

while to ask uncomfortable questions of

our taxpayer-supported institutions, one

of which is: Are the wrong people getting

the big bucks while programs and the

public suffer? ■

A Question

Of Priorities

Arkansas Business’ Opinion Page

Views

GMorit[email protected]

Editor’s Note

Gwen Moritz

Business

Arkansas

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Who Care

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EDITORIAL

ark Corallo’s resignation

as the media spokesman for

President Donald Trump’s per-

sonal legal team was reported as a rou-

tine Washington news story back in July.

Inside baseball stuff. His name was not

familiar to me, although he is appar-

ently a crisis communications veteran

who had worked under Attorney General

John Ashcroft during the George W. Bush

administration.

He quit after just a few weeks on the

job. The small stories that appeared at

the time suggested he didn’t need the

money enough to put up with the infight-

ing. Sounds about right.

Then Michael Wolff’s controversial

book “Fire & Fury: Inside the Trump

White House” was published — earlier

than originally announced to take mar-

keting advantage of the president’s melt-

down over a particularly unflattering

excerpt. And, assuming it’s not one of

the details Wolff got wrong in a book that

appears to have gotten the big picture

right, it seems that Corallo resigned for a

much more specific reason:

He thought the president and other

advisers, huddled on Air Force One to

craft a misleading explanation for a

meeting his son set up with Russian

operatives offering political dirt, were

likely obstructing justice.

This anecdote didn’t create a firestorm

of presidential tweets, as did the sec-

tion of the book in which Steve Bannon,

Trump’s former campaign manager

and later chief political strategist, was

quoted as saying that the meeting with

the Russians was likely treasonous. But

Jennifer Rubin, the Washington Post’s

most conservative columnist, took note,

giving Corallo the title of “distinguished

person of the week”

because he “wouldn’t join

in Trump’s skulduggery.”

Rubin wondered in

print why more White

House staffers cited in

Wolff’s book hadn’t quit

on principle. Then, par-

enthetically, might have

answered her own ques-

tion: “[S]adly, with this

president, the best and

brightest and most mor-

ally grounded people did

not go work in the White

House in the first place.”

In point of fact, the

Trump White House has had unusually

high turnover. The Wall Street Journal,

using data collected by the Brookings

Institution, reported late last month that

21 of 61 senior officials had already left

the fledgling administration, a rate that

was twice as high as the next-highest

turnover during a president’s first year.

Maybe some of them left on prin-

ciple, but not the big names. Michael

Flynn, the national security adviser

whom President Obama had specifically

advised Trump not to hire, was fired for

lying to the vice president — and has

since pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.

Sean Spicer. Reince Priebus. Anthony

Scaramucci, whose vulgar description of

Bannon may have been closer to correct

than I gave him credit for at the time.

Bannon doesn’t seem to have done

anything principled in his entire, miser-

able life.

I mentioned The Wall Street Journal’s

story about White House turnover on

Twitter, and an Arkansas business execu-

tive responded. The turnover rate doesn’t

matter, he said, as long as they are good

people who care.

Clearly, the turnover rate is nothing

like the most disturbing news out of the

White House. But it did surprise me that

a businessman would dismiss so cava-

lierly a worrisome metric like a very high

turnover rate — twice that of Reagan, five

times that of George W. Bush. Especially

since Donald Trump’s primary qualifica-

tion for the presidency was supposedly

his business savvy.

Most business executives I know at

least give lip service to the importance

of staffing, and I’ve never heard one

opine that good people are plentiful and

interchangeable. On the

contrary, good people are

hard to find and keeping

them is vital.

Turnover varies by

industry, but a much

higher rate than the norm

is a symptom of some-

thing. Either good people

aren’t being hired in the

first place or there’s a rea-

son good hires don’t stay.

Unusually low

turnover can also be

unhealthy. It can mean

hiring mistakes — and

everyone makes those

from time to time — are allowed to stay

on when they should be eased out, mak-

ing room for better hires. But unusually

high turnover is never a sign of a well-

managed, well-functioning workplace,

especially when a manager hasn’t inher-

ited someone else’s hiring mistakes. ■

Gwen Moritz is editor of Arkansas

Business. Email her at GMoritz@ABPG.

com.

Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

month or two ago I

wrote here about cou-

rageous authenticity —

the ability to speak and encour-

age dialogue about difficult,

challenging and even taboo

topics without anger, blame or

finger-pointing.

In the last few months we

have seen a perfect laboratory

for a leader’s test of courageous

authenticity. The recent flood of

women who have begun speak-

ing out about behavior that

ranges from inappropriate to

criminal creates a lightning-rod

topic for organizational lead-

ers. It is a challenging topic to

discuss openly — and it is an

incendiary topic to ignore. And

like so many topics that require

courage to address, harassment

in your workplace is not a topic

to put off.

There is not a lot of subtlety

in the decision. A leader is either

going to address harassment in

the culture of the organization

or pass and hope that it does

not become a major problem

— until it does. The days of

ignoring this issue and the peo-

ple it affects are gone, as well

they should be. Until recently,

women largely either colluded

out of a sense of hopelessness

(“Oh, boys will be boys.”) or felt

it utterly unsafe to say anything

or suffered in silence.

One common form of denial

about this issue is the appear-

ance that it is suddenly au cou-

rant for women to claim to have

been taken advantage of in ways

ranging from subtle, inappro-

priate behavior to sexual extor-

tion. It should not be a mystery

why there is “suddenly” such

a flood of complaints that an

entire movement is afoot. In

any infestation or plague, little

attention is generally paid until

enough cases are reported, and

then many who were silent raise

their hands — in this case, say-

ing #MeToo.

So after decades of turning a

blind eye to almost all women

who voiced a concern, it should

not be shocking that larger

numbers are speaking out at

time when there is at least hope

that their experiences will not

be dismissed out of hand.

One of the common say-

ings among my peers who run

Vistage CEO groups is that in

our businesses “we get what we

tolerate.”

A leader who tolerates bad

behav ior actively communicates

tacit approval. Harassment can

be an uncomfortable and emo-

tionally charged topic to talk

about. And the company that

does not address harassment

will see more of it — and even-

tually is likely to be addressing it

in court, or in the court of public

opinion.

Vistage speaker and nation-

ally acclaimed HR guru Hunter

Lott had this to say about how

companies should be preparing

for harassment problems, and

responding to them:

“If an employee feels that

he or she is a target of sexu-

al harassment or witnesses

harassing behavior, they should

be encouraged to voice their

concerns to management.

Handbook language that tells

victims to first address the issue

with the alleged harasser is mis-

guided. This takes management

out of the loop. An employer’s

corporate culture is manage-

ment’s obligation. This is a lead-

ership issue. Having a policy

against harassment and train-

ing managers on complaint pro-

cedures is the right thing to do.

It can also provide additional

legal protection. However, it’s

only as good as management’s

willingness to act. You can-

not abdicate your leadership

responsibility to a policy.”

Ironically, it turns out that

by ignoring the possibility that

there is harassment happening

in an organization, leadership

exposes the company to added

risk. Again, quoting Hunter Lott

in 2009 (What? You thought this

was only a 2017 issue?):

“Of the roughly 5,000 sex-

harassment complaints filed

with EEOC last year [2008], the

majority of them were based on

supervisors not responding to

initial complaints. Most firms

get into trouble because super-

visors don’t take complaints

seriously, so employees feel

forced to go outside the com-

pany to get someone to listen to

them.” ■

I. Barry Goldberg is an exec-

utive coach and Vistage CEO

group chair in central Arkansas.

Contact Barry at Barry.

Goldberg@EntelechyPartners.

com.

Time to Talk About Harassment

VIEWS

On Leadership

Barry Goldberg

Barry.Goldberg@EntelechyPartners.com

Congratulations

James “Jim” A. Bottin

Founder & Chairman

ABC Financial

John D. Correnti

(1947-2015)

Former Chairman & CEO

Big River Steel

Herbert H. McAdams II

(1915-2001)

Former Chairman & CEO

Citizens Bank of Jonesboro

Union National Bank of Arkansas

James Kirk Thompson

Chairman

J.B. Hunt Transport, Inc.

Friday, February 9, 2018

Statehouse Convention Center

Little Rock, Arkansas

Tickets to the black-tie optional event are available for $150 per person by calling 479.575.6146, emailing

abhf@walton.uark.edu or online at walton.uark.edu/abhf. Sponsorships at all levels are available by

contacting Leslie Manthei in the Sam M. Walton College of Business Oce of External Relations at

lmanthei@walton.uark.edu or 479.575.6120.

2018 Arkansas Business Hall of Fame Inductees

Arkansas Business welcomes

Letters to the Editors. Letters must

be signed and writers must include

their hometowns and contact

information so we can conﬁ rm

their identity. Letters are subject to

editing for clarity, length, spelling

and punctuation.

Letters may be mailed to Editor

Gwen Moritz, Arkansas Business,

114 Scott St., Little Rock, AR

72201; faxed to (501) 375-7933; or

emailed to GMoritz@ABPG.com.

January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

Architecture

Toni Wyre, a senior

associate at Polk Stanley

Wilcox Architects in

Little Rock, has been

appointed to the nation-

al board of directors of

the American Society of

Interior Designers

Economic Development

JD Lowery, manager of community

and economic devel-

opment at the Electric

Cooperatives of

Arkansas in Little Rock,

has been named state

director for Arkansas

on the board of direc-

tors of the Southern

Economic Development

Council

of Atlanta.

Education

Alyson Gill has been named provost

at the University of the

Ozarks

in Clarksville.

She was formerly

an associate profes-

sor of art history and

associate provost for

instructional innova-

tion at the University

of Massachusetts at

Amherst.

Ericka Gutierrez has been hired as

Hispanic and Latino

outreach initiatives

coordinator for the

University of Central

Arkansas

at Conway.

Mohammad Abrar

Alam

, assistant pro-

fessor of chem-

istry at Arkansas

State University in

Jonesboro, was recently recognized by

the Arkansas Biosciences Institute with

its New Investigator of the Year award

for 2017. Alam’s research work includes

three recent grants funded through the

Arkansas IDeA Network of Biomedical

Research Excellence, two involving novel

pyrazole compounds and an instrumen-

tation grant for cryogenic storage for

mammalian cells.

Catherine Calloway, professor of

English at A-State,

recently presented a

paper on American lit-

erature written about

the Iraq War at the

annual meeting of the

Arkansas Philological

Association

in Little

Rock.

Fabricio Medina-

Bolivar

, professor of plant metabolic

engineering at A-State, and Carole

Cramer

, professor of molecular biology,

along with graduate student Tianhong

Yang, were recognized by Altmetric for

their work with Worcester Polytechnic

and the University of Wisconsin on plant

tissue scaffolding. Their work was No.

53 on Altmetric’s Top 100 list of research

projects that have attracted the most

attention worldwide in 2017.

R.L. Qualls of Little Rock, the for-

mer CEO of Baldor Electric Co. of Fort

Smith, will be honored next month

as the 2018 national alumnus of the

year by Mississippi State University at

Starkville.

Financial Services

Christopher Dickie

has joined the loan

origination team at the

Little Rock branch of

First Community Bank

of Batesville. Dickie

was previously direc-

tor of admissions at the

University of Arkansas

Community College at

Batesville.

Health Care

Brad Holloway has been named clini-

cal director of Little

Rock Community Mental

Health Center

. Holloway

succeeds Lisa Evans,

who left the center in

September. Holloway

has more than 30 years

of experience in com-

munity mental health.

Dr. Steven Kempson,

a board-certified fam-

ily medicine physi-

cian, recently joined

the medical staff of

Northwest Family Care-

Westside

in Springdale.

Kempson received his

medical education

at the University of

Arkansas for Medical

Sciences in Little Rock and completed a

Submit news items to ArkansasBusiness.com/Movers

Movers

Shakers

Business

Arkansas

Toni

Wyre

Alyson

Gill

Catherine

Calloway

Christopher

Dickie

Brad

Holloway

Steven

Kempson

Ericka

Gutierrez

Lowery

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Arkansas Business January 15, 2018

family medicine internship and residen-

cy at the UAMS Area Health Education

Center in Texarkana.

Dr. Terry Angtuaco, a profes-

sor in the College of

Medicine’s Department

of Radiology at the

University of Arkansas

for Medical Sciences,

is one of 18 inducted

recently into the first

fellowship class of the

American Association

for Women Radiologists

Angtuaco joined UAMS in 1980 and

holds faculty positions in five depart-

ments across the colleges of Medicine,

Health Professions and Public Health.

Brooke Bumpers, Patti Luppen, Mike

Miller

, Barbara Sugg and Doug Wasson

have been elected to the board of direc-

tors for Arkansas Hospice of North Little

Rock.

Scott Durham, senior vice president

and branch manager

for Wells Fargo Advisors

in Jonesboro, is the new

chairman of the board

of directors of the St.

Bernards Foundation

The former football

coach at Arkansas State

University has been

with Wells Fargo for

almost 20 years.

John Stewart has been named direc-

tor of case management and social ser-

vices for Washington

Regional Medical Center

in Fayetteville. Stewart

graduated from the

nursing program

at North Arkansas

Community College and

also earned a bachelor’s

degree in nursing from

Oklahoma Wesleyan University. Before

joining Washington Regional in 2010,

Stewart retired from the Arkansas Game

& Fish Commission after 20 years.

Hospitality

Tina Archer has been hired by

Experience Fayetteville

as director of sales of

the Fayetteville Town

Center, an event venue.

Archer brings more

than 10 years of experi-

ence in the hospitality

industry to the position,

most of which was in

sales and marketing.

Most recently, Archer was director of

sales and marketing at the Hilton Garden

Inn in Bentonville.

Legal

Natha n R. Finch, Daveante Jones , Jessica

Pruitt Koehler

and Sidney L. Leasure have

joined the Little Rock office of Wright

Lindsey Jennings

as associate attorneys.

Finch attended the Culinary Institute

of America in New York and worked in

the hospitality industry for more than a

decade before attending the University

of Arkansas School of Law at Fayetteville.

He practices corporate law and estate

planning. Jones, also a graduate of the

UA School of Law and a former clerk for

Chief U.S. District Judge Brian S. Miller,

will practice labor and employment

law. Koehler, also a UA law graduate,

clerked for U.S. District Judge Kristine

G. Baker. Her litigation practice includes

insurance defense, medical malpractice

defense, product liability defense and

general commercial litigation. Leasure

has a degree from the Bowen School

of Law at the University of Arkansas at

Little Rock and an LL.M. in taxation from

the University of Florida Levin College

of Law. She spent three years in the tax

accounting department of Stephens

Investments Holdings.

Laura Johnson and Greg Northen have

been named directors at Cross Gunter

Witherspoon & Galchus

in Little Rock.

Johnson had been of counsel with the

firm since 2014. Northen had joined as

an associate in 2011.

Nonproﬁ ts

State Sen. Cecile Bledsoe, R-Rogers,

was recently recognized by AARP for

her work in support of family caregivers.

Bledsoe was one of nearly 100 elected

officials from more than 30 states to be

honored as a Capitol Caregiver for 2017.

Kathy White Loyd, the interim dean of

the College of Business at Arkansas State

University at Jonesboro, and Melanie

Taylor

, vice president of customer service

for Entergy Arkansas in Little Rock, have

been elected to the board of directors of

the Women’s Foundation of Arkansas. ■

Terry

Angtuaco

John

Stewart

Nathan

Finch

Laura

Johnson

Jessica

Pruitt Koehler

Daveante

Jones

Greg

Northen

Sidney

Leasure

Tina

Archer

Scott

Durham

Legal Notice

NOTICE

IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF FAULKNER COUNTY,

ARKANSAS

ESTATE OF JERRY LESTER, DECEASED

LAST KNOWN ADDRESS: 6271 Prince Street

Conway, Arkansas 72304

DATE OF DEATH: September 25, 2017

DOCKET NO.: 23PR-17-632

The undersigned has been appointed Administrator

of the above named estate on the 14th day of

December 2017.

All persons having claims against the estate must

exhibit them, duly verified, to the undersigned within

six (6) months from the date of the first publication

of this notice, or they shall be forever barred and

precluded from any benefit in the estate.

This notice first published on 15th day of January

2018.

Connie Lester

Administrator of the Estate of

Jerry Lester

c/o Paul Parnell

Rose Law Firm

120 E. Fourth Street

Little Rock, AR 72201

PROBATE NOTICE

THE DEADLINE

TO SUBMIT

LEGAL NOTICES

IS NOON MONDAY.

Submit your notices to [email protected].

For more info contact Bonnie Jacoby at (501) 372-1443 ext. 308.

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January 15, 2018 Arkansas Business

Bio: Charles Bowen

‘Chip’ Blanchard

Background:

Blanchard, 37, is the son

of bank CEO Charles

Blanchard and the

grandson of Wil-

liam H. Bowen,

the legendary

lawyer whose

name graces

the University of

Arkansas at Little

Rock law school.

Blanchard earned

a ﬁ nance and

marketing degree

from the Univer-

sity of Arkansas, and

worked for Metro-

politan National Bank

before joining First State

in 2011. ■

[PHOTO BY COREY S. KRASKO]

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To submit questions or interview suggestions, email GMoritz@ABPG.com

Exec Q&A

Business

Arkansas

This Week: Charles Blanchard

President and COO of First State Bank of Russellville

Why are community banks im-

portant? A community bank’s level

of success is often immediately tied

to the success of its local economy,

which gives it more “skin in the game”

and more incentive to support its

community than large bank competi-

tors have. Russellville is more impor-

tant to our bank than it is to any other

bank that has an oﬃ ce here since it

is the home of our company. Most

importantly, our proﬁ ts stay here

and are invested into our community.

Community banks truly have a vested

interest in seeing the community suc-

ceed as a whole.

What is the most common mis-

conception about community

banks? The biggest misconception

is that community banks don’t have

products or pricing comparable with

the large banks. The advancement

in technology has allowed commu-

nity banks to have product oﬀ erings

similar to those of larger banks, while

continuing to provide the superior

level of service that is expected of a

local business. There is also a miscon-

ception about pricing. There is a gen-

eral assumption that larger banks are

going to have more favorable pricing.

Whether you’re looking at deposit

products, rates or loan products, give

your local bank a shot.

What beneﬁ ts or problems do

you expect for banks from the

new tax overhaul? Lower taxes

will help in two major ways. First,

lower taxes will increase net earnings,

making it easier to build capital to

support growth. Second, hopefully, a

tax reduction will increase small-

business proﬁ tability enough to cre-

ate even more activity and demand

for expansion. And that will create

enough new activity to increase tax

revenue even at the lower rates.

Does First State Bank have

any expansion plans? With the

advancement in technology and

the reduced reliance on bricks and

mortar, expansion plans can take

on a diﬀ erent look then they have

historically. We plan on expanding

our balance sheet by continuing to

expand our customer base and the

geographic reach we have. Conve-

nience has been, and will continue to

be, one of the highest priority items

for customers. When our customers

have our cell phone numbers and

know where we live and how to reach

us, we are more convenient than

the large banks. It doesn’t matter

how many branches you have if a

customer doesn’t know how to reach

someone about a problem. We have

experienced 33 percent growth in our

asset base in the previous four years

without adding a branch. We will add

branches and they will likely be in

new markets, but that is certainly not

the only way we intend to grow.

First State Bank has $247.6 million in assets and  ve branches, four in

Russellville.

What is the best advice you

were ever given? That people are

the most important asset in banking,

which is especially true in community

banking. If you take care of your

people, they will take care of custom-

ers. In an industry driven by balance

sheet and asset quality ratios, our fo-

cus starts with our people. If we can

have the highest quality people, who

truly believe in putting the customer

ﬁ rst and supporting the communities

we serve, our success should take

care of itself. ■

FINTECH PREDICTIONS

FOR ARKANSAS

2018

With the founding of Systematics in 1968, Little Rock became the birthplace of ﬁnancial technology. Now, start-

ups from around the world and banks from coast to coast come here for 12 weeks in the summer for the VC

FinTech Accelerator. Keep your bank at the forefront of FinTech innovation with these insights from Wayne

Miller, Managing Director of the VC FinTech Accelerator.

In which area do you expect to see

the biggest growth in FinTech?

How can ﬁnancial institutions use

FinTech to engage millennials, the

underbanked and SMBs?

What advice do you have for a

bank interested in partnering

with a FinTech startup?

How can Arkansas be a bigger

player in the FinTech community?

THE VC FINTECH ACCELERATOR IS A PROGRAM OF THE VENTURE CENTER AND IS EMPOWERED BY FIS

KICK OFF

MAY 2, 2018

DEMO DAY

JULY 18, 2018

Your bank can shape the

future of FinTech.

The VC FinTech Accelerator is a rigorous 12-week program that helps 10 early-stage startups grow through training, connections & mentorship

designed and delivered by The Venture Center. This is your chance to learn about emerging FinTech solutions, gain a competitive advantage and

give valuable feedback to the entrepreneurs shaping the future of FinTech. Act quickly to reserve your spot. Email Brian Bauer at

brian@venturecenter.co today. Learn more at venturecenter.co/vcﬁntech.

The opportunities to create eciencies and im-

prove the customer experience are abundant.

Enabling banks to better serve their customers,

improve proﬁtability and better address the reg-

ulatory burdens will lead the eorts. Innovation

in payments, application of machine learning

and AI along with greatly improved regulatory

management will be a focus, and the continued

application of blockchain technology will create

faster, better and more secure transactions.

FinTech is helping the underbanked gain access

to tools that help them reduce the need to have

cash and leverage electronic payment and de-

posit methods. Banks are developing mobile

payment platforms that no longer require the

need to visit brick and mortar locations. Giving

access to these new technologies is enabling

anyone with a handheld device to bank any-

where. Millennials are using these resources for

mortgages, car loans, managing wealth and pay-

ments. Small businesses are getting access to

tools for cash ﬂow and inventory/supply chain

management that help them be better opera-

tors and enhance their ability to succeed.

We’ve had great success with our Accelerator

in Little Rock exposing bank leaders to innova-

tive solutions from early-stage companies. The

dedication and time given to the program by

hundreds of high-level banking executives have

been integral to this process. Banking leadership

recognizes that a collaborative approach is key.

Our program focuses on bank enabling solu-

tions that help banks be more relevant to their

customers. We’ve created an environment that

allows bank leadership and FinTech innovators

to work together toward a common goal. It’s

amazing what we seen. Two companies have en-

tered into formal reseller agreements with FIS.

Another company was endorsed by the Ameri-

can Bankers Association. Eighteen of 20 port-

folio companies have raised a combined $20

million in capital after Demo Day.

We have an advantage in that many of the

thought leaders associated with decades of Fin-

Tech innovation are here and willing to help.

Arkansas continues to develop its workforce

and continues to invest heavily in innovation.

The cost of living and quality of life here is very

appealing to early-stage companies who would

otherwise spend considerably more in major

markets like NYC and San Francisco. I think

that the state is doing great things to attract

companies to Arkansas. I am conﬁdent that Ar-

kansas will continue to gain signiﬁcant traction

as we demonstrate our ability to build world-

class solutions for the ﬁnancial community.