Kyle Kellams: Let's start this edition of Ozarks at Large with Michael Tilley in his office in Fort Smith. He's with Talk Business & Politics. Michael, welcome back to the program.
Michael Tilley: Hey, thanks for having me back.
Kellams: Let's talk about an addition to the River Valley. And that's the Mercy Cancer Center.
Tilley: Yes, the long-awaited cancer center. They ceremonially had a groundbreaking on Aug. 8 for their $41 million cancer center. It'll be attached to their existing area for their cancer services there on the Mercy campus in Fort Smith.
It was an interesting — there were well over 100 people at the groundbreaking. It was quite an event. It was interesting to hear from Dr. Daniel Mackey. He's the head of their cancer services and talked about there are roughly 5,000 people a year in this Fort Smith metro medical market, which is about 500,000 population, but about 5,000 a year — and that number is growing — that are diagnosed with cancer. And he said the growth and the number of people diagnosed with cancer is outpacing their ability to care for them. So this cancer center hopefully will begin to somewhat address that.
The new center is going to include about 20,000 square feet of added space. They're going to renovate between 15,000 and 20,000 square feet of existing space. They hope to have it fully open to patients — it's going to open in phases, Kyle — but they hope to have it fully open to patients by early 2027.
It's going to have a long list of new equipment, added infusion labs. They're going to expand their number of oncologists from four to eight. They'll expand the number of their advanced practice registered nurse oncologists from eight to 12. They're also hoping to have more surgical oncologists on board, and they hope to have at least four on board when it opens.
And I can tell you — I wish I didn't have this perspective — but I am a cancer survivor who used the Mercy services, and I can tell you this will be a welcome addition because those folks who work in there, they're kind of on top of each other now. Their infusion services share the lab with other parts of the hospital. You have to go to other areas for the screenings, for some of the testing. This, as somebody who's been through those services, is going to be a very welcome addition to the health care scene in the Fort Smith area.
Kellams: As long as we're talking about additions, let's talk about an additional six acres the U.S. Air Force wants for the foreign pilot training center. What will they use these six acres for?
Tilley: They'll use them for these F-35 variants that use short takeoff and vertical landing. It's kind of like if anyone remembers — any aviation buffs out there remember — the Harrier jet that could take off straight up and then be a jet. It's the same type of technology, but on a much more advanced platform.
This is going back a little bit — the foreign pilot training center was set up and approved back in 2023, and it was initially just for 24 of the F-35 jets. But the program has increased in terms of the number of foreign buyers. So now it's going from 24 to 36 of the advanced jets. That requires another environmental impact statement. And from that statement we learned they're going to need another six acres. Some of that will include more room for a main ramp on the airport property, just under three acres for these vertical landing pads for these new jets.
The Air Force and the Federal Aviation Administration will look at all of this and make a decision. That decision is supposed to come down in May of next year. They're tentatively scheduled to add around six acres. The Ebbing Air National Guard Base, on which all this is located, is now around 110 acres. They'll lease the extra property from the Fort Smith Regional Airport, which has about 1,400 acres. That gives you some idea — six acres may sound like a lot, but it's not a lot.
I think the good news is it's an expansion of that center. We don't know yet, Kyle, how much that will change the cost. There's an estimate of between $1 billion and $1.2 billion to get the training center fully operational once they get all the physical buildings up and going. Construction — we were told the more active construction is supposed to begin or has begun this summer — will last and could last anywhere from two to five years depending on funding, process, construction timing. If you're a supporter of this pilot training center being in the Fort Smith metro, this is good news because it's expanded and there will be more jets, more personnel. That was another part of the environmental statement — there will be more personnel attached to it also.
Kellams: As long as we're getting numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, let's talk about them. The Fort Smith metro, in the latest report from the Bureau, added about 1,700 jobs, about 1.5%, a little bit more than that, compared with June of 2024.
Tilley: That is good news. And that's a good point about the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Who knows if we'll ever get reliable numbers again or if we may just get them quarterly or whenever the administration wants to put them out. But we'll see. For now, the most recent report — the June numbers — the Fort Smith metro was up 1,700 jobs compared to the same period in 2024.
So where do those jobs come from? Primarily, the professional business services sector added 800 jobs, which is pretty good news. That sector tends to have — not always, but it tends to have — higher-paying jobs.
Another bit of interesting news is that the tourism sector, officially called the leisure and hospitality sector — which makes me think of people in 1970s suits sitting around with mimosas — had 9,800 jobs in June, which was a record for the sector. The previous record was set in May with 9,600 jobs, so that was a 300-job increase.
Also driving job growth is the education and health services sector, which has been on a roll the last several years. They had 17,800 jobs in June in the metro area, up 600 jobs since June of 2020. Job numbers are up almost 11% in that sector. That has been driving a lot of the growth in the Fort Smith metro area, especially since the manufacturing sector has fallen off. In the education and health services sector, you do have some good-paying jobs.
Kellams: It was March 31, 2024, when there was an internal auditor working in the city of Fort Smith. Since then, there hasn't been one. We've talked about the trials to hire a new person in that position. Looks like there may be one now.
Tilley: Everybody knock on wood. We could have one. This should have just been a normal process to find a qualified person, because this is a top-level job. The Fort Smith Board of Directors only directly hires two positions — one is the city administrator, the top boss, and the other is the internal auditor, the director of internal audit.
They took forever to hire it. Earlier this year, they thought they had a person hired. It turned out that person had some problems in their past, some potential criminal liability in their past. So they had to reverse that hiring decision. Recently, they voted to hire — and this is the lady's name — Amanda Strange, which is almost appropriate for this whole process. She has been approved tentatively. She has to go through the HR process to negotiate a salary, that kind of thing. But the board has moved to set that in place, and we're set to have a final vote on her employment on Sept. 2.
Kellams: See, some of these stories that we talk about that go on for a while get close to a conclusion. Hopefully, this is a happy ending.
Tilley: There you go.
Michael Tilley is with Talk Business & Politics. You can follow state news, Arkansas River news, Northwest Arkansas news and more at talkbusiness.net.
Kellams: Michael, have a relaxing and safe weekend. Talk to you next week.
Tilley: I will. I just worship the air conditioner every day as long as it's still going.
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