Caruth: This is Ozarks at Large. I’m Daniel Caruth in for Kyle Kellams today and joined by Michael Tilley from Talk Business and Politics. Michael, how’s it going?
Tilley: It’s going well. I’ll try not to take it personal that Kyle didn’t want to talk to me today, but it’s going well other than that.
Caruth: Well, I appreciate you still agreeing to talk, even though you’ve got the JV squad in today. But I appreciate you bearing with me. And thanks. We haven’t heard from you in about a week. A good Thanksgiving holiday? Everything go all right?
Tilley: You know, yeah. Family’s still together. Nobody disowned anybody. So I’ll take that as a win.
Caruth: A boring holiday well, good to hear that it went all right, though. And with it being the holiday season, after Thanksgiving all the lights are up, everybody’s in the swing. So I feel like we can talk about everyone’s favorite holiday subject: building permits. So yes, let us know what’s going on.
Tilley: Yeah. When you think of garland, you think of building permits.
Tilley: Well, building permit numbers in Fort Smith have really been on a tear the last several years, but last year they were down quite a bit. But the November permits—what we look at, Daniel, is Fort Smith, Greenwood and Van Buren numbers—and in November it was just under $23 million combined, which is down about 29 percent from November of last year. However, for the first 11 months of the year, the three cities have reported around $270 million in permitted construction. That’s up a little over 13 percent compared to the same period in 2024.
So that’s moving in the right direction. Of that, Fort Smith has issued a little over $240 million. That’s up 4.5 percent. Van Buren’s a little over $18 million in permits. That’s down about 18 percent. And Greenwood numbers are a little over $12 million, and that’s down about 1.6 percent. So Fort Smith has been driving that gain so far through the year.
And the three cities’ permit values last year totaled $271 million. That was down 48 percent compared to $520 million in 2023. Now, Kyle and I have talked about this before. We had some significant projects in 2022 and 2023—over $100 million that went into a Simmons Foods plant in Van Buren, a couple hundred million that were going into the Mercy Hospital expansion.
One last thing on 2024: we’ve got one more month, so barring a significant drop-off, the permit numbers could top $300 million. But they will definitely beat last year’s numbers. So that’s a good direction.
We also have to keep in mind that in the Fort Smith area there are two unique situations in terms of public investment. The city of Fort Smith is spending millions of dollars every year—every month, in some cases—to respond to this federal consent decree that requires the city to improve its sewer system. And we also have millions of dollars of construction related to the buildout of this foreign pilot training center at Ebbing Air National Guard Base in Fort Smith. Those numbers don’t show up on building permit numbers, but they still take capacity out of the local construction and design trades. I guess my point is sometimes the building permit numbers don’t always reflect the amount of activity that’s going on.
Caruth: Well, in looking at and doing this reporting, what is the canary in the coal mine, I guess, for most people? Like, I hear building permit numbers are down. It doesn’t necessarily trigger something to me in my head of, oh, what will that mean in the future?
Tilley: You know, I talk to construction companies. I talk to engineering firms that design these projects. What I hear from them is that in an area like the Fort Smith metro, since 2020 the growth has been significant in the building permit values. And what I hear from them is that sometimes the market just has to cool off, catch its breath. But if we see another two or three years of trending down, then we might be concerned. And again, I also hear from them there’s a lot going on that’s just not being permitted. We don’t see it because they don’t need permits for any of it. So I do not hear any alarm among those in the industry.
Caruth: And one of those projects, speaking of, was the foreign pilot training program. There’s an update to that.
Tilley: Yeah. And so, for some of your listeners who may not remember, Ebbing Air National Guard Base in Fort Smith was selected in 2023—really sooner, but officially in 2023—to be the foreign pilot training center for these allied countries that buy the F-35 fighter jet.
Now, part of that was that the Republic of Singapore was going to have a permanent presence with its F-35 jets and its F-16 jets. We got an update on their arrival. The F-35 jets will begin to arrive in late 2026 in Fort Smith. Their F-16 jets are set to arrive around the summer of 2027. And we’ve been told that up to 400 personnel—pilots, crew, family, technicians—will be stationed in Fort Smith when all of the Singapore planes arrive.
We also got another clarification. We’ve been receiving different numbers since 2023 about what it would cost to build this pilot training center out, and it ranged from $850 million to more than $1.2 billion. The Air Force, through their Air Education and Training Command, sent us an update: right now their update is $807 million as their buildout cost. That seems like a specific number, but it’s still a lot of money. The federal funding has been up to $600 million so far for the project. And $353 million of that is for the Singapore facility that will be co-located there at Ebbing.
Caruth: You know, we heard about this what feels like forever ago—back in 2022, 2023. Are people still focused on this? Do they still feel like we’re preparing for it? What’s the sense down there?
Tilley: Yeah. No, you know that they’re here. For example, Poland has planes now. You hear them every day. I can almost tell you when it’s 10 o’clock every morning because you will hear the jets unless they’re doing night flying exercises. It’s 9, 9:30 or 10—it’s almost like clockwork. So the planes from Poland are here now. Finland pilots and their planes are set to arrive next. Then there’ll be planes from Germany and Switzerland. And who knows—President Trump has said he wants to sell them now to Saudi Arabia. Who knows if they will come through here to train. We don’t know that yet.
But no, it’s ongoing. And you see—if you drive by the base, you will see construction. I think there are a couple of cranes up in the air. People know that it’s very active in Fort Smith.
Caruth: Some other good news of things happening in Fort Smith: sales tax numbers up year to date.
Tilley: Yes. The October report showed the second month in a row that the numbers were up. The city’s share of the Sebastian County sales tax was just a little over $2 million, about $2.1 million. That was up 3.3 percent compared to October of last year, and it was up a little over 3 percent compared to the budget estimate. Year to date, the city’s share of that countywide tax is a little over $20 million. It’s up over 3 percent. The tax was down almost 1 percent in 2024 compared to 2023.
Now, we watch that tax revenue closely because the city’s share of that county wide tax helps fund police, fire and other key city services. And the city is facing a budget shortfall now. Any gain through the end of the year will not only help with the estimated 2025 budget deficit, but could make the 2026 budget decisions slightly less difficult. And I think that vote is set for sometime in mid-December for final approval on that 2026 budget. So those tax revenue numbers are getting a little more attention than they usually do.
Caruth: I can imagine. Well, another fun thing happening in Fort Smith—Bricktown Brewery is getting redone; put up. Can you talk to us a little about that and some updates on the brewery down there?
Tilley: Yeah. So in November of last year, the historic Adelaide Hall there in the 300 block of Garrison Avenue caught fire. It was such a bad fire that the whole building had to be torn down. It’s left a real scar. It’s the second-oldest building, I think, in Fort Smith. I’m sure somebody will correct me when this airs.
But we’ve all wondered. Rick Griffin, who owns the property and the building, said they were going to rebuild. He announced recently they’re going to rebuild. The city issued them a $2.8 million permit. It will cost more than that, but that’s just the construction permit.
The old Adelaide Hall is going to look different, but it’s going to look the same, if that makes sense. We have a rendering with our story on the website. It’s a little over 14,000 square foot building. Bricktown Brewery—the Oklahoma City-based restaurant company—has said they’re going to come back in. Construction will begin later in December, later this year, or the first of January. A year to 18 months it’ll take for it to be complete and the restaurant open.
Just one more note on that building: it was built by William Meade Fishback in 1871 and restored by Richard Griffin, the father of Rick Griffin in 1994. Varsity Grill was the first restaurant in it. Then in the summer of 2014, Bricktown invested just under $1 million to renovate it and reopen it with its brand. It’s a popular restaurant, a popular bar, sports bar. The Adelaide Hall is a popular meeting space—lots of prom parties, wedding parties were held in the top of the building. It gets a lot of traffic. People love downtown stories—Fort Smith, Bentonville, Van Buren, Springdale. Rightfully so. I’m a geek for those downtown stories as much as I am for numbers stories. So we’ll be looking forward to this opening up.
Caruth: Absolutely. And when you go to Bricktown, what’s your go-to brew or drink of choice there?
Tilley: Well, I’m kind of a bourbon guy. So just pour me some Maker’s Mark over ice and I’m good to go.
Caruth: All right, you got the Michael Tilley special. Everybody can get that. Michael, thanks so much for talking to me and for keeping us updated on everything happening in Fort Smith.
Tilley: Hey, I appreciate it. I always look forward to it.
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