Kellams: Right now we have some questions for Michael Tilley with Talk Business and Politics. He's a man we already know isn't a fan of heat domes. Michael, welcome to this Friday edition of our show.
Tilley: He just say no to heat domes. So perfect time to stay in and watch some soccer, which I've become a new fan of. I never thought I would, but here I am.
Kellams: Well, if you wanted, I don't know if the Choctaw Casino & Resort - Pocola has a sportsbook where you could bet on soccer matches, but they might in the future because they're going to upgrade.
Tilley: Yeah. They, well they do have an area for that. We'll see how robust it is.
But yeah, so they announced recently a $140 million plan to expand and renovate this gaming hotel and dining complex here in Pocola. And when I say it's close to Fort Smith, I think part of their eastern parking lot is in city limits, Fort Smith city limits. I mean, it's closer to downtown Fort Smith and parts of Chaffee Crossing.
Kellams: Mhm.
Tilley: But that work is going to begin later this year, according to the folks at the Durant, Oklahoma based Choctaw Nation. The biggest part of that will be a new seven-story hotel that will have 130 rooms. They already have a 118-room hotel with 10 suites and luxury suites. And that was, you know, this follows, it's almost 13 years later, will probably be 14, 14 and a half years later, when it's finished.
But from this, what they're operating out of now, which was a $60 million expansion back in 2013, that's where they built 148,000 square feet of new casino and event and hotel space. This is, they're going to, they're going to mess around and have a real casino resort complex out there if they're not careful.
You know, this isn't the only large complex. The Cherokee Nation has a large hotel casino complex in Roland, Oklahoma, which again, is just a mile or two away from downtown Fort Smith across the border that was upgraded in 2015. They've got 170,000 square foot casino and hotel there. So some significant casino operations right across the border.
I do want to make a quick note. Anytime we have these casino stories, there are folks that come out of the woodwork claiming that there should be one of these big casino resort complexes on the Arkansas River side of Fort Smith and near the downtown area. They say that many years ago those evil Fort Smith City folks ran them off. They blocked construction of the casino. Well, it's just simply not true. And you know, but there's a lot of things that are not true that apparently keep coming around. That was a decision back then by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Look, every resident in the city of Fort Smith could have lobbied for the casino, and the license would still have been rejected. It had nothing to do with the Fort Smith folks rejecting it. I just I hate to have to put that out every time, but there you go.
Kellams: Well, this expansion equal more jobs.
Tilley: I can't imagine that it won't. When they expanded the facility in 2013, they were estimated to employ around 850. So if you're adding a whole new hotel, all of that, the resort style pools and cabanas spa, I would be very surprised if their employment doesn't get around the 1,000 or more when it's fully operational. But we're going to follow up. They have told us they're going to have more details on this later this fall when they start breaking ground.
Kellams: We have the May report for Fort Smith sales tax revenue up in some categories.
Tilley: Yes. And so, you know, kind of continued good news. We saw the revenue kind of get off to a better start this year.
So through May, the city's portion of the Sebastian County 1% tax was up more than 7%. And it's more than 6% above the budget estimate. Year to date, that revenue from that countywide tax is up more than 4%. Of course, the reason we closely watch that, that helps fund the city's general fund budget, which much of that paying for police fire, and other essential city services.
So like I said, in the first five reporting months of the year, the countywide tax has generated about $10.4 million. That's up 4.6% compared to the same time in 2025. Now, the city's 1% tax, which partially funds, you know, the federally mandated sewer system work, but also, support street, bridge and drainage projects that generated $2.4 million, a little over $2.4 million in the May report. And that was up a healthy 6.2% compared with May 2025. And it was more than 5% above the budget estimate.
You know, one of the reasons we run these numbers, and I know tax numbers, building permit numbers and all that, they're not sexy and glamorous and fun, but numbers matter. Numbers tell stories, and that's why we report them. So for example, the report, Andy Richards, he's the city's chief financial officer. He's doing this new thing now where he provides more detail on where the tax revenue comes from. To his credit, it's a good thing. And it's educational, but he shows that tax revenue from retail sales in May was down almost 5% compared with May 2023.
So why is that? Well, he showed us that there are two primary areas where the tax revenue was down. One was from building materials. It was down about seven, almost 8%. But the interesting thing, tax revenue from jewelry sales in May was just $22,000, just under $23,000 really. And that's 343% below the almost $101,000 in the May 2023 report. And that difference, along with the building materials difference, more than makes. In fact, it's more than the overall combined difference.
But what happened in 2023? What's the difference? Well, if we remember Newton's Jewelers, the very popular jewelry store that operated in downtown Fort Smith for 109 years, closed in April 2023.
Kellams: Yep.
Tilley: And so you had a lot of people in there buying up, you know, their last minute sales. Plus, people wanted to go buy something from Newton's before it closed. So I think that gives you an example of not only how popular that jewelry store was, but how then those sales have trickled either down or those sales have gone elsewhere, since 2023. Just again, numbers tell interesting stories.
Kellams: All right. It's not a surprise that Baptist Health is selling some family clinics. Their footprint is evaporating or at least shrinking in the Fort Smith region. Interesting that Springdale based Community Clinic is coming into the River Valley. That's a good bit of news.
Tilley: You know, if Baptist is going to be in trouble and having to sell stuff off, this is kind of a relief. But the Baptist Health thing, it's starting to feel kind of like a car up on blocks and they're just selling pieces off, you know, and I don't say that to be funny. It's not funny. It's just the best analogy I can come up with.
But yeah, so they announced that Baptist Health announced that they're going to sell their clinics in Alma, Fort Smith, Greenwood and Van Buren to Springdale based Community Clinic. Now, I think it's potential. And from what I'm hearing from people in the community that this is good news. Community Clinic has a good reputation in Northwest Arkansas. They have a good track record in Northwest Arkansas. According to their numbers, they have more than 75,000 patients that they work with annually through 30 locations in Arkansas. They're from Northwest Arkansas and northeast Oklahoma.
So, you know, we'll know more. We don't know exactly what that's going to look like. The announcement or the deal is pending a federal review. And we'll probably know more details. But, you know, for example, we'd like to know more about how many people is everyone going to transfer, how many nurses and doctors will transfer? Will there be any changes? Will all the clinics remain open? So those are some answers we don't have yet.
But this again, it's not a surprise. We've reported on this, Baptist began showing strains earlier this year. They've cut at least 260 hospital staff nursing and physician jobs that we know of since late March. That includes service cuts and labor and delivery, pharmacy, radiology, case coordination, many other areas.
But, you know, this and ideally we would think that, you know, this is a major deal that maybe this is kind of it, but I'm hearing from some other folks saying that, you know, there will be more news from Baptist that they're going to continue to kind of streamline their operations in Fort Smith, but that's a, this is a big deal. And I'm thinking it's a positive, you know, it's better than those clinics just being shut down.
Kellams: Finally, we're halfway through 2026. Fort Smith board had a strategy session to talk about.
Tilley: Yeah. Well, to talk about their strategy, their approach to governance for 2027. It's a healthy exercise. I'm kind of proud that my local government does this. It's an all day session and I was there with them all day and there could be many ways to cover this, but I'm just going to hit kind of what they looked at.
Their top three strengths they identified, this is where the top city staff and the Fort Smith board of directors, you know, they meet and look at their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, and their strengths, they cited this foreign military pilot training center at Ebbing Air National Guard Base here in Fort Smith, the region's education and military institutions, and the region's geographic location that can serve as a national business hub. And I thought it was interesting, a close contender for those top three strengths was the ongoing improvements in the city's parks, trails, and greenways.
They identified the weaknesses they identified were water system infrastructure needs, competing priorities for the city's general fund and homelessness, primarily in the downtown area. There are opportunities they hit. Was maximizing the any economic benefits from that foreign pilot training center, growth in growth from manufacturing and leveraging, leveraging growth around this completion of this Interstate 49 segment through the Fort Smith metro area. They also cited benefits from having UofA Fort Smith, the Arkansas College of Health Education, in the area as being, you know, opportunities for growth, threats they identified, these are threats to city and regional success were negative public perceptions, economic competition with Northwest Arkansas and other regions, and as we just talked about a decline in health care services.
One last note, you know, city, Jeff Dingman, who's been the acting city administrator for almost two years now since Carl Geffken was fired. He's kind of a mild mannered guy. He doesn't really. He's, you know, he's really kind of a caretaker type personality. Keeps the trains running on time. He really came out swinging. I've never seen him so adamant before about an issue, but he came out swinging and challenged the board that they needed to address these this water system infrastructure problems. And, you know, we had a series of six or seven stories on the issue and where the city engineers talked about, you know, we're just one, you know, one major event from having a major crisis, whether in water transmission, water treatment, distribution.
And, but he challenged the board. He said, you've got to get on. He said, we need to get on board with some of these projects. He said, you know, waiting for straight state or federal grants, quote, will not get it done for us. And said that they need to make some decisions. He said the city cannot continue without a water rate increase, noting that a revenue increase is needed in a substantial way, not an incremental way.
And it'll be interesting to see the board's reaction. The board, just in a surprising way, is even though they know that they're facing these critical water system needs, which are, you know, $300 million to $600 million, depending on how you want to prioritize them. It's not insignificant. They just kind of keep kicking the ball down the road and making a decision. And, again, it's unusual to see Mr. Dingman so adamant and so pointed, but he certainly came out, and kind of told him how, what's the, how the cow ate the cabbage and we'll see how that lands I guess over the next six, 18, 36 months.
Kellams: You can read about all of this at talkbusiness.net. Michael, I hope you have a safe and enjoyable weekend.
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