Arkansas Inc. Podcast: 2023 Economic Development Roundtable

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TRANSCRIPT

Clint O’Neal:

Welcome to the Arkansas Inc Podcast. This is Clint O’Neal. I serve as executive director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission. For the past several years on the Arkansas Inc Podcast, I've hosted an economic development round table featuring economic development leaders from around Arkansas. We all know that economic development happens at the local level, and our state is only as good as our local communities. The good news is that Arkansas has some outstanding communities of all sizes, and we have some top-notch passionate economic development leaders around the state. Today I'm joined by three of those local leaders. Jon Chadwell is the executive director of the Newport Economic Development Commission. Dr. Megan Selman serves as president and CEO of the Russellville Area Chamber of Commerce and the Russellville Regional Economic Development Alliance. Gary Troutman is the president and CEO of the Greater Hot Springs Chamber of Commerce and Hot Springs Metro Partnership. Jon, Megan, Gary, welcome to the Arkansas Inc podcast.

Gary Troutman:

Thank you, Clint.

Jon Chadwell:

Yeah, glad to be here.

 Clint O’Neal:

All right. So we're going to dive in. We have Megan here in the studio with me and Gary and Jon calling in. So Megan, since you're here, you get to go first.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Okay.

Clint O’Neal:

I was reading in the Courier News, the local newspaper, a quote of yours. It says, "My parents settled down here in Russellville because of the economic opportunities. My husband and I continued to live here because of the community, the quality of life, and the people." Well said, as an economic developer.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Thank you. Thank you.

Clint O’Neal:

So with your now four children, talk about your vision for your community and how economic development plays a part in that.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Yes. Well, I actually have a background. I spent a few years before I came to the Russellville Chamber at the Boys and Girls Club of Russellville, Dardanelle and London. And so it's funny how those two things seem so unrelated, but it helps me think every day about creating those work opportunities as we recruit business and industry into our community. It's a feather in your hat as an economic developer, but it's really impactful for the community to be able to have work opportunities, create opportunities for new jobs that can bring families, just so much new growth there.

Take a family and parent and re-skill them or upskill them and what that means for our community. And when I think about what that means for individuals and individual homes and neighborhoods and then so on and so forth, and just the lasting impact that can have for an entire region, bringing these opportunities to town. So putting people to work is something that I am passionate about. And to do that they have to have places to work and a strong workforce programs and strong educational facilities all working together in their region. And so I think that's how I found this job.

Clint O’Neal:

That's great. And you're doing your part to grow the population of Russellville and Arkansas.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Yes. In the workforce.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Jon, I think you've been in economic development the longest of everyone at the table here. Can you tell us about your story getting into economic development and what has led you to the pathway of being at Newport?

Jon Chadwell:

Well, that just means I'm the oldest one here, Clint. That's all it means. But I actually stumbled into economic development. I was in a career transition and looking for something and found a job with the Camden Area Chamber of Commerce and thought, "Hey, I'll just take this and see what it's like." I really was not intending necessarily to make it a career choice. It was just something to do at that point in my life. But I ended up falling in love with chamber work, economic development work, and I moved from Camden to Prescott. In Camden, I had to raise 100% of the funds that I used in economic development. So probably half my time was spent in fundraising. And then I moved to Prescott and I had to spend about 25% of my time raising money because we had some public money. But got a call from a good friend Russell Harris who said, "Hey, I'm leaving Newport and I think it'd be great for you."

And then he baited the hook. He said, "You don't have to raise any money because they have a sales tax and they have all the money they need." And at that point, he had me. It was interesting, when I moved to Newport, I was 42 years old. I'd never lived anywhere in my entire life as a child or an adult more than five years.

So at 42, five years is my longest stay anywhere. And so when I moved in, they asked me, they said, "How long are you going to be here in Newport?" And I said, "Well, here's the deal. I've never lived anywhere less than four years or more than five. So that's your window of opportunity with me." And I just started my 19th year in Newport. So I fell in love with the community. I believe in the opportunity we have here. We've done some incredible things, but the biggest thing here that is so uncommon is the spirit of teamwork among everybody here, the elected officials, the educational community, everybody is on the same page, playing on the same team, wants the same things. And that's not always common, that that's not in every community. And so that's really something that's kept me here. And while I've been here 19 years, I'm almost a native now.

Clint O’Neal:

Thanks, Jon. That's quite a run. A lot of people get run out of town as an economic developer after a few years, but that's a good long streak. Okay, let's go to Gary. Gary, you started your career in the chamber world and in economic development after working, I believe as a banker and for a couple different newspapers. Is that right?

Gary Troutman:

Actually, Clint, going way back, I was a district marketing guy for Farmer's Insurance in Little Rock, had 67 agents in around Little Rock. Was in that career 11 years, 14 years in the newspaper business as you alluded to, classified ad director of the Democrat Gazette and then managed our hometown paper here in Hot Springs for almost six years and didn't like the future that newspapers were headed, uncertain. And at 50, much like Jon, I made a career choice at 50. What do I want to do now that I'm grown up? And I decided banking was the way to go and did that two and a half years. And I frankly was going to do like he did and just stay here for many years. But I had been on the chamber board, chamber exec committee going way back 20 years ago as the captain of Chamber Ambassadors here in Hot Springs and between stints living here in Little Rock and as vice president Jim Fram, who everyone knows that's listening today, a legend in this business announced he was going to retire after 35 years.

And a couple, two or three local business leaders kind of recruited me and frankly, it was the easiest choice I'd ever made. My apologize for the sirens. My dad, my grandfather, my uncle were all self-employed in Hot Springs. My mom worked here back, and Jon and I were basically the same age, but my mom worked at a time when a lot of moms didn't work at that time of frame, so just always been in the back of my mind and just couldn't let my community anymore and saw this as the ultimate way to give back. So it's been wonderful thing. I'm jealous of Jon because I'm going to spend the rest of the summer raising money. This is our capital campaign year, so we have to do that every three years. So that's how we're going to spend the summer in Hot Springs.

Clint O’Neal:

All right. Well, Gary, I'm sure you'll be successful there. You guys at the Chamber are doing great work in Hot Springs. There's a lot for you to talk about when you're out visiting with potential investors. Let's stay with you. Talk some about the base of businesses and industries in your community and how they play such an important role in helping you to go out and attract more jobs, whether that be from entrepreneurs or recruiting new companies. What are some of those existing companies that are so important to seeing that their success and growth in Hot Springs?

Gary Troutman:

Well, and thank you, Clint. That's a good point. So many people recognize Hot Springs is the tourism industry of Arkansas, and we are, but the thing that Megan and Jon and I do, that's not our part of the job or not my primary part of the job because tourism is handled. We do have five aerospace companies here in Hot Springs, so that's our greatest concentration of any one in industry. But when I say Alliance Rubber, we have the largest producer of rubber bands in the entire world, and we have Mountain Valley water. So the four of us could be at dinner in New York or LA tonight, and there's a good chance there'd be a bottle of Mountain Valley water on our table.

So we have a lot of great companies. Those are a few that we build around. And then of course, we do have the Oaklawns of the world and our two major hospitals, CHI St. Vincent just got recognized as one of the top 50 hospitals in America. So I know these other folks on the call with me are going to use every angle they can for recruitment and certainly having a great hospital, great schools, and we have a two year school here in National Park College. So we use all those in our of quiver of arrows when we're trying to lure new business and economy to Hot Springs.

Clint O’Neal:

Thanks, Gary. Megan, how about you? Give us a level set of Russellville existing industries and the economy of your community?

Dr. Megan Selman:

Well, starting with the economy of my community, I can honestly say I think Russellville is as strong as it's ever been right now. We have such great leadership from the county to the city, all across the board there with our superintendent of our schools and just our tourism director. And everybody seems to be at the table working together right now and going in the same direction, which is really, I think, unique to see in a community. And everybody is interested in this. Something we talk about a lot in Russellville is stewardship of place and how we can bring everybody together from leaders, from all different sectors, industry, business, community, nonprofit, and get around the table and then get everybody going in the same direction to leave Russellville better than we found it. And right now I feel like that passion and that vision is there.

And with our location on I-40 and we've got a strong industrial park, we've got Rockline, and the biggest ConAgra in the world is in Russellville, Arkansas, Bridgestone, Firestone. They make the inner tubes for tires, and I think are one of the last man standing in that industry too. There's a good chance of if you're a farmer and there's an inner tube in your tire, it came from Russellville, that Bridgestone plant out there. So with our Tysons and our tabor industry out there as well in that industrial park, we're just really strong on industry and the industry is really involved. They get around the table with educators once a month to talk about workforce issues, community issues. It's just a really exciting time in the community, and so I'm happy to get to be a part of that.

 Clint O’Neal:

Yeah. Jon, how about you lay the foundation for us about the economy in Newport?

Jon Chadwell:

Well, we believe that the economy's got to be built on several different pillars. You can't just depend on one sector because if you do, you're going to be really subject to recessionary pressures. Pressures come at different sectors at different times. One of the traditional sectors in Newport and Jackson County has been agriculture, and it's been huge here, and it still is a predominant sector of our economy. As far as our industries go, we've got a number. We've got Shearer's Foods who creates probably most of the Great Value corn based snack chips that anybody in Arkansas eats. If you go get on the border tortilla chips that were made right here in Newport, Arkansas. We know that Blytheville gets a lot of credit as the steel capital of Arkansas. But the very first steel mill that located in Arkansas, actually located in Newport, and they're still here, Arkansas Steel Associates, they make 99.9% of all railroad tie plates in North America.

We got Granges Aluminum. If you drink Capri Sun, which most of us probably don't, but I imagine there's some children out there who do the aluminum packaging on Capri Sun. That's all made right here in Newport, Arkansas. And Granges just announced a new expansion. We're going to actually have the very first electric vehicle battery foil plant in the United States right here in Newport, which is pretty exciting for us too, to be on the cutting edge of technology. We've got Southwest Steel processing, which uses steel from the steel mill to do value added products. And then as if all of that wasn't enough, we diversified more. We recruited a vodka distillery. So we have our very own distillery here in Newport. We have medical marijuana cultivation in Newport, and we have cryptocurrency in Newport. I'm not sure what else we'll get that'll be outside the pale.

If you had asked me, I don't know, 30 years ago when I started in economic development, "Hey, will you ever work on marijuana?" I would've said, "There is no way." "How about vodka?" "Nope, won't happen." "How about digital money?" "I don't want that." But all of that's part of our economic mix. And we're right now in some negotiations with a pretty large tech company that'll bring some tech jobs in. So we're just trying to really stay diversified so that in case of a recession, we've got so many pillars in our economy that we don't get set back by any one thing.

 Clint O’Neal:

Thanks, Jon. Well, Megan and I were looking at each other during your comment. I know that we both have young children and there are Capri Suns in the refrigerators above-

Jon Chadwell:

Oh yes.

Clint O’Neal:

... of our homes.

Dr. Megan Selman:

We're keeping that industry alive and well.

Jon Chadwell:

Great. We appreciate it.

Clint O’Neal:

All right. Well, I want to ask you each about a significant project that has come together in your community and really want to highlight the role of economic development professionals. One thing that we all want for this industry is to grow a bigger pipeline of people who say, "I may want to spend my career working as an economic developer." I started my career in economic development 15 years ago, and I've loved it ever since. I really hope that some of these answers can generate an interest in some of our listeners of what this is in a career field. But what I want to do first is I want to read AEDCs new mission statement. So hot off the press here, just announced late last week "At AEDC, we know economic advancement doesn't happen by accident. We work strategically with businesses and communities to create strong economic opportunities making Arkansas the natural choice for success."

So I hope you like it. If you don't, you can tell me outside of the podcast, but when I think about that mission statement, I think about the partnership that we have with friends like you guys around the state. When the state and local community come together and we recognize, "Hey, this stuff is not just going to happen on its own. It doesn't happen by accident. We've got to work to create these opportunities." We believe in capitalism, but we also believe that economic developers have a role to play, to lay the foundation of good infrastructure, good policy, good workforce development strategies. And if we do that, companies are going to be very successful in the communities that we represent. So Jon, let me go back to you. Kick us off with a project that you've been involved in, Newport, kind of how it came together, and who from the community leadership team was involved in making it happen?

Jon Chadwell:

Well, I'll start with the Granges project, the expansion. Well, actually locating Granges here about four years ago, we had an abandoned aluminum plant. Granges bought the assets of that plant, but they weren't going to open every facility back up that had been opened under the previous owners. They had decided they were only going to open a few. And so we got in conversations with Granges, they came to visit the community. The mayor was involved, the county judge was involved. We had our local utility folks involved. And altogether we just came up with a package and went to them and said, "Hey, we want you to consider us. We want to be the spot." And honestly, I think it was about 50-50. We were competing with a spot in Tennessee. We were competing with a spot in North Carolina. Our state offered some great incentives to be able to help.

At the local level we can offer a lot. We can offer a good site. We can offer cooperation with infrastructure, we can offer easy building permit access and things of that nature. But by and large, with some of these large projects, it's going to come down to also what the state can offer. And so we've got to be good partners with you, you've got to be good partners with us. And that's been the case. It's been the case for all these years that I've worked in Newport, that AEDC's been a fantastic partner and that y'all bring so much to the table. And so what I see as part of our responsibility in that mix is that we don't bother you unnecessarily. If we bring you a project, we've already vetted it. We've already looked at it. We've already said, "Hey, this is something our community wants." And so it makes a good team.

You take us seriously, we take you seriously. And it just really makes for a good team. And we do that locally too. We treat each other with respect. We take each other seriously. We understand what each team member brings to the project. Perhaps my most exciting projects, not an industrial development project as far as recruiting an industry in, but it's our new Tech Depot Workforce training Center. We are just finishing a $3 million workforce training center in downtown Newport. And we're looking at reaching out to people who have not been participating in the workforce. People who, they're not on employment, they're not looking for a job, they're out there because they don't have the skill level to earn a wage that allows them to afford daycare, transportation and other things. And how do we remove those barriers, bring those individuals, give them the skills where they can earn a wage that allows them to have all of these things and healthcare and other things that they've not had access to.

It's been a real collaboration we've had. Right now, we're up to 21 different partners who've been part of the process. And it's just really rewarding to see everybody sit down at the table and want to reach out to a population of folks, different populations of folks actually, that really right now are being left behind and have the opportunity. And so to me, my previous career before my 30 years in economic development was that I was a minister and I was a minister because I wanted to help people. And as I come in, came into economic development, I found out that economic development's much the same way. When we recruit a factory in, when we do workforce training, we enrich people's lives, we help people, we make their lives better. And that's what it's all about to me.

Clint O’Neal:

Amen, brother, you're doing great work. I'm really excited to see that project come to fruition and that that's such important work. I'm glad you highlighted that. Okay, Gary, your turn. A significant project in your community and how it all came together.

Gary Troutman:

Well, first off, I want to echo everything Jon said. Amen. Getting everyone involved, everybody rowing the same direction. Clint, I don't have to go far to think of ours. I mean, you were here just a few weeks ago, Origami Sake. We have got a new business that probably everyone that's listening has heard about and heard about probably even as much as a year before it came in advance. As we all know, some of these projects burn hot, some of them burn cold,. The burn hot ones are fun because you can kind of set aside a lot of stuff and focus your attention on that. Let me tell you about Origami Sake. We opened a file on that six years ago. We started working with a young man who was a graduate of the math and science school, which we have here in Hot Springs.

And a young man from Sheridan that had come to school here. He had the vision for it. He had immersed himself in the culture in Japan, learned how to make sake in large part, do our sister city program that worked with Hanamaki, Japan. For whatever reason, maybe just didn't have the wherewithal, the entrepreneurship, whatever, doesn't matter. Matt Bell came in whom a lot of folks know, well regarded business person from Little Rock, took over the project Midstream, had the funding and the acumen to see it through. And Clint, you were gracious enough to join us a few weeks ago for that announcement. Hot Springs is already being dubbed as potentially the Napa Valley of Saki as we're going to be using Arkansas rice from the England, Arkansas area, and our wonderful hot springs water to produce the best saki, certainly in North America, if not the world.

So we're excited about that. But before I finish, I just want to say real quickly what I've heard all three of you already say, this doesn't happen if your city and your county and community aren't working together. And we simply did not have that five or six years ago. We had a city and county that were quite frankly at war and changing leaders. If you can't change people, sometimes you just have to change people. And we've had a new county judge, new city manager, new mayor since that time. Everyone has rode the same way. Our own economic development organization, the Metro Partnership, has demanded business leaders and community leaders to demand more out of our leadership. And consequently, it's resulted in a lot of wins. And I think you're going to see a lot more for our community in the future.

Clint O’Neal:

Thanks, Gary. It was an honor to join you at the ribbon cutting ceremony of Origami Sake. I love the bold statements that were made one day. You mentioned one about Hot Springs being the Napa Valley of Sake. The other one was that Sake is going to do to wine, what pickleball has done to tennis. It's going to take some market share, because all the great products coming out of Hot Springs. Okay. Megan, tell us about a significant project in Russellville.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Yeah, so I'm one year into my role in Russellville. So my rookie year we had Owens Corning. We recruited Owens Corning, a huge foam insulation company out of Ohio based to Russellville, Arkansas. And that was such a neat experience. I think you asked earlier about how do we make sure the next generation is excited to be economic developers? And it is an exciting experience. It's competitive, which speaks to my background quite a bit. And you bring everybody around the table, you get to be, I think as the chamber executive or as a economic developer executive, you are the convener of the people. And so you work hard, I think to have those relationships and build up some trust equity. And then when it's your time to shine and you've got a fish on the line like Owens Corning, you bring everybody in around the table and say, "What can we do to get you here in Russellville?"

We have a fantastic quality of place, and we had land packaged and ready to go. The AEDC had helped us with that certification process. We were certified as a competitive community, so we had done a lot of due diligence on the backend and we were ready for Owens Corning when they came knocking. And then it was getting our partners around the table. So Energy Arkansas, all of our local utilities, our mayor, county judge, the schools, Arkansas Tech, everybody was excited and had the same passion to bring this opportunity to Russellville, to this industry, to our area. And once you get everybody going in the same direction and a bunch of leaders, I think going in the same direction, you are going to see some success. And so that was exciting to see that big win. It was a $60 million project and I was about seven months into my job.

So that was a really neat, kind of caught the passion, I think for it. And it's not only a personal win, you get to see so many other people in your community that will benefit from that for years and years, whether it's job opportunities or other businesses that, because there are 50 new jobs in the industrial park, there are more people going to the dry cleaners, more people eating at the restaurants, more people shopping in your local stores. So I love to be part of that. And I think that that's a lot of the work of economic development. I like to see people go to work. I like to see people. I think work is important. And Clint, I think I've heard you give this spiel that work was in the garden before the fall. So work is a good thing. It's a godly thing. And so I like to be able to bring those opportunities to my community and it makes me excited. So I hope that would excite a future or the next generation of economic developers that it's fun. It's not all- Yeah, it's hard work, but it's fun.

Clint O’Neal:

So big question for you, Megan. You have four kids?

Dr. Megan Selman:

Yes.

Clint O’Neal:

And at the announcement event, the team from Owens Corning gave us a Pink Panther stuffed animal. Which one did you give it to?

Dr. Megan Selman:

I had to put that in my office. I had to put that in my office, so I didn't pick anyone.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah. Good choice. Okay, we're going to move on to more of a short answer, lightning round. The first few might be somewhat serious asking about the job, and then it's going to kind of go downhill from there because in terms of seriousness, so Gary, let's start with you. What's your favorite part of the job and the profession as an economic developer?

Gary Troutman:

Well, I would have to say it would just be having a part and some things that have happened since you've been here. I referenced Jim Fram earlier, my second month on the job, I get to spend four months with Jim, and before he left, he took me to Frisco, Texas. And we rode with a gentleman there that had been in economic development for the past 30 years. And we didn't drive by a building or a major development that he didn't talk about that he had a hand in that. And basically it would be much like Megan talking about her four children driving around Frisco. "We did this in '95. We did that in 2003 to make them come here. Here's how this worked."

I've only been in it six years. I know I don't have the history Jon does. I know Megan and I are hoping for a long career here, but ideally, Clint, when I get ready to retire, hopefully in 10 years I can drive around Hot Springs and Garland County and look at developments and things that frankly might not have been here had we not been in this profession. So I guess the best answer I could give you was looking through another gentleman's eyes two months into this career and seeing the potential if you stayed with the community long enough and just gave it your heart and soul.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah, that's a real impact. Thank you for sharing that. Okay, Jon, what's the best advice you've been given in your career as an economic developer?

Jon Chadwell:

Two. One is get education. This doesn't just happen. I think my first year I went to Community Development Institute, went to Economic Development Institute to get education from people who know. And then the second one was, if you want people to trust you, you got to trust them. It's a two-way street. So if you want the mayor or the county judge to trust you, then you got to turn around and trust them too and build that network of trust.

Clint O’Neal:

Thank you. All right, Megan, what are some qualities that make for a successful economic developer?

Dr. Megan Selman:

You've got to be able, I think, to have the relationships in your community to bring people together around the table. I think that's a big piece of it, getting the right people in the room so that you can have the right conversations. And I think probably being competitive. I have a background in college sports, so I love a good competition, being competitive. And then I like what I think Gary just said, and I like to think of it differently to have a friend, you've got to be a friend. So some of that trust relationship goes both ways that you're serving your community, you're out there kind of selling your community, but you're also invested. You're serving your community. You understand that a win for an economic development group or for yourself in that position is motivated by wanting the best for the people that you're going to church with, your kids are playing soccer with and wanting the best for your community.

Clint O’Neal:

Okay. Jon, back to you. What advice would you have for students who are considering career options and how would you pitch economic development as worthy to put in the potential mix for a career option?

Jon Chadwell:

Well, I would just tell them it's fun. It is fun. No project is the same. Every project's different. So if you like trying to figure out how to make things work, trying to figure out how to solve problems, it's the ultimate problem solving profession. You get in it, you find out what people want, what people need, and then you work to find the resources to make it happen. I say we're the world's biggest puzzle solvers. We take all the different pieces from around our community, around our state, even around the country and the world, and we put them all together to make things work for our community and for the people in our community.

Clint O’Neal:

That's a good analogy. Okay Gary, if economic development was not an option and you could not go back to any former careers, how would you spend the rest of your career?

Gary Troutman:

I was glad you asked me this one, Clint. Jon and I like said we're about the same age. Had I known and when I was in high school that ESPN was going to blow up and that sports broadcast would be such a part of our mainstream life. I probably would've gone into broadcasting and tried to either work in sports or in weather, believe it or not, with the intention of putting in my years and paying the dues and working my way back to Arkansas. So broadcast.

Clint O’Neal:

Okay. I could see you being good at that. All right. This question's for all three of you. I told you it was going to go downhill. Economic developer in Arkansas with the best hair. Who wants to take a stab at that one? So we've done this for a couple years now. I'm not going to tell you who won the poll the last couple years, just in case there's a repeat champion, but anybody have a name they want to throw out there?

Gary Troutman:

Off the top of my head, I'll go Robert Birch in North Little Rock.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Olivia Womack has some good naturally curly hair. I don't-

Gary Troutman:

Okay, okay.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Yeah. Can we throw her name in there?

Clint O’Neal:

Okay. Robert has been challenged. I like it. I like it.

Jon Chadwell:

Just to give a whole another perspective, I'm going to go with JD Lowry.

Gary Troutman:

Oh.

Clint O’Neal:

Okay. I like it. All right. Appreciate the participation. In the last couple years Tim Allen and Brad Lacey have been mentioned, but no mention of them this year.

Dr. Megan Selman:

I've lost the crown.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Megan, your next instate vacation destination, where would you go around Arkansas?

Dr. Megan Selman:

In state. We'd love in state, we love to go to Mountain Nebo. That's our go-to on a weeknight or a weekend, but a destination overnight, we love Hebrew Springs. I grew up, my parents had a home there and we love the lake and just turn our kids loose and relax for maybe two or three minutes while we're there. So that would be my pick.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah. Okay. Gary, if you had to select a restaurant to go to dinner and it could not be in your community somewhere around Arkansas, where would it be?

Gary Troutman:

Oh, so tough, Clint, because I'm a lifelong Arkansan. Oh, let's see. I might go with Brave New Restaurant in Little Rock. I was sad, even though it's a chain, I was sad when Copeland's went down. I loved Copeland's wherever they were, but you know my rap and what I've known for, it would have to be a Whataburger in any community where they are in Arkansas.

Clint O’Neal:

Okay. Very good. All right, Jon, who is your favorite and least favorite person at AEDC to work with?

Jon Chadwell:

Well, they're all my favorite. Every single one of them. It depends on what I need.

Dr. Megan Selman:

That's a great chamber executive, right there.

Jon Chadwell:

There you go.

 Clint O’Neal:

I think you should all have-

Jon Chadwell:

It depends on what I need any given day.

Clint O’Neal:

... good careers in politics if it didn't work out.

Jon Chadwell:

Yeah. Honestly, it's been a great team at AEDC, I don't think I've ever run into anybody that I did not enjoy working with. And any given day you need something different. So I might be working with Jean in the grants department, or I might be working with Olivia in the business development department, or it just depends on what the process is. So I just really enjoy working with the team. There's a lot of new faces now, so I'm learning a new good group of folks and have enjoyed my time getting to know each one of them as well.

Gary Troutman:

If I could weigh in, Clint, I just say you guys have always done a phenomenal job of putting people in front of us. Like I said, I'm only six years in, but Drew Williams is great. Jack Thomas has been fantastic. And like Jon just said, Olivia and Jarod and Jack that you've got now, just they're all fantastic to work projects with.

Clint O’Neal:

Thanks Gary.

Jon Chadwell:

And you did us a big favor by putting Amy Williams over our community when she's from here. She's in our community development and she knows us very well. So y'all put people in good positions to do a great job.

Clint O’Neal:

Well, the economic development community in Arkansas is small. We get along well except for when people poach our best talent at AEDC. So we've lost a lot of good ones. Some that Gary mentioned to other organizations and companies, but I can't blame them. People start their career in economic development at AEDC, they get a lot of good exposure to communities and company leaders and they go on and do bigger and better things.

Gary Troutman:

Well, Clint, if I may, that's just a job hazard for us as well. I mean, a lot of our project managers, they work with a company, I believe that happened in Little Rock not too long ago. You put your best foot forward and that that's their contact and a community they're not familiar with and say, "Hey, this person's pretty sharp." I believe that's happened in Little Rock and Arkadelphia both in just the past several months.

Clint O’Neal:

Yep. Thanks Gary. Okay, before we wrap up, I want to give each of you the opportunity just for a final word. Feel free to talk about anything that you wish I would've asked you about your career as an economic developer or your community or our state as a great place to do business. But Jon, I'll start with you.

Jon Chadwell:

Well, I just want to say I feel very blessed to be in this career field as somebody who didn't plan to be in it, didn't really even know what economic development was when I started. It has been extremely rewarding for me. I left a career field I was pretty passionate about and really couldn't get passionate about anything else. And then I found this career field and it's become a life, it's become a really great lifestyle. I've met wonderful people and so I feel really, really blessed to be involved and I feel blessed to make a lot of the friends I've made in this career field. I know people from all walks of life and all across the state that I wouldn't know if I hadn't been in economic development. It's just been extremely rewarding. And I still wake up and get excited about coming to work. If you can do something for 30 years and still wake up and get excited about coming to work, then that's a really good life.

Clint O’Neal:

Thanks, Jon. I really appreciate your perspective. We call it economic development and moving the economy forward, but really it's about people. It's about the opportunities that we provide for people to better provide for themselves and their families. And so really appreciate your perspective. All right. Megan, what about you?

Dr. Megan Selman:

I think I'd just like to reiterate, man, I'm excited to be in Russellville right now. And I'm not just saying that because it sounds good or it's what I'm supposed to say, but I just think about my community, the leadership that we have right now. We have such a strong, I would say the strongest starting five we've ever had and a really deep bench in our community. We've got a impeccable, amazing outdoor recreation in Russellville, rivers and lakes and fishing, and mountain biking and Mount Nebo. And then we've got a low cost of living, especially nationwide, but even compared to other places in Arkansas. And we're not landlocked in any direction. And so we've still got commercial land, residential land, all of that available all around us. So potential for growth is amazing right now. We're low regulation and the business economy and the vision of growth is just, I think, rampant in our community right now.

And I'm really excited. We've got tons of fun projects, about 90% of them under an NDA, but coming down the pipe, lots of exciting things coming into Russellville. And I think over the next five years it's just going to be a really exciting time. So keep your eye on our region. It's exciting. So it's just exciting to be a part of that. And I just feel like you guys were saying, just blessed to be a part of that. And just happy that my community trusts me for this position. And you started the podcast, you said that economic development isn't always a long term gig. And so I hope they don't run me out. Yeah-

Clint O’Neal:

Well you're doing good so far.

Dr. Megan Selman:

Yeah, one year in, I hope they let me stay. I want to stay as long as they'll let me stay.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah, no, I think they might give you a Jon Chadwell type of contract.

Dr. Megan Selman:

I need to know, I need to know how to get one of those 30 year commitments out of it.

Clint O’Neal:

Yeah, very good. Okay, Gary, last word.

Gary Troutman:

Well, first off paraphrasing what Jon said earlier. You don't want to be a college football coach. You don't want to be everybody's buddy for two years and then they run you out of town three years later. So you want to have stability. But I tell you, if someone would've told me, and again, I'm a native guy from Hot Springs, somebody told me growing up in high school or college that someday I was going to get to be the head cheerleader for the community that I love the most. Out of all the 100,000 people that live in this county. I would've said, "I can't wait to get started." Unfortunately, it took 53 years to get to make it to that position. But just making every day count, just being gracious for the opportunity we've been given to do this. And again, Clint, we mentioned the Origami Sake.

It happened just a few weeks ago. Those are fun moments. They really are. But to do successfully what Jon and Megan and you and I do, you've really got to have that vision. While we'll have some kudos, some pats on the back for things we'll do this year. In our job, you have got to be thinking 20 years down the road, the best saying that I had or in my career has been the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best one is today. So we're trying to be very cognizant of things we're doing today that we won't maybe be around to see, but we know that we're leaving it better for the folks than we found it. And to me, that's the ultimate give back in this career.

Clint O’Neal:

Thanks, Gary. I really appreciate the passion I'm hearing around the table. You guys are excellent representatives of your community, of the state, and that's what's going to help us continue this economic development momentum in Arkansas and communities like in Newport, Hot Springs and Russellville, and the regions that you serve. Well today I've been talking with Jon Chadwell, executive director of the Newport Economic Development Commission, Dr. Megan Selman, president and CEO of the Russellville Area Chamber of Commerce and the Russellville Regional Economic Development Alliance, and Gary Troutman, president and CEO of the Greater Hot Springs Chamber of Commerce and Hot Springs Metro Partnership. You've been listening to the Arkansas Inc Podcast. This is Clint O’Neal, executive director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission. You can subscribe to the Arkansas Inc podcast on Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, and other podcast apps. For more information about AEDC and to sign up for our monthly newsletter, visit arkansasedc.com and connect with us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Thanks for listening.