arkansas democrat gazette- argenta branch renovation update
TRANSCRIPT
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Inside Man’s body found in NLR. PAGE 6B
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STEPHEN B. THORNTON
The former Save-a-lot at Roosevelt Road and Broadway in Little Rock has been sold to Dollar General.
Dollar General faces hurdles New LR store doesn’t need conditional permit, it says
A Dollar General store looking to open in the former Save-a-lot building on Broad- way and Roosevelt Road in Little Rock will have to clear a few hurdles before it gets the OK from the Capitol Zon- ing District Commission.
The full commission will vote Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. on whether to give the store a conditional-use zoning per- mit. Dollar General represen- tatives have argued that the
store will be close to a gro- cery store minus the fresh produce, so the conditional use isn’t necessary.
The commission says it is necessary. Neighbors also question whether the store will be a place to grab milk and eggs or a place that at- tracts littering, loitering and panhandling.
The commission’s Man- sion District Advisory Com- mittee voted 11-3 Thursday night to recommend approval of a conditional-use permit
for the store after more than an hour of questions about landscaping, security, opera- tions and the store’s business model.
If the commission ap- proves the recommendation, commission staff memberrs said the store will have to meet landscaping and other requirements outlined as part of the conditional use before the permit allowing the store to open would be issued.
Staff said store managers have said they hope to open
by Labor Day, and asked for the expedited special meeting Thursday.
Issues with the store be- gan when neighbors noticed work going on inside the long-vacant grocery store.
The owners of Save-a-lot leased the property from a private owner and hope to sub-lease it to the Dollar General company.
Dollar General obtained a permit from the City to de-
CLAUDIA LAUER ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STATON BREIDENTHAL
Jeff Baskin, executive director of the William F. Laman Library System, stands in the basement level of the old U.S. post office in downtown North Little Rock last week. The building will be the new location for Laman Library’s Argenta Branch.
Preparing for Kennel Club show
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/MELISSA SUE GERRITS
Pro handler Trudy Golden-Akins helps groom two Alaskan Malamutes before showing at the Arkansas Kennel Club Dog Show on Sunday at the State Fairgrounds in Little Rock.
Argenta library project utilizes building’s space Redone post offi ce on track for mid-January opening
Talking over the clat- ter of construction work, Jeff Baskin guided visitors through the stripped-out in- sides of what once was North Little Rock’s downtown post office one day last week and noted the unique task being undertaken to create a new library branch.
“It’s a funky space to turn into a library,” said Baskin, executive director for the William F. Laman Library System in North Little Rock that will oversee a planned, mid-January move of its Ar- genta branch library into the historic post office building at 420 Main St. “I think we’ve utilized the space we have as well as possible.”
North Little Rock’s Public Building Authority bought the building late last year by acquiring a loan that the Laman Library Commission will pay off over the next 10 years. The authority will then deed the property to the commission.
The $3.5 million proj- ect, including the building’s $775,000 purchase price, is “right on target,” Baskin said,
to be ready for a planned opening by Jan. 15, though he added that he’s unsure if all the moving-in can be done by then. Construction began in early March.
By the time the U.S. Post- al Service closed the down- town post office June 15, 2012, a closure city officials anticipated for years, Baskin had already envisioned the 82-year-old, three-story building as a most suitable replacement for the cramped Argenta branch that has about 2,500 square feet just up the street at 506 Main St.
The post office building, completed in 1931 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, will provide about 15,000 square feet of li- brary space that will include an auditorium, an exhibit gal- lery, a railroad history collec- tion, a children’s library, 25 high-speed wireless comput- ers for public use and a cafe. The main Laman Library, 2801 Orange St., has about 60,000 square feet.
“This is really turning out to be nice,” Baskin said, ad- miring what the now open space and bare concrete
JAKE SANDLIN ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
ROGERS — When Lou- is Shaw, co-founder of Two Brothers Canoe, learned Wednesday morning that the synthetic material he uses to make his entire line of canoes might be unavail- able in less than a year, he couldn’t even talk about it.
“I’m waylaid right now,” Shaw said in a phone call. “I’ve built my entire busi- ness around this material.”
Shaw had just confirmed with his supplier in Warsaw, Ind., that plastic manufac- turer PolyOne would stop taking orders for Royalex in April 2014. Royalex is the proprietary name for acry- lonatrile butadeine styrine, a multilayered synthetic material used to make many high-end canoes.
The discontinuation of the material comes af- ter PolyOne’s purchase of Spartech, the longtime manufacturer of Royalex, in March, according to in- dustry news reports. In July, PolyOne announced it will close six of the plants ac- quired in the purchase, in- cluding the Warsaw plant where Royalex is produced. Reports said the closures will eliminate about 250 jobs and save PolyOne about $25 million a year. Repeated calls to PolyOne were not returned.
A day later, Shaw was more upbeat. Like oth- er canoe manufacturers, outfitters and retailers throughout Arkansas and the country, he had digest- ed the news and begun to think about how to adapt to the changing environment.
“I’ve got a lot wrapped up in this, and if I can’t get the material, I can’t make Royalex boats anymore,” said Shaw, who started his business in 2006 with his half brother, William Davis. “But there’s a whole gamut of thermo-forming materi- als out there. Just very few thermo-forming materials that make great canoes.”
The news that the Ohio- based PolyOne corporation would cease making Royal- ex began filtering through the paddling community in July after manufacturers such as Wenonah and Con- fluence, which owns Mad River Canoe, announced $200-$300 price increases for Royalex-based canoes at an annual industry trade show in Salt Lake City.
Kevin Fendley, a man- ager and buyer for Pack Rat Outdoor Center in Fayetteville, attended the trade show. Fendley said that although none of the manufacturers at the show told him directly that Roy- alex might be going out of production, it became clear that the material was at least going to become scarcer.
Fendley declined to say how many canoes he is purchasing this season for
RYAN MCGEENEY ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
Merger will sink canoe material Businesses look for other choices
Nonprofit center furnishes low-cost space for groups ROGERS — Lance Nutt
said it would have been im- possible to grow his small nonprofit, made up of a hand- ful of friends, into a national organization with more than 1,000 members if it wasn’t for the Center for Nonprofits at St. Mary’s in Rogers.
Sheep Dog — Impact As- sistance, an organization that helps current and former mil- itary members and first re- sponders, was formed three years ago. Nutt said the dis- counted cost of prime space
at the center was a blessing for the organization’s expan- sion.
The center opened its doors in July 2009 in the former St. Mary’s hospital in Rogers, which was previ- ously set to be demolished. The 255,000-square-foot fa- cility has 175,000 square feet of rental space at a reduced price for nonprofits, said Mike Gilbert, chief operat- ing officer of the The Jones Trust. The trust is based in Springdale.
The Jones Trust manages the property but does not
fund it in any way, Gilbert said. Funds from leasing the building cover the center’s operating costs and loan pay- ments.
A budget for the facility provided by Gilbert shows the center’s total expenses for 2013 at $658,805 and its revenue at $695,993.
The center is 95 percent full, with only eight offices vacant, Gilbert said. More than 30 nonprofits operate at the facility, including the American Cancer Society and the Benton County Health Department, as well as start-
ups such as the NWA Autism Support Group.
A nonprofit can rent an of- fice for $250 a month, Gilbert said. Utilities such as electric- ity and a wireless Internet connection are included in that cost. The organizations also receive free use of the facility’s conference room, board room, classroom and auditorium space, along with its 250-seat reception hall.
Nutt said free use of rooms like the auditorium have helped his organization hold monthly meetings that aver- age 60 people. The nonprofit
also holds training courses and fundraising events at the facility.
“Without the center, we would have been scrambling to find a place to meet,” Nutt said. “We would have been paying triple the costs. With- out the support they gave us coming in, I don’t believe we would have grown as fast as we have or would have im- pacted the lives of the people that we have.”
Sheep Dog was developed by Nutt in 2010 after his re- turn from a deployment in
TERESA MOSS ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
New director starts job at Ozark nature center
Teaching a child about nature can be simple.
Matthew Miller, the new executive director for Ozark Natural Science Center, likes to give a child a 1-foot loop of string to lay on the ground as part of a group activity. He tells the child to imagine being the size of an ant and walking across the ground within the rope. The activity forces children to stop and look carefully at nature.
“If you learn about the natural environment, then you tend to care about it,” he said. “You tend to appre- ciate it.”
Miller, 54, began his new job Aug. 1, almost six weeks before the first group of schoolchildren are due to arrive for an overnight expe- rience at the center, located in the Bear Hollow Natural
Area north of Huntsville in Madison County. He has spent 37 years working in en- vironmental education, from seasonal naturalist positions to full-time administrative positions for five environ- mental education organiza- tions.
He finished his under- graduate education in recre- ation administration and nat- ural resource management in 1981 at Eastern Illinois University. He earned a mas- ter’s degree in environmen- tal studies in 1991 from Bard College in Annandale, N.Y.
Most recently, Miller spent four years as director of the Living River Environ- mental Center in Brierfield, Ala., a project of a Presby- terian Church organization in Alabama. He also worked in several program manager positions from 2001 to 2009
BRENDA BERNET ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
See STORE, Page 6B
See ARGENTA, Page 6B
See CENTER, Page 3B
See OZARK, Page 3BSee MERGER, Page 3B
BENTONVILLE — Bill Lyle, executive chef at Ella’s restau- rant at the Inn at Carnall Hall on the University of Arkansas-Fay- etteville campus, will take over as executive chef at Eleven, the restaurant at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, to- day.
“It’s one of the most highly sought-after positions, not just in Northwest Arkansas, but around the state and the coun- try,” said Case Dighero, director of culinary services at Crystal Bridges. Many candidates who applied before the Bentonville museum’s opening in Novem- ber 2011 are still seeking the po- sition, he said.
Eleven’s former executive chef, Jacob Harr, left in June to return to Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Dighero said Harr took a senior position in food service with the retailer.
Lyle, 31, has been at Ella’s for 5½ years and will be replaced by his sous chef, Bill Ferguson. Lyle and Ferguson have worked together for five years, Lyle said.
Lyle has said he got into the restaurant business as a way to pay for college at UA, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in business management. He previously worked at Bordinos, Jose’s and the now-closed Uncle Gaylord’s Mountain Cafe. While
at Ella’s, he catered and hosted several of the Walton Arts Cen- ter’s winemaker dinners, which kick off the center’s Art of Wine Festival.
Lyle said he will take with him to Eleven many of the same practices he honed at the Fay- etteville eatery — “fine dining with locally sourced food, but on a larger scale.”
At the height of attendance during last spring’s exhibition of works by American paint- er Norman Rockwell, Eleven served 1,500 to 2,000 diners at lunch alone, Dighero said.
“It’s a whole new ballgame for me,” Lyle said of the scope of the job. His hiring came after a 2½- to three-month interview process.
“They took it pretty serious,” he said.
Dighero said Lyle was “a catch.”
“He’s become such a part of the cultural fabric of Fay- etteville,” he said. Dighero de- scribed Lyle as “accessible” and “approachable.”
As with many Eleven/Crys- tal Bridges culinary events, menus are tailored to talks that include information about art- work or exhibitions. Lyle has a knack for that, Dighero said.
“He’s all about telling the story with his food, and that’s exciting,” he said of Lyle.
Eleven’s fare is described
as “modern American comfort food.” Lyle said he’ll strive to bring more fine dining to the lunch crowd.
His move to Eleven will mean he’ll have to resign from the Fayetteville Advertising and Promotions Commission, where he is a representative of the city’s restaurant sector. He said he plans to announce his resignation at the commission’s
meeting today. Representatives on the commission must live and work in Fayetteville.
Maudie Schmitt, a friend of Lyle’s and former representative on the Advertising and Promo- tions Commission, said Lyle had gotten comfortable at Ella’s, “but he can really test his culinary wings [at Eleven].”
“It’s a great place for him to fly,” she said.
CYD KING ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
A pair of bicyclists found a man’s body near a creek in North Little Rock on Sunday afternoon but police have yet to rule the case a homicide.
About 2 p.m. Sunday, two adults were riding their bikes along the trails in a wood- ed area on Batesville Pike in North Little Rock when they came across the body of an adult white male with trauma to his head, said Sgt. Shana Cobbs with the North Little Rock Police Department.
Cobbs didn’t give any de- tails about the trauma Sunday but said the body was taken to the state Crime Laboratory and that the police depart- ment should know by today if foul play is suspected.
Police had the 2-mile, wooded stretch of Batesville Pike between Kellog Acres Road and Maryland Avenue blocked off until about 5 p.m. The body was found under the first bridge past Maryland Av-
enue, near a creek in the grass area, said Sgt. Brian Dedrick, the department’s spokesman.
Because there was a trail of evidence near the scene still being collected, reporters weren’t allowed near the ar- ea while detectives were still there. Though the case hadn’t been ruled a homicide, Cobbs said detectives treat all scenes as such upon arrival.
As of Sunday afternoon, police didn’t know the man’s age, name or where he was from. Cobbs gave no specif- ics on how the body looked when it was found but said that detectives speculate the body appeared in that loca- tion sometime after Saturday night’s downpour.
Neither the North Little Rock Police Department nor surrounding agencies had any missing persons reported to their office at the time the body was found, Cobbs said.
CHELSEA BOOZER ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
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walls will someday become. “It’s looking good.”
The renovations not on- ly have taken out walls but raised the ceiling and un- veiled tall windows that had been covered up during previous remodelings by the post office.
The changes, Baskin said, will help restore the building to its original look — known by blueprints discovered af- ter the library took posses- sion of the building — and open up the indoor space.
“We’ve opened it up all the way to the top,” Baskin said. “There was a drop- down ceiling before and you couldn’t see the windows at all. We ripped down the ceiling to expose the original lobby.”
On the second floor, where the children’s library area will be, Baskin marveled at the amount of natural light coming through the uncov- ered windows.
“There’s going to be plen- ty of light up here,” Baskin said. “We have no lights on up here and you can see how much light there is.”
The project hasn’t been without surprises and dis- appointments, Baskin said, but the project budget hasn’t had much additional cost so far. There was a $17,000 construction change order to remove asbestos — “We thought all of the asbes- tos had been removed. We found out that wasn’t quite
the case,” Baskin said — plus hardwood floors expected to be found beneath the “black, ugly tile” on the main floor weren’t there when the floor- ing was taken up, he added.
“We thought the original wood floor was still under it, but there was no wood floor underneath it at all,” Baskin said. “Just concrete.
“So there were some things we didn’t know exist- ed,” he said. “With an older building, there’s going to be some surprises.”
Another change order is coming for additional upgrades to the building’s electrical sys- tem for high-speed Internet, but that anticipated cost isn’t yet known, Baskin said.
The new branch’s biggest additions from the current one will be the main-floor exhibition gallery and, in the basement area, a 140-seat au- ditorium and space for the li- brary’s Arkansas History and Genealogy Room that will be home to the library’s railroad history collection.
Plus, the former loading dock in the outside back will allow for a music stage for outdoor concerts.
“We’re excited to be able to put another auditorium in Argenta,” Baskin said. “And we’re excited about the Rail- road History collection. We have a very large railroad collection, North Little Rock being a railroad town. … A lot of it is in storage. The books have been accessible, but the papers, photographs and slides that are now packed away will all be coming down here.”
Argenta v Continued from Page 1B
molish portions of the inside of the store, but never came to the Capital Zoning District Commission until neighbors began questioning the con- struction.
“To be clear, they are not doing construction illegally or without a permit,” said Mark Johnson, a local consultant for the company that owns Save-a-lot. “They obtained the correct permit for that.”
Several committee mem- bers asked Johnson ques- tions about whether the Dollar General management planned to have parking lot security, whether they had surveyed the community to see what kinds of items to carry and what kind of em- ployee contract they planned to use.
Johnson said he did not represent Dollar General and couldn’t answer many of those questions. He did say the store did not plan to sell beer and wine, in part to ad- dress community concerns about panhandling and loi- tering.
Several committee mem- bers said that they were dis- appointed a Dollar General representative did not come to the meeting.
The conditional-use per- mit would limit the hours of operation to 7 a.m to 9 p.m., require the parking lot lights to be on from dusk until dawn and require that the landscap- ing pass muster with the city and state regulations because of its location at the intersec- tion of Roosevelt Road, which is a state highway.
Boyd Maher, executive director of the commission, said as of Thursday staff had received four letters against the store’s request and eight or nine letters supporting the request if the owners would submit to the conditions and be a good neighbor.
Store v Continued from Page 1B
New chef to take over at art museum eatery
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STATON BREIDENTHAL
A construction worker cuts through a basement wall Tuesday after- noon as renovations continue on the old U.S. post office in downtown North Little Rock, the new location for Laman Library’s Argenta Branch.
Ark Dem Gaz Aug 12 page 1
Ark Dem Gaz Aug 12 page 2
Inside Man’s body found in NLR. PAGE 6B
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STEPHEN B. THORNTON
The former Save-a-lot at Roosevelt Road and Broadway in Little Rock has been sold to Dollar General.
Dollar General faces hurdles New LR store doesn’t need conditional permit, it says
A Dollar General store looking to open in the former Save-a-lot building on Broad- way and Roosevelt Road in Little Rock will have to clear a few hurdles before it gets the OK from the Capitol Zon- ing District Commission.
The full commission will vote Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. on whether to give the store a conditional-use zoning per- mit. Dollar General represen- tatives have argued that the
store will be close to a gro- cery store minus the fresh produce, so the conditional use isn’t necessary.
The commission says it is necessary. Neighbors also question whether the store will be a place to grab milk and eggs or a place that at- tracts littering, loitering and panhandling.
The commission’s Man- sion District Advisory Com- mittee voted 11-3 Thursday night to recommend approval of a conditional-use permit
for the store after more than an hour of questions about landscaping, security, opera- tions and the store’s business model.
If the commission ap- proves the recommendation, commission staff memberrs said the store will have to meet landscaping and other requirements outlined as part of the conditional use before the permit allowing the store to open would be issued.
Staff said store managers have said they hope to open
by Labor Day, and asked for the expedited special meeting Thursday.
Issues with the store be- gan when neighbors noticed work going on inside the long-vacant grocery store.
The owners of Save-a-lot leased the property from a private owner and hope to sub-lease it to the Dollar General company.
Dollar General obtained a permit from the City to de-
CLAUDIA LAUER ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STATON BREIDENTHAL
Jeff Baskin, executive director of the William F. Laman Library System, stands in the basement level of the old U.S. post office in downtown North Little Rock last week. The building will be the new location for Laman Library’s Argenta Branch.
Preparing for Kennel Club show
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/MELISSA SUE GERRITS
Pro handler Trudy Golden-Akins helps groom two Alaskan Malamutes before showing at the Arkansas Kennel Club Dog Show on Sunday at the State Fairgrounds in Little Rock.
Argenta library project utilizes building’s space Redone post offi ce on track for mid-January opening
Talking over the clat- ter of construction work, Jeff Baskin guided visitors through the stripped-out in- sides of what once was North Little Rock’s downtown post office one day last week and noted the unique task being undertaken to create a new library branch.
“It’s a funky space to turn into a library,” said Baskin, executive director for the William F. Laman Library System in North Little Rock that will oversee a planned, mid-January move of its Ar- genta branch library into the historic post office building at 420 Main St. “I think we’ve utilized the space we have as well as possible.”
North Little Rock’s Public Building Authority bought the building late last year by acquiring a loan that the Laman Library Commission will pay off over the next 10 years. The authority will then deed the property to the commission.
The $3.5 million proj- ect, including the building’s $775,000 purchase price, is “right on target,” Baskin said,
to be ready for a planned opening by Jan. 15, though he added that he’s unsure if all the moving-in can be done by then. Construction began in early March.
By the time the U.S. Post- al Service closed the down- town post office June 15, 2012, a closure city officials anticipated for years, Baskin had already envisioned the 82-year-old, three-story building as a most suitable replacement for the cramped Argenta branch that has about 2,500 square feet just up the street at 506 Main St.
The post office building, completed in 1931 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, will provide about 15,000 square feet of li- brary space that will include an auditorium, an exhibit gal- lery, a railroad history collec- tion, a children’s library, 25 high-speed wireless comput- ers for public use and a cafe. The main Laman Library, 2801 Orange St., has about 60,000 square feet.
“This is really turning out to be nice,” Baskin said, ad- miring what the now open space and bare concrete
JAKE SANDLIN ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
ROGERS — When Lou- is Shaw, co-founder of Two Brothers Canoe, learned Wednesday morning that the synthetic material he uses to make his entire line of canoes might be unavail- able in less than a year, he couldn’t even talk about it.
“I’m waylaid right now,” Shaw said in a phone call. “I’ve built my entire busi- ness around this material.”
Shaw had just confirmed with his supplier in Warsaw, Ind., that plastic manufac- turer PolyOne would stop taking orders for Royalex in April 2014. Royalex is the proprietary name for acry- lonatrile butadeine styrine, a multilayered synthetic material used to make many high-end canoes.
The discontinuation of the material comes af- ter PolyOne’s purchase of Spartech, the longtime manufacturer of Royalex, in March, according to in- dustry news reports. In July, PolyOne announced it will close six of the plants ac- quired in the purchase, in- cluding the Warsaw plant where Royalex is produced. Reports said the closures will eliminate about 250 jobs and save PolyOne about $25 million a year. Repeated calls to PolyOne were not returned.
A day later, Shaw was more upbeat. Like oth- er canoe manufacturers, outfitters and retailers throughout Arkansas and the country, he had digest- ed the news and begun to think about how to adapt to the changing environment.
“I’ve got a lot wrapped up in this, and if I can’t get the material, I can’t make Royalex boats anymore,” said Shaw, who started his business in 2006 with his half brother, William Davis. “But there’s a whole gamut of thermo-forming materi- als out there. Just very few thermo-forming materials that make great canoes.”
The news that the Ohio- based PolyOne corporation would cease making Royal- ex began filtering through the paddling community in July after manufacturers such as Wenonah and Con- fluence, which owns Mad River Canoe, announced $200-$300 price increases for Royalex-based canoes at an annual industry trade show in Salt Lake City.
Kevin Fendley, a man- ager and buyer for Pack Rat Outdoor Center in Fayetteville, attended the trade show. Fendley said that although none of the manufacturers at the show told him directly that Roy- alex might be going out of production, it became clear that the material was at least going to become scarcer.
Fendley declined to say how many canoes he is purchasing this season for
RYAN MCGEENEY ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
Merger will sink canoe material Businesses look for other choices
Nonprofit center furnishes low-cost space for groups ROGERS — Lance Nutt
said it would have been im- possible to grow his small nonprofit, made up of a hand- ful of friends, into a national organization with more than 1,000 members if it wasn’t for the Center for Nonprofits at St. Mary’s in Rogers.
Sheep Dog — Impact As- sistance, an organization that helps current and former mil- itary members and first re- sponders, was formed three years ago. Nutt said the dis- counted cost of prime space
at the center was a blessing for the organization’s expan- sion.
The center opened its doors in July 2009 in the former St. Mary’s hospital in Rogers, which was previ- ously set to be demolished. The 255,000-square-foot fa- cility has 175,000 square feet of rental space at a reduced price for nonprofits, said Mike Gilbert, chief operat- ing officer of the The Jones Trust. The trust is based in Springdale.
The Jones Trust manages the property but does not
fund it in any way, Gilbert said. Funds from leasing the building cover the center’s operating costs and loan pay- ments.
A budget for the facility provided by Gilbert shows the center’s total expenses for 2013 at $658,805 and its revenue at $695,993.
The center is 95 percent full, with only eight offices vacant, Gilbert said. More than 30 nonprofits operate at the facility, including the American Cancer Society and the Benton County Health Department, as well as start-
ups such as the NWA Autism Support Group.
A nonprofit can rent an of- fice for $250 a month, Gilbert said. Utilities such as electric- ity and a wireless Internet connection are included in that cost. The organizations also receive free use of the facility’s conference room, board room, classroom and auditorium space, along with its 250-seat reception hall.
Nutt said free use of rooms like the auditorium have helped his organization hold monthly meetings that aver- age 60 people. The nonprofit
also holds training courses and fundraising events at the facility.
“Without the center, we would have been scrambling to find a place to meet,” Nutt said. “We would have been paying triple the costs. With- out the support they gave us coming in, I don’t believe we would have grown as fast as we have or would have im- pacted the lives of the people that we have.”
Sheep Dog was developed by Nutt in 2010 after his re- turn from a deployment in
TERESA MOSS ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
New director starts job at Ozark nature center
Teaching a child about nature can be simple.
Matthew Miller, the new executive director for Ozark Natural Science Center, likes to give a child a 1-foot loop of string to lay on the ground as part of a group activity. He tells the child to imagine being the size of an ant and walking across the ground within the rope. The activity forces children to stop and look carefully at nature.
“If you learn about the natural environment, then you tend to care about it,” he said. “You tend to appre- ciate it.”
Miller, 54, began his new job Aug. 1, almost six weeks before the first group of schoolchildren are due to arrive for an overnight expe- rience at the center, located in the Bear Hollow Natural
Area north of Huntsville in Madison County. He has spent 37 years working in en- vironmental education, from seasonal naturalist positions to full-time administrative positions for five environ- mental education organiza- tions.
He finished his under- graduate education in recre- ation administration and nat- ural resource management in 1981 at Eastern Illinois University. He earned a mas- ter’s degree in environmen- tal studies in 1991 from Bard College in Annandale, N.Y.
Most recently, Miller spent four years as director of the Living River Environ- mental Center in Brierfield, Ala., a project of a Presby- terian Church organization in Alabama. He also worked in several program manager positions from 2001 to 2009
BRENDA BERNET ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
See STORE, Page 6B
See ARGENTA, Page 6B
See CENTER, Page 3B
See OZARK, Page 3BSee MERGER, Page 3B
BENTONVILLE — Bill Lyle, executive chef at Ella’s restau- rant at the Inn at Carnall Hall on the University of Arkansas-Fay- etteville campus, will take over as executive chef at Eleven, the restaurant at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, to- day.
“It’s one of the most highly sought-after positions, not just in Northwest Arkansas, but around the state and the coun- try,” said Case Dighero, director of culinary services at Crystal Bridges. Many candidates who applied before the Bentonville museum’s opening in Novem- ber 2011 are still seeking the po- sition, he said.
Eleven’s former executive chef, Jacob Harr, left in June to return to Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Dighero said Harr took a senior position in food service with the retailer.
Lyle, 31, has been at Ella’s for 5½ years and will be replaced by his sous chef, Bill Ferguson. Lyle and Ferguson have worked together for five years, Lyle said.
Lyle has said he got into the restaurant business as a way to pay for college at UA, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in business management. He previously worked at Bordinos, Jose’s and the now-closed Uncle Gaylord’s Mountain Cafe. While
at Ella’s, he catered and hosted several of the Walton Arts Cen- ter’s winemaker dinners, which kick off the center’s Art of Wine Festival.
Lyle said he will take with him to Eleven many of the same practices he honed at the Fay- etteville eatery — “fine dining with locally sourced food, but on a larger scale.”
At the height of attendance during last spring’s exhibition of works by American paint- er Norman Rockwell, Eleven served 1,500 to 2,000 diners at lunch alone, Dighero said.
“It’s a whole new ballgame for me,” Lyle said of the scope of the job. His hiring came after a 2½- to three-month interview process.
“They took it pretty serious,” he said.
Dighero said Lyle was “a catch.”
“He’s become such a part of the cultural fabric of Fay- etteville,” he said. Dighero de- scribed Lyle as “accessible” and “approachable.”
As with many Eleven/Crys- tal Bridges culinary events, menus are tailored to talks that include information about art- work or exhibitions. Lyle has a knack for that, Dighero said.
“He’s all about telling the story with his food, and that’s exciting,” he said of Lyle.
Eleven’s fare is described
as “modern American comfort food.” Lyle said he’ll strive to bring more fine dining to the lunch crowd.
His move to Eleven will mean he’ll have to resign from the Fayetteville Advertising and Promotions Commission, where he is a representative of the city’s restaurant sector. He said he plans to announce his resignation at the commission’s
meeting today. Representatives on the commission must live and work in Fayetteville.
Maudie Schmitt, a friend of Lyle’s and former representative on the Advertising and Promo- tions Commission, said Lyle had gotten comfortable at Ella’s, “but he can really test his culinary wings [at Eleven].”
“It’s a great place for him to fly,” she said.
CYD KING ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
A pair of bicyclists found a man’s body near a creek in North Little Rock on Sunday afternoon but police have yet to rule the case a homicide.
About 2 p.m. Sunday, two adults were riding their bikes along the trails in a wood- ed area on Batesville Pike in North Little Rock when they came across the body of an adult white male with trauma to his head, said Sgt. Shana Cobbs with the North Little Rock Police Department.
Cobbs didn’t give any de- tails about the trauma Sunday but said the body was taken to the state Crime Laboratory and that the police depart- ment should know by today if foul play is suspected.
Police had the 2-mile, wooded stretch of Batesville Pike between Kellog Acres Road and Maryland Avenue blocked off until about 5 p.m. The body was found under the first bridge past Maryland Av-
enue, near a creek in the grass area, said Sgt. Brian Dedrick, the department’s spokesman.
Because there was a trail of evidence near the scene still being collected, reporters weren’t allowed near the ar- ea while detectives were still there. Though the case hadn’t been ruled a homicide, Cobbs said detectives treat all scenes as such upon arrival.
As of Sunday afternoon, police didn’t know the man’s age, name or where he was from. Cobbs gave no specif- ics on how the body looked when it was found but said that detectives speculate the body appeared in that loca- tion sometime after Saturday night’s downpour.
Neither the North Little Rock Police Department nor surrounding agencies had any missing persons reported to their office at the time the body was found, Cobbs said.
CHELSEA BOOZER ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
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walls will someday become. “It’s looking good.”
The renovations not on- ly have taken out walls but raised the ceiling and un- veiled tall windows that had been covered up during previous remodelings by the post office.
The changes, Baskin said, will help restore the building to its original look — known by blueprints discovered af- ter the library took posses- sion of the building — and open up the indoor space.
“We’ve opened it up all the way to the top,” Baskin said. “There was a drop- down ceiling before and you couldn’t see the windows at all. We ripped down the ceiling to expose the original lobby.”
On the second floor, where the children’s library area will be, Baskin marveled at the amount of natural light coming through the uncov- ered windows.
“There’s going to be plen- ty of light up here,” Baskin said. “We have no lights on up here and you can see how much light there is.”
The project hasn’t been without surprises and dis- appointments, Baskin said, but the project budget hasn’t had much additional cost so far. There was a $17,000 construction change order to remove asbestos — “We thought all of the asbes- tos had been removed. We found out that wasn’t quite
the case,” Baskin said — plus hardwood floors expected to be found beneath the “black, ugly tile” on the main floor weren’t there when the floor- ing was taken up, he added.
“We thought the original wood floor was still under it, but there was no wood floor underneath it at all,” Baskin said. “Just concrete.
“So there were some things we didn’t know exist- ed,” he said. “With an older building, there’s going to be some surprises.”
Another change order is coming for additional upgrades to the building’s electrical sys- tem for high-speed Internet, but that anticipated cost isn’t yet known, Baskin said.
The new branch’s biggest additions from the current one will be the main-floor exhibition gallery and, in the basement area, a 140-seat au- ditorium and space for the li- brary’s Arkansas History and Genealogy Room that will be home to the library’s railroad history collection.
Plus, the former loading dock in the outside back will allow for a music stage for outdoor concerts.
“We’re excited to be able to put another auditorium in Argenta,” Baskin said. “And we’re excited about the Rail- road History collection. We have a very large railroad collection, North Little Rock being a railroad town. … A lot of it is in storage. The books have been accessible, but the papers, photographs and slides that are now packed away will all be coming down here.”
Argenta v Continued from Page 1B
molish portions of the inside of the store, but never came to the Capital Zoning District Commission until neighbors began questioning the con- struction.
“To be clear, they are not doing construction illegally or without a permit,” said Mark Johnson, a local consultant for the company that owns Save-a-lot. “They obtained the correct permit for that.”
Several committee mem- bers asked Johnson ques- tions about whether the Dollar General management planned to have parking lot security, whether they had surveyed the community to see what kinds of items to carry and what kind of em- ployee contract they planned to use.
Johnson said he did not represent Dollar General and couldn’t answer many of those questions. He did say the store did not plan to sell beer and wine, in part to ad- dress community concerns about panhandling and loi- tering.
Several committee mem- bers said that they were dis- appointed a Dollar General representative did not come to the meeting.
The conditional-use per- mit would limit the hours of operation to 7 a.m to 9 p.m., require the parking lot lights to be on from dusk until dawn and require that the landscap- ing pass muster with the city and state regulations because of its location at the intersec- tion of Roosevelt Road, which is a state highway.
Boyd Maher, executive director of the commission, said as of Thursday staff had received four letters against the store’s request and eight or nine letters supporting the request if the owners would submit to the conditions and be a good neighbor.
Store v Continued from Page 1B
New chef to take over at art museum eatery
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STATON BREIDENTHAL
A construction worker cuts through a basement wall Tuesday after- noon as renovations continue on the old U.S. post office in downtown North Little Rock, the new location for Laman Library’s Argenta Branch.
Ark Dem Gaz Aug 12 page 1
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