House Agriculture, Forestry, and Economic Development Committee Part 1
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Bills discussed (2)
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HR1032
· 3 mentions in transcript, chapter
Matched: “…ection, the first item of business is we're going to hear a House Resolution 1032 by Representative Eddie Cheatham. Mr. Cheatham, if you'll s…”
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Pre-2017 bill | ||
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HB2002
· 2 mentions in chapter, transcript
Matched: “HB2002”
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Pre-2017 bill |
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We'll begin with this one-hour session. We've got quite a bit to get done, if we possibly can. We want to hear everything thoroughly, but expedite things as quickly as we can. Without objection, the first item of business is we're going to hear a House Resolution 1032 by Representative Eddie Cheatham. Mr. Cheatham, if you'll sit at the end of the table and recognize yourself, you may begin. H.R. 1032. Thank you, Mr. Chair
Representative Eddie L. Cheatham
Unverified
0:27
of the committee. I'll be very brief. I know we are pressed for time.
Many times we're approached by groups to asking us to run resolutions to just kind of bring things to light. And this group is the Land Trust of Arkansas. And basically what House Resolution 1032 does, they're trying to bring to light IRS rulings that govern donations of conservation easements on agricultural land. And this is legislation that's already in effect on the federal and state level, but the resolution just spells out what you can do if you're a landowner is trying to keep the land in the home, in the hands of the farmers that we have here in Arkansas, where they can get tax credits, tax breaks on conservation easements.
Speaker 7
1:18
And I'd be glad to take questions. Governor
Stewart, do you have a question? I have a motion. I'll accept that later. Does any member of the committee have a question about this resolution? If not, let me go to the audience. Anybody in the audience want to speak against this resolution or for the resolution? Seeing none, Representative Stewart. Motion do pass. We have a motion do pass. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, signed. Congratulations, Representative Stewart. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, committee. Thank you so much. Members, let's now go to the top of the agenda. House Bill 2002 by Representative Link. Representative Link, do we have an amendment for that? Yes, sir. Staff will hand it out. Please recognize yourself, Representative, and you may begin while we hand this amendment out.
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
2:19
I am Representative Kelly Link of District 86 in Flippin. And if you're ready for me to proceed, we'll talk about the amendment first. Yes, let's speak on the amendment. You're recognized. This is a great program and a good bill, and I did not realize the amount of work that Representative Tracy Pernartz had
put into this before I got involved with it, and she was kind enough to let me know and ask if she could sign on. So this is a bill that just adds her name as a co-sponsor. I'm very glad to have her on to the bill as well.
Is there any discussion about the amendment? Amendment only. Motion? We have a motion by Representative Meeks. All in favor of the motion say aye. The amendment is passed. You may continue,
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
3:06
continue kind of where I left off, this bill has been a great deal of work and progress before I was ever elected and brought into the legislature. I was incredibly proud to be handed this project early on, and it has taken us to this point
to get it to where I think it's a good bill. Let me put it this way. It's a great program. It's a good bill. I'm glad that I'm a freshman in this legislature, and I hope that I'm back over the next six years because I think this is going to be such a great program that we're going to be tweaking this bill to keep up with the program. This entitled Arkansas Great Places, obviously I'm not going to read the entire bill to you. I want to tell you a few things about it and kind of the ideas of it. But economic development, you don't build a building and call Toyota and say, we built you a building.
You build a community, you build an infrastructure, you build a way of doing business in an area. And at that point in time, the businesses will come and economic development will happen. It's the same for tourism. You don't build tourism, you build an environment. And this bill gives opportunities to people that have an environment or an idea for an environment. They have a passion. They have a start. They don't have the tools to get themselves over the edge and make themselves as a great
place. So we're going to do two things. We're going to give them those tools, and we're going to give them a hand up to make themselves a great place. And we're going to recognize them as such so that entities, whether they're visitors to the area or folks that may be looking to do more business in Arkansas are able to easily find the truly great places of Arkansas. The funding, if we want to discuss that a little bit for this, will come from GIF. I don't think that there could be a better purpose for GIF. GIF is that, general improvement funds, and this is exactly what this bill does.
It is general improvement to an area, to a community, to a not-for-profit organization, whatever it is. There's four congressional districts in the state of Arkansas. This bill will allow for one project in each congressional district every two years. We don't think that one year is sufficient to make a great place out of a willing community and out of a worthwhile community. We will use existing language, if you will, an existing agency, an existing board of directors,
so we're creating nothing new. And on page 6, you'll see the organizations that are involved, page 6, lines 20 and down. The organization that will choose and hopefully continue to help these great places, potential great places, the Director of the Department of Arkansas Heritage, Department of Arkansas Economic Development, State Highway and Transportation, Department of Health, Parks and Tourism, Game and Fish, a person appointed by the Governor, a person appointed by the President
Pro Tem of the Senate, and a person appointed by the Speaker of the House of Representatives. And, of course, there's more language on the number of years that those appointees may serve and so on and so forth. I've talked with every agency head, with the exception of Ms. Haley of Arkansas Economic development, we've somehow or another missed each other, but her department is certainly aware. We've had absolutely no opposition from anybody or any agency on this bill. I can talk about this for the next hour and a half, but I think that would make the crowd very bored and probably get you aggravated with me. Again, it's a project I'm incredibly
proud to be involved with, and I'd be glad to answer any questions.
Representative Garry L. Smith
Unverified
6:53
Thank you, Representative. Representative Smith, you're first. You have a question. Thank you, Mr. Speaker and Mr. Chairman. Representative Link, how much money are you thinking of
pushing to each of these projects per session? Is that the way I understood you? One per district per session? Yes,
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
7:10
sir. Per session. What dollar amount you're thinking of? $500,000 per project per session. That would be $2
million per session, $1 million per year.
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
7:20
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. MR. Thank you, Mr. Chair. MR. Yes, sir. MR. That actually was in line with my question. Are we talking about, now, is this Arkansas Natural and Cultural Heritage Advisory Committee, now, is that a new
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
7:38
board? Is that a newly formed board? MR. No, sir. That's an existing, I won't say dormant board. Of course, they've continued on with their projects and they've been working, but it is a board that has some room and some flexibility which we could work this into. I wanted to stay in line with this House of Representatives and the policies that we set
the first day, which was not to create new boards and new agencies to do things that we
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
8:02
already have something in place for. Okay. Now, as you said, it's going to be $2 million a year. Now are you saying that you're going to provide GIF each
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
8:11
year? One million dollars per year, $2 million per session.
Speaker 27
8:15
So for every session you're trying to provide GIF for this project? In this bill,
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
8:20
there's a little bit of language, and it would take me a moment to find it. We hope to get it off of GIF.
We hope that when we put this project out there, it is such a success that we're going to find yearly funding for it within the budget, and we won't have
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
8:37
to rely on GIF. Okay. So if we don't provide, if we don't, if your hope is not
Speaker 27
8:41
there, then are you saying that are you going to be looking to the General Assembly to provide general revenue for this project each term? MR. If this is a success that
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
8:50
we think it will be, it's been proven success in Iowa. Again, I don't want to sell myself short here. I want to be a little bit brief.
I've got some information about the success that's been in Iowa, which is what we kind of drafted this after. MR. Okay. MR.
And so to get back to answering your question, Representative Love, we think that it's going
to be such a success that we'll be able to pull it out of the GIF, out of the general improvement funds, and actually find more permanent funding for it in the future. I don't think it would be smart as a project to go out and set up permanent funding for it until we are approving to the legislature and to the executive branches the success
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
9:28
it will be. Okay. All right. Thank you, sir. Representative Link, I have maybe a two-part question. The first question I have is would you go over some of the qualifications in order for a project to be considered for an Arkansas great place?
And then the follow-up would be if that project is approved, what is the criteria to determine whether that project has been successful or not? Very good. We can do that.
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
10:18
Let me first start off by telling you one of the words that we used when I was working with the Department of Heritage, and those folks are here to help us kind of get this off the ground and start putting this into law, is flexibility. We all talk about common sense in government, and it's a great idea to have common sense in government.
It's hard to write common sense in the law. It's hard to write with that gray ink that gives that flexibility to our agencies to carry things out. So with that idea, we have tried to write flexibility in here, and we've tried to write common sense into it. Eligibility can be a county, which is what the population is based off of later in the language. Municipality, incorporated city, a community, a not-for-profit organization representing a group of people like a community.
The folks will go through an application process to this board that we've described with these agency heads and these appointees. they've got to show that they're not just wanting a handout. They've got to show that they've got a great project, they've got a great passion, they truly are a great place in Arkansas, and with that hand up, not a handout, but with that hand up, they can be recognized as that great place.
And so we've got language in here of what we're going to look for. We're looking for something that will foster creative economics, that will protect heritage, protect history, stimulate economic growth, enhance local community development efforts. So there's a list of, we'll say, the criteria that these communities or organizations need to meet for this board to select them as a great place candidate or a great place. And then a
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
12:12
follow-up, what would be the criteria with that same criteria
to say whether that program was successful Will there be follow-up with that program to make sure that the money was spent in accordance with what the project was supposed to
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
12:27
be for in the first place? Absolutely, there will be. Again, modeling after Great Places Iowa, I didn't bring the multiple hundred page, I guess, project conclusion that I recently read. But, yes, it's kind of like doing marketing. When you do marketing, you go back and you see was it a success or not a success.
And if you don't do that, it's like flying an airplane in the dark. You may crash into the ground, and you don't even know you're headed that way. So you absolutely have to go back and analyze what, you know, did this meet the goals that we were after. And so, yes, that is in place, absolutely. Okay. All right. Thank you. Representative Smith, you're recognized again.
Representative Garry L. Smith
Unverified
13:09
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm sorry I didn't get all these the first go around, but as the discussion continues, I had a couple of
ideas. questions I want to ask who determines or what determines what district gets what funding at what time is first question good very good okay each
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
13:23
district each congressional district the one of four will be eligible for the five hundred thousand dollars no more no less well obviously less if it's not needed we're not going to throw money at you know bad idea that board of directors will pick through the winners if you will it won in each congressional district. You cannot have two in any congressional district. You cannot have, you know, that's it. Now, let me also put it this way in this language. The first year, there must be four
selected. From that year on, there does not have to be four selected.
We only want to award those folks that truly meet the criteria and truly can be
a great place. We're not going to force this agent, force this board to go out and select some place from a group that may not meet the criteria. So we're not going to throw $500,000 out there if there's not somebody that's truly a great place. We want a group when they're recognized or an area when it's recognized as a great place to actually mean something.
And we're kind of get off a little bit but come back to it. The organization that I work for, we give a yearly award if deserved. We've not given that award in three years. We hope to hopefully give it this next year if someone steps up and deserves it. And we talked about that when putting together this legislation. and that's why we determined that if there's only
two great-place potential candidates out there, we will
Representative Garry L. Smith
Unverified
14:49
only fund two great places. Okay, thank you. And next question then, are there safeguards to prevent a $500,000 mistake?
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
15:00
Yeah, that's a great question, Representative Smith. I don't know if there's safeguards to present a multibillion-dollar mistake that we call Arkansas government sometimes. Well, oftentimes we have entities that
Representative Garry L. Smith
Unverified
15:08
bring programs or ideas that, to them, it's the best thing since sliced bread. Who determines if it's a good idea or a bad one?
How do we vet that before we – does a committee do that, I hope? Oh, absolutely. That's
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
15:21
what this committee made up these agency heads is for. Okay, and then my last one, Mr. Chairman, if you'll allow me. Then I see
Representative Garry L. Smith
Unverified
15:27
in the wording of the bill that you talk about historic sites.
So I have a feeling you might look at something like the old Washington site in southwest Arkansas or maybe Poison Springs Battlefield or maybe Jenkins Ferry Battlefield. Would those be some maybe potentials if someone came to you with those as options for historical sites of interest? If they meet all the criteria, they can't
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
15:48
just be a good-looking historical site and be a great place. I understand that. Thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chair. Next on the
list is Representative Stewart. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. I've got two questions.
Representative Randy Stewart
Unverified
16:02
One of them is, can you tell me how successful Iowa was in getting grants from outside money? We allow
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
16:09
that, if you will, up to that great place. In other
Representative Randy Stewart
Unverified
16:13
words. How successful was Iowa in doing that? Were they successful in getting money from outside the state coffers? Their great places have qualified
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
16:20
for other federal grants, yes. It's kind of one of those things. It's like banks love to give people money that they know will pay it back, and once a place is designated as a great place,
And once they're starting to make this progress and other people want to help them along. So, yes, the Iowa great places
Representative Randy Stewart
Unverified
16:40
have also qualified for more federal grants. Okay, and one follow-up. In my rural area, the biggest town I have is 2,000 people. I don't know that we're ever going to have a $500,000 project. Have you considered doing some smaller projects in the rural areas in the smaller places that may have a significant historic place or a great place that it would not be necessary to spend $500,000.
That's a great idea, Mr. Stewart. In other
Speaker 53
17:06
words, you could have two at $250,000. And that's a
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
17:10
possibility for later on. I agree. Okay, all right, thank you. We do want to make sure that whatever a
Representative Randy Stewart
Unverified
17:16
great place is, it is a
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
17:19
great place. Well, not all great places are in big towns. Oh, amen. And that's very true. And if you – in this language, we very clearly make it eligible to – more eligible to smaller communities and would do larger by the amount of match fund necessary.
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
17:34
I saw that, yeah. Okay. All right. Thank you. Representative Love. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Link, I'm looking over the departments that you're going to pull people from, And I would just like to make one suggestion, is that you include Rural
Speaker 27
17:56
Services, Department of Rural Services, because they usually deal with smaller communities of 20,000 or less. And that would just be a suggestion.
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
18:06
But I hate to keep harping on this, but I'm going to go back to the GIF situation. Now, I think earlier this week or
Speaker 27
18:15
last week, we voted down all GIF projects. Is this not a personal GIF project? I mean, explain to me
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
18:25
how this is going to work. Sure. Yes, we did vote down every member's own, every House member's own GIF.
Agenda
Documents
No documents posted.
Speakers
Representative Jerry R. Brown Chair
Unverified
Representative Eddie L. Cheatham
Unverified
Speaker 7
Representative Kelley Linck
Unverified
Speaker 15
Representative Garry L. Smith
Unverified
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
Speaker 27
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
Representative Randy Stewart
Unverified
Speaker 53