The clock is ticking as Joe Smith’s eight-year run as Mayor of North Little Rock is winding down.
In the second to last City Council meeting of 2020, Smith told the Council with a laugh that he was going to “slowly ride off into the sunset.”
Counting Thursday, Smith has nine business days left in his term, as City Hall will be closed for Christmas Eve and Christmas. There’s one more Council meeting, on Monday, Dec. 28, left for Smith, and Ward 1’s Beth White, who is also retiring from elected service, at year’s end. That won’t be the last time North Little Rock sees Smith though.
“It was not the prudent thing to do,” Smith said of a retirement event before his departure and said he thought “September, when we have the ribbon-cutting for the new justice center,” would be the best time to have something.
North Little Rock Mayor Joe Smith
“After we lost Buck Dancy to this awful disease,” Smith said of the Covid-19 related passing of the North Little Rock police sergeant. “It hit home and I didn’t want to get” people gathered together.
Smith added that his hope that by September, pandemic concerns would be abated.
In other business, the Council voted 8-0 on all agenda items, in a meeting that took about 30 minutes. The most significant item of business was a special call to approve a resolution for the city to with the Arkansas Department of Transportation on improvements near the Highway 70 and Highway 391 intersection.
Code-named “Project Runner,” the improvements will be to facilitate an Amazon.com facility on North Little Rock’s eastern edge. Details on the project are light, but the resolution says the developer of Project Runner will be responsible for any costs beyond $2 million. Also present for the meeting was Mayor-elect Terry Hartwick, who beat School Board member Tracy Steele in a December runoff, and Nathan Hamilton, who will be taking White’s Ward 1 seat on the Council.
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North Little Rock: Smith’s time as mayor nears end
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The clock is ticking as Joe Smith’s eight-year run as Mayor of North Little Rock is winding down.
In the second to last City Council meeting of 2020, Smith told the Council with a laugh that he was going to “slowly ride off into the sunset.”
Counting Thursday, Smith has nine business days left in his term, as City Hall will be closed for Christmas Eve and Christmas. There’s one more Council meeting, on Monday, Dec. 28, left for Smith, and Ward 1’s Beth White, who is also retiring from elected service, at year’s end.
That won’t be the last time North Little Rock sees Smith though.
“It was not the prudent thing to do,” Smith said of a retirement event before his departure and said he thought “September, when we have the ribbon-cutting for the new justice center,” would be the best time to have something.
“After we lost Buck Dancy to this awful disease,” Smith said of the Covid-19 related passing of the North Little Rock police sergeant. “It hit home and I didn’t want to get” people gathered together.
Smith added that his hope that by September, pandemic concerns would be abated.
In other business, the Council voted 8-0 on all agenda items, in a meeting that took about 30 minutes.
The most significant item of business was a special call to approve a resolution for the city to with the Arkansas Department of Transportation on improvements near the Highway 70 and Highway 391 intersection.
Code-named “Project Runner,” the improvements will be to facilitate an Amazon.com facility on North Little Rock’s eastern edge. Details on the project are light, but the resolution says the developer of Project Runner will be responsible for any costs beyond $2 million.
Also present for the meeting was Mayor-elect Terry Hartwick, who beat School Board member Tracy Steele in a December runoff, and Nathan Hamilton, who will be taking White’s Ward 1 seat on the Council.