Tiffany Wright is looking for child welfare warriors

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Tiffany WrightDo you remember the U.S. Marines’ recruiting slogan, “We’re looking for a few good men”? Tiffany Wright is looking for 130 child welfare warriors.

Wright is director of the Division of Children and Family Services, which responds to reports of child abuse and neglect and administers the state’s foster care system.

DCFS has more than 130 job vacancies, including 69 for front line workers who manage an average of 24 cases. It is advertising job opportunities through social media, recruitment webinars, and a new webpage, humanservices.arkansas.gov/u/dcfs-jobs.

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ state employee pay plan last year increased front line workers’ starting salaries from $36,155 to $52,137. Average annual turnover has since fallen from 60%-70% to 43%, which is still high.  Continue reading →

Low expectations for Hogs good for Silverfield

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Ryan Silverfield expectationsIt can be an advantage when people have low expectations of you, especially when you’re Ryan Silverfield.

The new Arkansas Razorbacks head football coach leads a program of which few expect much this year, to his benefit. The Razorbacks are coming off a season where they finished 2-10 overall and 0-8 in the Southeastern Conference. It was the fourth 0-8 conference record since 2013. The Hogs have won one SEC home game in three years.

Things aren’t expected to get much better. ESPN says the Razorbacks have the nation’s toughest schedule this year. Media types who cover the SEC picked the Hogs to finish last among 16 teams.

Silverfield, 46, wisely didn’t make pie-in-the-sky predictions as he prepared for the season opener against North Alabama Sept. 5. Instead, he promised the Little Rock Touchdown Club Aug. 24 only a “special, special year” and a bright future.  Continue reading →

State would get millions; Facebook promises changes

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Meta settlementThe state of Arkansas could collect more than $172 million spread over 10 years from Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram. Meanwhile, the company says it will take steps to reduce its platforms’ potential harms to teens.

Those new developments would come as a result of a settlement announced Wednesday between the company and 48 states along with the District of Columbia and three U.S. territories.

Attorney General Tim Griffin was the nation’s first attorney general to file a lawsuit when he did so in 2023. He argued that Meta had violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act by misleading young people and their parents about its platforms’ addictive properties. 

Eventually every state sued. The company announced Wednesday it was settling with almost all of them, paying a combined $18 billion over 10 years. The exceptions being New Mexico, which has already won at trial, and Florida. The latter’s attorney general called the settlement “peanuts” and said the state is going to court. 

That’s understandable, considering Meta reported revenues of almost $201 billion in 2025. Continue reading →

On your ballot: $500 million to fix leaky water pipes

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$500 million bond issueAs Chris Colclasure puts it, “Water falls free from the sky.” But it’s not free if you want it to come out of a pipe clean enough to drink.

Colclasure is director of the Arkansas Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Division. He would help administer a $500 million bond issue for water and wastewater projects if voters approve it this November.

Issue 4 represents the fifth time legislators have asked voters to give the state such authority. Voters have said yes the previous four times. The first was in 1982, and the most recent was in 2008. The latter was for $300 million, with the last of the bonds issued in August. 

The state has identified $20.1 billion in needed upgrades over the next 20 years through its soon-to-be-released State Water Plan update. Issue 4 would help provide that funding for the next 16 years. It would help the state pay for its 20% share for federal matching funds and allow it to fund projects directly with general obligation bonds. The state would loan proceeds to communities, often at a better interest rate than they could obtain on their own. Continue reading →

Poll finds Arkansas races tighter than expected

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Sen. Tom Cotton, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Rep. French Hill  are definitely still the favorites to win in November. But the election just got more interesting.

A Talk Business & Politics-Hendrix College poll released over the course of this week found that Cotton, a Republican, was trailing Democrat Hallie Shoffner, 47.4% to 44%. Libertarian Jeff Wadlin was running at 3%, while 5.65% of respondents were undecided. 

The poll also found that in the governor’s race, Sanders was leading Democrat state Sen. Fred Love, 45% to 40%, while Libertarian Colt Shelby trailed with 7%. Another 8% were undecided. 

The poll of 1,217 likely voters was conducted Aug. 11-12 via text message and had a plus-minus margin of error of 4.7%. That’s a 9.4% swing, which means Cotton could be leading his race while Love could be ahead of Sanders. 

In a separate survey of 1,112 likely voters in the 2nd District, Rep. Hill was trailing Democrat Chris Jones, 44% to 48%.

The impossible-to-ignore finding was that more respondents disapproved of President Trump than approved, 53%-46%. Perhaps even more significant was the fact that almost half the respondents (48.3%) strongly disapproved. Less than 5% only somewhat disapproved. In contrast, one-third (32.2%) strongly approved.  Continue reading →