By Andrea Bruner, White River Now
Batesville is in a housing crisis, and Crystal Johnson says there is a prime opportunity here for new development.
Johnson, Batesville Area Chamber of Commerce CEO, and Chris Hill, director of marketing and communications at the chamber, came before the Batesville City Council on Tuesday night to discuss “three major challenges that pose a threat to our local economy.”
Besides a major housing shortage, the other two are connecting the emerging workforce to job opportunities and retail attraction.
Johnson said the job market is strong, with the local population projected to increase, but she said the majority of our community is unable to find affordable housing. In fact, she said 44 percent of the local workforce (7,500+ people) commutes from not just outside the city limits but also outside our county. Twenty percent of those travel more than 50 miles each way.
In the past decade, more than 3,000 jobs have been created here, with $97 million in private investments announced and $150 million in public projects underway. “People want to live here,” she said, but, “the majority of our workforce can’t afford to live here.”
“I’m going to keep talking about until we are no longer in a housing crisis,” she told the council.
Some of the most common jobs are cashier, retail sales or supervisors, fast food counter and wait staff, food supervisors, cafeteria cooks, office clerks, receptionists and secretaries, bookkeepers, maintenance, truck drivers, nurses/nursing assistants, home health aides, janitors/cleaners, teachers and factory workers, but none of the top 35 jobs pay enough for the worker to live here, research shows.
The median household income in Independence County is $58,318, which translates to a median home affordability price below $195,000. However, the median list price for an available home is $225,000, with the majority of available homes (57 percent) priced at or above $200,000.
Locally, the rental unit vacancy rate is 0.7 percent – far below the “healthy range” of 4-6 percent vacancy.
Over the next five years, Johnson said the area will need to build approximately 1,000 homes and 1,000 rental units. The largest rental need, she added, is for units with monthly rent of $832-$1,330. The largest for-sale need is for homes priced at $177,000-$266,000.
“This is not unique to us; it’s happening all across the state,” she said. “We want to move the housing needle.”
The chamber is working on a collaboration, known as Work/Wired, to ensure sustainable access to a living wage for the emerging workforce for every resident.
Johnson said workforce problems often begin as social issues. “When we consider why our solutions aren’t working – that’s a big puzzle – we took a step back and focused on what’s happening to residents from 0 to age 24, evaluating every step of that life span and identifying where the gaps are.”
For instance, with early childhood, they found there are delays in finding affordable childcare spots. “Now we have some teams in place to focus on that 0-4 age group to make sure we have spots (for affordable childcare).”
On the other end of the spectrum, Johnson said ages 18-24 have struggled to find family-sustaining wages. A single person should be making $18.25 an hour to cover housing, food, healthcare, etc., and that number only increases with additional members in the family/household.
“The problem is a good majority of kids are not being shown how to find that living wage,” Johnson said. “It will take everyone in the community to admit there is a problem and work together to chip away at the gaps in the system.”
The third challenge she discussed Tuesday night was retail recruitment.
“We know from data there are large gaps in retail,” she said, and as long as there are gaps for items such as sporting goods or additional restaurants, people will go out of town to spend money elsewhere. “It’s been a slow year for retail. We’ve contacted hundreds of retailers, so they’re aware of our community, but the hard reality is there are limited sites. All of our large retail wants to be on St. Louis or Harrison.”
She said there may be opportunities for some property owners to relocate to give others better investment points. For instance, there was a pawn shop where 7 Brew is now, and she hopes there may be similar situations arise. “There are very few commercial sites; maybe in 2026, we’ll be able to level the playing field.”
Meanwhile, Hill said he got the “fun” portion of the report in talking up tourism in Independence County. He said the chamber’s Experience Builder app was used by 18,000 people this year, with 75 percent of those being from out of town.
The chamber promotes this app as the go-to tool for discovering local attractions, planning weekend getaways, or finding the best dining or shopping spots, but Hill said there are local hiking and biking trails on there, and much more.
With the city’s Advertising and Promotion Commission recently wrapping up its fall campaign, sights are now set on starting the Christmas campaign.
Hill said research shows that the average visitor spends $149.64 daily, thus creating an estimated economic impact of $377,000.
Among the hotel/Airbnb/other lodging tax monies, the city has collected $163,504 so far this year, 7.5 percent ahead of this time last year, and 20 percent ahead of the last five years. Johnson did say that this fund can only grow so far – until the city adds another hotel.
So far this year, restaurants, lodging, and retail have collected $212 million, Hill said.
And while the holiday lights will be displaced, there are more people coming to Batesville’s social media to look for information about the “Christmas Capital of Arkansas.” Hill said they have compared social media from 2024 to 2025, and the A&P’s campaign has “doubled the reach,” Hill said.
“So if people don’t come, it’s not because they’re not aware,” Johnson added.
The council asked about “primary drivers” of tourism, and Hill said some are events such as basketball tournaments (held at the community center), Lyon College’s Arkansas Scottish Festival, Batesville Motor Speedway races, and then of course, the Christmas lights, but he said there are plenty of people who come to Batesville for “adventure,” or to eat at restaurants and shop in Batesville.
In other news, Tuesday night:
— Mayor Rick Elumbaugh announced City Hall will be a collection site for a food drive to benefit Batesville Help & Hope until Friday, Nov. 21. Items needed include shelf-stable milk, canned goods (vegetables, soups, meats, etc.), peanut butter, pasta, rice, individual macaroni and cheese cups, cooking oils, spices, etc.
The council approved moving money from the community center’s perpetual fund to make purchases. The first totals approximately $8,800 for a pump motor for the community center.
The second is to replace the cardio equipment at the center, at a cost of about $150,000. Elumbaugh said a treadmill went down last week and was told it would cost $6,000 to repair, but the treadmill had only cost $13,000 when purchased, and it would take about 14 weeks for the parts. He said the equipment is seven years old, and most only last five to seven years. He also said the community center membership is down a little, and he hopes new cardio equipment will help that.
The council also approved “employee incentives” (formerly known as bonuses) of $1,000 for full-time employees; amounts to part-time employees will be prorated based on time worked.
— Police Department Capt. Fred Friar presented the department’s monthly report in the absence of Chief John Scarbrough.
Friar noted that calls for service doubled from the previous month, with 2,205 calls in October (compared to 1,093 calls in September and 1,431 in August), 46 accidents (55 in September and 37 in August), 29 (32 in September and 38 in August), 62 incident reports (69 in September and 79 in August), 161 citations (211 in September and 280 in August) and 204 warnings (170 in September and 378 in August).
During the month of October, department personnel completed a total of 449.5 training hours across various areas of law enforcement education and professional development.
In October, the Batesville Police Department received 20 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Friar said the department has fielded a total of 46 FOIA requests since July, when it started keeping count.
He also said the new mobile app “Batesville PD AR” has launched and is available on Android and Apple, giving users access to press releases, messages from the chief, sex offender map, and more.
— Fire Chief Mark McCollum presented July’s monthly statistics for his department: 50 total calls (compared to 51 total calls, one structure fire, two grass or woods fires, one vehicle fire, five medical assists, 14 motor vehicle accidents, five gas leaks, 10 false alarms, and 10 good intent/service calls.
Firefighters also performed 93 inspections and four plan reviews and accumulated 202 training hours. McCollum said the department also pressure-tested 15,000 feet of fire hoses and flow-tested more than 300 hydrants.
— Public Works Engineer Damon Johnson gave a report, as well, informing the council that street department supervisor Johnny Coles is trying to pass the baton of traffic light maintenance, and asked that city employee Billy Stidham, who lives outside the city limits, be allowed to drive a city vehicle home at night. Stidham is a crew leader who has been with the city for more than 15 years, Johnson noted.
Johnson said that if a drunk driver hits a light pole at 2 a.m. or if lightning strikes the pole, Stidham will be the primary responder. “It happens six to 10 times a year. It happens a little more frequently as of late, with the new traffic light at St. Louis and Harrison working the gremlins out. It doesn’t happen a lot, but it happens some. … It would cut down response time by about 30 minutes,” Johnson said.
The council approved the request.
Johnson said he and the mayor have been working on the city budget and hope to present it to the council in December. “This is the most difficult budget I’ve ever worked on in the last 18 years,” Johnson said. “Expenses have gone up, and revenues are pretty flat. … It’s tough right now.”
He then updated the council on the parks expansion project, stating the events center is “really coming together” with visible progress alongside St. Louis Street, while the sports courts are starting to be formed up and the skateboarding and all-wheel park is also moving ahead.
He said the water plant construction crews are making up some of the lost time and are now only two weeks behind schedule instead of three, with hopes of gaining enough ground that the project will actually finish ahead of time.
Johnson said he will meet with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality later this month to make the case that the city has met all requirements for the Consent Administrative Order.
Johnson said the city has been under the CAO since 2008, when the ADEQ sent a letter stating that the wastewater treatment plant was “in significant noncompliance” for violating certain limits for four consecutive months in 2007. City officials met with the ADEQ to negotiate a lesser fine, but there was no getting around the fact that the city needed a new, larger capacity wastewater plant and collection system.
Eventually, the city built a plant that can legally discharge 9 million gallons a day, which went online in December 2015.
“This (CAO) was something the mayor and I got slapped in the face with,” Johnson said. “We’re spending $100 million on sewer rehab/improvements, and we’re going to make a case that we have completed all the requirements, and we will ask them to remove that from the city of Batesville.”
— The council went into executive session but took no action. Elumbaugh said the parks commission has multiple vacancies; anyone who lives within the city limits interested in serving should contact Parks Director Lowen Lermitte at 870-698-2427 or lermitte@batesvillearkansas.gov.
— While council meetings are typically held on the second and fourth Tuesdays of the month, the first November meeting was moved due to Veterans Day. Elumbaugh said there are some council members with conflicts during the next meeting, so it may be moved as well, but no date has been set yet.
— The mayor and council recognized Alderman Fred Krug, a Vietnam vet, in honor of Veterans Day. City offices were closed on Tuesday, although trash was still picked up.
— During the citizens’ comments portion of the agenda, some residents from both inside the city limits and outside came to speak regarding the Oct. 29 article on White River Now, “City pauses decision to team with ICE” and asked the council to reconsider its decision to pause the agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The council offered no response.
All council members were present.
File image: Gena Tate, White River Now
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