The Eureka Springs City Advertising and Promotion Commission has approved a plan for the hiring process of a permanent director.
At its regular monthly meeting on Wednesday, Jan. 24, the CAPC voted to have new commissioner Brian Weinmann lead a hiring committee that will interview the applicants and make a recommendation to the full commission.
Kolin Paulk and Bradley Tate-Greene, who both also recently joined the CAPC, will also be a part of the interview process, but since two or more commissioners discussing any commission business constitutes a public meeting, they will conduct any interviews separately.
That will likely happen at the Eureka Springs Community Center, the commission discussed, as chair Chris Clifton said a system that the commission used in the past worked well since the facility has ample rooms necessary.
Most commissioners agreed the process needs to get underway sooner rather than later.
“If you look in the bylaws, basically an interim director, which is Mike [Maloney] in that position right now,” Weinmann said during a workshop held before the meeting. “There’s several areas that his hands are tied, and I don’t like that.”
Maloney is an applicant for the permanent position.
“I think that a date needs to be set on this decision,” Heinmann said. “Because if I’m in a position of Mike’s, as an interim, and I’m banking on a salary, I’d sure like to know what my future is eventually.”
Maloney responded: “Thank you.”
Commissioners previously voted to have Staffmark recruit candidates for the position. If the CAPC hires a candidate Staffmark vets, then Staffmark will be owed 8 percent of the approved salary.
“If it’s a candidate that comes straight to us, then we don’t,” Clifton said, adding that commissioners haven’t seen any of the applicants recruited by Staffmark.
“We told them to hold on to them until we found out what the process was,” Clifton said. “There’s resumes to start going through …” “If I’m going to have to vote on somebody I’m going to want to interview them,” Weinmann responded. “I can’t vote on somebody by paper. That’s where I stand.”
Clifton responded: “Well, maybe you should lead it.”
Commissioners discussed having all of the resumes emailed individually to each commissioner for review.
“I think all the commissioners should get copies of the resumes from all the applicants,” commissioner Steve Holifield said. “Just to be transparent because if someone says ‘hey, I applied and I didn’t get an interview,’ is that because for whatever reason?”
The process is a bit challenging, Clifton said, because he feels some candidates “are not going to be down for a public interview.”
“There’s some locals who will apply that are not qualified and they will get their feelings hurt and spread the word out there that they’re the most qualified person and they didn’t interview me,” Holifield added.
Clifton suggested once all commissioners receive the information from all the applicants they recommend their top “three or four” candidates to Weinmann, who along with Paulk and Tate-Greene will interview each of the top choices one-on-one and bring their recommendations to the commission.
All applications and resumes for the director position are public record.
BUDGET REPORT
Scott Bardin, interim finance director, reported thattheCAPC’sbankbalance as of Nov 30, 2023, was $2,073,948.98.
In comparing the commission’s budget for November to actual collections, Bardin said food and beverage collected $83,107, which was 17 percent lower than the projected $100,000. In lodging, the commission collected $72,441, which was 28 percent under the $100,000 budget. In all the CAPC collected 22 percent less in November than budgeted.
Despite those numbers year-to-date collections through Nov. 30 were still $42,467 more than projected.
“Mike and I were talking earlier … about our advertising efforts in comparison to our funds received,” Bardin told commissioners about the numbers. “In looking at Paradise Advertising’s monthly summary, I did notice that the interaction with people on social media with our Eureka Springs website was down 38 percent, substantially, which shocked me because I’m like, well that feeds into why we’re down a little bit here.”
Clifton responded: “The easy scapegoat would be the past group we were working with. I mean, that’s the lazy answer, but … we are in a transition.”
DIRECTOR’S REPORT
Maloney reported that the first of “CAPC’s 58-minute breakfasts,” where commission staff and one commissioner will meet with invited community stakeholders for breakfast, was held Jan. 15 and included Mayor Butch Berry, Paulk, Jennifer Cross from Mud Street Cafe and Allen Huffman from Arvest Bank.
“We sat down and we tackled a couple of topics,” he said. “One of them was hospitality, which we’re all akin to here in Eureka Springs and the second was employee retention.”
Maloney said the meetings will be video recorded and edited versions will be placed on the CAPC website, visiteurekasprings. com.
“These were great sessions and we look forward to the next one,” Maloney said of the second meeting, which was held Monday, Jan. 29.
Maloney reported that a crowd of approximately 975 attended the Old Crow Medicine Show concert at The Auditorium on Saturday, Jan. 20.
“If you weren’t in Eureka Springs last Saturday night, I don’t know where you were,” he said. “We had a terrific crowd for the event and it was, what I would call, a rockin’ good time. I think everybody was happy and we had a tremendous response from the public, and I think a tremendous way to start our Auditorium season of entertainment.”
Maloney said January was a “month of what I called acute fixes and some near emergencies” at the Auditorium.
“We were faced with a laundry list of things that we did not anticipate,” he said.
Those things included a termite inspection, a repair and overhaul of the main fire protection in the building, repair of three heating and air units, a communication device for the building’s elevator and exit sign repairs.
“All this leads to the question of who owns the building,” Maloney said. “We know the city does own the building. On the same token, we’re going to investigate the opportunity to work with the city in terms of a contractual relationship, to at least come up with the amount of money that the CAPC will go and devote to these type of repairs. But, in the same token, we have to cap it somewhere along the line because we can’t just keep having emergency failures and then expecting the CAPC to bail out everything that goes on.”
Holifield suggested routine inspections on all areas of the Auditorium to help the CAPC have a grasp of what repairs or replacements might need to be on the radar of commissioners.
Maloney also gave commissioners an update on the new relationship with Madden Media, outlining part of the agency’s plan for the city’s marketing and public relation efforts and how the budget the CAPC is paying is planned for the year.
FUNDING REQUESTS
The commission approved two of the three funding requests presented.
Approved was $173.65 from the Arkansas State Questers for help with the cost of brochures. The Questers will be holding a state spring convention April 11-12 at the Crescent Hotel.
The commission also approved a $5,000 amount for a Eureka Springs Pride event June 6-9.
The only funding request denied was one for $1,500 from Main Street Eureka for a preservation workshop training specially on “restoration of historical windows,” which is planned for March 2-3. The request failed when it only received three votes.
OFFICER ELECTIONS
Clifton was re-elected as CAPC chair, Holifield selected again for vice chair and commissioner Chris Jones as secretary.
Paulk was selected as the commission’s marketing liaison with Madden Media.
