ALC Review: Jan. 13, 2026

Senator Blake Johnson All right, members, take your seats. We’re going to get started. Review Subcommittee will come to order. Co-chair, you got anything? Without objection, we’re going to take up the supplemental agenda. I’m going to suspend the rules, take up the supplemental agenda. Motion? Motion. Second by Senator Painter– or Representative Painter. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Thank you, members. We’re going to take up the supplemental agenda. 

Vehicle licensing app

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good morning, members. Katie Walden, Bureau of Legislative Research, Fiscal Division. Your supplemental agenda can be found on the very back of your packet behind the blue sheet of paper. 

Staff received an additional contract for review by request of the Department of Finance and Administration on Monday of last week. This is one out-of-state contract for Tyler Technologies. This contract is originally valued at $2.6 million. It was procured through RFP process and it is for the development of a mobile app for citizens to be able to access state services. 

Initially, it’s going to be used by DFA for their vehicle services and licensing. But the hope is to expand this out to further services across state government. This is the supplemental agenda item, Mr. Chair. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any questions? Senator Rice. 

Senator Terry Rice Thank you Mr. Chair. You got me on now. My light was on before the supplemental. My question was, and I thought it would be helpful for the committee, can the committee expect going forward we’re going to continue to flip and have Review mornings and Peer in the afternoon? Or was it one time? 

Senator Blake Johnson I would hope not. That was a request from the Peer chairs. 

Senator Terry Rice Okay, you don’t expect that to continue? 

Senator Blake Johnson I don’t expect. 

Senator Terry Rice Okay, I just thought that would help the committee. Thank you. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any questions on the supplemental agenda? Senator Bryant. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you, Mr. Chair. Maybe some of the DFA can answer this, but I’m just curious when we let this contract and then the current progress of the development of the software. Can that be part of this discussion? 

Senator Blake Johnson Introduce yourself and you’re recognized. 

Jim Hudson Jim Hudson, Secretary, DFA. Good morning, committee. Senator Bryant, honestly, the underlying software, if you want to use that term, for all the systems, they’re already developed. They’re already there. 

This is a way to kind of bring in through a single sign-on process, all those systems. So citizens don’t have to go to 15 different websites to be able to access services. We’re looking at having one app that consolidates all those services, so making it easier for the taxpayers to be able to access their information, the services they depend on. 

Senator Joshua Bryant The original contract, has that portion been completed? We’re just going to add more to the contract so they can add more of those services onto that single app access? 

Jim Hudson So this is a new contract. And the contract is strictly for developing the app to be able to access the services that– again, the services are all already existent in the existing systems around the state government. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay. Do you know when the hopeful completion of the app would be? 

Jim Hudson We’re targeting the fall, October 1st-ish. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay, so this year? 

Jim Hudson This year. This calendar year, yes. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any other questions? Seeing none, motion to review supplemental agenda. Motion and a second by Senator McKee. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Thank you. Let’s go on to the method of finance. 

Methods of Finance Overview

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. Under item B, you have five methods of finance for your review today. First, you’ll see the letter from the Department of Finance and Administration stating the five projects. And then behind that, you will see a table summarizing each of those projects. So I’ll quickly outline them for you now. 

The first two methods of finance are with ASU Jonesboro. Number one is for the College of Business roof replacement. It’s an original MOF valued at 477,000. They hope to use Sustainable Building Energy Revolving Loan funds for this project. 

And number 2 is for the admin cooling tower replacement for their administration building. This is revising an existing MOF up to $269,000. They hope to use university reserves for this product. 

Number 3, and you’ll see this project mentioned a few times throughout the agenda. This first time is with U of A Fayetteville. This is for an academic classroom building. The U of A hopes to build a 100,000 gross square foot facility in the McElroy district. It will include classrooms, an innovation hub, and it will increase by 2,300 student seats. The original total projected cost is $100 million and it will be paid for with 95% university reserves and 5% gifts. 

Number 4, with UA Fort Smith, this is a new original MOF for the university police department renovation valued at $522,000 originally, using university reserves. 

And number 5, with U of A Hope Texarkana, this is an original MOF for the student center boiler chiller replacement. They will use plant funds for this project. These are the methods of finance this month, Mr. Chair. 

Senator Blake Johnson Representative Ladyman.

UA Fayetteville new business building location

Representative Jack Ladyman Mr. Chair, I’ve got a couple of questions, actually. On number 3 there, it talks about the new classroom building is going to be located in the McElroy district. Where is the McElroy district? I asked Representative McElroy. He said it wasn’t in his district. 

Senator Blake Johnson Do you want the university to come down? 

Representative Jack Ladyman Yeah, please. Yeah, I was just curious. Is this on the main campus or a satellite campus? 

Senator Blake Johnson Just introduce yourself and you’re recognized. You’ve heard the question. 

Clayton Hamilton Good morning. Thank you and happy new year to you. My name is Clayton Hamilton, Senior Associate Vice Chancellor for Campus Services. So for us, that is our facilities, real estate, police, parking and transit. This new classroom building will be located on the main campus adjacent to the Walton College of Business, in that footprint on campus. 

Projects already completed before approval

Representative Jack Ladyman Thank you very much. I had a second question. In the last column– if that’s okay– where it has the estimated start date for these five projects and the completion date. All of the estimated start dates have passed, not a long time ago. One of the completion dates has passed. So why does it show a completion date in 2025 when we’re just reviewing it now? That may not be yours. 

Clayton Hamilton Yeah, that may not be our project. Be 2029. 

Senator Blake Johnson That’s University of Arkansas Texarkana.

Representative Jack Ladyman Texarkana. So are they here? 

Senator Blake Johnson Is there anybody here from University of Arkansas Texarkana? Come on down. Same thing, just introduce yourself and you’ve heard the question. 

Sherry Ford Yes, I am Sherry Ford, the CFO or Vice Chancellor of Finance and Administration with Hope Texarkana. The reason why, it was originally under budget or under the $250,000. But we ended up finding some other problems that we ended up going over that $250,000 threshold. 

And it was more of an emergency type of situation where we ended up having to go ahead and do the repairs because there was nothing else that we could heat the building with, cool the building with. And it was in our student center. It’s the only method of heating and cooling that we can do there. 

Representative Jack Ladyman So the project is complete? 

Sherry Ford Yes, sir. 

Representative Jack Ladyman We’re reviewing it now? 

Sherry Ford Yes, sir. It was originally supposed to be under that $250,000. But as we got into the project, we found more problems that were with it. It is a 60-year-old campus. With piping and compressors and things like that, it just, it got larger. 

Representative Jack Ladyman Well, this is not just for you, but number 1, number 2, and number 5 all show that they started before this meeting and we’re reviewing them all now. I think these dates should be adjusted. Why are we reviewing things after they’re done? I mean, what recourse do we have to have any input into a project that’s already complete? 

Maybe I’m asking the wrong– maybe it’s staff. I mean, why shouldn’t these things be brought to us before they start? If it takes an emergency, then there should be an emergency addendum and it should be brought before us. 

I don’t know whether that’s a question, Mr. Chairman, but I’d like to have some kind of an answer, why we’re not reviewing things before they start and, in some cases, before they are done. 

Senator Blake Johnson I think DFA reviews these and that’s why they were brought forward.

Representative Jack Ladyman Well, why can’t we review them before they start? That’s my question. 

Senator Blake Johnson If they were originally below the threshold, that’s probably why. Don’t go too far there. I’ve got some more in the queue. 

Jim Hudson Mr. Chairman, this is not excited. It’s my natural disposition. Jim Hudson, Secretary DFA. By rule, methods of fans don’t get reviewed over here if they’re under $250,000. So the university did exactly what they’re supposed to do. Once they trip that 250, they provide the method of finance. 

We reviewed it promptly and put it on your agenda for you to look at. So really, it’s impossible for situations like this, for them to know in advance if they don’t have a surprise. But when they found the surprise, they promptly notified us and now it’s before you. 

Representative Jack Ladyman I understand. Thank you for that answer. 

Jim Hudson Yes, sir. 

Senator Blake Johnson Senator Bryant. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you, Mr. Chair. This will go back into item 3 for University of Arkansas Fayetteville. 

Senator Blake Johnson I don’t think you have to introduce yourself again. I was about to tell you not to leave. 

UA Fayetteville building: $1,000 per square foot

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you, I’m just right over to your left. It’ll follow also into item C since it’s reviewed over contracts of $5 million. It just kept flagging in my mind that we’re going to pay $1,000 a square foot for this structure. I’m curious, you may not be familiar with the build, but can you kind of help me understand what’s going into this structure for $1,000 a foot? 

Clayton Hamilton Yes, sir. And thank you for that question. So there was an extensive amount of work done prior to this project, moving forward to look at options for a new classroom building. We had completed a space study on campus. We completed a study specific to our Walton College of Business and certainly knew we had the need for additional classroom space. 

The $1,000 a square foot is estimated on the high end. We’ve unfortunately had some projects recently that have come in over budget where we’ve had to come back and request approval after the fact. So that carries a healthy amount of contingency in that estimated cost. And we’re working through a full design phase. 

We’ve got a contractor on– we will have a contractor onboard to help us with the estimating as we work through the design. Costs have gone up significantly, certainly, across the country. We’re seeing that in Northwest Arkansas. So a big part of that is just trying to have a budget that we can stay within. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay, so we haven’t finalized the contract yet? 

Clayton Hamilton No, sir. No, sir. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay. I just looked at the next page. We’d reviewed nine and interviewed four, but you’ve not made a decision. 

Clayton Hamilton Let me back up. Actually, we have presented the contractor and the architect to our Board of Trustees for approval. So we have received approval to move forward with those two firms. We have not completed the contract yet. That’s the reason we’re presenting that today. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay, are they coming in closer to the $100 million? 

Clayton Hamilton And we’ve not started the design process yet. So we’ll get into the design process and come up with the design and have a contractor estimate for the project for us as we work through that design process. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any other questions? Motion to review 1 through 5? Motion. I heard a second by Representative Painter. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Mr. Hamilton, just stay seated there. You’re the next on the list, too. General contract or construction projects exceeding 5 million. Go ahead. 

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. Item C is an alternative delivery method project. These are special projects that are over $5 million that agencies or institutions can request where they don’t necessarily have to accept the lowest bidder if a project is very special and they need to do this type of procurement. So as we’ve already discussed, this item is presented from U of A Fayetteville. 

It is also for the academic classroom building and this gives you a little more detail on the selection of the contractor. They state here this project will be a new academic building to be located in the McElroy district. It will include classrooms totaling seats for 2,300 students. It will also create a hub for study, collaboration, and innovation envisioned to enhance the educational experience. 

It will be 100,000 gross square feet. They received nine contractor proposals. They interviewed four contractors. And as a result of that and through negotiations, they have chosen CDI contractors for this project. They’ve also chosen Hufft as the design professional. They estimate the completion will be June of 2029 and the total cost to be at $100 million. So this is the alternative delivery method project, Mr. Chair. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any questions on alternative delivery? Senator Bryant. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess the question would be, is there a guaranteed maximum on these contracts or is it open ended up to $100 million? Thank you. 

Clayton Hamilton We will reach a guaranteed maximum price with the contractor before we move forward with the project. So we’ll start into design. We’ve got the architect. We’ve got the contractor part of the design process. Once we’re comfortable with the design within that established budget, we’ll put it out to bid and come back with the guaranteed maximum price for the project. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay, thank you. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any other questions on alternative method? Seeing none, motion to review? Motion by Representative Painter. Second by Senator Bryant. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Thank you. Members, let’s go on to the discretionary grants. 

Discretionary grants overview

Katie Walden Thank you Mr. Chair. Item D are the discretionary grants for your review today. There are two discretionary grants from DHS. The first one is with DHS DYS. This is an amended grant, federal grant, for targeted youth advocacy initiatives for the Southwest Arkansas region with specific focus on justice involved youth in Columbia County. 

Number 2 is with the DHS Division of Aging Adults and Behavioral Health with the Family-Centered Treatment Foundation. This adds $582,000 to an existing grant, and it is for licensure, monitoring, training, and implementing the Family Center treatment model for treatment facilities. These are the discretionary grants, Mr. Chair. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any questions on 1? Any questions on 2? Seeing none, motion to review? Motion by Representative Painter. Second by Representative Ladyman. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Thank you, members. Let’s go on to services contracts. 

Service contracts overview

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. Item E are the contracts presented for your review today. At the front part of that section, you’ll see a letter from the OSP director Miss Jessica Patterson stating that she and her staff have reviewed all the contracts presented for review this month and deemed them lawful and allowable. 

They also, as a request of the September 2024 ALC meeting, a list of all the contracts on the agenda today that were selected using the most advantageous proposal method or the traditional RFP method. There’s the list for you there. 

And finally they state that, as an update, they have submitted their revised procurement rules to the Governor’s Office and the Governor’s Office is still reviewing them. Moving on to the contracts. 

Item E1, we have the construction related contracts. There are seven for you today. Number 1 is with the Arkansas Commission on Law Enforcement Standards. This is amendment 2 to an existing contract with Cromwell Architects, and this is for design services for their East Camden and Northwest Arkansas Springdale facilities. 

Number 2, U of A ASMSA with Bell Construction. This is amendment 1 to an existing contract, and this to revise a contract to increase the electrical scope to provide for three phase power systems on their maintenance building and wood shop. 

Number 3, U of A ASMSA with Domain Architecture. This is for architectural and engineering design services for the construction of the ASMSA alumni hall and new charter field on Whittington Avenue and Hot Springs. 

Number 4, U of A Fayetteville with Hufft Projects. This is the architect firm that was chosen to design the academic building on the U of A campus. The original amount is for $6.2 million with Hufft Projects. 

Number 5, U of A Fayetteville with Wittenberg Delony & Davidson. This is amendment 7 to an existing contract, and this is for ongoing services for the silicone carbide fabrication lab project. 

Number 6, UAMS with Bernhard TME, and number 7, UAMS with Witsell Evans Rasco, these are both for on-call design services. These are the construction contracts. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any questions on the construction contracts? Representative Ladyman, which one? 

Representative Jack Ladyman Number 2, the University of Arkansas. 

Senator Blake Johnson University of Arkansas. Introduce yourselves. 

Melissa Rust Good morning. Melissa Rust, University of Arkansas System. 

Steve Maloch Good morning. Steve Maloch, Director of Finance at ASMSA. 

Senator Blake Johnson Representative Ladyman, if you want to ask a question. 

Electrical miscalculation

Representative Jack Ladyman Yes, just a clarification here. But the electrical contract originally was budgeted at 10,000 and it was raised by 91,000 due to requiring three-phase, I guess. But was that just an oversight or was there new equipment bought that required three-phase electricity? 

Steve Maloch It was actually, the three phase was a requirement as part of the specifications needed for the wood shop. And that determination was made on the front end by Entergy’s design team. And then when they actually got into construction, Entergy then advised that those plans that were put forth by their design team were not suitable for the project. And they had to route a different route for electrical services. And that’s what created the variance. 

Representative Jack Ladyman So the three-phase power and the amount you needed was not available. You had to add poles and lines. Is that what you’re saying? 

Steve Maloch Yeah, I’ve got more details here from what I’ve received for information from the architect. Yeah, it was that they were needing to add additional utility support poles, widening of the original planned cleared path, and extending the clearing limits to safely accommodate the three-phase power infrastructure. And they had to include an additional point of connection for three-phase power as well. And the distance was greater than what was originally planned for. 

Representative Jack Ladyman So was that our mistake or Entergy’s mistake in the pricing of that? 

Steve Maloch It was just a difference from what the design team with Entergy determined initially versus what was required during the actual construction. 

Representative Jack Ladyman I think this raises a question that we ought to look a little closer when we’re designing. I mean, that’s a pretty easy thing to know how much power you need and what type of power you need and the availability of that. I think we need to sharpen our pencil a little bit on that. Thank you. Thank you for the answer. 

Senator Blake Johnson Representative Ferguson, do you– okay. Any other questions on on those construction related contracts? Seeing none, I’ll take a motion to review. Motion to review. Second by Representative Ferguson. All in favor, say aye. All oppose, like sign. Y’all don’t sound so excited. Wake up. I know we’re early this morning. Let’s go on to the out-of-state contracts. There are quite a few of these. 

Out-of-State contracts overview

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. Item E2 in your packet are the out-of-state contracts presented for your review today. Number 1 is with Arkansas Public Employees Retirement System with Wellington Management Company. This is amendment 1 to an existing contract and this amends the scope and increases funds for this contract for funds management. And they state this is to comply with Act 937 which is the China Divestment Initiative. 

Number 2, Department of Commerce, Division of Workforce Services with Carahsoft Technology. This is amendment 1 to an existing contract to add additional funding in support of the UI unemployment insurance modernization project and Go Live support program. 

Number 3, Department of Education with ACT Education Corp. This is Amendment 10 to an existing contract. It increases the contract by $17 million. As a result of the last session, ADE is now required to offer pre-ACT testing to Arkansas students in grade 9 and grade 10 beginning in this school year. And so this amendment is to comply with that legislation. So that will be offered free to all 9th and 10th grade students in the state. 

Number 4, Department of Education with Buechler and Associates. This is an original contract for due process hearings for investigations of violations of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

Number 5, Department of Education with Cartwheel, this was pulled by the agency prior to the meeting. 

Number 6, Department of Finance and Administration with BDO Government Services. This is a new contract valued at $12.5 million for RHTP Grant Management and Compliance Services. This is part of the new federal program for the Rural Health Transformation. And this company, this BDO company, will manage these grants, they will establish the process, they will oversee the administration of them from beginning to end, and fund monies made available to state agencies. 

Number 7, Department of Finance and Administration Child Support Enforcement with Laboratory Corporation of America. This is an original contract for paternity testing for custodial and non-custodial parents of children by OCSE. 

Number 8, Department of Health with ICF Macro. This is an original special procurement contract for interviews for the behavioral risk factor surveillance system. And since this is the first time this committee is seeing this, we have attached the justification form for the special procurement in your packet. It is the– I call it Tiffany blue sheet of paper. And this is also new this time. 

Several months ago, the Office of State Procurement, formerly they would offer a letter in response to these special procurement requests. But through the permission of the chairs and through discussions, they now provide their approval on the backside of that form. You’ll see a section where they can select approved as submitted or approved with revisions. And there is still a section for the OSP director signature. So that’s a little bit different than what you normally see. 

Contract number 9 is with DHS Division of Aging, Adults and Behavioral Health Services with SHC services. This is for a contract providing highly qualified skilled nursing at the Arkansas Health Center. 

Contracts number 10 and 11 are both with DHS DCFS for intensive in-home services for Division of Children and Family Services clients. And also I’ll mention that number 11 is 9 million and it also includes transitional support for young adults services for DCFS clients. 

Number 12, DHS Division of County Operations with Fidelity National Information Services. This is a $16.5 million original contract, and this is to provide statewide electronic benefit transfer services system. And this is for the delivery of T and SNAP benefits to Arkansas citizens through ATM machines and point of sale devices. 

Number 13, DHS Division of County Operations with Orin Burnett. This is for janitorial services at the Miller County DCO office. 

Number 14, Department of the Military with Net at Work. This is an original contract for the implementation of financial software. It will provide greater automation for the agency. 

Number 15, DTSS Division of Information Systems with Carahsoft Technology. This is the original contract for the migration of the OCSE systems to cloud-based systems. 

Number 16, Department of Veterans Affairs with A Quality Staffing. This is for medical staffing services. 

Number 17, also with DVA with Hire Energy, also for RN, LPN, CNA medical staffing service. 

Number 18, Department of Social Security Administration. This is with David Tessler. This is an original contract for medical consultant examinations, reviews and evaluations. 

Number 19 is with the U of A system with Brailsford & Dunlavy Incorporated. This is an original $4.1 million contract and this is to assist the UA System on planning and strategy development initiatives. And this for evaluation and optimization of their existing and future property and assets. 

Number 20 is with U of A Fayetteville with Integrity 9 LLC. This is an original contract for a university-wide sponsorship strategy in collaboration with stakeholders to increase revenue and increase recruitment and retention and engagement of alumni. 

Number 21, with U of A Fayetteville with PFM Financial Advisors, a new $2 million contract for financial planning, budget and strategic advice, just overall financial advising. 

Contracts number 22 and 23 are both with UA Little Rock. And these are both for temporary staffing services for the university. That gets us over to page 15 under item E. It’s the last out-of-state contract. And this is with UCA with Coursera Incorporated. This is a new original contract for campus-wide Career Academy licensing, Career Academy campus alumni match, and integration services and annual maintenance. These are the out- of-state contracts. 

Senator Blake Johnson Senator Rice. 

Senator Terry Rice Number 12, DHS. I’ve got a question. 

Senator Blake Johnson Introduce yourselves. And Senator Rice, you’re recognized whenever they get done. 

SNAP benefit theft and security

Mary Franklin Good morning, I’m Mary Franklin, Director of the Division of County Operations for the Department of Human Services. 

Sarah Cunningham I’m Sarah Cunningham with the Office of Procurement, DHS. 

Senator Terry Rice Good morning. Could you give us a little bit of what the changes are on this? 

Mary Franklin Yes, sir. This contract is for EBT services. Our previous contract had come to end of life and is actually on a special procurement at this point. We are transitioning to a new vendor with this contract with updated functionality. And EBT is how we deliver SNAP benefits, summer EBT benefits, as well as the benefits for the T and Work Pays program. 

And in this contract, we will also be transitioning from the traditional EBT mag stripe cards to chip cards, which are much less susceptible to fraud and stolen benefits. And now we have summer EBT included in this contract because it’s not a new program and we know we’re going to continue it. And some additional fraud capabilities, fraud prevention capabilities, detection and prevention. So those are the things that are new in this contract that we did not have in the previous contract. 

Senator Terry Rice Are we still getting reports of fraud, people having their benefits stolen? 

Mary Franklin We are, but not nearly to the level that we were back during the summer. But there are still benefits that are stolen that we do still hear from clients. But it is not nearly at the level that it was. But these changes that we’ll be implementing with this contract should help further protect our clients here in Arkansas from that type of theft. 

Senator Terry Rice Well, it had been a while since I’d had contacts on that. But at church Sunday, somebody mentioned a family member that recently had, and he’s a cancer patient right now, and he’d had what little benefits he had stolen. This is much needed. I appreciate the update. I thought that’d be good for people to hear. And that’s what I wanted to hear. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any other questions on that item? Seeing none, Senator Bryant. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you, Mr. Chair. Item number 8, Department of Health. 

Senator Blake Johnson I thought you were saying 9. Just introduce yourselves and you’re recognized for your questions. 

Cassie Cochran Cassie Cochran, Deputy Director for Programs, Arkansas Department of Health. 

Matt Gilmore Matt Gilmore, Department of Health.

Department of Health survey

Senator Joshua Bryant Thank you all for being here. I’m over to your left. So we’re losing some federal funding for this. I guess my first question would be, do we anticipate future budgets, federal budgets, having funding for this type of system? 

Matt Gilmore I think it remains to be seen. I think the direction the federal government’s going is still in development. And I think a majority of our budget is federally funded. But I think we’re just taking it step by step and adjusting as we need to. 

Senator Joshua Bryant Okay, so this is the last year of a seven-year contract. Can you explain what data the state has received from this contract to be able to give us guidance on how to handle issues? 

Matt Gilmore I can speak to it generally, but Miss Cochran beside me can speak more to the details of it.

Cassie Cochran Sure, I’d be happy to. So historically, there’s about 400,000 calls made annually to participants that voluntarily agree to complete the survey. It takes about 15 to 20 minutes, and that’s with all 50 states and territories. Locally in Arkansas, we do about 5,200 calls per year to collect this information. And it’s utilized not only within the Health Department for program initiatives or tweaks to our current programs, but also by partner agencies. 

Matt Gilmore I think a lot of it is used just for general surveys and data that we collect and to see where we are on different topics and issues as far as health, primarily with obesity or different habits and that sort of thing. So it’s helpful information to have, just as a state to know where we stand on different rankings. 

Senator Joshua Bryant So what is the state? So I think I received one of these calls probably about a month ago. And it actually asked me if I’m eating my vegetables and how much household members smoke and how much alcohol do I consume. So once you get a report that has that information, what does the Department of Health do with it? Like do you increase public awareness of, ‘alcohol is bad for you?’ 

Matt Gilmore I think we use it for several different things. I think when we’re putting out, or we get federal funding or even state dollars for different grants and different types of health education activities or– I mean, it covers– if you went through the whole call, it asked lots of different questions. 

So I think a lot of that data we get is used across the department for different programs. But it does help guide us and point us in the right direction on, Hey, this is becoming a bigger issue than we thought it was in the past or maybe that work that we’ve done there has helped here and we need to move and do something different. But I’ll let Ms. Cochran add to that if she wants. 

Cassie Cochran No, I agree. It helps develop program initiatives or change program initiatives. Also, if we see an increase in an area of issues in our state, we can look for funding opportunities or ways to utilize or braid funding to address those issues. 

Senator Joshua Bryant I’ll finish my line of questioning. I guess one request would be, could you send to the chair what one of these reports look like? Just pick any year that that the services provide a data set to the state, and just send that report for this committee to look at. 

Cassie Cochran I’ll be happy to. 

Senator Blake Johnson Don’t be calling me on what I eat. I’m just glad y’all flipped the food pyramid. I don’t know why you’d call Josh over me anyway. Senator McKee. 

Senator Matt McKee Thank you both for being here. Does the state of Arkansas fund any quality leering centers? Any daycares? 

Cassie Cochran I didn’t hear that. 

Senator Matt McKee I didn’t know if quality leering centers had any branches in Arkansas. 

Matt Gilmore I’m not familiar with that. 

Senator Matt McKee Not familiar with that term? Thank you. 

Senator Blake Johnson You guys are dismissed. Representative Cavenaugh, University of Arkansas. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh Yes, sir. Contracts 19, 20, and 21. 

Senator Blake Johnson Just go ahead and introduce yourselves again and you’ll be recognized. And Representative Cavenaugh. 

Melissa Rust Melissa Rust, University of Arkansas System. 

Clayton Hamilton I’m Clayton Hamilton, Senior Associate Vice Chancellor for Campus Services, UA Fayetteville. 

UA contracts: Campus sponsorship

Representative Frances Cavenaugh On contracts 19, 20, and 21, there are consultants that it looks like we’re using to do advisory on planning, strategy development, financial planning, one that’s going to implement and manage university-wide sponsorship strategy, and then you got another financial planning for budget and strategic advice. Can you explain to me why we need consultants to do these things for us when you have a whole university full of people? 

Clayton Hamilton I’ll speak to number 20. This was completed through an RFP for a firm to lead a sponsorship sales strategy for our campus. So it’s something very similar to what you might have heard with the Razorback Athletic Program. They sell sponsorships to third parties to sponsor the program, a way to generate revenue to support the program. 

The campus completed a study about a year ago just to look for similar opportunities on campus. And we used the example of like a welcome back event to campus where we might have 8,000 new students show up to a welcome back event. A company might offer free pizzas to those new students where there is a value to that opportunity to be in front of that number of students on campus. 

So we completed a study just to look at what those opportunities might look like across campus. We don’t have a sales team on campus to be able to get out and sell sponsorships, fulfill sponsorships in the way our athletic program has. So we looked to an outside party, completed this RFP. And it is part set fee and part commission based, as far as the contract that is being proposed. But we see this as a real revenue opportunity to support campus. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh What is the projected revenue for this $996,000? 

Clayton Hamilton Well, and that is a multi-year contract. So year one, we’re projecting 500,000 in sponsorship sales. We think there’s an opportunity to get up to 5 million a year. We’ll never get to the point the athletic program is. That’s just a different market a lot of folks like to tap into. But there is real revenue opportunity for this campus-wide sponsorship program. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh And there’s no department in the U of A that can handle the sale of sponsorships? 

Clayton Hamilton Not with the expertise that we need to get out and sell the sponsorships and fulfill in this manner. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh Thank you. And what about 19 and 20– I mean 21. 

UA contracts: On-call financial consulting

Melissa Rust Representative Cavanaugh, on 19 and 21, those are contracts that we did at the system office level. We did an RFQ for potential vendors to assist us with financial consulting and financial advisory services. 

These two contracts are akin to what I think you probably have become accustomed to here when you hear about contracts that are considered on-call contracts. These contracts should be considered an on-call. They’re not like consulting construction contracts like you would normally encounter with an on call, but they are for when we do need potential financial advisory or specialty services. 

And as an example, on number 19, the Brailsford & Dunlavey contract, this particular firm has a particular expertise with P3 projects. And as we look to determine how we can upgrade and renovate and maintain a number of buildings on our campuses throughout the system, having someone with specialty P3 services we felt like was clearly advantageous and helpful to us. 

We don’t have anyone in house for instance to be able to do this. And as an example, our financial wing that’s at the system office that helps administer the financial services for our entire system consists of two people at the System Office level. Our board in particular has asked us to look at alternatives for financing of projects. 

They have also asked us to look at long-term financial modeling for all of our campuses to make sure that we are maximizing the revenue that we have and to do things that are most financially advantageous. And frankly, we need that expertise and that experience. So these costs will not be incurred unless we choose or we decide that we have a project that we would like to access one of these particular vendors. 

The second one– is it all right if I go down to 21? On number 21, this is PFM Financial Advisors. We have utilized PFM in the past as well. They have quite significant expertise in the financial market. They also have P3 expertise, but Brailsford & Dunlavy are really specialized in the P3 area. 

But with respect to PFM, we look to them, for instance, for assistance with bond issues when our board elects to issue bonds on behalf of our campuses. We are also in the process at the system office, frankly, early on in the process, of looking at significant use of shared services across all of our campuses to see how we can be the most efficient we possibly can be. 

And PFM has some expertise in assisting entities with shared services. And so those are just two examples. But it’s part of the overall financial modeling in the long-term financial services and I think outlook that our Board of Trustees has indicated that they would like us to engage in. So both of these contracts are on-calls in the sense that we may or may not spend this money unless we have a project for which the funds are needed or we feel like the expertise is needed. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh Okay, so if these are basically on-call, why are you doing them now if you don’t have a need for them? 

Melissa Rust I don’t know that we don’t have a current need for them. That would be something, probably, that our CFO would be better able to answer for you. But when we went out on an RFQ, we went looking for these types of services. And just so you know, so that there’s no surprise, we have a third contract. It did not get complete before the timeframe to bring this before you at this meeting. And so we will have an additional contract at the next meeting with Stephens. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh All right, thank you. 

Senator Blake Johnson On 20, the Walton School of Business, you could get 15 marketing students and give them a share. I mean, you could buy a lot of ramen. 

Clayton Hamilton Part of this, Senator Johnson, would be hiring those students to complete internships to assist in this process. But this company would lead it for us and organize the strategy and how we sell and fulfill. But absolutely right, opportunities to connect with students. 

Senator Blake Johnson The Dean can’t do that? 

Clayton Hamilton I mean their full-time focus is teaching the students, not necessarily getting out there and selling and fulfilling the sponsorships. 

Senator Blake Johnson That would be the student’s job. Anyway, I’m going to stop. Representative Vaught. 

Representative DeAnn Vaught Thank you, Mr. Chair. Ms. Melissa, on number 19, it says 100% state. Usually y’all say like, it divides it down to where the money comes from. Can you tell me what you mean there by 100% state? 

Melissa Rust I am making an assumption, Representative Vaught, but when we usually when we reference 100% state, that would be a general revenue that the institution or the entity receives. 

Representative DeAnn Vaught Okay. Thank you, ma’am. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any other questions? Seeing none, take a motion to review out-of-state contracts. Motion by Representative Ladyman. Second by Senator Hester. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Thank you, members. Let’s go on to the in-state contracts. 

In-state contracts overview

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. Item E3, these are the last sections of contracts for your review. These are in-state contracts. Number 1 is with the Department of Corrections, Division of Community Corrections. This is an original contract for supervision, housing, and evidence-based programs for transitional housing for eligible recipients. 

Number 2, Department of Health, Arkansas State Board of Nursing with Richard Keith Bibb. This is for investigation services for complaints and questions asked of the Board of Nursing on licensed nurses. 

Number 3, DHS DCFS with Arisa Health. This is an original contract. This is providing enhanced board payment for children in foster care and in a community reintegration program. 

Number 4, DHS DCFS with Arkansas Baptist Children’s. This is a new original contract for in-home services for DCFS clients in specified service areas. 

Number 5, DHS DCFS with Arkansas Children’s Hospital. This is amendment 2 to an existing contract. It adds 4.3 million to this contract and it is for the Arkansas Health and Wellbeing Program for intervention of child welfare involved families. 

Number 6, DHS DCFS with Immerse Arkansas. This is an original contract for $500,000. This is for transition support services for youth who are aging out of the foster care system. 

Number 7, DDS DCFS with Piney Ridge Treatment Center. This is an original contract for enhanced board payment for children in foster care and in community reintegration programs. 

Number 8, DHS DCFS with Southern Christian Home Incorporated. This is amendment 1 to an existing contract. And this is for foster care services in family home settings. 

Number 9 and number 10 are both with DHS Division of County Operations, both with OJ’s Service Two. This is for janitorial services in their Independence County and Mississippi County local offices. 

On item E, page 19, that takes us to number 11 with Department of Public Safety, Division of Emergency Management, with Motorola Solutions. This is an original contract for channel expansion services for the AWIN system. This is to provide ADEM with additional capacity and enhanced functionality at 10 sites. 

Number 12, Department of Veterans Affairs with 1 of a Kind In Home Care and Medical. This is Amendment 3 to an existing contract for temporary nurse staffing in the Fayetteville and North Little Rock Veterans Homes. 

Also contracts number 13 through 16, these are all with Department of Veterans Affairs, all with various vendors for the same reason as I just mentioned, temporary nursing staffing at their sites in Fayetteville and North Little Rock. 

Number 17, that takes us over to item E, page 21. This is with DDSSA and Stephen David Snyder. This is an original contract for medical consultant examinations, reviews and evaluations for medical records of cases. 

Number 18 with U of A Pulaski Tech with Comfort Systems USA. This is amendment 1 to an existing contract for HVAC services on call and as needed. 

And number 19 with UAMS with the Kester Group. This is an original contract for $270,000 and this vendor will provide grants consulting services for UAMS. These are the in-state contracts, Madam Chair. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh Thank you, Katie. Any questions? Representative Ladyman, who’s your question for? 

Representative Jack Ladyman Well, my question is for procurement. It’s a general question. So if there’s somebody else who’s got a specific item, you can put me at the bottom of that. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh There’s nobody else in the queue. 

Representative Jack Ladyman All right. I’ll take it. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh Well, wait just second. Representative Beaty, do you have a question for– hold a second, Representative Ladyman. Representative Beaty, who’s your question for? 

Representative Howard Beaty Corrections. 

Representative Frances Cavenaugh Representative Ladyman, I’m going to take you out if you’ll get back in the queue. Can we have someone from Corrections come down, please? And if you’ll please introduce yourself for the record. And then you can continue, Representative Beaty.

Jim Cheek Jim Cheek, Director, Division of Community Correction. 

Chad Brown Chad Brown, CFO, Department of Correction. 

Re-entry center: Empty beds

Representative Howard Beaty Thank you, madam chair. I guess my question is maybe give us a little more information on this Re-Nu Life Center and exactly what that center, services that center provides. 

Jim Cheek They provide reentry services. I actually talked to our guy this morning because it says Bismarck. But I think that’s the Re-Nu, which is Hidden Creek in Little Rock. 

Representative Howard Beaty That’s what I was– you got to my point. I was just seeing exactly what was going on there. Can you give us an update on that system and what we’re doing there? 

Jim Cheek Well, we’re still housing offenders. Actually, we are down on numbers, and we’re trying to get our numbers up. Actually, it’s worse today than it’s been all year. But we’ve got 39 vacant beds throughout the system of the 204 beds that were allotted. Based on the ones that we can screen that are available, our numbers are getting smaller. So we’re trying to figure out how we’re going to retool this to actually utilize those beds. 

Representative Howard Beaty I guess my problem is, we’ve been talking about how we’re going to reutilize and utilize this space and keep these beds full. But we seem to continue to have a problem there. 

Jim Cheek Yes, sir. Absolutely. I get a report every single morning from Mr. Self as to what we’re doing. I think we had 14 that were eligible yesterday that when they went to the Post Prison Transfer Board, seven of them were denied. One of them had warrants that’s not eligible and one of them have a disciplinary. 

So now we’re down to, what, five that’s actually eligible. And once we screen them, we’re not saying all those are actually going to be eligible to go. So we had five at Hidden Creek that actually transitioned to stage four of the program, which they may have moved out of Hidden Creek into the community. So it’s kind of a catch up game back and forth. So gaining on the front end is getting kind of difficult. 

Representative Howard Beaty Well, I’ll just say, I don’t have a problem with vacant beds being for folks that are transitioning out and returning to be a productive member of society. I do have problems when we’ve got vacant beds and corrections can’t get folks in there on this program that works. 

Jim Cheek And I understand, Representative Beaty. But they have to meet a certain criteria. I mean, these are inmates from the Department of Correction that have to meet certain criteria to go to these facilities because they have not actually met their TEP date to get out on probation or pro. 

So the Post Prison Transfer Board does screen them to get to this point. But then again, we have to make sure that these people are going to comply with the rules of the facility and not walk off, because at that point, then they become escapees. And I don’t want us not to do our due diligence on the front end to make sure that they don’t go out and hurt a citizen of the state of Arkansas if we’re not screening them properly on the front end. 

Representative Howard Beaty Well, I guess I’ll leave this alone, because we’re going to talk about this a lot more until you guys can take care of vacant beds and get folks in this program. But I’m going to tell you that it’s an important program and it works. And my phone rings all the time with vacancies and folks not being in there. And I know that we have a population that would qualify for this. 

So every time I see a reentry program on here, you’re going to hear from me. I’m going to ask about it. I’m going to ask what we’ve got in vacancy. It’s a priority. We work too hard on recidivism in this state with the overcrowding we have now. This program works and we need to utilize it. Just know that that’s what’s going to happen and the heat’s going to be turned up on it. So thank you. 

Jim Cheek Yes, sir. Thank you, sir 

Senator Blake Johnson Any other questions? Representative Ladyman.

Representative Jack Ladyman Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess this question would be for procurement, if there’s anybody here from state procurement.

Senator Blake Johnson Introduce yourself and you’re recognized. Representative Ladyman.

Jessica Patterson Good morning, Jessica Patterson, State Procurement Director. 

In-state vs out-of-state spending

Representative Jack Ladyman Thank you for being here. And I don’t know, maybe DFA may have to answer this, but when I’m looking at the out-of-state contracts and the in-state contracts– and I know we’ve brought this up before, but I did some quick math here. So it might be a estimate, I would say. 

So we reviewed 24 out-of-state contracts worth roughly $70,793,000. We reviewed 19 in-state contracts with a rough amount of $8,291,000. And my question is, are we giving in-state companies or people that are vying for these jobs, are we giving them an advantage because they’re in state? 

And the reason I ask that, and I know some of these contracts would not be eligible for sales tax, but if I just calculate the sales tax on $70 million, it’s about $5.6 million, our state sales tax. We’re sending a lot of money across the state lines. And I understand that these are high tech, high training companies. 

But do we give– we need to get some of these people to move to Arkansas so we can get the tax dollars that Texas or somebody else is getting. So are we giving in-state entities any advantages? If we’re looking at just the lowest cost, we may be losing money here. Do you understand my question? 

Jessica Patterson I do understand your question. Under procurement law, currently, there’s no method to give preference to an in-state vendor over an out-of-state vendor. However, just because some of these vendors are listed as being out-of-state vendors or contractors doesn’t mean that they don’t have local presence. 

So it could be a national company that has some local presence, but they are not– so they might have employees that are located in the state, but they are a national company. So they are an out-of-state company. 

Representative Jack Ladyman But their corporate headquarters are still out of state because that’s the address? 

Jessica Patterson Their corporate headquarters would be out-of-state. 

Representative Jack Ladyman Well, I think that’s something that we really need to look into to keep money in the state. Sending money across the state line doesn’t help us that much. So thank you for your answer. 

Senator Blake Johnson Is there any other questions on the in-state contracts? If not, I’ll accept a motion to review all in-state contracts. Motion by Representative Ladyman and second by Senator Hester. All in favor, say aye. All opposed, like sign. Thank you members. Thank you very much. Let’s go to the reports and other business. 

Katie Walden Thank you, Mr. Chair. The last couple of items for your information today are the reports and communications and one item under other business. You’ll see under item F, reports and communication, there are two regular reports that you all see each month. One is the contract amendments without a material change. The second is executed minor contracts. 

And finally, I’ll just mention for the committee’s information, yesterday an emergency action report was completed for the Review Subcommittee. This was submitted by the Department of Commerce and DFA. And it just made two revisions to the discretionary grants that you all approved last month for the advocacy centers. These are the reports for the committee’s information, Mr. Chair. 

Senator Blake Johnson Any questions? Anything else to come before the committee? We will try to keep our schedule with the afternoon meeting and not do the morning meeting. Thank you, members, and we’re adjourned.