Return of the city killer

Little Italy means big trouble

THERE’S more than one sentimental reason why incorporating the tiny (pop. under 400), widely scattered community known as Little Italy sounded like a good idea once upon a time. It has a colorful history, or at least founding myth, that appeals to those of us who like our past served with a side of spaghetti and meatballs accompanied by a nice port or sharp claret.

Alas, sentimentality can be the opposite and adversary of true sentiment, and the story of Little

Italy has undergone the all too familiar transformation from genuine history into folklore, and from gold into dross—or only fool’s gold.

Little Italy’s five founding families may all have been composed of nothing but sterling characters back when they left Chicago and environs back in 1915 to head south in search of a place of their own they could call home. And they did. With the blessings of the Holy Mother Church herself. (This little congregation of communicants in Pulaski County half an hour’s drive from downtown Little Rock is now known as St. Francis of Assisi Church, and long may it prosper.)

But the sweetest of dreams have a way of running into the harshest of realities. In the case of Little Italy, the many obstacles to its incorporation would seem to have been more than adequately summed up by Barry Hyde, county judge of Pulaski County, who has steadfastly opposed the community’s attempt to break away from county government in hopes of setting up its own independent principality. Among those all too real obstacles, Little Italy failed to consider certain expenses, like contracting with the Pulaski County sheriff’s office for police protection and paying for upkeep on roads. And its area is unreasonably large, lacking “necessary unity of a single place.”

These problems represent only the beginning of Little Italy’s insurmountable challenges. For, as it turns out, according to the chief legal counsel for Central Arkansas Water, our Little Italy lies inside the Lake Maumelle watershed, the principal source of water for more than 400,000 residents in the center of this state. If the place were to become its own separate town, it would remove some 5,600 acres from water-quality protection. So said C. Tad Bohannon, chief counsel for the Central Arkansas Water utility in 2015.

As he all too aptly described Little Italy at that time, the “proposed Town is not a community with a shared background or identity; rather, it is a clump of communities with little shared interests other than attempting to avoid regulation by Pulaski County.”

Unlike urban enclaves like Cammack Village tucked away inside Little Rock’s city limits, Little Italy has no record of its supporting itself or providing city services like police protection. Indeed, a former editorial writer for Arkansas’ Newspaper—Tucker Carlson by name—used to describe Cammack Village as the only police state in which he’d ever lived.

THE CREATION of still more ittybitty towns also invites still more corruption, and this state already has its fill of big scandals in small towns. Just the other day, the state’s Legislative Joint Auditing Committee reported that tens of thousands of dollars in fines and bonds had gone missing in Prescott. The FBI and IRS are investigating $1.57 million missing in Farmington.

Thank goodness the state’s auditors are on guard against these repeated and highly suspect shortages. This state doesn’t need one more little city that produces big scandals. Little Italy’s time did come once in the state’s history, but it went a century ago. An independent Little Italy now could prove only another city killer.

So it’s no wonder that a circuit judge in Pulaski County—the Hon. Chris Piazza—dismissed the case for Little Italy’s independence. Let’s just hope this case is closed. And court adjourned.