PB council votes 7-0 to approve casino’s bank building lease
PINE BLUFF — The City Council approved a resolution authorizing Mayor Shirley Washington to execute an agreement with Saracen Casino Resort for a two-month lease of the Bank of America building on Main Street in downtown Pine Bluff.
Casino officials had expressed a need for space to train some 1,000 employees to work the 80,000-squarefoot gambling floor before the casino’s projected Oct. 1 opening.
Council members passed the resolution 7-0, with no discussion. Council member Win Trafford recused from the vote. Trafford represents the Quapaw Nation, which is developing the $350 million casino project, in some real estate and construction matters.
Under the terms of the two-month agreement, Saracen officials will lease the first floor lobby and the Main Street annex for two months until Sept. 30, with an option to renew on a monthly basis until Dec. 30, 2021, for the purpose of hiring and training new employees. Saracen officials agreed to pay $2,000 a month for the property, to pay all utilities and to pay for cleaning of the premises.
Carlton Saffa, the program manager for Saracen Casino Resort, said he expects to be
gin using the property almost immediately.
“I anticipate that by the end of the week we will be in that space,” Saffa said, noting that a discussion at last week’s Planning and Development Committee meeting reported in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette indicated that he may have the option to extend the lease period out by a few days to compensate for the fact that the lease, while dated to begin Saturday, could not be ratified by the full council until its Monday regular meeting.
“A councilman said we may have to change the dates a little bit and we have no problem with that,” he said. “We’ve actually, as a show of goodwill, we’ve cleaned up the exterior of that building. It needed a good power-washing, it needed the weeds pulled, it needed a little TLC, so that’s already in place.”
Saffa said initially the building will be used to conduct interviews with prospective employees in an effort to fill some 1,000 positions that will be needed to operate the facility.
“Those jobs range to everything from food service, security, to a whole host of other options,” he said. “When you look at interviewing hundreds of people, it’s a heck of an opportunity, but it’s also a daunting task. We needed a bigger space … a larger venue to safely accommodate folks coming in and out for interviews.”
Saffa said people interested in jobs with Saracen Casino Resort may apply online at https://saracenresort.com/ or at saracenannex.com.
“Once we’ve hired our folks we’ll be doing a phased orientation process there,” he added. “We’ll bring in folks at a level we determine will accommodate social-distancing needs, whether that’s 50, whether that’s 90, I’ll leave that up to someone else, but the Bank of America building’s large lobby offers us that opportunity.”
Saffa said Saracen officials had considered some other short-term lease options in the local area but he said the Bank of America building was what he considered to be the best option, not only for its size and central location, but also for aesthetic reasons and because the lease is in keeping with the Quapaw Nation commitment to the area.
“It’s a beautiful building and someone ought to be using it, for one thing,” he said. “Second, the city is carrying the cost of it, and anything we can do to help defray that cost is something we want to do.”
Saffa said that when hiring began for Saracen Casino Annex, which opened last September, far more people applied for jobs than there were positions available, and he advised those people who were not hired to reapply for a position in the big casino.
“If you didn’t get a call from us, by all means, go online and resubmit your application,” he said. “It’s the easiest way to do it. It moves your application right back to the top of the stack.”