Selection paused for Business Hall

The 2021 class of inductees into the Arkansas Business Hall of Fame is the latest casualty of the coronavirus pandemic.

The organization’s board has decided to pause selection of a new class because of the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic, according to a news release Thursday from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, which is the hall’s permanent home.

Organizers for the 2021 event that had been scheduled for Feb. 10 at the Statehouse Convention Center in Little Rock said the honor of being inducted into the hall was too important to the inductees, their families, friends and colleagues.

“We did not want to choose a class that wouldn’t be able to celebrate their big night in Little Rock, so we have decided to pause selection of new inductees for a year,” Jason LaFrance, principal in Dale Capital Partners and chairman of the organization’s 12-member board, said in the release.

Nominations for the hall of fame are usually considered active for five years. Existing active nominations will have one year of eligibility added, and nominations received this year will be considered “new” next year.