DISTRICT 6 ERNEST PENDER
What are the key issues facing Miller County today?
Maintaining our roads, our buildings, and other infrastructure on the limited taxes we have available. Arkansas is constitutionally limited to the amount of tax a county may impose. The bulk of the money on an individual homeowner’s tax bill goes to school taxes, while the county receives only a small percentage of the total. Counties are allowed to budget only 90 percent of their total revenue exclusive of sales tax and grants. In order for the county to budget most or all of the anticipated revenue, it must have adequate reserves. The Investment Fund reserves, can be counted as additional revenue for budgeting purposes. The reserves also are important to being able to respond to unanticipated emergencies. Miller County has much lower tax revenues than our neighboring Texas county. It must therefore be very cautious to budget in a sustainable way.
Do you feel the state does enough to support rural counties like Miller?
Yes, our local representative and Senator are very responsive to helping Miller County. Judge Harrison has been very effective in going after grants to meet the infrastructure needs of the county. These grants have been essential in updating the court house and in covering large, long-term investments in infrastructure.
Attitudes on the quorum court have been combative at several meetings. Why is this? Do you feel these sorts of attitudes are conducive to good governance?
Most of the debate that might be termed as combative has involved elected officials competing to have a larger share of the available funds for their respective office. It is the primary job of the Quorum Court to deal with these budgeting disagreements in a way that is sustainable for Miller County. This past year, as in previous years, the budget decisions passed with near unanimity with no more than one or two dissenting votes out of the ten justices voting. Each office competes for funds for desired pay increases for their staff, but the court has to be mindful of fairness in the distribution of funds and competing interests will not always agree, but we do our best to consider all arguments before making hard decisions about spending the taxpayer’s money.
How will you support businesses and development in Miller County?
I have always endeavored to make funds available for economic development as we did to attract the SRT terminal to be built in Miller County. I was approached by a founding member of the REDI Group, to help involve Miller County in attracting a large manufacturer. I worked to see that Miller County along with the city of Texarkana made funding available to find and acquire a shovel ready site for such a facility. We are now in the final phase of negotiations with a large manufacturer that will bring a large number of high paying jobs to Miller County on that site, and we continue to budget funding to further those efforts. We are expecting an announcement in the next two or three months about new manufacturing facility.
What is your opinion of how Miller County has used and plans to use federal pandemic recovery and infrastructure funds?
We have used those funds for improvements to Miller County’s aging buildings such as the court house. We are currently working with an architecture firm to bid repairs to the roof of the Miller County Health Department building. We are also are studying the use of the funds to provide for a limited expansion of the Miller County Jail, and to provide an appropriate facility for the Miller County Coroners office. While some of the funds were initially used to provide some financial relief for employees during the covid crisis, the more appropriate use of these funds will be for large one-time expenses rather than for salaries.