Clerk, treasurer jobs to combine
North Little Rock will combine the offices of city clerk-collector and city treasurer to begin 2015 when City Treasurer Mary Ruth Morgan leaves office after 40 years.
Morgan told the North Little Rock City Council in a letter that she won’t seek re-election in November for the part-time position.
Morgan, elected 10 times without ever having opposition, will leave office when her term expires Dec. 31, two weeks after she will turn 86.
Morgan recommended to Mayor Joe Smith and the City Council that the duties of treasurer be consolidated with the city clerk’s office, as many cities have done. Most of the treasurer’s duties are now handled by the city clerk’s office, she said.
City Clerk- Collector Diane Whitbey’s new title will be city clerk-treasurer, starting Jan. 1. Whitbey, city clerk for 13 years, will be in the middle of her four-year term.
City aldermen approved the title change 8-0.
In ’13, 1,076 join city senior center
The Patrick Hays Senior Center in North Little Rock added 1,076 members in 2013, the center’s staff reported in an annual review completed at the end of this year’s first quarter.
The report was presented to the North Little Rock City Council last week.
The new members raised the memberships during the center’s 11 years to 19,626. About a fourth of that membership number uses the center monthly.
Memberships are available to anyone in Arkansas age 50 and older.
The center at 401 W. Pershing Blvd. opened in February 2003. It was built using $4 million from North Little Rock’s 1 percent city sales tax and $1 million from the state. The center added a $4.8 million expansion in 2007. The expansion was paid for by a two-year, 1 percent city sales tax that also was used to build Dickey-Stephens Park baseball stadium.
Volunteers at the Hays Center provided 10,067 hours of service to the center’s programs, according to the annual report.
OK sends $72,000 to two nonprofits
The North Little Rock City Council agreed last week to continue funding contracts totaling $72,000 through the end of this year for two nonprofits.
The city has been reworking funding agreements with nonprofits to get all onto a calendar-year schedule. The funds were already included among Special Appropriations in the city’s general fund budget as line items under Arts and Cultural Education.
Aldermen approved the agreement with the North Little Rock-based Thea Foundation in an 8-0 vote. The funding agreement is to pay the Thea Foundation $4,000 monthly to run May 1-Dec. 31, for a $32,000 total for those eight months.
Aldermen approved an agreement with the Arkansas Arts Center in Little Rock for $40,000 to be in a lump sum payment, according to the legislation that passed 7-1. Alderman Bruce Foutch voted no. The Arts Center’s contract period is to be April 30-Dec. 31, according to the agreement.
Arkansas, Pages 14 on 04/20/2014