It can be hard to move to a new community in a new state, but Allison Phelps said it’s easier when you are with someone you love.
Phelps and her husband, Kyle, moved to Batesville two years ago, and she wasted no time in getting to know the community. They moved when Kyle was offered the chance to help start the football program at his alma mater, Lyon College.
“I had never lived outside of the Houston (Texas) area before I met him, other than a short time in Austin when I was in college,” Phelps said. “They say when you meet the person you’re going to spend the rest of your life with, you’ll go anywhere with them. That’s been true for me.”
Knowing no one in Batesville, Phelps said, she reasoned the chamber of commerce is always a good place to find out about jobs and the community. The Batesville Area Chamber of Commerce president/CEO, Crystal Johnson, offered Phelps a job, and she immediately jumped in to familiarize herself with her new neck of the woods.
With her two years of experience with the movers and shakers in Batesville, Phelps recently took on the position of executive director for the United Way of North Central Arkansas, where she plans to continue carrying out the hopes and dreams of the organization’s board of directors.
Phelps grew up in Columbus, Texas, a suburb of Houston. Her family has strong roots there, and she said it was a great place to grow up.
“I was born and raised there, and so were my parents,” she said. “My parents have lived there their whole lives.”
After high school, Phelps went to the University of Texas at Austin, where she majored in government and history. At first she thought she would head to law school after she finished her bachelor’s degree, but the more she learned about the day-to-day tasks of a lawyer, the less appealing it sounded.
“It’s nothing like what they show on television,” she said.
While that plan did not work out in the end, Phelps had other skills that made her marketable. Knowing her strengths and weaknesses helped her land a job with a telecommunications company right out of college.
“My last semester in college, I was looking for jobs,” she said. “I’m a natural-born sales person, so I applied for sales and marketing jobs.”
The job was in a Texas community called The Woodlands. With this job, Phelps was able to stay close to her sister, Ami, and was still not far from her parents. The job also led to an addition to Phelps’ family by introducing her to her husband.
“He was coaching for a summer collegiate league team in The Woodlands,” she said. “My company supplied some things for the team, and we just hit it off. It was kind of a crazy whirlwind thing.”
After the summer, Kyle returned to Bartlesville, Oklahoma, where he was a baseball coach at Oklahoma Wesleyan University. The two got married that December, and Phelps moved out of Texas for the first time in her life.
The next summer, Kyle coached in another summer collegiate league. This one was in Virginia, and the couple stayed in Winchester, Virginia, with a host family during May, June and July. It was there that Kyle got a call from Lyon’s Kirk Kelley about a new venture for the Scots. Kelley — who was Kyle’s baseball coach when he was at Lyon College — offered Kyle a job as recruiting coordinator for the college’s new football team.
“Batesville has Kyle’s heart, and Lyon College holds a very special place for him,” Phelps said. “We decided he couldn’t pass up this opportunity. Literally, on our way back from Virginia, I dropped him off in Batesville, and I went back to Bartlesville to pack up and put our house on the market.”
With Kyle set in a new job with a college he already loved, Phelps, with no connections in the city, had to find a way to get a job.
“Having a background in sales, I knew what a great resource the chamber of commerce was,” she said. “I went there looking for leads on a job, and Crystal told me, ‘I’ve got the gig for you.’”
Phelps worked as the director of programs and events at the chamber for two years, coordinating functions for local business leaders and meeting people in government, business and nonprofit sectors.
“It was really fun and awesome for me because so many people who are influential are connected with the chamber,” she said. “Being new here, it was great to get to know everyone and let them know me.”
After a couple of years, Phelps learned of an opening with the United Way. The executive director was stepping down, and the organization was looking for a replacement. Within two days, two people mentioned the position to Phelps, so she started digging to find out what the job would entail.
“I knew what United Way did and [its] great initiatives, but as far as the logistics, I didn’t really know how it worked,” she said. “After about five questions, I knew it was a great opportunity for me, and I could help the community at the same time.”
Phelps said that each year, her New Year’s resolution is to make a difference, and this new job was just the way to fulfill that resolution on a daily basis.
Aside from being the CEO/president of the chamber, Johnson was also on the
United Way board. She had always made it clear to Phelps that she was a valuable chamber employee, but that should not stop her from moving forward in her career.
“She’s always told me that as long as I wanted to stay at the chamber, she’d keep me, but she’d never hold me back from another opportunity,” Phelps said.
Phelps was offered and accepted the job as executive director for the United Way, and her first order of business was to file paperwork with the secretary of state to change the organization’s name. The board of directors had already started a new strategic plan to broaden the organization’s reach, and the name has changed from the United Way of Independence County to the United Way of North Central Arkansas, showing the board’s desire to make a bigger impact in northern Cleburne, Izard, Sharp and Stone counties.
“A lot of the agencies we fund service so much more than Independence County,” Phelps said.
On Saturday, the United Way of North Central Arkansas will hold the Independence County Annual Day of Caring, when volunteers will help start the next Habitat for Humanity home construction and paint classrooms at The Community School in Batesville.
Plans are in the works for a Sharp County Day of Caring, and Phelps said she is excited to get it off the ground.
“We’ve only ever done it in Independence County, but this will be our first step with Sharp County to show them that we care,” she said.
For more information on volunteering with the United Way of North Central Arkansas, call (870) 793-5991 or email info@liveunitednca.org.