Since the beginning of last year, Little Rock's Ward 2 City Director Ken Richardson has missed 40 percent of all voting meetings of the city board, far more than any other member, while also racking up the highest amount of expense reimbursements for trips.
Richardson has missed the past four voting meetings of the Board of Directors, making it to only one so far this year. Since January 2016, he has missed 13 of 33 voting board meetings. The next-highest number of meetings missed by a city director during that time was four.
In that same time, the city has reimbursed his costs for three trips, totaling $7,702.76 -- also more than any other city board member. One of those trips was paid for with a grant, while the other two were taxpayer-funded.
The board meets weekly, but it votes and sets policy only every other week. During the in-between meetings, members set the agenda for the voting meetings. The city doesn't keep tally of attendance at agenda-setting meetings.
Asked about his attendance record, Richardson said he was sick on some of the nights he missed and that he also has been dealing with the illness of a family member. He didn't want to discuss the details publicly, but he said it has taken a lot of his and his family's time.
Richardson also has some health issues of his own. He suffers from seizures and has to have a driver. In the past, he was involved in a car wreck after suffering a seizure while driving. Richardson also was convicted of driving under the influence in 2015, and his license was restricted at that time.
"I don't want to get into my health issues. That's kind of personal for me," Richardson said Friday. "I understand the concern about my presence at meetings, but I think my representation in Ward 2 stands beyond any votes [at board meetings.] A lot of time those votes are not directly related to the ward. I could see [anger] if a lot of the [agenda items] were centered around activities or the missions of Ward 2, but my representation extends beyond that. It's not my intention to miss that many meetings. It's just been some family issues."
Richardson pointed to work he has done in the community, such as reaching out to neighborhoods when violent crimes occur in Ward 2, particularly among youths. In his former job at New Futures for Youth, he worked as a community intervention specialist. New Futures closed down because of lack of funding in 2016, and Richardson has not gained employment elsewhere.
In addition to focusing on crime prevention and response, Richardson said he's been working with nonprofits to revitalize portions of southwest Little Rock, in a similar manner to the 12th Street Corridor revitalization efforts he spearheaded a few years ago.
He said one of two trips he has taken so far this year -- a four-day excursion to Savannah, Ga., to talk about the Invest Health initiative that Little Rock was chosen to take part in -- was at the request of Mayor Mark Stodola. The mayor confirmed that Friday and said the trip was paid for with a grant.
The mayor didn't have specific comments related to Richardson's board meeting absences.
"The purpose of travel obviously needs to be related to a board member's responsibilities with the city, or issues that affect the city," Stodola said. "Each board member is elected and is accountable to their constituencies as it relates to that, and I'll let others be the judge of that. Obviously, Ken has had some medical issues. I know that has had some impact on his attendance, so I can't really speak to that issue. I think others have been pretty well good in attendance."
The board member with the next highest number of absences since January 2016 was Gene Fortson, with four. Former City Director Brad Cazort also missed four voting meetings in 2016, but he did not return to the board this year.
Three board members have missed only one meeting since January 2016 and one -- Ward 6's Doris Wright -- hasn't missed any. Capi Peck from Ward 4 has not missed a meeting, but her term didn't begin until January this year.
The next highest amount of travel expenditures among the city directors since January 2016 is the $̶5̶,̶9̶3̶5̶.̶3̶1̶ $7,516 the city paid for Wright to go on t̶h̶r̶e̶e̶ four* trips.
When contacted Friday, Wright said she couldn't comment on Richardson's absences or travel, because she didn't know the circumstances.
In regard to her own city-funded trips, she said she's instituted several initiatives based on what she learned during those meetings. She brought the idea for the Youth Master Plan back from one conference. At another, she learned of a new concept the city is exploring regarding efforts to widen a long stretch of Bowman Road.
There's another concept regarding home foreclosures -- which she has a high number of in her ward -- that she and city officials are working to implement in Little Rock, under which the owners of foreclosed properties pay a fee to the city and are required to maintain and take care of the properties, instead of that burden falling on the city.
When reached Friday and asked about Richardson's absences and travel, some city directors chose not to comment and others said they were concerned only when those matters affected the entire board.
"I have concerns about the board meetings he's missing," said Joan Adcock, city director at-large. "Like last week. Director Fortson had had surgery that day and really didn't feel like coming, but we knew that because Director [Dean] Kumpuris was out of town and we assumed Director Richardson wouldn't come, we possibly couldn't have done the city's business without Director Fortson."
Eight of the 10 city board members are needed to suspend the rules to read an ordinance three times in one night and vote that night. Otherwise, state law requires ordinances be read at three separate meetings before a vote is taken.
"When it starts impacting board members who are ill, who have to come in because Ken isn't coming, I think it's a concern to all of us. And when you have a room full of citizens there to conduct business and you don't have enough city directors, the citizens get angry," Adcock said.
She also pointed out that she has battled cancer and other illnesses without missing board meetings. In 2016, she missed one meeting, the week her husband died.
Fortson didn't comment on Richardson specifically when reached by phone Friday, but he said he hadn't felt the need to travel on city business and that board travel should be limited to "necessary trips."
Kathy Webb, the vice mayor and Ward 3's representative, said that when she was in the Legislature there were many policies about trips.
"We had limits on trips. I learned a lot at meetings I went to, so I think they are of tremendous value. But if we don't have a city policy, we should," Webb said.
Ward 7's B.J. Wyrick said she thought the board created a policy more than a decade ago restricting members to $2,500 or less in travel per year, with anything beyond needing the approval of the board. That was after public criticism of some city directors who had spent a large amount of money on a trip to Africa.
Asked about an official travel policy for the board, city officials couldn't locate one Friday. Some officials were out of the office, and others didn't respond to phone messages.
Richardson said he understands questions about his attendance at meetings.
"I've spent a lot more time than I imagined I would be trying to help resolve some of these community-based conflicts and violent activity," he said. "A lot of our communities are distressed. It requires a lot of time. I didn't realize I was going to have to spend this much time on doing this.
"It requires far more attention than just meetings, but I do understand those concerns."
Metro on 03/12/2017
*CORRECTION: Little Rock City Director Doris Wright has taken four city-funded business trips that cost a total of $7,516 since January 2016. Because of incorrect information from the city, a previous version of this article gave the wrong total for Wright’s travel costs.