A good listener and a great organizer, Mark Hayes serves as Arkansas Municipal League’s executive director

“The pandemic has been a double-down for those who want help and really want to try to get well, but can’t get to appointments. Depression levels have driven many of them back into usage and overdoses. We are literally losing a generation of kids and young adults; kids that came to our house dozens of times or we’ve gone to football games and basketball games with their parents and all of a sudden, they are either dead or gone to rehab.” -Mark Hayes
(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Cary Jenkins)
“The pandemic has been a double-down for those who want help and really want to try to get well, but can’t get to appointments. Depression levels have driven many of them back into usage and overdoses. We are literally losing a generation of kids and young adults; kids that came to our house dozens of times or we’ve gone to football games and basketball games with their parents and all of a sudden, they are either dead or gone to rehab.” -Mark Hayes (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Cary Jenkins)

Everything about Mark Hayes is big. From his towering height to his basso voice, his is a presence that fills the room and commands attention -- advantages the lawyer-by-training doesn't hesitate to leverage in court.

Professionally, Hayes thinks big, dreams big and invites others to do the same, especially the 500 or so cities and towns that make up the membership of the Arkansas Municipal League, of which he is executive director. From Fayetteville to West Helena, Texarkana to Pocahontas, he preaches a sweeping gospel of potential and opportunity waiting to be tapped.

"I like where we're headed," he says. "There are already some very unique gemstone communities out there and they're really going to be able to shine when they have the ability to get their message out and show what they can do. I think Arkansas can be very attractive to lots of people. We're a tourism state and to be able to add to that dimension will be huge for all of us."

Even Hayes' missteps are large and all-encompassing. A recent entanglement with his Golden Labradoodle Zorro didn't just sprain, it left his arm in such bad shape the surgeon gave him a post-operative ultimatum.

"That's the worst thing I've ever seen," he says the doc told him. "Don't break it again because I can't put it back together."

Hayes also enjoys a seemingly bottomless capacity for empathy and compassion, leading him into community service and personal crusades alike. Friends stricken with prostate cancer and families decimated by drug addiction pull him headlong into advocacy and action. It's a quality that has earned him friendships measured in decades.

"You know how people always say 'He never knew a stranger'? Well, Mark has more true friends, and I mean good friends, than literally anyone I know," says Tom Kieklak of Fayetteville, a friend of nearly 30 years. "If someone didn't believe that, you could just track his travel. Mark can't go anywhere in this country without knowing someone personally. He's just that kind of person who makes friends easily and keeps them all his life."

ON THE MOVE

Hayes' deep roots and steadfast advocacy for the Natural State contrasts sharply with the almost nomadic existence of his upbringing. His late father, Franz, was in manufacturing and the family was almost constantly uprooting and moving from one assignment to another.

"We moved a bunch of places," he says. "I was born in Warwick, R.I.; lived in Michigan in three places, then Kentucky and Wisconsin. Mom's from South Carolina, Dad's from New England, so we had all sorts of adventures on the east coast from New Hampshire to South Carolina."

"We moved to Jonesboro when I was 16 when my father was transferred there in 1976. We had been in Racine, Wis., since I was 10."

The moving around forged a tight relationship between Hayes and his brother Pete, just 14 months his junior, but the divergence in their personalities was apparent from the beginning.

"He and I were very close and are to this day," Hayes says. "But it's clear who we take after. Pete takes after Dad. He is mechanically oriented; he has an incredible gift for building and putting things together.

"Mom was a nurse, was musically inclined and didn't mind getting up in front of people. I don't mind that, either. Candidly, I always wanted to be an actor but I never saw myself totally doing that."

Instead, Hayes majored in business-personnel management at Arkansas State University, a degree that didn't give him a firm career direction. He says he more or less drifted into law school because he saw others doing so and he didn't have any better option at the time.

But once enrolled in the University of Arkansas at Little Rock School of Law, now William H. Bowen School of Law, the focus and resolve that would grow into his calling card solidified. All he needed was a place to start.

"Mark Stodola was the Little Rock city attorney and I just went into his office and asked to be a law clerk there," he says with a wry chuckle. "I said, 'I'm not the brightest guy in the world, but you won't be disappointed if you hire me,' and he did.

"I really liked it and he offered me a job once I graduated. I worked a lot with the police and human resources department. I kind of fell into something that, it turned out, I loved."

BRILLIANT LEGAL MIND

In his role with the city, Hayes would regularly interact with the Arkansas Municipal League in various cases and after three years, the League hired him as a litigator in 1989. His caseload was so deep even a guy of his stature had to paddle fast to keep from going under.

"The League had a risk management pool and at the time, one of the things the executive director set up was an in-house law firm which was essentially me," he says. "Rather than having to pay separate counsel, I got the cases and worked on them.

"I was awfully green and I inherited 50 federal lawsuits. In the first year, I think I had two or three full-blown jury trials. It was a real trial by fire."

After taking a brief sabbatical to fill the remaining term of Little Rock's municipal judge, a post to which he was appointed by Gov. Mike Huckabee, Hayes returned to the League and was promoted to general counsel in 1997. In that role, he took on legislative issues as well as kept a finger on legal operations. The work furthered his reputation as a capable and effective advocate among city administrators and mayors statewide.

"Mark's brilliant legal mind and his practical experience in advising municipal officials for many, many years was and is, I believe, a terrific qualification," says Rep. Steve Womack, former mayor of Rogers who has known Hayes for 25 years. "The other noteworthy thing is he's not a wimp by any stretch of the imagination. He has a very imposing presence and his ability to speak and think on his feet and advise people in search of his guidance is compelling.

"When you combine the articulate skills, his voice and his command presence with his legal mind, you've got a rare blend of professionalism there that has benefited the Municipal League for a very long time."

CREATED A VACANCY

Throughout his tenure at the League, Hayes reported to Don Zimmerman, which didn't exactly put him in the minority. Formed in 1934, the organization had been led since World War II by only two executive directors, Zimmerman and his father, Glenn, before him. So, when Don Zimmerman suffered a stroke and died in 2018, it created a vacancy that hadn't been seen for decades and no small shoes to fill besides.

"We went through some tough times when Don Zimmerman passed away," says Harold Perrin, former mayor of Jonesboro and past president of the League. "Don was there for many years and when we started looking for an executive director, I told the Executive Committee, there was no need to look outside or get a professional head-hunter. You've got someone here who was right beside Don almost daily for 20-plus years.

"My point is he knew all the staff within the organization and he got along with them well. He's a good listener. He listened to people before he would make a decision. I think that's part of that law degree in him. And he was a great organizer."

Hayes was happy to serve, but it was clear from the beginning that a new era was coming to the longstanding organization which, broadly defined, acts like a trade association for cities and towns.

"When I took over, we were still a very good association and provided good services. But it became clear to me there were needs to be addressed," Hayes says. "One was our computer data systems were becoming, if they were not already, completely antiquated when I took over. I also did a shakeup of management.

"One of the big things we worked on was our relationship with the Association of Arkansas Counties, which wasn't necessarily bad, but it wasn't what it should have been. Cities and counties have far more in common than what they oppose, even though every now and then they butt heads on what jail beds should cost. But primarily, our missions are the same, just in different areas.

"That's helped in the Legislature. Legislators don't want a mayor and county judge on opposite sides of the fence on major issues, it's difficult to deal with. When we stand together on things, it's a powerful message to lawmakers."

TOO LATE

One noteworthy improvement in the Hayes administration was in communications. If you want to know what's foremost on the minds of Arkansas' city leaders, "City & Town Magazine," the official magazine of the Arkansas Municipal League, is a good place to start. Leaf through any issue and you'll discover what keeps mayors up at night, from legislative issues and infrastructure challenges to tricks of the economic development trade. Hayes has a regular column in the publication, and it sets the tone for the pages to come.

In May last year, the topic was the opioid crisis, a scourge which grips small towns and metropolitan areas -- rich neighborhoods and poor ones -- with the same talons. With a natural flair for words, Hayes' columns are consistently engaging, but this one was absolutely gripping. It was personal, detailing the addiction of his stepson, Wells, who'd succumbed to opioids and died about a month earlier. He was 23.

"Near-death experiences from overdoses certainly weren't everyday occurrences with him, but they happened often enough that we knew what the drill was," he wrote. "We knew the need for chest compressions, counting one, two, three, four while listening to the neutral calm voice of the 911 dispatcher. We knew that help would arrive quickly. We knew Narcan could be administered with near-miraculous results. We also knew it was too late this last time.

"I tried. Nearly two minutes of me pushing on his chest. Oh, how I tried."

The column was one part epitaph and tribute to his fallen stepson; one part rallying cry for the children and families who remained, some already struggling, some not yet fallen into the abyss. One of Zimmerman's last actions had been initiating a landmark lawsuit against prescription opioid drug manufacturers, a cause Hayes was all too happy to take up and push forward.

"We joined forces with the Association of Arkansas Counties and we took a tact that nobody else in the country was able to do and probably will never be able to do," he says. "We have every county and virtually every city and town as actual claimants under one roof, one lawyer. And we have also now joined with the state as well. ... Arkansas will be made whole over an 18-year period of time."

'HORRIBLE FATES'

At this Hayes falls silent, his zeal at holding drug manufacturers accountable getting ahead of him. After a pause, he says, "Well, that's not fair. Nobody's ever going to be made whole, because too many people have died and horrible fates have happened."

Hayes says Wells' death, while enormously painful, merely reinforced how insidious and widespread the reach of such drugs has become. Opioid addiction is a numbers game, and the odds of a family being unaffected have quickly become substantially longer.

"The pandemic has been a double-down for those who want help and really want to try to get well, but can't get to appointments. Depression levels have driven many of them back into usage and overdoses," he says. "We are literally losing a generation of kids and young adults; kids that came to our house dozens of times or we've gone to football games and basketball games with their parents and all of a sudden, they are either dead or gone to rehab."

Like everyone else, Wells was more than the final scene of his life. Hayes rattles off some of the young man's qualities -- intelligence, inquisitiveness, and a near photographic memory -- that speak far more about him than his addiction. Doing so brings him back to a central tenet, that too many Arkansas families are grieving in harmony. Resolve seeps into his tone.

"I could probably name 10 kids right off the top of my head who have died, all in the age bracket of our kids," he says. "It's just terrible. It is an unfortunate reality of our times and we've got to get this settlement completed. We have a great ability now to go forward and make a big, big difference. We're working diligently on that."

NAGGING ENCOURAGED

Hayes' other community service has been promoting prostate health and prostate testing. His involvement started, predictably, after watching some of his many friends suffer with prostate cancer.

"I have some really good friends who are survivors, in fact, my father-in-law just went through it," he says. "The more I got to know about it, the more it became clear that if men get routinely checked, it is one of the very few cancers that you can all but guarantee you'll recover from. I just thought what a waste if men aren't going to the doctor getting their PSA checked because it's just not a complicated thing to do."

Hayes was invited to serve the Arkansas Prostate Cancer Foundation as an advocate for prostate cancer awareness and testing, which he accepted with gusto. During his tenure, messaging efforts jumped considerably and connections were made with more organizations on the ground, in part due to his reach and recognition in the state's 500 cities and towns.

"We put a pretty good amount of money into the bank for close to two years now," he says. "We did a No Shave November that someone told me broke the previous record pretty substantially. And all that money just goes right back into messaging, testing, education, travel around the state. We'll do the same thing at the Blue Ribbon Bash gala."

At that event, slated for Sept. 25 in Little Rock, Hayes will be recognized as the Foundation's Man of the Year. It was supposed to happen in 2020, which technically makes him a two-time winner of the award, he jokes. This year's event will be virtual due to the increase in covid-19 cases.

He's modest about the recognition but not about the cause. Anything to save a life.

"Men are terrible about going to the doctor. So, my message last year wasn't to men, it was to women," he says. "I said, 'Whoever the man is in your life -- your brother, your dad, your husband, your best friend, whoever it is -- go nag them. Go nag them until you know for sure that they are routinely getting their PSA checked.' It's so important to understand how quickly they can go from OK to not OK and how quickly they can get back to OK if they are staying on top of it.

"It is one of those things where I feel good about being involved because it does make a difference. We actually can make a difference and it's desperately needed. Nobody needs to die from prostate cancer, it just doesn't have to happen."

“Men are terrible about going to the doctor. So, my message last year wasn’t to men, it was to women. I said, ‘Whoever the man is in your life — your brother, your dad, your husband, your best friend, whoever it is — go nag them. Go nag them until you know for sure that they are routinely getting their PSA checked.’” -Mark Hayes
(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Cary Jenkins)
“Men are terrible about going to the doctor. So, my message last year wasn’t to men, it was to women. I said, ‘Whoever the man is in your life — your brother, your dad, your husband, your best friend, whoever it is — go nag them. Go nag them until you know for sure that they are routinely getting their PSA checked.’” -Mark Hayes (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Cary Jenkins)

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SELF PORTRAIT

Mark Hayes

• DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH: April 3, 1960, Warwick, R.I.

• FAMILY: Wife Alison Hayes, mother Marilyn Hayes, sons Franz and Colin Hayes, stepdaughter Bliss Bratton, stepson Wells Bratton (deceased).

• MY FAVORITE MOVIE IS: A tough one to narrow down, because I love movies! The original "Star Wars Trilogy," "The Cowboys" and "Young Frankenstein" top the list.

• MY PERSONAL MOTTO IS: "There is no substitute for hard work" and "Laughter truly is the best medicine"

• IF I WASN'T IN MY CURRENT JOB, I WOULD PROBABLY BE: An actor/writer or an architect.

• THE ONE THING I KNOW TO BE TRUE ABOUT ALL PEOPLE IS: They need to be heard and acknowledged. If they were, there would be a lot less conflict in the world.

• THE BEST ADVICE I EVER GOT CAME FROM: My parents who told me, "Treat all people with whom you come in contact fairly and with kindness. At the end of the day, we are all human beings."

• MY GUILTY PLEASURE IS: Gin martinis and potato chips.

• ONE THING I'D CHANGE ABOUT MYSELF WOULD BE: To gain more patience. My family would say I need to be more patient, and they would be correct.

• WHEN I AM NOT WORKING, YOU'RE MOST LIKELY TO FIND ME: Boating, reading or watching the Green Bay Packers, the world's greatest professional football team. Or, watching the Arkansas State University Red Wolves, the world's greatest collegiate football team. (Insert my U of A alumni wife's eye roll here.)

• MY PROUDEST ACCOMPLISHMENT, BY FAR, IS: My family.

• THE WORD THAT SUMS ME UP: Actually two words: persistent and content.

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