Support for Arkansas Week provided by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

The Arkansas Times and KUAR FM 89.

Hello and welcome to Arkansas Week.

I'm Christina Munoz.

The Arkansas legislature wrapped up the special session on Thursday, sending legislation on tax cuts and funding for a school safety grant program to the governor's desk for signage.

Though the $500 million tax cut package sailed through with overwhelming support, it did not come without opposition from several legislative Democrats, as well as an attempt to extend the session to consider teacher salary increases, which the governor had previously removed from the agenda.

Joining us today to provide a recap of the session and what the tax cuts mean for Arkansans are Michael Hilbert Hedlund, the news director for KUAR Radio.

Dr. Heather Yates, a associate professor of political science at U.S.A. And Andrew DeMello, Little Rock Capital Correspondent of the Associated Press.

I first want to say thank you to all three of you for joining us here today.

It's very good to have you here.

So thank you for sharing your time.

We appreciate it.

Michael, I'm going to start with you.

You got to be there for majority of the special session, lasts about three, three and a half days.

Tell us a little bit about the tax cuts as far as that was kind of the reason that was the purpose.

We all knew this was coming, but fill us in as much as you can on what that package looks like.

Well, this will be a package that provides overall a reduction of income tax rates for individuals.

It goes from 5.5% to 4.9%.

That is retroactive to the beginning of the year.

The top corporate tax rate goes from 5.9% to 5.3%.

And at the governor's bill signing ceremony on Thursday, he called this historic day, said when he came into office, the tax rate was at 7%, the highest it's ever been.

And he's bringing it down to 4.9%, which is the lowest it's ever been.

It provided a little bit of a history lesson, said the state income tax was first introduced in Arkansas in 1929.

At that time it was 5%.

And he brought up that fact that during his inaugural address, he talked about the importance of bringing this down.

And he also reflected on the fact that some of Arkansas's border states have no income tax.

Tennessee in Texarkana.

There was discussion about the differences between Texarkana, Arkansas, Texarkana, Texas, West Memphis and Memphis said that this has been needed to help make the state more competitive.

Absolutely.

I mean, understand that very well.

And I want to go over to AP's Andrew DeMello.

Lots of talk about this surplus, $1.6 billion.

That's a huge amount.

Talk a little bit about why this was the desire out there to really get the money back to Arkansans.

Yeah.

You know, and this this session wasn't announced until after the state had announced its surplus for the previous fiscal year.

As you noted, $1.6 billion.

And the governor had said that he wanted to return some some of that money to Texas, to taxpayer in some way, but also to address rising costs because because of inflation.

And this was this package of cuts, which goes primarily the acceleration of those tax cuts, but also included some other items, including a1a temporary $150 tax tax credit for individuals making up to $87,000.

And basically, you're saying that this you know, the surplus showed that the state of the state can afford to do this.

But also the just with the costs going on right now, that that really showed the motivation for doing this.

And also that helped motivate the the idea of this school state, their school safety grant program, tapping into the surplus for that $50 million program.

Absolutely.

We're going to talk about that a little bit more in just a minute.

But first, I want to go over to Dr. Yates and fill us in about the political side of this.

Everyone likes to say money back in your pocket.

This is good news.

But in all politics, we know it's not always that easy.

So kind of present to us the political side of how this went down.

Absolutely.

So to give some context to what the special session meant was there was a staggering surplus in the state budget, 1.6 billion.

I just have to articulate that because it is so large and because of this surplus it was directed to to fund the tax relief and the one time tax credits.

But it was also politically a real missed opportunity by what was not on the agenda.

And that's teacher pay that has been in the cycles and at the top of a lot of people's minds.

Schools are beginning to start and this is also important for a couple of reasons.

One, the governor did kind of telegraph and a desire to address the teacher pay issue, but it ultimately was not a part of the agenda in the special session because the reason being given is that there isn't that support inside the legislature.

However, they are also and when I say they, the governor and the Republicans are saying they're not closing the door on teacher pay, but this is a classic example of kicking the can down the road.

Here is the context.

In January, the state legislative committees on Education embarked on the adequacy study.

And so the by the the agenda issued by the adequacy study, they said that the legislators were going to review teacher pay in April.

And so when a special session is called, the teachers rallying said this is an excellent opportunity to redirect $1.6 billion surplus to elevate teacher pay.

And the response to that was from the Republicans is like, well, we don't have enough information yet.

We have to wait till the adequate study is concluded and the price tag is 333 million.

And so the legislature, I think, really lost an opportunity.

It is election cycle and teachers are voters and they camped out on the Capitol steps all week to present this.

Are this issue and to be very visible.

Now, the politics of this is that I'm not sure if voters are going to penalize the legislature for not addressing teacher pay and by their actions in the special legislature.

It goes to suggest that maybe not voters will not penalize the legislators for that.

So this is this is an action this is a moving issue.

But it was also a real lost opportunity.

And teachers are making sure the legislature hears that.

Absolutely.

Which is typically the case.

There have been rallies, there's been social media outcries.

A lot of talk about the teacher pay issue.

So, Michael, I want to go over to you.

And you have is as you've been covering this issue, what have you been hearing from teachers that are speaking out as well as the politicians that are saying, well, we might have to wait on this?

Well, we did have teachers who were at the Capitol who were actually lined up along the stairs, going up to the House chamber, trying to sway lawmakers.

I asked the governor about this on Thursday at his after he signed the bills into law.

I asked him, you know, any regrets about this?

Because, as you said, he had expressed some support for this, but said there was not support among legislative leaders right now, said we should wait for this adequacy study to be completed.

But in the meantime, you've got a lot of teachers who are leaving the profession.

The salary right now, minimum salary, $35,000, that doesn't go very far for in most cases, people who are highly educated.

So you do have a lot of people leaving right now.

The governor said he is confident this will be brought up next year.

But in the meantime, just like so many other industries, you have a lot of people who have decided to change profession and largely in some cases because of the salaries.

So, yes, we'll see what happens.

I was talking with Jonathan dismaying the senator from Beebe as we were walking out of the Capitol on Thursday.

He said he's confident it will be addressed next year.

But just at this time, the governor had said when he issued the call he wanted this to be quick and apparently they did not want to delve into this at this time, which might have stretched out the session longer than three days.

It was absolutely very good points.

And Andrew Miller, I want to go over to you.

One of the concerns that was expressed was that this is one time money, teacher salary is an ongoing, continual, continual money.

Is that, do you believe, one of the strongest arguments for not addressing it in this special session?

You know, I think that was, you know, one of the arguments you heard at first.

But the argument that you started hearing more and more was the the adequacy study.

You know, this this study that the legislature is required to do to determine what constitutes an adequate education.

It's used to make recommendations on school funding levels.

And the you know, the argument that you started hearing more and more was special session is not the right time to do this because this study is still under is still underway.

And, you know, wait until January when when we can or when when the legislature can take a closer look at this and can have more data to back back up these numbers on what the salary amount is.

I think given that argument, I think there is going to be a lot more pressure on the legislature next year, considering that they were pointing to it.

And you really, you know, for the most part, you heard most most Republican leaders saying they think there will be some kind of raise raised for teachers.

So there's going to be pressure to take some kind of action.

And I think it'll be interesting this fall to see what the adequacy report says, because that's going to really kind of provide the backup for that.

Very good point.

Well, thank you very much for that.

And Dr. Gates, I want to go over back to you, because you talked about missed opportunities.

Another issue that was a highly debated and very emotional was the possibility of, as some people say, at fixing the trigger, a law that went into effect regarding the Roe v Wade announcement that came out earlier this year, that there is not any sort of legislation in our trigger law that allows for rape or incest.

There had been some talk that this would have been a great an opportunity to add that in.

At this time.

That did not happen.

What is your take on that side of the issue?

Oh, that's correct.

And another missed opportunity with amending the abortion legislation, because as it stands in Arkansas, there is a nearly universal ban.

No questions, no exceptions for life or health of the mother in the case of rape, incest or a non-viable pregnancy.

And this was the first legislative session opportunity to revisit that trigger law in the wake of the Kansas referendum.

I think the Kansas referendum, where the the residents went to the polls to defeat a constitutional amendment, really was resounding through the region.

And it caught the legislature's attention.

And this is where I think the the Arkansas legislature took a look at the language of that bill and realize that there needs to be some sort of language legal exception, a medical language that affords the medical community.

This is this is so much larger than just one person dealing with a pregnancy.

This is also the medical community because also what we're seeing in Texas is that there are medical professionals that are being extremely cautious because they don't want to, for the lack of a better term, trigger a prosecution when under the law as it stands.

And so this is where Arkansas is kind of at the crossroads, almost quite literally regionally and geographically and politically and so this was also another astounding lost opportunity where there were two Republicans, notable Republicans, who actually pushed the trigger law and were heavy opponents on it.

They were the ones also wanting to support an extended legislative session to return to that language.

And I think it's really important to emphasize that this is also language that would protect the medical community as well as private citizens.

So why, in your opinion, did it not get discussed here?

I think for the purpose that this is campaign season and this is always an issue to campaign on.

Abortion is a lightning rod to pull from the Kansas example.

Again, it will mobilize voters.

And so by not putting it on the table, too, to augment, augment that language, it is a campaign issue.

It's a campaign issue to stand on principles.

It's Arkansas.

It's a very rural state.

And in rural communities in Arkansas, it didn't play outside such the same way in Kansas.

But in Arkansas, the issue of abortion is a very dichotomous abortion.

You're there for it or you're against it.

It's black or white.

There's very few discussions in the gray area, so it circles back around to and I'll pull teacher pay into this as well.

This is campaign season ads.

And when I say missed opportunities legislatively, I'm also speaking very specifically to lost opportunities on campaigning.

This was to issues that voters will will mobilize around.

It just was which direction will they mobilize in?

Very interesting.

Like you said, it always seems to go back to politics, especially if there's an election around the corner.

Before we wrap up, Andrew, I want to go back over to you to talk about something that it was also passed and it's the money for school safety.

Explain how much it is and how this is going to work.

Yeah.

So it's a $50 million grant program.

The governor had proposed this after the Uvalde School shooting where 19 children and two teachers were killed.

And the the legislation itself is very general, basically just sets this money aside.

There's still a lot of details that are going to have to be hashed out through the rulemaking process.

We don't know how the money is going to be divided, what it's going to have to go toward.

You know, part of the discussion is that this will help implement some of the recommendations from the School Safety Commission that was reinstated after the Uvalde Eovaldi shooting.

So I think this fall we will get a better idea of what exactly the mechanics of this, you know, what will this fund, what or what types of things, what qualifications are our districts going to have to have the process for it?

But there's still the mechanics and the details are still have to be hashed out.

Absolutely.

And going back to the tax issue, because I know that people are listening, always want to know how do we get the money?

How does this play out?

Is it a check in the mail?

Is it your taxes?

Is it retroactive to the beginning of this year?

Retroactive to the beginning of the year, at least for the tax income part.

And then it's a tax credit for the $150 for individuals or up to $300 for married couples filing jointly.

And so as you do your taxes, this is when you're going to see that impact on your taxes when you file them next year.

Right.

It won't be like a check like we did with the federal stimulus dollars.

Right.

So don't be looking for your mailbox, waiting for the checks.

But it will be in your pocket when you do your taxes.

And they're hoping that that money can help the economy.

And Dr.

Doctor, do you see us being in this position?

Again, I want to emphasize, you use the word B, 4 billion is with a, B, not million.

It's a huge dollar amount.

What do you anticipate the surplus, if there is one, in the future?

Well, based on all the reports that we've been able to ascertain is that when the surplus is used to fund tax relief, that actually reduces the amount of income into the state.

And so we are looking at a future projection of reduced income.

And when we look at reduced income circle back around to teacher pay and circle back around to public education.

Right.

That that makes some of those contingencies, some of those portions of the electorate a little nervous because it's what will the future surplus, if there is one available, what does that look like?

Where we sit today, that projected surplus is significantly reduced.

And I guess that's part of why they so many people wanted some of these issues pressed because they are concerned that there could be a change in the future.

Fiscally, it was a lost opportunity.

I think we've said that several times here.

Andrew, before we go, would you look into your crystal ball and see the session coming forward?

What do you anticipate being the biggest issues debated in the in the session?

I you know, next year we're going to have a new governor.

And based on the polling right now, you know, Sarah Sanders is still very much favored in that race and she hasn't talked to gone into a lot of details on things.

But we have kind of a general idea of some of the things she wants to do.

One of the big things is she wants to do even more income tax cuts.

So I think we're going to see a lot more discussion on that as well as, you know, how do you fund some of these other things that people want to do while cutting income taxes?

And beyond that, I think we're going to see some of the same social issues that we saw really tie up the legislature in the past couple a couple of years.

You know, we've heard, you know, even though with the Davis decision, there's still going to be some follow up discussion on on abortion and additional restrictions kind of dealing with that issue, even with the trigger ban.

You know, there's been discussion on, you know, things like, you know, how race is taught in schools.

So I think we're going to see you were already getting idea of all these issues, but the income tax debate is still going to be a pretty big one.

Absolutely.

Very well said.

And things we will all be continuing to follow for sure.

Well, we no doubt have the best of the best from the AP, from KUAR and from UK.

So I want to say thank you to all three of you for sharing your time and expertize with us today.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

Coming up, we take a look at urban farming on this month's good roots.

Major funding for good roots is provided by Arkansas Farm Bureau.

Arkansas Farm Bureau advocating the interests of Arkansas, largest industry for more than 80 years.

Arkansas counts on agriculture.

Agriculture counts on Farm Bureau.

Additional funding for good roots provided by the Union Pacific Foundation.

Tickets to get tickets.

Tickets.

Tickets.

Yes, I know it's morning and I have some goodies for you.

Go.

If I had to put it in any way at all, I would say my passion, my gift is helping people connect to their food and it's through heritage.

So when I designed Urbana Farmstead, I wanted to incorporate all aspects from the planting to the harvest scene to the distribution.

That's what you have here.

So urban farm that has the farm and then the market and then also the kitchen.

It's all part of one farmstead, which is really important because if you're at home and it's a homestead, that's what you would be doing.

When I plant something I have in mind, what am I going to do with it afterwards?

And I try to do 40 to 50% of everything I grow that I actually sell inside the market.

The whole property is one acre, but we're actually only farming on less than one quarter.

We have a pretty good high yield because we're using the space wisely.

We do everything vertical.

So vertical gardening is where you plant in the ground, or in our case, we're using five gallon buckets and some of our planning and you remove the leaves going up the stem, which forces and causes that plant to grow up and then you stabilize it with a string.

And so you have really less ground you're using.

But also it keeps away the bugs, it helps you for watering.

So there's a lot of really good reasons why you want to do vertical farming.

I think it's important for all of us know again more about our own self and how do we feed not just our bodies but our souls.

So this is part of what I'm doing here.

I'm feeding my body, but I'm also feeding my soul.

And I try to share that.

There's so many people come to my market and they'll walk around my farm and they'll say, Wow, I wish I could do this.

And I'm like, You can you can have an entire herb garden in one little pot.

You can have a tomato, you can have a cucumber, you can roll things if you want to in your apartment, on your balcony, you know, on a patio.

It's very possible to do that economically is really important for people to grow their own food.

Second of all, there's just nothing from a taste perspective.

A tomato in a garden.

Did you pick off that vine?

Taste like a tomato.

Smells like a tomato.

And of course it looks like a tomato.

Some of the things you buy in the grocery store, they've had to pick them so green that they don't smell or taste like whatever they were supposed to be.

So here on the property, you can buy it fresh, you can buy it already canned, which I do for you.

Or you can come and learn how to canned yourself in my canning club.

If you want, you can come and learn how to cook it into Parmesan or whatever.

Because I have cooking classes as well.

In addition, I'm trying to teach people value add, which is the preservation piece of it.

So I take things in.

So the cucumbers in example, and I take it in and I preserve it by making pickles, but I also make relish.

But I also use that so I can add that to other things and make a chutney.

So you can use those things by creating multiple things out of that one cucumber.

It all roots back to Italy.

Both my mom and my dad's family are from Italy, Sicily, in the Naples and then they eventually moved to south part of L.A., where I actually grew up.

We lived in an urban community with a very small house, and they ripped out the lawns and they planted in this urban house, our garden.

So we lived like this.

We lived sustainably.

Everybody did something, you know, you always learn how to plant and of course, harvest, and you learn how to pluck a chicken so you can have the chicken.

We raised rabbits for food.

We absolutely did those things and I learned a lot of it from that.

But then the real training came.

When I went and lived abroad, I went to Italy and the southern part of Spain for 18 months and I lived with families and I did this farm away program where I was working in the fields for 6 hours, and then I worked in the kitchen for 6 hours, and that's where I really learned the techniques because I learned some things as a child, but this is where it really came into practice.

I decided I wanted to go back to Italy and to discover more about my roots.

It was really great to be able to see myself and to, you know, look at things that were happening in my life and to say this makes sense now.

I jumped from the farming world of, you know, just trying to live as a poor family.

And then I went off and got my education and I went into high tech.

Even when I was doing that job, I was always looking for an opportunity to go and take cooking classes and learn other new cuisines.

During 911, there were a lot of major things that happened to the world and me personally as well.

I had a ticket in my possession where I was supposed to be on the plane that took themselves down.

And I decided at the very last minute that to not go on that trip, I was saying what what would life look like now?

What should it look like?

What does it need to be to fill my soul?

One of my friends said, Want to go check out Arkansas?

It's exactly what you're looking for.

So I took a car and I actually went through the Boston Mountains and the Ozarks, and I spent a weekend and I fell in love.

I said, This is exactly where I want to be.

I felt like, Hey, I can do this because I've learned the techniques while I was in Italy and I lived the experience of doing urban farming as a child.

And that's what urban farmstead is.

Urbana for urban.

And then farmstead is a place where you can grow everything you need to live sustainably.

That's where I'm at in my life, is to give back, show people how to use this wonderful produce that they can grow in their yard, or that I'm growing either one and, you know, just change their lives a little bit.

Major and a big thank you to Margie Raimondo for sharing her passion to inform and teach others about urban farming.

That concludes this edition of Arkansas Week.

We'll see you next time.

Support for Arkansas Week provided by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, the Arkansas Times and KUAR AR FM 89.