NEW DIRECTOR OPENS DELTA CENTER IN CLARENDON

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark.—Susan Thomas, the newly appointed director of the Delta Research and Design Center (DRDC), opened the doors to her office on November 5.

The center, located in Clarendon, is a unit of the University of Arkansas Community Design Center (UACDC), which is a division of the School of Architecture.

"The Delta Research and Design Center is the direct expression of a commitment by the School of Architecture to increase our service and outreach role in the state," said Jeff Shannon, interim dean of the University of Arkansas School of Architecture. "We have recognized the need for assistance in this part of Arkansas for several years and are very pleased to have a presence there."

On June 1, 2001, the UACDC received two grants totaling $346,000 from the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation. One of the grants, amounting to $96,000, was used to establish the new Delta outreach center. The center will assist local communities in developing plans and programs to help them expand their economy, improve education, and develop ecotourism and conservation.

Thomas envisions this process as gradual, requiring what she describes as "small steps."

"The work will be slow, the victories will be small. But we will be doing work that matters, and our efforts will produce an impact in that region that should help promote and build communities for years to come," she said. "The big victories take time."

But big things may happen under Thomas' leadership. She received her bachelor's and master's degrees in public administration and is currently finishing her doctorate in public policy, all from the University of Arkansas. She's not an academic who expounds on abstractions without getting socially involved, however. In the coming weeks, she's moving from Fayetteville to east Arkansas to continue work already in progress with various community groups and local governments.

"Our first real big project, which is typical of some of the projects we'll be doing, is working on a grant for a community development center called BGACDC," Thomas said.

BGACDC is an acronym for the Boys Girls Adults Community Development Corporation located in Marvell. This nonprofit social organization was started over 25 years ago and provides a wide range of social services to the Marvell community.

As a native of Arkansas, Thomas has a deep commitment to the state and its communities. She stresses how the center is not concerned only with the physical rebuilding of a town, but instead she believes renovating a building is only the first step in reconstructing the economic and social makeup of an entire community.

"When we started the UACDC in '95, our focus was primarily on the physical, but as we matured we have tended to look at community development and planning in a more multifaceted way," said David Evan Glasser, UACDC director and Steven L. Anderson chair in urban studies.

From education to economy, ecotourism to conservation, Thomas said it's amazing how everything is intertwined. In other words, according to Thomas, we can improve an economy slowly, observe the effects those improvements have on an education system, and then watch them trickle down into other social improvements but not overnight.

Thomas said she wants to adjust the way success is viewed and be realistic about what can actually be accomplished. As a result, she emphasizes the center's long-term commitment to the Delta.

"The Delta has suffered many federal and state programs which stopped and started," Glasser said. "This breeds cynicism. Our intention is that this new Delta center will be a sustained effort."

Thomas and Glasser, along with Valerie Hunt, a graduate lawyer and a Winthrop Rockefeller Fellow in the doctorate program in public policy, toured the Delta in search of the center's new location. After interviewing mayors and observing different communities' needs, they chose office space located in the old Merchant’s and Planters Bank building in downtown Clarendon with the consultation of the Rockefeller Foundation. The building—a casualty of the 1927 flood—has a main floor that will eventually become a welcome and visitor's center for the community, Thomas said. The DRDC will be located on the mezzanine of the newly remodeled bank.

"We were impressed with the Clarendon mayor's attitude, which had to do not just with arbitrary growth but with conservation of open land and development of ecotourism," Glasser said.

"The Rockefeller Foundation, in awarding the money, underscored the value of a collaboration with The Nature Conservancy, headquartered in Clarendon as well," he said. "We anticipate generating a substantial number of development initiatives in the coming years, thanks in large part to support from the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation."

Although the funds provided by the Rockefeller Foundation were for the single academic year of 2001-2, both the School of Architecture and UACDC have made a long-term commitment to DRDC. Thomas' position as director, for example, is supported by both the school and UACDC.

The Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation is a private, nonprofit organization that is dedicated to improving the economic and social well-being of Arkansas and its people. It was created in 1974 by an endowment from the estate of former governor Winthrop Rockefeller.