mayor

Residents of the Walnut Valley neighborhood walk along Shackleford Road in west Little Rock Friday afternoon, March 31, 2023, after a tornado plowed through the area, damaging hundreds of homes and businesses. (John Sykes/Arkansas Advocate)

Tornadoes kill at least 5 in Arkansas, damage hundreds of homes and businesses

BY: and - March 31, 2023

At least five people died in tornadoes in Arkansas on Friday, but officials reported no fatalities in Little Rock as of Saturday afternoon. The first death was reported in the city of North Little Rock in a tornado that struck a little after 2 p.m.; four were killed in Wynne, about 105 miles northeast of […]

Incumbent Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott Jr. (right) won reelection Tuesday. Here he gives a pat on the back in passing to candidate Steve Landers Sr. at the conclusion of a candidate forum held in Little Rock. Oct. 10, 2022. (John Sykes/Arkansas Advocate)

Frank Scott Jr. wins second term as Little Rock’s mayor

BY: - November 9, 2022

This story was updated at 4:10 p.m. Nov. 11 to reflect the latest vote tallies from the Pulaski County Election Commission’s website. Incumbent Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott Jr. won re-election Tuesday night in the city’s combative and high-dollar mayor’s race, with 49.9% of the vote according to unofficial totals on election night. Finishing second […]

The only campaign finance reports filed in the Little Rock mayor's race show Steve Landers Sr. (second from left) has raised more than double the amount of incumbent Mayor Frank Scott Jr.(left) and vastly more than (third and fourth from left) Greg Henderson and Gary Schwarz combined. (John Sykes/Arkansas Advocate)

Landers outspends Scott by about $250K in race for Little Rock mayor

BY: - November 2, 2022

Retired auto dealer Steve Landers Sr. has raised almost $1 million in campaign contributions in the race for Little Rock mayor, more than doubling incumbent Mayor Frank Scott Jr. ‘s $403,604 total, according to campaign finance disclosure reports filed Tuesday (Nov. 1). Landers’ campaign contributions include a $400,000 loan to himself. All four candidates in […]

Major contributors to Little Rock mayoral race remain unknown

BY: - October 19, 2022

Three weeks before the Nov. 8 general election, Little Rock voters still can’t learn the big contributors behind the four candidates in this year’s contentious mayor’s race. And they can’t know how candidates are spending those contribution dollars. State law doesn’t require campaign finance disclosure information from nonpartisan municipal candidates until Nov. 1, just seven […]

A picture of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee from 2015. Huckabee's political action committee donated more than 61% of the funds received by a group behind TV ads critical of incumbent Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott Jr.

Mike Huckabee PAC funnels cash to committee behind anti-Scott ads

BY: - October 11, 2022

This story was updated at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2022, to include Mayor Frank Scott Jr.’s response. Former Gov. Mike Huckabee’s political action committee, HuckPAC, is the primary funding source for a group behind advertising critical of Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott, Jr. and his re-election bid. Ads targeting the mayor have appeared on […]

Three Little Rock mayoral candidates voice support for marijuana amendment

BY: - October 11, 2022

Three candidates for Little Rock mayor, including incumbent Frank Scott Jr., expressed full-throated support Monday night for legalizing recreational use of marijuana in Arkansas. The fourth mayoral hopeful, car dealer Steve Landers, voiced no opposition to the proposed state constitutional amendment while saying: “I will do what the people of the state of Arkansas decide […]

COMMENTARY

A chance at unity devolves into political division and recrimination

BY: - October 5, 2022

Could the Little Rock mayor’s race come down to how the city administration handled a contract for a party — and how the administration responds to public records requests? The drama that has played out at City Hall, on Twitter and in the media the last three weeks kept getting stranger and stranger as a […]