Four Little Rock City Directors are up for reelection this year, and three new candidates are hoping to win seats.
Ward 4 Director Capi Peck and all three at-large directors — Dean Kumpuris, Joan Adcock and Antwan Phillips — have filed the necessary paperwork to appear on the ballot in November, Deputy City Clerk Allison Segars said.
New candidates Blake Tierney, Jordan Thomas and Glen Schwarz have also filed paperwork to run.
The filing period for campaign paperwork for city director candidates opened July 31 and closed at noon today. Candidates must have resided in Little Rock for at least 30 days before filing, be at least 21 years old and a registered voter, have no party designation, and turn in a petition with at least 50 signatures from Little Rock voters.
Blake Tierney announced his bid for Joan Adcock’s at-large position earlier this year and filed the required paperwork July 31. Tierney, 32, works for a Boston-based nonprofit called Third Sector, which provides consulting services for state and county governments. The Arkansas Times profiled Tierney in April.
From the Arkansas Times profile:
“Asked why he chose to oppose Adcock and not one of the other at-large members also up for election in November, Tierney said Adcock’s name has come up when he’s talked with residents about what changes they want to see in city leadership.”
Adcock, 84, is the longest-serving board member in history, winning her first term in 1992 and serving as Little Rock Vice Mayor from January 1995 until December 1996. Adcock filed her campaign paperwork July 31.
Jordan Thomas, a broker at agricultural brokerage firm J.W. Nutt Co., announced his candidacy for at-large position 9, the position currently held by Phillips, earlier this year. Thomas filed his campaign paperwork Aug. 7.
Phillips, an attorney at Wright Lindsey Jennings, is running for his second term as city director. He filed his paperwork Aug. 6.
Former Little Rock mayoral candidate and Arkansas gubernatorial candidate Glen Schwarz, whom the Arkansas Times profiled in 2018, quietly filed paperwork to run for At-Large Position 8 on the board, currently held by Kumpuris. A 2021 Arkansas law could end his campaign, though.
Schwarz had a nonviolent felony conviction from the 1990s that was expunged in 2010, which bars him from running for municipal office under current Arkansas law. This 2022 Twitter thread from the Arkansas Times’ Matt Campbell, who was not yet working for the Arkansas Times, delves deeper into the relevant statutes that prevent Schwarz from running.
Uh…it’s probably noteworthy, given the closeness of the race overall, that Glen Schwarz is not eligible to run for or hold the office he’s seeking according to his own admission in today’s Dem-Gaz story on the Little Rock mayoral race. https://t.co/5tH5THfelK pic.twitter.com/zHyvox03Nc
— Matt Campbell (@BlueHogReport) October 23, 2022
Essentially, a 2019 Arkansas law made it so that the expungement of a felony would not restore a person’s ability to run for a constitutional office, like secretary of state or attorney general. In 2021, the law was extended to municipal offices, like the city board.
Kumpuris, a gastroenterologist at St. Vincent hospital, is running for his eighth full term on the city board after being appointed to fill a vacancy in January 1995. Kumpuris served as Little Rock Vice Mayor from January 2011 to December 2012. In his time as a city director, Kumpuris has spearheaded the installation of over 90 statues in Little Rock, the most recent of which is to be modified to remove the name of a cult leader. Kumpuris filed paperwork to run again on Aug. 1.
No new candidates filed paperwork for Peck’s Ward 4 position, meaning she will run unopposed.
Executive chef and owner of Trio’s Restaurant, Peck is running for her third term as city director. She first won a seat in 2016 and ran unopposed in 2020. Peck filed campaign paperwork on Aug. 2. In 2022, the Arkansas Times published a Q&A with Peck.
The Little Rock Board of Directors is the local governing and policy-making body for the city. It consists of the Little Rock mayor, seven city directors representing Little Rock’s seven wards, and three at-large city directors who represent the whole city.
The city board meets every Tuesday at its City Hall meeting chambers and alternates between agenda-setting meetings and voting meetings, where the board votes on the agenda they set the week before.
Little Rock voters will vote on city board positions on Election Day, Nov. 5.