My frustration level rises immediately as I exit Interstate 30 and enter the River Market District of downtown Little Rock.
The exit is filthy. There's trash on both sides of the road as I make my way off the interstate. Around the parking lot that's just to the east of the main post office building--a lot often used by buses visiting the Clinton Presidential Center--the weeds are several feet high. It's not a pretty sight for those visiting downtown. We fail to get the little things right far too often in Little Rock. This is the route, after all, to the visitors' center at Curran Hall on East Capitol Avenue. First impressions matter.
My mood improves later in the day as I leave my office at the intersection of Capitol Avenue and Scott Street and head west on foot. The Boyle Building still stands empty and sadly neglected, but there's activity elsewhere on what should be the state's showcase street from the interstate to the state Capitol. The promenade so far has failed to live up to its potential.
On the ground floor of the Union Plaza Building, Flint's Just Like Mom's Home Cooking has been feeding downtown workers since July in a space that previously housed the Sufficient Grounds Cafe. Owner Flint Fanoy serves both breakfast and lunch. Further east in the Hotel Frederica, the restaurant known as TAE serves lunch and dinner. After closing his Southern Gourmasian on Capitol Avenue, Justin Patterson moved into the historic building that once housed the Hotel Sam Peck. There was a time decades ago when the dining room of the Sam Peck was the top place for fine dining in Little Rock. It's nice to see good food again being sold in that building. I had some of the best fried chicken I've ever eaten at TAE one night this summer.
Restaurants such as Flint's and TAE--if successful--could help Capitol Avenue see the type of development that has occurred in the River Market District and along Main Street. As I walk to a lunch meeting at Mainstream Technologies, I can't help but notice the construction taking place. On the north side of Capitol Avenue, Bank of America is putting a state-of-the-art customer service center in the lobby of its namesake building. On the south side, construction workers are transforming the Hall and Davidson buildings into a 112-room AC Hotel by Marriott. According to the building permit, it's a $14.7 million development. The five-story Hall Building was constructed in 1923. The three-story Davidson Building was constructed in 1947 as an annex. In addition to the hotel rooms, developers promise a hip lounge and restaurant that should bring more evening traffic to a part of Capitol Avenue that's now desolate after dark.
At Mainstream Technologies, co-founder John Burgess is quick to sing the praises of downtown Little Rock. In 2008, Burgess moved the company into what had been the offices of the Little Rock branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The building had been empty for five years at that point, but it proved perfect for Mainstream. A large open space houses the company's data center. Security is tight. I punch a button to be let in. I then have to provide information and have my photo taken on a small monitor. Lunch is catered catfish in the executive conference room.
Burgess and Mark McClelland began the company in 1996 to do contract software programming. What began as a three-person firm now has about 65 employees. In 2002, Mainstream expanded its business to hosting IT for companies. Earlier this year, it was announced that Mainstream had added a business unit focused on cybersecurity.
"Cybersecurity really is different for every business," Burgess says. "The first step is determining exactly what each business should be doing to meet its unique cybersecurity needs."
The jobs provided by Mainstream are just the type of knowledge-based jobs that downtown Little Rock needs. As we visit over lunch, I can't help but thinking that these are the young, talented workers who will live downtown and frequent new bars and restaurants. That kind of growth will begin to build on itself. Burgess has served as chairman of the Little Rock Technology Park Authority board, which has a similar vision for downtown Little Rock. Burgess, who earned a bachelor's degree in computer science from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, joined the board in June 2016.
"I take my role in the community seriously," he says. "We have offices in Conway and Bentonville, but Little Rock is home for this company. We've never in our 22 years really had a problem hiring the people we need. We started in a strip center at Maumelle and grew from there. About half of our business now comes from outside the state."
Burgess says he didn't want Mainstream to be one of those "flash-in-the-pan software companies that's hot one year and gone the next." The company's founders focused on slow, steady growth while creating a place that would serve as a destination job for programmers.
"What we do is free up our clients so they can focus on their core business activities," Burgess says. "They don't have to worry about the IT part of things. We tailor solutions that meet their needs without them having to spend excessive amounts on things they don't need."
Downtown Little Rock needs more companies like Mainstream. That's the job of the Little Rock Technology Park--to give birth to just such companies.
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Senior Editor Rex Nelson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He's also the author of the Southern Fried blog at rexnelsonsouthernfried.com.
Editorial on 10/03/2018