BELLA VISTA — John Nuttall said he has lived in Bella Vista since 2010.
“We moved here because my wife was a manager for IBM and she had a relatively long-term assignment to work on some stuff for Walmart,” he said.
After four or five years, he said, they decided they liked the area and its amenities and wanted to stay.
Nuttall said he believes someone shouldn’t complain about their surroundings if they aren’t willing to get involved and he’s been fortunate enough to have the time to do that over the years.
“I have many decades of experience on HOA boards, city committees, advisory committees to cities. I’ve actually been involved in one way or another with governments since the ’80s,” he said.
He’s previously served on the Property Owners Association board of directors and currently serves on the board of construction appeals, which hears cases where builders or residents and city staff may need a variance — an exception to city code — to make a project work.
Nuttall said he’s running in part because the city, currently handling multiple large projects and experiencing its share of Northwest Arkansas’ growth, is in an interesting position and he believes he can help.
It’s important for the council to develop a plan to manage upcoming growth and stick with it, he said.
Additionally, council members need to set the budget and watch it closely, he explained.
Officials also have a responsibility to make sure information is readily accessible through the city’s website and social media channels.
“We need to communicate it to the residents, businesses and the people in town so they know where we’re trying to get. We don’t do a great job of making city government accessible to people, and it should be very accessible,” he said.
Managing the city’s growth is its biggest challenge, Nuttall said.
Population could be in the high 30,000 to 40,000 area in the next five or six years, he said, and the city needs to work to provide for everyone.
“Our current tax base is not big enough to support that many people,” he said. “If we had places where you could spend your money in town … then it would go to the local government.”
The city government needs to become more business-friendly, he said.
While some may prefer to avoid growth, he said, it can’t be reversed.
“That boat sailed a long time ago, you know, we’re not going to go back to 1985,” he said.
While the city has taken out municipal bonds, as approved by voters, to cover a handful of public safety facilities, it needs to have income to support staff for those facilities.
The city benefits from its natural beauty as well as its population, he said.
“We have a pretty diverse group of people that live here… We have a lot of people that moved here because they wanted to be here, they’re not here because they can’t go someplace else,” Nuttall said.
Nuttall said his biggest goal if elected, is to make Bella Vista more business-friendly to expand the city’s tax base.
Additionally, Nuttall said he wants to ensure all residents have a way to communicate with the city and be comfortable they can get answers.
“They need to be able to understand what the city does; they need to understand how to access it,” he said.
Keith Bryant may be reached by email at [email protected] .