Arkansas news

• Witness a bird tornado at Swift Night Out

  14-09-2026 21:19 via arktimes.com
  
  Tomorrow evening marks the annual Swift Night Out, a continent-wide gathering to behold swarms of chimney swifts, a species known for spiraling down chimneys in spooky, dramatic swarms that make it feel like Halloween is around the corner. The Audubon Society will host the event on Tuesday, Sept. 15 at its Little Rock location on Springer Boulevard, which boasts multiple towers built just for chimney-swift nesting and slumbering. Uta Meyer, a center manager, describes Swift Night Out as a c
  
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• Standing in the ballroom

  19-09-2026 13:00 via arktimes.com
  
  The White House ballroom construction project waltzes on after the August 31 Supreme Court decision, despite the wording of the opinion: “Today, we do not pass upon the legality of the government’s East Wing project.”  Chief Justice Roberts’ dissent is even more frustrating: “The construction is likely unlawful.” This is what happens when a decision is made based not on the merits of the case, but on the standing of a party. The Supreme Court e
  
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• UA Fayetteville prof fired for charging wedding expenses to the school faces domestic battery charge

  18-09-2026 21:35 via arktimes.com
  
  Najja Baptist, a former professor at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville who was dismissed in March after an internal audit found that he charged tens of thousands of dollars in personal expenses related to his June 2025 wedding and honeymoon, was arrested for domestic battery this week. His new wife is seeking a divorce.  Additionally, the university’s board of trustees upheld Baptist’s dismissal on Thursday. 
  
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• Arkansas reports fewer failing schools and school districts in 2025-2026

  18-09-2026 19:17 via arktimes.com
  
  The percentage of Arkansas schools and districts receiving failing or low grades from the state for their performance has decreased, according to data released by the state Department of Education Thursday.Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders and education officials touted the numbers as validation for her signature 2023 education law, the LEARNS Act. Education Secretary Jacob Oliva told reporters Thursday that “the improvements that we’ve made by building out this blueprint and this
  
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• GMC Sierra Denali Giveaway and Upcoming Shows at Saracen

  18-09-2026 16:34 via arktimes.com
  
  September is HOT at Saracen and the winning is non-stop! And now there are more reasons than ever to make the trip to Pine Bluff. Book a room in the all new Saracen Casino Resort hotel and catch a show in the state of the art event center.
  
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• ‘Your Beloved Remains’: A Q&A with writing duo Quinn Connor ahead of Six Bridges Book Festival

  18-09-2026 16:00 via arktimes.com
  
  With bestselling authors like Ariel Lawhon, Alix E. Harrow, Deesha Philyaw, Sarah Damoff and Annie Hartnett on the docket, the Central Arkansas Book Festival’s Six Bridges Book Festival — running Sept. 27-Oct. 4 — is proving once again that its organizers have their fingers on the national literary pulse. But don’t let those big-shot names distract you from the homegrown talent on display. To give you a sense of Six Bridges’ robust ties to The Natural State, w
  
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• Slideshow: Kennedy scion comes South to stump for Chris Jones

  18-09-2026 03:27 via arktimes.com
  
  It’s not every day that a Massachusetts Kennedy comes to Arkansas.
  But on Thursday, Joe Kennedy III, the redheaded former congressman and diplomat with that distinctive family jawline, rolled into Conway to host a town hall alongside Arkansas District 2 congressional hopeful Chris Jones.The fellow Democrats held court at Cross Creek Sandwiches on Oak Street to chat up the locals and energize voters as Jones hustles to try to unseat Republican incumbent French Hill.
  Joe Kennedy III comes t
  
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• UPDATE: Arkansas Education Department releases district letter grades (sort of)

  17-09-2026 23:50 via arktimes.com
  
  UPDATE: The Arkansas Department of Education sent out a corrected press release Thursday evening. The numbers in the table the department initially sent out were incorrect and have been updated with the correct numbers.
  The department’s online data center also appears to have been updated with district and letter grades for the 2025-26 school year. Little Rock School District remains at a C grade.
  
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• Arkansas Education Department releases district letter grades (sort of)

  17-09-2026 23:50 via arktimes.com
  
  The Arkansas Department of Education announced Thursday that they’ve released the official district and school letter grades for the 2025-26 school year.
  If you’re eager to see how your district did, though, you might need to wait a bit longer. The website where these grades are to be posted appeared to still show grades for the 2024-25 school year as the latest available around 4:45 p.m., suggesting some glitches are possibly glitching, and may frustrate your search.
  
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• Little Rock Zoo nets $1.2M donation, hires new higher-ups 

  17-09-2026 21:25 via arktimes.com
  
  With a big honking donation in their coffers and new people in new positions, it’s been a big week for the Little Rock Zoo. On Tuesday, the Arkansas Zoological Foundation, the nonprofit fundraising arm of the Little Rock Zoo, announced a $1.2 million donation to ongoing renovations at the zoo, an undertaking dubbed “Project Zoo: Wildly Reimagined.” 
  
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• Unconventional spending fuels the Grappes’ unusual, on-the-ground campaign

  17-09-2026 20:49 via arktimes.com
  
  Democratic secretary of state candidate Kelly Grappe knows she is taking a unique approach to campaigning. She’s not following the usual strategy of quick appearances at political events and heavy spending on advertising. Rather, she’s focusing on being in communities for extended periods of time, talking to voters who, according to her, rarely get the chance to speak to Democratic candidates for any office.“This is our strategy and we’re proud of it,” she said. &ld
  
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• U.S. House takes up familiar debate over who pays for data centers’ electric infrastructure

  17-09-2026 19:06 via arktimes.com
  
  Arkansas is not at all special in its ongoing tussles over how and if to embrace artificial intelligence and the hot, loud, sprawling data centers it requires.
  As local news broke Wednesday that Entergy was dropping legal action in its attempt to keep the secret details of its deal to power a West Memphis Google data center under wraps, federal lawmakers were also wrangling with how to power data centers and who should pay.The U.S. House overwhelmingly approved a bill Wednesday that aims to hav
  
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• Six Bridges Book Festival returns Sept. 27-Oct. 4

  17-09-2026 16:52 via arktimes.com
  
  SIX BRIDGES BOOK FESTIVAL
  SUNDAY 9/27-SUNDAY 10/4. Downtown Little Rock. Free.Except for a final hoorah fundraiser event featuring Ariel Lawhon, a historical fiction writer who’s sold nearly 2 million copies of her 2023 book “The Frozen River,” the Six Bridges Book Festival is entirely free. That’s remarkable, given the resources — both financial and logistical — required to rally five dozen authors from across the state and country into one place. Notable gu
  
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• Metallica announces U of A show, Razorbacks post strange AI slop video to celebrate 

  17-09-2026 16:43 via arktimes.com
  
  Thrash metal pioneers Metallica are coming to Razorback Stadium at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville in May, and the Razorbacks created a freaky AI-generated video to announce the show. Metallica is bringing along rap-rock royalty Limp Bizkit, which has experienced a resurgence in popularity in recent years, and Swedish heavy metal band Avatar as support. Tickets for the general public go on sale next Friday, Sept. 25 at 10 a.m. 
  
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• Entergy dismisses case against publications, citizen over trade secrets beef

  17-09-2026 03:42 via arktimes.com
  
  Entergy has dropped its federal court complaint against the Arkansas Times and Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, two reporters and a citizen activist that was filed after documents mistakenly shared revealed controversial details about plans for a Google data center in the state. Entergy sued after the Arkansas Public Service Commission inadvertently shared documents with engaged citizen Jessica Kivell, who shared them with Democrat-Gazette reporter Sydney Sasser. Entergy said the documents reveal
  
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• Climate change is making Arkansas summers hotter, especially at night

  16-09-2026 23:34 via arktimes.com
  
  Yes, this was the hottest summer on record across the contiguous United States, according to data released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) last week. Although Arkansas had only its 10th hottest summer (measured as June through August) on record, the state is seeing dramatic shifts towards hotter nighttime temperatures, along with hotter temps in the early fall and record-breaking drought.According to NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information data,
  
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• Arkansas summers are getting hotter — especially at night

  16-09-2026 23:34 via arktimes.com
  
  Yes, this was the hottest summer on record across the contiguous United States, according to data released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) last week. Although Arkansas had only its 10th hottest summer (measured as June through August) on record, the state is seeing dramatic shifts towards hotter nighttime temperatures, along with hotter temps in the early fall and record-breaking drought.According to NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information data,
  
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• Arkansas Diamonds bring arena football back to Little Rock, invests $1.5M in Barton Coliseum renovation

  16-09-2026 21:33 via arktimes.com
  
  Arena football is returning to Little Rock for the first time since 2010. The Arkansas Diamonds, an arena football team set to play its inaugural season in the Indoor Football League next year, announced on Tuesday that the team would relocate from Hot Springs to Little Rock and play home games at Barton Coliseum. 
  
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• Arkansas Diamonds bring arena football back to Little Rock, invest $1.5M in Barton Coliseum renovation

  16-09-2026 21:33 via arktimes.com
  
  Arena football is returning to Little Rock for the first time since 2010. The Arkansas Diamonds, an arena football team set to play its inaugural season in the Indoor Football League next year, announced on Tuesday that the team would relocate from Hot Springs to Little Rock and play home games at Barton Coliseum. 
  
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• State lawmakers grill Entergy, praise Google in Joint Committee on Energy meeting

  16-09-2026 04:29 via arktimes.com
  
  On Tuesday afternoon, the Arkansas Joint Committee on Energy met up at the Capitol for a lengthy conversation on, what else, data centers. While Pulaski County and the city of Little Rock have been left to duke it out on whether and how to regulate the incoming behemoths, the State Legislature — with the General Assembly on recess since Google and AVAIO Digital‘s official announcements in January — has been waiting in the wings. But it appears a recent scandal involving le
  
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• More support coming for CES waitlist families

  15-09-2026 20:00 via arktimes.com
  
  It’s not exactly what the parents were asking for, but Gov. Sarah Sanders took a step in their direction on Tuesday when she announced that help was on the way for hundreds of disabled individuals. Sanders, along with Janet Mann, head of the Department of Human Services, made the announcement from Dardanelle, where the governor was visiting, saying that people on a waitlist for services that would help them live fuller, more independent lives that has climbed to almost 2,500 people wo
  
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• Central High Historic Site hosts event series featuring Little Rock Nine, scholars and historians

  15-09-2026 19:25 via arktimes.com
  
  The Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site is hosting a series of free, educational pop-up programs this month about the Little Rock Nine and the 1957 Desegregation Crisis, culminating in an anniversary commemoration with four of the Little Rock Nine. The first event, titled “Beyond 1500 Park Street,” is scheduled for Sept. 17 at 11 a.m. at the National Historic Site, 2120 W. Daisy L. Gatson Bates Drive.
  
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• Longtime state senator behind changes to utility regulations resigns for job with electric coop

  15-09-2026 18:52 via arktimes.com
  
  State Sen. Jonathan Dismang, the Beebe Republican known for his mastery of the unwieldy Arkansas state budgeting process and his advocacy for utility companies, is leaving his lawmaker role to become vice president of external affairs for Arkansas Electric Cooperatives Inc.In his new role, Dismang will handle government relations for 17 electricity distributors that serve about a million customers in Arkansas and surrounding states.
  
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• ‘When Trees Testify’: A Q&A with writer Beronda L. Montgomery ahead of Six Bridges Book Festival

  15-09-2026 17:54 via arktimes.com
  
  With bestselling authors like Ariel Lawhon, Alix E. Harrow, Deesha Philyaw, Sarah Damoff and Annie Hartnett on the docket, the Central Arkansas Book Festival’s Six Bridges Book Festival — running Sept. 27-Oct. 4 — is proving once again that its organizers have their fingers on the national literary pulse. But don’t let those big-shot names distract you from the homegrown talent on display. To give you a sense of Six Bridges’ robust ties to The Natural State, w
  
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• Have you experienced ‘The Beginning of Convenience’ at The Momentary?

  15-09-2026 16:00 via arktimes.com
  
  ‘THE BEGINNING OF CONVENIENCE’
  THROUGH 7/27/2027. The Momentary, Bentonville. Free.British artist Lucy Sparrow’s “The Beginning of Convenience,” which debuted at The Momentary in July, is the kind of art exhibition that demands to be seen in person. An installation of the grandest proportions and an exercise in meticulous mimesis, the show brings together more than 20,000 handmade felt replicas of various consumer objects — cereal, jars of peanut butter, loav
  
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• Two Jasper cops nicked for stealing guns

  14-09-2026 23:20 via arktimes.com
  
  Arkansas State Police sent a press release Monday about the arrests of a Jasper Police officer and a Newton County Sheriff’s Office detective accused of stealing guns.Jasper Police officer Mikel Blocker and Newton County deputy Aaron Carter were arrested Friday, charged with theft of a firearm and booked into the Newton County Detention Center. Neither men remained on the Newton County Jail roster Monday.
  
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• Vouchers promise students with disabilities a path to private school. Parents say that’s not the reality.

  14-09-2026 20:48 via arktimes.com
  
  It’s after 6 p.m. by the time Angela Johnson hurries home from work. Her 12-year-old daughter, Amelia, is at their house outside of Pensacola, Florida, with a nurse trained to care for medically fragile children. Amelia, who was born with a rare genetic anomaly, has endured many surgeries and requires a brain shunt and a feeding tube.The nurse starts caring for Amelia as soon as a bus from the public school drops her off. Johnson loves much about the school. But as a physical therapist, s
  
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• The songs are the stars of ‘Side by Side by Sondheim’ at The Rep

  14-09-2026 20:27 via arktimes.com
  
  The late Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) was a giant of American musical theater, responsible for many of the most well-loved productions in Broadway history. For his work, he has been awarded more than a dozen Tony and Grammy awards, the Kennedy Center Honor and even the Presidential Medal of Freedom. As far back as 1976, his songs were so revered that entire productions were assembled by some of his peers as a revue and tribute. The first, “Side By Side By Sondheim,” typically fe
  
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• Conway School Board furor leads to sudden resignation

  14-09-2026 19:14 via arktimes.com
  
  After serving one month on the Conway School Board, Matthew White has resigned, citing the “vitriol” and incessant controversy as well as the time commitment involved in the job.White resigned effective immediately in a letter Saturday to Superintendent Jason Black and board President Leona Walton.
  
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• Fire trucks respond to smoldering Rebsamen Liquor call

  14-09-2026 18:24 via arktimes.com
  
  First responders were all over the Town Pump/Rebsamen Liquor building in Little Rock’s Riverdale area this morning, after smoke was seen rising from the roof.Here are some shots from the scene, taken around 10:30 a.m. Monday.
  
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