VisionWorks' Breakthrough Solutions
Community and Regional Success Stories
Batesville Moves Forward, Builds Auditorium – April 1998
Congratulations to the Batesville VISION 2010 Leadership Team for
its success in moving the community forward. The team made
presentations to 50 organizations in the community, which generated
1,700 ideas. Two major projects were implemented immediately – the
EAST Program at Southside School, and construction of a large
auditorium on the University of Arkansas Community College at
Batesville campus.
Southside School learned about the EAST Program through VISION 2010.
They sent several school leaders to Greenbrier to learn about the
program, and within four days they made a commitment of $100,000 to
participate in the program. Southside was one of four VISION 2010
communities that made this commitment to invest in their future.
Batesville’s auditorium story is best told in the following
paragraphs by Dr. Jack Lassiter, former chancellor of the University
of Arkansas Community College at Batesville:
"When I arrived in Batesville in October of 1997, the campus had
planned to build a 500-seat auditorium on campus. As a technical
college, we merged with the University of Arkansas without passing a
sales tax. After the merger, we committed to passing a sales tax to
become a community college. I went to some of the VISION 2010
meetings, and a conference center came up over and over. Based on
that and our local steering committee, we committed to build the
conference center and a business outreach center if the sales tax
would pass.
"The sales tax passed, and we are now building a 1,600-seat
auditorium. In the auditorium, 800 seats will be fixed seating, and
the other 800 seats can be folded into the wall to create three
additional meetings areas. In addition, it will contain a lecture
hall with two more classrooms. This also came out of the VISION 2010
discussions. I had never heard of the concept of VISION 2010 before
coming to Batesville. It is a wonderful concept, and it is truly
been a total community effort here.
"What it has caused us – Independence County, the community of
Batesville, and the U of A Community College at Batesville – to do
is to look where we are and make realistic plans about where we want
to be in the future."
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