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The AP is bulldogging the story it created about the enrollment of students without citizenship or student visa papers in Arkansas colleges at in-state tuition rates. Lots of different practices around the various campuses.

Here's the deal. Colleges asked applicants for Social Seucrity numbers. They didn't check the legitimacy of those supplied and many didn't ask questions when none were offered because the law didn't require them to do so. But now, thanks to Mike Beebe's instant cave on this issue, it has become a big deal. 

We still don't know if colleges will attempt to verify all S.S. numbers offered (nor do any seem to care that the verification system is notoriously inaccurate). What we do know is that long-time residents of Arkansas, graduates of Arkansas high schools  -- high-achieving motivated students  --will no longer apply for admission to Arkansas colleges because they can't afford to pay out-of-state tuition. If you think that's a good outcome, you are a heartless so-and-so.

But one small point. The AP article to which I've linked raises an utterly nonsensical point based on no evidence. It is that the colleges have somehow decided to admit illegals to boost enrollment and state aid. Stupid. They've admitted illegals because they admitted Arkansas high school graduates who wanted a college education. If dollars followed, well, good.

This article also introduces you to a Grade A jackass, the chancellor of the UA's Fort Smith campus, who has long been trying to keep Latinos off his campus. Read the link.

... an open line.

Sorry. Well, no, not sorry.  I've been lollygagging, a recipient of a free dinner at Brave New Restaurant. On the deck. Gorgeous, cool night. Beautiful skyline view. Great sauteed walleye.

The restaurant was full of familiar faces, among them that indestructible progressive, the retired banker Charlie Johnston; former state Education Director and former LR School Supt. Don Roberts (could we find 10 more like him somewhere -- now?) with an old friend and former director of Mississippi education; this week's cover story author Mara Leveritt, with her mother, visiting from afar; lawyer Ralph Hamner, a good Democrat now safely removed from a former Republican governor neighbor since he (Hamner) has moved from NLR to Hot Springs, and many more. Old tales were told from Henderson University intramurals to newspaper wars to momentous civil rights struggles. All were vastly improved beyond the underlying facts. The out-of-town visitor who hosted Ernie Dumas and me couldn't help but remark about what a small town our big city seems to be. So true. So wonderful.

Somebody passed along to me today an e-mail from Tim Griffin, the infamous Republican political research man and former U.S. attorney. It's on the jump. He's still dabbling in political issues, even if he isn't currently working for the RNC on this year's presidential campaign.

As a "favor" to friends, he told me, he's agreed to hold an organizational meeting for a state "center-right coalition," a group that would have a kinship, if not a formal relationship, to Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform.

Griffin said he didn't have time to head such a group himself, but was willing to see if others were willing to take that role. He's sent out e-mails to his list of contacts and others. Republicans, social conservatives, business executives and others are on the invite list. It's not a partisan group, he said. Democrats are welcome, but tax-and-spenders like myself undoubtedly wouldn't feel very much at home. Griffin said there's no specific motivation in the form of a single pressing issue for formation of the group at this time. If it is formed, he said, it would be with a view toward a permanent presence, not just for this election year.

He said he'd been told 45 states have such groups sympathetic to or loosely affiliated with Norquist's national group. He said he didn't yet have an idea of what the initial response would be. He said he expected perhaps 10 people at the meeting next week.

The Fayetteville High School controversy is expected to climax tonight at a School Board meeting. The Iconoclast predicts the board will sell the school to the University of Arkansas for less than its appraised value.

Given the deep division in the community over the issue, many are predicting trouble for the district in passing a millage to support new school construction. Here's what we wrote earlier.

Congratulations UA students. Your tuition is about to buy you a fine high school.

It was even worse than previously described in Conway. Electronic machines tabulated votes for a race that did not appear on the electronic ballot. I hate touch screen voting machines.

NOTE: Several people have reported problems posting to this item. I have republished it on a different entry because of a snafu on our own blogging system that occurred when the item posted twice. When I eliminated one duplicate it apparently made it impossible to add comments to the one remaining.

The Arkansas Supreme Court has upheld Circuit Judge Tim Fox's finding that the Little Rock School Board had not misspent taxpayer money in buying out the contract of former Superintendent Roy Brooks.

Here's the opinion. In short, the court has issued a clear and unanimous statement that severance pay for a school official is a constitutional expenditure of school funds. The Constitution prohibits expenditure of school funds for any but school purposes. This opinion will protect other districts  from similar illegal exaction lawsuits.

(Loose thought: The court's frequent repetition of the Constitution's clarity about restricting expenditure of school money to school purposes got me thinking again about tax increment financing. A previous court ruling crippled developers' desires to expropriate school money for shopping centers, hotels, etc. in tax increment finance districts, but a few TIF projects linger on where developers are reaping a few school mills above the state-required base rate. I still ask: How can this be constitutional?)

I learned today that Central Arkansas Water had decided to change ad/PR representation.

Heathcott Associates had been handling the work. But at a recent commission meeting, after winnowing a number of applicants, the Commission decided to hire Advantage Communications for ad and PR work and to hire Cranford Johnson Robinson Woods to work on policy development.

I don't know if the operative word is "irony," but there's an interesting connection in the decision. Advantage is headed by Michael Steele. He's the brother of Sen. Tracy Steele, who sided with Sen. Bob Johnson and other forces of darkness in the 2005 legislative session to attempt to strip CAW of its ability to effectively manage the Lake Maumelle watershed. Perhaps his brother can persuade him to be a little friendlier to the utility's interest in the future.

Graham Rich, CEO of the water utility, said Advantage was chosen strictly on merit. "They made a very good presentation with a lot of good ideas." He was aware of the family relationship. "We don't view it as a detriment. In fact, it could be an avenue to get in and see what the issues are with him [Tracy Steele] and try to win him over to our side." But he quickly added that wasn't a consideration in the hiring decision.

Advantage is one of the few minority ad and PR firms in the state and has reaped a significant amount of state set-aside work for minority contractors on state ad and public relations accounts. Just today, in fact Advantage announced another state contract, this one with DHS. Some of those advertising campaigns have purchased ads in Senator Steele's newspaper, Stand News. Steele made headlines recently for failing to report his newspaper's state business.

We posted yesterday a news release from Lt. Gov. Bill Halter about mayors and county judges who backed his state lottery proposal.

Oops. Checking a tip from South Arkansas, we found at least one county judge, Larry Atkinson of Columbia County, who was "definitely" surprised to be counted as having endorsed the lottery.

Atkinson said that when Halter called him he told him, "People should be given a choice to vote up or down on it. But I didn't endorse anything like that."

A spokesman for Halter said:

Lieutenant Governor Halter phoned the judge this morning to clear-up any confusion.  We regret that this was just a simple matter of miscommunication.  While he is not endorsing or opposing the actual scholarship lottery, Judge Atkinson does support having the measure on the November ballot so Arkansans can decide for themselves if Arkansas should have its own scholarship lottery.  The lieutenant governor is thankful for Judge Atkinsons's support for allowing Arkansans to vote on the scholarship lottery.

Argenta News muses on some recent land purchases near the NLR Electric Department by the V3 investment group that has made a number of investments in the Argenta neighborhood (old downtown).

He speculates, and I bet he's onto something, that this could be a piece of an emerging land swap that could put those properties in the city's hands for a city services building and turn over some desirable property on Main Street, particularly a city office building, into developers' hands for redevelopment.

The same developers figure in the former Rye Furniture building, mentioned in a Democrat-Gazette article, as a suggested spot for a city events facility. That might be a puzzle piece, too.

Noted: Clinton will win more pledged delegates in primary states. Obama's edge comes from caucus states. It's true that some of the caucus states might have been inclined to give Obama the edge even if the more participatory process was used.

For the record: I opposed caucuses in Arkansas way back when the discussion began about moving up our primary, long before Obama became a candidate. Switching to a caucus system was briefly mentioned by some politicians here. I don't like caucuses They are too easily manipulated by small numbers of people.

Here, by the way, are some polling results favorable to Clinton on the electability question. It is presented somewhat grudgingly by the reliably pro-Obama Talking Points Memo.

Brummett chats with Religious Right Republican Sen. Gilbert Baker about his coming contest with Democrat Joe White in the fall.

Do we see Baker's attack taking shape? The challenge is coming, he suggests, from "Little Rock Democrats." This might surprise long-time Conway businesman White.

Why didn't Baker just complete the thought and call his opponents "Nancy Pelosi-style Democrats." I guess in Baker's mind, Little Rock is just about as unholy as San Francisco. Makes you wonder why a guy would raise a quarter-million-dollars for the right to come down here so often.

Residents in nominally dry counties around Arkansas have often been unhappy as the state Alcoholic Beverage Control commission has merrily used a loophole added to state law to give what are essentially restaurant drink permits in the name of economic development. So now you can get a cocktail at highway diners from Bald Knob to Star City.

Yesterday, the ABC gave a flipside view to the through-the-looking-glass world of alcohol legislation. It unanimously nixed an off-premise beer permit for a convenience store in Fayetteville. This preserves the monopoly held on package beer sales for liquor stores. They sell a little beer in college towns, I understand. The cops are in on the fix, which pleases some grocery store owners who don't want to sell beer and don't want competition from those who do and immensely pleases the liquor stores. The cops contend more widely available beer could create lines at convenience stores and lax I.D. checking.

And while we're perusing the Stephens Media ABC story, the following sentence contains another inudstry-coined PR phrase that should be removed from news stories, along with "electronic games of skill," for blatant inaccuracy. See if you can guess. It's about a private club permit in Jacksonville.

Jay O'Neal, an officer in the business, assured the board the club would not be a biker club or a gentlemen's club.

UPDATE: Fayetteville may not have beer in grocery stores but Kiplinger has put it at No. 7 on the Top 10 list of the best American cities in which to "live, work and play."

UPDATE II: The irreverent Fayetteville Flyer has a good take on Fetvul's high standing.