Fort Smith wants YOU (30 years after they wanted us)

Just saw this come through my social feed. Fort Smith, Arkansas is offering over $11,000 in incentives—most of it in cash—for remote workers to relocate there.

For the truly old school among us, you may remember the Fort Smith Grand Prix, which was a street autocross that we put on back in the CMC days as part of their big downtown festival. Honestly, it was one of the coolest autocross events I've ever been a part of. The course would through the main downtown streets and through a residential street just adjacent to downtown. The streets were lined with fans and the front yards of all the homes on the residential area were full of barbecues and tailgate parties. Really cool vibe.

Even then, Fort Smith struck me as a pretty cool town. It's right on the western border of Arkansas, and has kind of a prehistoric Chattanooga vibe to it. i'm not surprised that they're still looking at creative ways to make the place happen. 

It's also within easy driving distance (~1hr) of all the awesome outdoor stuff in Northwest Arkansas!

It's an interesting area. I've not spent more than a day there at a time but don't recall anything terrible about it. I think they are trying some interesting tactics to increase growth which has to be difficult with the NW Arkansas boom. The downtown area was a fun place to ride old motorcycles as a breakfast stop just across from an old railroad depot.
 

I also used to go to a super sketch autocross around Ft Chaffee a few years back. Massive ditches on all sides of a grid  to swallow you're car whole if you tried to run too hot.  The downtown race sounds awesome and would have been a neat experience.