President’s Day closings set
Jefferson County — The Jefferson County Courthouse and related county offices will be closed.
Pine Bluff — City Hall and related offices will be closed. The Pine Bluff City Council will meet Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. at the Detective Kevin Collins Center in the council chambers. View the agenda at https://www.cityofpinebluff-ar.gov/city-council-meetings or watch live at https://tinyurl.com/COPBLive.
State offices — State offices will be closed. The Arkansas Secretary of State’s Office reminds voters that early voting for Preferential Primary Election races and Nonpartisan General Election races will begin on Tuesday, rather than Monday, due to Presidents Day, also known as George Washington’s Birthday and Daisy Gatson Bates Day.
Broadband group to meet Feb. 27
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
The Jefferson County Broadband Working Group has scheduled a meeting for 10-11:30 a.m. Feb. 27 at The Generator, 435 S. Main St.
Goals of the stakeholder planning session are to identify priority groups for digital skills training, plan targeted outreach to underserved residents, explore the possibility of a donated and refurbished computer program, and receive updates on providers’ status, if possible. Attendees are asked to RSVP by Feb. 25 to jcbwgroup@gmail.com.
History’s lesson on changing Fed chair
A change in the leadership of the Federal Open Market Committee may open a year of uncertainty as the economy and the new chair feel each other out, Ryan Loy, extension economist for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture, said in a Division news release.
Last month, the White House announced the nomination of Kevin Warsh to serve as chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. If confirmed by the Senate, he would succeed Jerome Powell, who has been chair since 2018 and whose term expires in May.
The Federal Reserve System, begun by Congress in 1913, has a complex mission. Among its most well-known activities is setting the interest rates used by banks, a job performed by its Federal Open Market Committee. The system is made up of 12 regional banks, with 24 regional branches, including one in Little Rock.
In looking at data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, Loy found a pattern.
“What was interesting is that the economy grows more slowly in the actual transition year after a new Fed chair,” Loy said.
“It’s almost as if the Fed and the financial markets take a while to catch up to what that new chair is trying to do,” he said. Or in more colorful terms, “it’s like a giant game of chicken.”
In its Jan. 28 meeting, the Federal Open Market Committee decided to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 3.5 to 3.75 percent. In a statement, the committee said it “seeks to achieve maximum employment and inflation at the rate of 2 percent over the longer run” as “uncertainty about the economic outlook remains elevated.”
The Fed cut rates in September, October and December 2025, a pattern that echoed the committee’s cuts in September, November and December of 2024. The last time the Fed raised interest rates was in July 2023.
The next FOMC meeting is March 17-18 and its actions are subject to much speculation.
CME Group’s FedWatch Tool — which analyzes the probability of FOMC rate changes — set the probability on Thursday at 92.1 percent that the current target rate would remain in place through March, Loy said.
CME is “only penciling in one cut this year, but again, it’s too early to tell,” Loy said.
CME Group operates major financial exchanges, including the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade.
On Thursday, the prediction market platform Polymarket listed a 93 percent probability that the Fed would keep the current rates at the March meeting.
While the Fed’s interest rates don’t affect consumers directly, a cut or even the status quo might provide a little relief for farmers by easing the cost of borrowing money.