Lance Eads

Lance Ronaco Eads (born August 5, 1968)^[1][2] is a businessman from West Fork in Washington County in northwestern Arkansas, who has been since 2017 a Republican member of the Arkansas State Senate for District 7. Earlier, from 2015 to 2017, he was a one-term member of the Arkansas House of Representatives for District 88 in Washington County.^[3]

Background

Eads is the son of Vol Leroy and Joyce Gail Eads of Fayetteville, Arkansas. He graduated from Prairie Grove High School in Prairie Grove in Washington County. In 1992, he received a Bachelor of Science degree in professional education from Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia in Clark County in southern Arkansas. He resides with his wife, the former Kim Hufford, and their two children]] in Springdale, Arkansas Washington County.^[3][4] In 2003, he was named a business development manager for a federal credit union; in 2010, he joined the Springdale Chamber of Commerceand has served as a vice president of the organization.^[4] He previously resided in Farmington, and Fayetteville in Washington County.^[2].

Eads is a Southern Baptist and a member of the mega-church, The Cross Church in Washington County,^[3] also known as the First Baptist Church of Springdale; the pastor is Ronnie Floyd, the 2014 president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Political life

From 2011 to 2012, Eads was a justice of the peace in Washington County. In 2014, he unseated in the low-turnout Republican primary election the one-term incumbent, Randy Alexander, also of Springdale, 1,137 to 817 votes (58-42 percent). Eads then ran without opposition in the November 4 general election.^[5] Eads was assigned to the House committees on: (1) Public Transportation, (2) City, County and Local Affairs, and (3) Joint Performance Review.^[3] In February 2015, Eads joined dozens of his fellow Republicans and two Democrats in co-sponsoring legislation submitted by Representative Lane Jean of Magnolia, to reduce unemployment compensation benefits. The measure was promptly signed into law by Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson.^[6]

That same month, Eads supported House Bill 1228, sponsored by Bob Ballinger of Carroll County, which sought to prohibit government from imposing a burden on the free exercise of religion.^[7] The measure passed the House, seventy-two to twenty.^[8] One of the opponents, Democratic Representative Camille Bennett, a former city attorney for Lonoke, Arkansas, called for a reworking of the legislation.^[9] Bennett claimed the Ballinger bill would establish a "type of religious litmus test" which could impact nearly any law under consideration by the legislature.^[10] The measure was subsequently passed by a large margin in the House and signed into law in revised form, SB 975, by Governor Hutchinson.^[11]

References