TOP STORY >> This is PA

By 2nd Lt. Amanda Porter
19th Airlift Wing Public Affairs


“Is this TMO?”

Daily visitors to building 1255, the consolidated support center, often pop into room 138, the former home of the Traffic Management Office looking for Wingate Travel or help with household goods shipments. While this question has become a running joke within the Public Affairs office at Little Rock Air Force Base, Ark., it would slowly build into a larger project.
“This is PA.”

Before you scoff and think this article is a shameless plug for PA, let us reassure you of our intentions. We recently conducted a survey to learn how to better serve the Team Little Rock community. The survey was designed to find out the effectiveness, awareness and usefulness of our products. The PA team wanted to engage in a conversation with our audience and establish what you want and enjoy.

After analyzing the survey responses, it was clear that our presence and purpose on base is a bit trivial.

We’d like to reestablish our mission, address some concerns from the survey and invite you to participate in our services.

Public Affairs provides accurate, timely information on Team Little Rock issues, programs and base events to the people in this community and members of the news media. What does that mean? Our office tells the Team Little Rock story to the American public. Through targeted communication, we reach out to our internal audience on base, the local public and military and civic leaders. 

Public Affairs is about building and maintaining relationships, whether this be with the on- or off-base community. As part of this, we’d like to address items within the survey.

Many responses indicated that our readers wanted more stories of particular interest (e.g., Airmen in their off-duty life). PA is here for you. Our photojournalists are consistently hunting for story ideas. New projects like the Little Rock Snapshot highlight our Airmen and what they’re doing off the flight line or out of the office. We rely on Team Little Rock members to nominate a candidate. Give the office a call; share your ideas. We want you to have a stake in PA products, because they are about and for TLR.

Survey participants expressed a need to know more about events and activities on base, what services helping agencies provide and how to get help or assistance when you need it. The PA team is now actively and diligently working to revamp www.littlerock.af.mil, making it user-friendly and applicable to your daily requests. A community calendar is posted on the homepage, sharing classes offered by helping agencies like Airman and Family Readiness Center, upcoming events from the Force Support Squadron and official events, such as promotion ceremonies.

We have a toolbox full of traditional news reporting, feature stories and commentaries, video reports, graphic campaigns, television, print media and interviews and social media.
Most commonly, our tools are the www.littlerock.af.mil website, Facebook, the base marquees and the newspaper. We do not operate “the giant voice,” the HERK line nor the ad hoc system. But, we are communicators; when information on these systems needs to be pushed to our audience, we use the tools we have to provide prompt and accurate information.

We know that Team Little Rock members also rely on Public Affairs to answer their queries and direct them to support when they need help.  Overall, Public Affairs specialists are problem solvers. Let us know how we can help you.

Our support services are extensive and cover the realm of photojournalism, videography, graphics, media relations and community relations. To find out more about services and how to request support, visit the base website at www.littlerock.af.mil/public affairs.

The office is open Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. but closed for training on Thursdays from 1 to 4:30 p.m. To reach a PA specialist, call 501-987-3601 or email 19AW.PAAll@us.af.mil.

After hours a PA rep can always be reached via the command post at 987-1900.