This is the fourth installment of a series during Women’s History Month on local women who have served in the Arkansas Legislature. Most of the information in this story is from the newly published University of Arkansas Press Book by Lindsley and Stephen Smith, “Stateswomen: A Centennial History of Arkansas Women Legislators, 1922-2022.” Some of the information is expanded and updated with more local information.
Special to the Saline River Chronicle.
Joyce Dees, born Joyce Ann Johnson, in Prattsville and was raised on a farm in rural south Arkansas, near Hermitage. She was the daughter of Ethel Mattie Trussell, a teacher and her father, Hagard Eddis Johnson, worked at the Potlatch Lumber Company, in Warren.
Raised in a close-knit family, her mother made many of her clothes, and Joyce learned to sew from her grandmother, who was a professional seamstress.
At Hermitage High School, Joyce was a cheerleader, in the Beta Club and the library club and the Future Teachers of America chapter.
Soon after graduation, she married John Dees, in 1971. He was soon deployed with the Arkansas Army National Guard. Together, she and her husband pursued their college education together at UA-Monticello. After obtaining a business degree, Joyce embarked on a twenty-five year career in banking.
The couple has two daughters, Millie Jo and Mindy.
Prior to seeking the state House of Representatives seat, Dees was a former member of the Hermitage School Board.
In 1998, as previous State House member, Marian Owens, was set to retire, due to state term limits at the time, Dees ran for the open house seat.
She was one of three candidates in the Democratic Primary for the seat. Others in the Democratic primary were former state Rep. Bill Wells of Hermitage and Bradley County Judge Joe Fowler. After the primary, Dees led Fowler into a Democratic party runoff where she took 58% of the vote.
Dees then faced both a Republican opponent, Clyde Temple of Johnsville, and a write-in-candidate, Andrew “Drew” Pritt of Warren. She won with 68 percent of the vote in the November general election.
As far as retaining her seat in the Arkansas Legislature, Dees, was unopposed in 2000 and 2002, as her seat changed during redistricting from largely Bradley County and a portion of Calhoun County to a House seat of all of Bradley County with portions of Calhoun, Cleveland, Ouachita, and Union counties.
One of her first bills, as a state Representative, was adopting a resolution to designate House members’ private work areas as nonsmoking. She also sponsored a resolution celebrating March 8th an International Women’s Day. In her second and third terms in the legislature, Dees, co-chaired the Women’s Legislative Caucus.
She focused her work in the House, on health, elderly and children’s issues.
Dees helped pass legislation addressing sexual assault, crimes committed in the presence of a child, adult abuse, child maltreatment, the juvenile cods, adoption and guardianship, child welfare and nurse practice.
On other issues, Dees passed legislation addressing personal watercraft safety, information disclosure, highway and road obstruction, alternative fuels, the Workforce Investment Board, the Arkansas Heavy Equipment Operator Training Academy and the “Cure Breast Cancer,” license plates program to fund b=cancer research.
Dees was chair of the Aging, Children and Youth, Legislative and Military Affairs Committee and a member of the Public Health, Welfare and Labor and Joint Budget Committee.
As she was term-limited in 2004’s election cycle, Dees ran for the Arkansas State Senate, losing to incumbent state senator Jimmy Jeffress of Crossett, a former school teacher, in the Democratic Primary. Dees and Jeffress had both served terms in the Arkansas House together.
She served on the Warren Bank and Trust Board of Directors and worked at the Warren Bank for a short while, following her legislative service.
Dees was tapped by Republican Governor Mike Huckabee to be a Health Policy Adviser for the Department of Health and Human Services on his staff in 2005.
She and her husband, John, now live in Hermitage in retirement.
End of a series focused on Women In History month on female legislators from Bradley County.
