Elaine Eubank

It’s CareLink’s mission to keep people 50 and older active and independent, but there’s nothing autonomous about the way the nonprofit’s president and CEO, Elaine Eubank, runs the organization.

She’s been with the 26-year-old CareLink for 13 years and has clearly found her place.

Eubank said, “My role is to provide the environment for all of us to work together as a team.”

The organization serves 16,500 older clients in six central and eastern Arkansas counties each year with programs like Meals-On-Wheels, home care, senior centers and aging information and assistance.

That amount of work requires 550 full-time employees, meaning Eubank manages more employees than any of the “Executive of the Year” nominees. CareLink also has some 500 volunteers.

Although Eubank stands at the head of the group, she shares credit for its effectiveness with coworkers, volunteers and board. Even when trying to pin her down on her own successes, the former social worker defers to her helpers.

“My greatest success is as a recruiter, because CareLink has an exceptional senior leadership team and they make my job easier,” Eubank said.

That team is going to have to help Eubank raise $12 million when CareLink embarks on a capital campaign sometime within the next year.

The money will go toward a new facility on World Avenue, near the soon-to-be Heifer International headquarters and the Clinton Presidential Library.

Raising the money will be a challenge, Eubank said, but CareLink — with an annual budget approaching $13 million — already does a good job at meeting its annual fund-raising goals. And a $400,000 anonymous donation has already paid for the 4 acres on which the facility will sit.

In the meantime CareLink will continue to operate out of borrowed spaces in Little Rock and North Little Rock. And the number of potential clients will continue to grow.

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