Frances Marie Lambert Biggs
January 25, 2015
Frances Marie Lambert Biggs, 68 of Atmore, passed away Friday, January 23, 2015, at her residence. She was a homemaker born in Atmore on February 26, 1946, to the late D.C. and Ruby Woods Lambert. She was of the Christian faith.
Survivors are her husband, Franklin Biggs; two sons, Dennis Biggs and Rodney (Lisa) Biggs, all of Atmore; three brothers, Edward (Opal) Lambert of Irvington, AL, Sherrel (Mabel) Lambert of Atmore, Norman Lambert of Perdido; three granddaughters, Heather (Jeff) Weaver of Atmore, Kristen (Daniel) Blackwell and Tiffany (Paul) Adams both of Foley; five great-grandchildren, Britton, Braden, Gracie, Kamryn and Kaylee.
Services were held Saturday January 24, 2015, at the Johnson-Quimby Funeral Home Chapel with Bro. Joel White officiating.
Interment will follow in Mothershed Cemetery.
Active pallbearers are Norman Lambert, Danny Lambert, Ronnie Lambert, BoBo Lambert, John Lambert, and Shayne Cooper.
Honorary pallbearers are Trent Lambert and Audie Coleman.
Johnson-Quimby Funeral Home is in charge of all arrangements.
Earl Ivey “Pops” Daw
January 25, 2015
Earl Ivey “Pops” Daw, 88, passed away on January 24, 2015. Mr. Daw was born on November 13, 1926, in Evergreen, Alabama. He was a proud veteran of the U.S. Air Force and a retiree of the City of Pensacola. Lovingly referred to as “Pop” by everyone who knew him, he was a lifelong lover of “old cars” and always had a story to tell with a smile on his face. Pop was a very snappy dresser usually wearing polished boots and a fancy cap. He loved attending church and reading his Bible.
Mr. Daw was preceded in death by his parents, Will Ivey Daw and Eugenia Stuckey Daw, and his sister, Nettie Bea Daw.
Mr. Daw was married to his loving wife, Mildred, for 59 years until her passing in 2004.
He is survived by his children, Marie Jones (David), Sandra Flaim, and C. Lynndale Daw (Pat); grandchildren, Charati Jennings, Renee Saks, Jennifer Flaim, Donald Flaim Jr., Bonnie Dannelley, Hollie McEwan, Michael Daw, and Kaitlee Glaze and many great-grandchildren.
Visitation will be held at Faith Chapel Funeral Home North on Monday, January 26, from 5:30 p.m. until 7:30 p.m.
Funeral services will be held at Faith Chapel Funeral Home North on Tuesday, January 27, at 9 a.m.
Interment will follow at Barrancas National Cemetery at 11 am.
Faith Chapel Funeral Home North is entrusted with the arrangements.
Ball Registrations Set For NWE, Molino, Miracle League
January 24, 2015
Here is baseball, tball and softball registration information for NWE’s Bradberry Park in Walnut Hill, the Molino Ballpark and the Miracle League of Pensacola:
Northwest Escambia’s Bradberry Park will hold registration on Saturday, January 31 from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m., Friday, February 6 from 5:30 until 8 p.m. and Saturday, February 7 from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m. Registration fees vary; a birth certification is needed. For more information, click here
Molino Ballpark will hold registration on Saturdays – January 24, January 31 and February 7 – from 10 a.m. until 1 p.m. A birth certificated is needed. For registration information, click here.
Miracle League of Pensacola will hold registration on Saturday, January 24 from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m., Saturday, January 31 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday, February 1 from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. at the Miracle League Park on Nine Mile Road. For more information, click here.
Unemployment Rate Falls Across Area
January 24, 2015
The latest job numbers released Friday show the unemployment level decreasing or holding steady in the North Escambia area.
Escambia County’s unemployment rate decreased from 5.8 percent in November to 5.4 percent in December. There were 7,428 people reported unemployed during the period. One year ago, unemployment in Escambia County was 6.2 percent.
Santa Rosa County unemployment decreased, from 5.1 to 7.8 percent from November to December. Santa Rosa County had a total of 3,508 persons still unemployed. The year-ago unemployment rate in Santa Rosa County was 5.3 percent.
In Escambia County, Alabama, unemployment decreased from 7.0 percent in November to 6.7 percent in December. That represented 925 people unemployed in the county during the month. One year ago, the unemployment rate in Escambia County, Alabama, was 7.1 percent.
Florida’s jobless rate hit 5.6 percent in December, down from 5.8 percent a month earlier. In a prepared statement, Gov. Rick Scott highlighted the growth of 11,500 private-sector jobs in December and reiterated that as he enters his second term he “will stay laser-focused on our goal of making Florida the global destination for business and job creation.”When Scott first took office four years ago, unemployment in Florida stood at 11.1 percent. The current mark keeps Florida even with the national unemployment figure of 5.6 percent.
Alabama’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate, at 5.7percent in December, was down from November’s rate of 6.0 percent and was below the year-ago rate of 6.1 percent.
The jobless numbers released by Florida and Alabama do not include persons that have given up on finding a job and are no longer reported as unemployed.
The News Service of Florida contributed to this report.
FWC Law Enforcement Report
January 24, 2015
The Florida FWC Division of Law Enforcement reported the following activity during the weekly period ending January 22 in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties.
SANTA ROSA COUNTY
Lieutenant Hahr and Officers Hoomes and Ramos were working a night hunting detail in a well known area where deer gather and where a large buck was recently seen. Soon after concealing their presence, a truck stopped near where Lieutenant Hahr and Officer Ramos were concealed. The driver of the truck jumped out and shot across a field at a deer. When the two officers announced their presence and identified themselves as law enforcement officers, the suspect jumped back in his truck and sped away. Officer Hoomes stopped the vehicle down the road. The four occupants were questioned by the officers. Two of the subjects admitted trying to kill the deer in the field. The driver was charged with attempting to take deer with a gun and light, shooting from a public roadway, and resisting arrest without violence. The other man was also charged with attempting to take deer by gun and light for actively participating by working the light for the driver. An infraction was issued to one of the other passengers for violation of the open container law.
Lieutenant Hahr and Officers Hutchinson and Barnard were working an area where numerous complaints of night hunting have been received. They observed a truck drive by them and shine a nearby field. After stopping the truck, the officers observed a rifle and a spotlight. The two men admitted they were trying to kill a big buck they had seen in the area. Both subjects were issued notices to appear for attempting to take deer at night with a gun and light.
No weekly report was received from Escambia County.
This report represents some events the FWC handled over the past week;however, it does not include all actions taken by the Division of Law Enforcement. Information provided by FWC
Santa Rosa Man Pleads In Shotgun Play Death
January 24, 2015
James Hunter Gates entered a plea Friday in Santa Rosa County to manslaughter with a firearm and possession of a firearm by a convicted delinquent. Circuit Court Judge John Miller ordered a presentence investigation and scheduled sentencing for March 17. Gates faces a maximum sentence of 45 years in state prison.
Gates, 20, was arrested on August 25, 2014 after deputies responded to a shooting at a residence on Keyser Lane in Pace. They found 24-year old Romeo Wolff dead from a gunshot wound to the head. Investigators with the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office determined that Gates and Wolff were drinking alcoholic beverages in a bedroom that evening while playing with a shotgun that belonged to Gates.
As a convicted delinquent, Gates was prohibited from possessing any firearms.
Wolff pointed the barrel of the gun at his face and dared Gates to pull the trigger. Gates responded by pulling the trigger which caused the gun to fire. Wolff was struck in the face with the blast and died at the scene.
Florida Gov’t Weekly Roundup: Trying To Change The Subject
January 24, 2015
Any week when a Republican governor can propose more than a half a billion dollars in tax relief and announce that the unemployment rate has ticked down by 0.2 percentage points is supposed to be a good week.
And Gov. Rick Scott got to open and close his week on those two positive notes, the perfect bookends to any week. Or, at least, any other week.
Because the middle of the week was once again consumed by questions about the ouster of former Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Gerald Bailey, a story that has become one of the most serious challenges to Scott’s 4-year-old administration. Everyone expected Scott would run into trouble in his second term — but few thought it would come this quickly.
That said, the news was not all FDLE, all the time. There were the positive notes from Scott, as well as the usual noise generated by a week of legislative committee meetings. Legislation that would allow firearms to be carried on college campuses started moving in the House. And the heads of two besieged departments trekked to the Capitol to answer lawmakers’ questions.
The question hovering over it all, though, was whether the fallout from Bailey’s dismissal would drag into a third week.
QUESTIONS, FREQUENT AND OTHERWISE, ABOUT FDLE
There’s nothing new anymore about noting that the week was a bad one for Scott. Things weren’t much better, though, for Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty, Office of Financial Regulation Commissioner Drew Breakspear and Department of Revenue executive director Marshall Stranburg.
All three were mentioned by Scott as possible targets for removal by the Florida Cabinet — though it seems questionable that Chief Financial Officer Jeff Atwater, Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam and Attorney General Pam Bondi would be willing to make changes right now.
Largely because Scott and the Cabinet members spent much of the week subtly and not-so-subtly arguing with each other about who was told what about Bailey’s removal, and when they were told.
By Thursday, Putnam and Atwater were beginning to entertain the idea of an investigation into the personnel changes at FDLE. And Putnam talked about holding the Feb. 5 Cabinet meeting in the Capitol instead of making the traditional sojourn to the Florida State Fair in Tampa.
“We need to have a more normal location and platform to have these conversations than the agenda that typically occurs when we’re holding a Cabinet (meeting) on the road,” Putnam said.
Earlier in the week, he proposed clarifying the requirements for agency heads, requiring candidate interviews, establishing an appointment-selection committee and setting a process to review each agency through quarterly performance standards.
Putnam and Atwater also said this week there should be a follow-up to reports from the joint Tallahassee bureau for the Miami Herald and Tampa Bay Times, including allegations that Bailey was forced out of office by Scott in part for rejecting a request to participate in the governor’s re-election efforts. Another report had Bailey alleging that Scott and members of his staff sought to have the state police in 2013 indicate that acting Orange County clerk of court Colleen Reilly was the target of an investigation.
“Just as they’ve been said, they’re very serious and they should be looked into,” Atwater told reporters Thursday. “Everybody should be able to see all of this. It should be all very transparent, very exposed, all the questions answered.”
That same day, Scott’s office issued its most-detailed response to the allegations in the form of a “Frequently Asked Questions” document — the kind you might get to help troubleshoot your new microwave. The forum allowed Scott’s office to control both the questions and the answers.
“Is it true that Gerald Bailey was forced to resign?” one question asked.
“Prior to December 16, 2015, the Governor’s staff notified cabinet staff (including the offices of the Attorney General, the Chief Financial Officer, and the Commissioner of Agriculture) that the Governor wanted new leadership at FDLE. Cabinet staff raised no objection,” the answer began. Presumably, it was intended to be Dec. 16, 2014.
The document also promised Scott’s full budget proposal will be announced next week. It wasn’t news, since the governor is essentially obligated by law to release his spending plan by the following Sunday, but it pointed to one more opportunity to distract from the brewing scandal.
LOOK OVER HERE!
Not that Scott wasn’t already trying to change the subject at every available opportunity. He was helped out by the calendar; January is generally a time when governors start to roll out some of their legislative initiatives for the upcoming session, and this week was no exception.
The biggest item was a $470 million reduction in taxes on cell-phone and television services the governor pitched Monday. The governor’s office said it would save about $43 a year for a family that spends $100 a month on cell-phone and cable services, though spending on such services varies widely by household.
“With our cell phone and TV tax cut, every Florida family is saving real money — around $40 a year for spending as little as $100 a month between cell phone, cable and satellite bills,” Scott said in a prepared statement.
Scott’s proposal would reduce what are known as “communications services tax” rates, which are now 9.17 percent on nonresidential landlines, cell phone, and cable services and 13.17 percent on satellite services. The tax has generated about $1.4 billion in annual collections in recent years, according to the Florida Tax Handbook.
The governor also floated proposals to eliminate the sales tax on college textbooks — price tag: $41.4 million — and extend Bright Futures scholarships to cover summer courses, at a cost of $23.5 million.
But will the Legislature go along? Senate Appropriations Chairman Tom Lee, R-Brandon, when asked about the communications tax cut: “Whether or not we can do that and still address the needs of the Senate and House kind of remains to be seen. As I said, everybody has to walk out of here with their priorities addressed to some extent.”
Scott also had one more mostly good piece of news to close the week: The state’s unemployment rate dropped from 5.8 percent in November to 5.6 percent in December. “Mostly” good because the drop in the unemployment rate came as the state’s workforce of 9.6 million declined by 17,000 from November to December, with people considered to have jobs falling by 4,000, according to the Department of Economic Opportunity.
In a prepared statement, Scott highlighted the growth of 11,500 private-sector jobs in December and reiterated that as he enters his second term he “will stay laser-focused on our goal of making Florida the global destination for business and job creation.”
MEANWHILE, IN THE LEGISLATURE …
It’s a rare January committee week that’s overshadowed by news about the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, but the Legislature seemed to spend much of its time playing second fiddle to the Bailey imbroglio.
Not that there wasn’t plenty going on. The House Criminal Justice Subcommittee voted 8-4 along party lines to pass a measure (HB 4005) allowing anyone with a concealed-carry permit to have a weapon — usually a firearm — on campus. Currently, people are banned from carrying such weapons at Florida colleges and universities, with the exception of stun guns or similar devices.
Supporters said current law actually makes students on campus less safe.
“This bill eliminates a possible pool of victims,” said Brant Hargrove, a member of the public who spoke in support of the legislation. “Predators know where victims are. They’re in places where people cannot defend themselves.”
But opponents, including several students and faculty members who showed up to argue against the legislation, said drugs, alcohol and stress prevalent on college campuses make the atmosphere particularly bad for allowing guns.
“I can only imagine walking through mid-terms week or finals week and being afraid, because these people, at times, college students break down, especially when they’re in engineering and in the sciences and mathematics,” said John Quiroz, a 22-year-old political-science student at the University of South Florida.
Elsewhere, Florida Department of Children and Families Secretary Mike Carroll spoke to lawmakers in the wake of a horrific child death earlier this month, discussing about how the tragedy might affect efforts to reform the state’s troubled child-welfare system.
Carroll told House and Senate panels that he’s waiting for a report from the agency’s Critical Incident Rapid Response Team, which he dispatched to Tampa on Jan. 8. That day, John Jonchuck allegedly dropped his 5-year-old daughter, Phoebe, 60 feet into the waters of Tampa Bay.
Ironically, Carroll had testified before the Senate Children, Families and Elder Affairs Committee on the morning of Phoebe Jonchuck’s death and provided mostly good news about the progress of a new child-welfare law, which went into effect July 1.
“We have done a lot of work on that, and I think we’ve made a lot of progress with it,” he told the same Senate committee Thursday. “The sad irony is that as we were speaking of the progress we’d made, at the same time there was a tragedy that unfolded in Tampa on the Sunshine Skyway Bridge.”
Meanwhile, new Corrections Secretary Julie Jones made her first appearance before the Legislature, painting a picture of an understaffed agency embattled by a crumbling infrastructure, skyrocketing numbers of mentally ill prisoners and private health-care vendors who aren’t living up to their contract requirements.
“Staffing is key to lowering the temperature in these facilities,” Jones said. “It’s going to take all hands on deck and it’s going to take a true change in how we look at the role of the corrections officers and also the expectations of what those corrections officers, what services, they deliver to those inmates. Quite frankly, it’s a service. They’re there to keep them happy and they’re there to keep them healthy … and do it in such a way that they enter the facility in the same way that they exit the facility. And we’re not doing that.”
STORY OF THE WEEK: Gov. Rick Scott continued to be dogged by questions about the dismissal of FDLE Commissioner Gerald Bailey, which contributed to a growing rift between Scott and his fellow Republicans in the Cabinet.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “What I’m trying to do is prevent further loss of life by giving God-fearing and law-abiding citizens who have gone through background checks and all the things they have to do to get a (permit) to be able to defend themselves and their family.”— Rep. Greg Steube, R-Sarasota, on his bill to allow firearms on college campuses.
by Brandon Larrabee, The News Service of Florida
Dry Weekend In Store
January 24, 2015
Here is your official North Escambia area forecast:
- Saturday Night Clear, with a low around 33. West wind around 5 mph.
- Sunday Sunny, with a high near 62. Southwest wind 5 to 10 mph increasing to 10 to 15 mph in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 25 mph.
- Sunday Night Mostly clear, with a low around 40. Southwest wind 5 to 10 mph becoming northwest after midnight.
- Monday Sunny, with a high near 54. Northwest wind around 10 mph.
- Monday Night Mostly clear, with a low around 36. Northwest wind around 5 mph.
- Tuesday Sunny, with a high near 60. Calm wind becoming northwest around 5 mph in the morning.
- Tuesday Night Mostly clear, with a low around 34. North wind around 5 mph.
- Wednesday Sunny, with a high near 56.
- Wednesday Night Mostly clear, with a low around 36.
- Thursday Mostly sunny, with a high near 62.
- Thursday Night A 20 percent chance of showers. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 44.
- Friday A 20 percent chance of showers. Partly sunny, with a high near 62.
IRS Warns Of Increasing Number Of Local Phone Scammers
January 24, 2015
Area residents are receiving an increasing number of aggressive and threatening phone calls by criminals impersonating Internal Revenue Service agents.
The IRS has seen a surge of these phone scams in recent months as scam artists threaten police arrest, deportation, license revocation and other things. The IRS reminds taxpayers to guard against all sorts of con games that arise during any filing season.
“If someone calls unexpectedly claiming to be from the IRS with aggressive threats if you don’t pay immediately, it’s a scam artist calling,” said IRS Commissioner John Koskinen. “The first IRS contact with taxpayers is usually through the mail. Taxpayers have rights, and this is not how we do business.”
Phone scams have been a persistent and pervasive problem for many taxpayers for many months. Scammers are able to alter caller ID numbers to make it look like the IRS is calling. They use fake names and bogus IRS badge numbers. They often leave “urgent” callback requests. They prey on the most vulnerable people, such as the elderly, newly arrived immigrants and those whose first language is not English. Scammers have been known to impersonate agents from IRS Criminal Investigation as well.
“These criminals try to scare and shock you into providing personal financial information on the spot while you are off guard,” Koskinen said. “Don’t be taken in and don’t engage these people over the phone.”
The IRS will never:
- Call to demand immediate payment, nor will the agency call about taxes owed without first having mailed you a bill.
- Demand that you pay taxes without giving you the opportunity to question or appeal the amount they say you owe.
- Require you to use a specific payment method for your taxes, such as a prepaid debit card.
- Ask for credit or debit card numbers over the phone.
- Threaten to bring in local police or other law-enforcement groups to have you arrested for not paying.
If you get a phone call from someone claiming to be from the IRS and asking for money, here’s what you should do:
- If you know you owe taxes or think you might owe, call the IRS at 1-800-829-1040. The IRS workers can help you with a payment issue.
- If you know you don’t owe taxes or have no reason to believe that you do, report the incident to the TIGTA at 1-800-366-4484 or at www.tigta.gov.
- If you’ve been targeted by this scam, also contact the Federal Trade Commission and use their “FTC Complaint Assistant” at FTC.gov. Please add “IRS Telephone Scam” to the comments of your complaint.
Northview Girls Weighlifting Team Honors Presented
January 24, 2015
The Northview High School Girls Weightlifting team presented the following awards Friday morning:
- Myisha Syria
- Danielle Robinson
- Lakelynn Parker
- Moriah McGahan