Gerald Lee Van Luven
July 17, 2016
Gerald Lee Van Luven, 75, of Pensacola, passed away on Thursday, July 14, 2016. Gerald was born on October 29, 1940, in Rhinelander, Wisconsin to the late Howard and Clarice Van Luven. He retired from the U. S. Navy and the U.S. Civil Service. Jerry’s heart and soul was entrenched in his military service and the love for his country. His 20 year span of service in the Navy included four tours in Vietnam and time on carrier ships. Jerry was also an outdoorsman and an avid fly fisherman.
He was preceded in death by his parents and his three siblings.
Jerry is survived by his wife of 35 years, Karen Kane Van Luven; three sons, Gregory James (Tammy), Shawn Lee (Cheryl) and Jon Michael (Julie) Van Luven; eight grandchildren, Rebekkah, Dustin, Dalton, Kristoffer, Jonathan, Alexxander, Julia-Bella; brothers and sisters-in-law, Cindy and Tom Kidder, Jim and Margie Kane, Mary and Pete Barraca, Richard and Laurie Kane, Kevin and Donna Kane, Teresa and Mike Nelson and Laura and Gary Hammac; and numerous nieces and nephews. He will also be loved and missed by his fur babies Samy, Jethro, JayJ and Hollie.
The family will receive friends from 9 a.m. until 10:15 a.m. on Wednesday, July 20, 2016, at Faith Chapel Funeral Home South.
Graveside services will be held at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, July 20, 2016, at Barrancas National Cemetery.
Pallbearers will be his sons, Greg and Jon Van Luven and brothers-in-law, Jim and Richard Kane, Tom Kidder and Pete Barraca.
In lieu of flowers please make donations to the Humane Society or Wildlife Sanctuary in Jerry’s name.
Faith Chapel Funeral Home South is entrusted with arrangements.
Burbie M. Willett Comer
July 17, 2016
Burbie M. Willett Comer, 91 of Atmore, passed away Thursday, July 14, 2016, in Atmore.
She was a retired nurses aid. She was born in Fayette, AL on February 13, 1925, to the late Randolph and Ida Pennington. She was a member of the Brooks Memorial Baptist Church.
She is preceded in death by husbands, Kenneth Willett and Charles Comer; and sons, Charles Pennington and Joseph Murphy.
Survivors include two daughters, Dorothy Hyslop Demille and Betty Donohoe both of Atmore; one sister, Erdeal McGhee of Atmore; a host of grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren; and many friends.
Services were held Sunday, July 17, 2016, from the Johnson-Quimby Funeral Home Chapel with Bro. Robert Heard officiating.
Interment was in Oak Hill Cemetery.
Johnson-Quimby Funeral Home is in charge of all arrangements.
Wahoos Beat Suns 5-2
July 17, 2016
With a pair of home runs by Brandon Dixon and a season-high nine strikeouts by Rookie Davis, the Pensacola Blue Wahoos were lights out against the Jacksonville Suns in a 5-2 win at the Baseball Grounds of Jacksonville.
The Blue Wahoos jumped out to an early 3-0 lead in the first inning after a two-out home run by Taylor Sparks. After a single by Sebastian Elizalde, Brandon Dixon hit his first homer of the night.
Rookie Davis, the Reds No. 11 prospect according to MLB Pipeline, started off his night by striking out five of the first six Suns’ batters. In the top of the second, Davis also raked his fourth RBI of the year with a single to bring home Ray Chang.
Brandon Dixon hit his final home run of the night, and 13th of the year, in the third inning to give Pensacola a 5-0 lead, and the team’s final run of the night.
It wasn’t until the fifth inning that Jacksonville was able to put runs on the board. After a ground rule double by Francisco Arcia, former Pensacola catcher Cam Maron hit his first home run of the season.
Davis finished the night striking out by striking out four more batters for a total of nine, a Double-A high for him.
After leaving the game after the sixth inning, the Pensacola bullpen shut down Jacksonville including an inning of hitless baseball by MLB rehabber Caleb Cotham. Carlos Gonzalez came in the eighth inning and struck out one while giving up no hits in his third straight appearance (3.2 innings total).
Alejandro Chacin, who leads the Southern League in saves, picked up his 17th save after two strikeouts and allowing two hits.
Pensacola and Jacksonville play two seven-inning games Sunday after Friday night’s postponement due to rain. RHP Jackson Stephens and RHP Sal Romano are taking the mound for Pensacola while LHP Matt Tomshaw and RHP Patrick Johnson take the hill for Jacksonville.
Thelma Lee Vasquez
July 17, 2016
Thelma Lee Vasquez was born on June 9,1941, and was called home to be with the Lord on July 14, 2016.
She leaves behind her loving husband of 56 years, Jerry Cruz Vasquez; and her children, Phyllis Finney, Jerry Vasquez, Sue Ann Hall, Jeannie Omerza, Frankie Vasquez , Tony Vasquez, and Quinn Vasquez. In addition to her children she was blessed with 16 grandchildren and 20 great-grandchildren. Her surviving siblings include, Joseph Nowling, Margaret Richardson, and Gracie Evans.
Her pallbearers will be Tony Vasquez Jr., Randy Vazquez, Steven Vasquez, Brennan Vasquez, Edward Hall, and Dwayne Vasquez.
Honorable pallbearers are Matt Nowling, Roger Vasquez, and Thomas Omerza.
She was born Thelma Lee Nowling in Holt, FL. She was raised in Pensacola where she met and married the love of her life on September 15, 1960. Together, they raised seven wonderful children. She was a devoted and loving mother, sister, grandmother, and friend. She enjoyed spending time in her garden and telling stories about her life and memories of her family. She made anyone who came to her home feel welcome and loved. She was the most caring person anyone had the pleasure and privilege of knowing and will be truly missed.
July Gardening Tips
July 16, 2016
The heat, humidity and frequent rains of July are great for tropical plants. Gardeners, however, take a bit of a beating. Remember to keep the sunscreen, insect repellant and iced tea handy as you venture out into your garden to perform some needed summer maintenance.
A midsummer application of fertilizer is usually required, especially on annual flowers, lawns, shrub beds and vegetable gardens. This is a supplemental application, so don’t overdo it. A 15-0-15 slow-release fertilizer is a good general purpose landscape fertilizer for most plants.
Major pruning jobs should have been done earlier, but there is still some maintenance pruning that should be done. Deadhead, or clip old flowers, from summer flowering shrubs as soon as they fade to help insure an extended season of bloom. Crape myrtles, hibiscus, hydrangeas and althea are examples of shrubs that will bloom repeatedly if light, selective pruning is done.
Flowering annuals also respond well to deadheading. Snip off old flowers and flower spikes before they have an opportunity to form seed. Allowing annual flowers to set seed can shorten their blooming season considerably.
Inspect your lawn and shrub plantings frequently in order to identify pest problems as early as possible. The most severe damage from pest insects normally begins in July. Be on the lookout for chinch bugs in St. Augustine grass; spittlebugs in centipede grass; sod webworm in all lawns-especially new ones; lacebug and caterpillars on azaleas; whiteflies on gardenia and spider mites on lots of different types of shrubs.
Sod webworms often attack lawns in the summer. They eat the grass blades producing areas that look as if they have been mowed too short. Close inspection will reveal that the blades have not been cleanly cut as with a mower blade but have been chewed along their edges and tips. These caterpillars feed at night and rest during the day down among the runners and in the thatch.
Once an insect pest is found, evaluate the damage and determine if control is necessary. If it is, choose the least toxic option. If only a few caterpillars are found, hand picking might be the choice. Aphids and spider mites can often be controlled by spraying with an insecticidal soap solution. Chemical insecticides are sometimes required. Before choosing one be sure that the insect pest has been properly identified and that the insecticide is labeled for that purpose For vegetable gardeners that have problems with nematodes, soil borne diseases and extensive weed problems, July is a great time to try soil solarization.
Prepare the soil as you normally would for a vegetable garden including adding organic matter. Moisten the area and cover with clear plastic, not black plastic. Clear plastic will produce the highest temperatures. Be sure to weigh down the edges of the plastic so that it doesn’t blow up. Allow the soil to bake in the sun for four to six weeks. The sun will raise the soil temperature high enough to kill many soil borne problems.
Tip of the Week: The nice thing about tomatoes is that you have the option of harvesting when the fruit is green if needed. Tomatoes will ripen indoors at room temperature. To ensure even ripening, place the tomato with the stem up. The ideal time to harvest tomatoes is when they are fully colored but still firm.
In general, it is best to harvest vegetables early in the mornings while the moisture content is higher. The overall quality will quickly diminish as vegetables are exposed to hotter temperatures later in the day.
Summer Pattern Showers
July 16, 2016
Here is your official North Escambia area forecast:
Saturday Night: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms before 1am. Partly cloudy, with a low around 74. South wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening.
Sunday: A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 92. Calm wind becoming southeast around 5 mph in the morning.
Sunday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around 74. South wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening.
Monday: A 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 92. Calm wind.
Monday Night: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly cloudy, with a low around 75. Calm wind.
Tuesday: A 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 92. North wind around 5 mph becoming southeast in the afternoon.
Tuesday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around 75. Calm wind.
Wednesday: A 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly sunny, with a high near 94.
Wednesday Night: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly cloudy, with a low around 75.
Thursday: A 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly sunny, with a high near 95.
Thursday Night: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly cloudy, with a low around 75.
Friday: A 40 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 93.
Florida Delegation Looks To Unite At GOP Convention
July 16, 2016
A year ago, some Florida Republicans dared to dream that one of the state’s own would be accepting the GOP presidential nomination in Cleveland at next week’s convention.
Former Gov. Jeb Bush was the front-runner, with piles of campaign contributions and a name that, for all of its baggage, designated him as a member of the party’s unofficial first family. And U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, young and Hispanic in a party struggling with both of those demographics, showed up in polls as seemingly everyone’s second choice, a prime position to pick up support once other candidates dropped out.
Instead, Bush couldn’t even make it to the Florida primary after devastating losses in states that voted earlier, and Rubio suspended his campaign after getting smashed by businessman Donald Trump in the Sunshine State — part of the real-estate mogul’s romp to the nomination.
Meanwhile, the primary and its aftermath exposed fault lines in the Florida GOP, divisions that party leaders will hope to heal, or at least patch over, during the party gathering in Cleveland. Especially since the electoral math for any Republican hoping to win the White House remains daunting without Florida.
“It’s already, we know, going to be very, very close, and Florida’s going to again be critical to Republican success. … The importance of unity for Florida is elevated this time out,” said Susan MacManus, a political science professor at the University of South Florida.
Much of the discussion in the lead-up to the gathering, though, has highlighted the fissures in the state GOP. Gov. Rick Scott, who emerged as an enthusiastic Trump supporter following the Florida primary, is scheduled to speak at the convention. So is Attorney General Pam Bondi, the highest-profile Republican in the state to endorse Trump before Floridians voted.
But others are staying away completely. Bush won’t attend, and Rubio will be campaigning for re-election in Florida after his surprise decision last month to run for another term in the Senate.
Some members of the state’s congressional delegation also won’t be in attendance. Congressman Carlos Curbelo, one of Trump’s harshest critics in the Florida GOP, reportedly won’t go. The offices of Congressmen Rich Nugent, Tom Rooney, Dennis Ross and Dan Webster told The News Service of Florida they won’t be in Cleveland next week.
“The congressman has a full schedule of events next week, and will not be attending the convention in Cleveland,” Elizabeth Tyrrell, a spokeswoman for Webster, wrote in an email.
Other lawmakers will be there. Congressmen Ander Crenshaw and Jeff Miller are delegates, while Congressmen Ted Yoho and Gus Bilirakis also plan to attend, according to their offices.
Most Florida Republicans who won’t attend either didn’t provide a reason for skipping the gathering or chalked it up to some reason other than the outsized presence of Trump, one of the party’s most controversial nominees in years.
“I’m not a delegate and I’d rather be home, to be honest,” said state Senate President Andy Gardiner, R-Orlando.
But if political calculations are driving some GOP candidates to avoid Cleveland, other Republicans are taking flak for staying home. Carlos Beruff, a developer challenging Rubio for the GOP nomination for the U.S. Senate seat, slammed Rubio for backtracking on speaking at the convention and offered to take his spot.
“It’s no surprise that Marco Rubio and others are shying away from supporting Donald Trump. … Trump is (motivating) voters across Florida and the country who have felt ignored by the Republican and Democratic establishment alike. He’s looking to shake up Washington, and I’m behind him 100 percent,” Beruff said.
There will also be agendas at play beyond 2016. Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, a top candidate to run for governor in 2018, will host the state’s delegates at a “Florida Grown Breakfast” on Tuesday, featuring neurosurgeon and former presidential candidate Ben Carson.
Other marquee names are likely to speak to the Florida delegation, either to help promote the party’s chances in 2016 or to boost their own profiles for future bids for office, perhaps the presidency in 2020 if Trump falls short.
“You can see raw ambition at every level,” MacManus said.
by Brandon Larrabee, The News Service of Florida
Huge Indoor Yard Sale Continues Today In McDavid
July 16, 2016
A giant indoor yard sale continues today at Ray’s Chapel Baptist Church to benefit an upcoming mission trip. The church is located at 140 West Bogia Road in McDavid, just off Highway 29. (Click here for a map). The yard sale begins at 8:00 Saturday morning. Photos for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Ballots On The Way To Military And Overseas Voters
July 16, 2016
The Escambia County Supervisor of Elections Office began sending vote-by-mail ballots on Friday, July 15, to eligible military and overseas citizens. Voters will either receive their ballot by mail or electronically, depending on their chosen method of delivery. Absent military voters and those living overseas can request, mark and track their vote-by-mail ballots electronically.
Vote-by-mail ballots for all eligible domestic voters will be mailed beginning on Monday, July 25. The deadline to request a vote-by-mail ballot to be mailed for the Primary Election is 5 p.m. on Wednesday, August 24. To request or track your vote-by-mail ballot for the Primary Election, visit EscambiaVotes.com and click “Vote by Mail”, or contact the Supervisor of Elections Office at (850) 595-3900.
Across the state, county supervisors of elections have already sent out more than 1.5 million ballots to overseas and military voters.
Of the ballots already out statewide, Republicans accounted for 626,019 and Democrats accounted for 610,328. Another 250,261 ballots went to people with no party affiliation and 36,457 were sent to people registered with one of the state’s minor parties.
The News Service of Florida contributed to this report.
Pictured: Escambia County Supervisor of Elections David Stafford with vote-by-mail ballots on their way overseas and to military voters. Courtesy photo for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Florida Gov’t Weekly Roundup: In The Background For A Bit
July 16, 2016
When it came to news, it was hard for Florida to get a word in edgewise this week.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump selected Indiana Gov. Mike Pence as his running mate. There was a brutal terror attack in the French city of Nice. And on Friday, an attempted coup in Turkey threw into grave doubt the future of one of America’s NATO allies.
By comparison, things in Florida seemed rather tame. There were some polls about whether Trump or former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, his Democratic opponent, had the upper edge in Florida with the national political conventions looming. The fight over kosher food at state prisons drew closer to a conclusion. And algae continued to muck things up in southern parts of the state.
None of which will diminish Florida’s reputation as odd news capital of the world, of course. But it did keep the spotlight off the Sunshine State for a few days.
OPPOSITE CONCLUSIONS
Who’s leading the presidential race in Florida, a state that is once again shaping up as one of the most important in the nation? It depends on whom you ask.
Quinnipiac University, one of the highest-profile independent polls, showed Trump taking a narrow lead over Clinton in Florida, with 42 percent of voters favoring the real estate mogul and 39 percent backing the first female major-party nominee. The margin grew to five points when pollsters added a pair of third-party candidates — Libertarian Gary Johnson and the Green Party’s Jill Stein.
The results of the head-to-head match-up between Clinton and Trump marked an 11-point swing in about three weeks. Peter A. Brown, assistant director of the poll, said Clinton’s numbers might have been dragged down by FBI Director James Comey, who publicly criticized the nominee for being “extremely careless” with email during her time as secretary of state, though Clinton was not charged with a crime.
“While there is no definite link between Clinton’s drop in Florida and the U.S. Justice Department decision not to prosecute her for her handling of e-mails, she has lost ground to Trump on questions which measure moral standards and honesty,” Brown said in comments accompanying the poll results.
But some Democrats were skeptical of the poll released Wednesday by the Connecticut-based university. In a blog post, Democratic strategist Steve Schale said he had no doubt Florida will be tight in November — but that the trend in Quinnipiac’s numbers lacked a ring of accuracy.
“For as much of a mess as Florida can be, it is a remarkably consistent state,” he said. “There just isn’t 10-12 points of movement here.”
And by Friday, another survey gave Clinton the lead. The NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist Poll showed the former secretary of state up 44 percent to 37 percent, and by five points when the third-party candidates were factored in.
Lee M. Miringoff, director of The Marist College Institute for Public Opinion, said in comments released with the poll numbers that Trump is “playing catchup” against Clinton in Florida, Colorado, North Carolina and Virginia. The institute, part of New York-based Marist College, also released results Friday showing Clinton ahead in those three other battleground states.
“The driving force behind voters’ choices is the negative impressions they have of both Trump and Clinton,” Miringoff said. “Clinton’s single-digit lead in each of these states is due to her slight advantage in how voters perceive the two candidates.”
Get ready for another nail-biter in the Sunshine State.
COURT MAKES NO BONES ABOUT PRISON FOOD
Complaints about meals in jail are probably about as old as jails themselves. But an appeals court on Thursday upheld a lower court’s decision to require Florida corrections officials to provide kosher meals to inmates.
U.S. District Judge Patricia Seitz last year ordered the Department of Corrections to offer kosher meals and barred it from removing inmates from the religious dietary plan if prisoners buy non-kosher food from canteens or don’t pick up the meals more than 10 percent of the time.
Corrections Secretary Julie Jones has maintained she has no plans to stop offering kosher meals. But her agency has argued that a federal law — the “Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act” of 2000 — allows prison officials to stop offering the meal plan if it gets too expensive.
A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Thursday that Jones and the agency failed to prove their case. The state has spent nearly $500,000 on legal fees and costs in the prolonged dispute.
Jones “fail(ed) to explain why the department cannot offer kosher meals when the Federal Bureau of Prisons and other states do so,” or why she can’t provide the kosher meals although the department offers other special diets “at similar marginal costs,” wrote appeals court Judge William Pryor.
Corrections officials were reviewing the court’s decision and “will determine next steps,” agency spokeswoman Michelle Glady said in an email Thursday evening.
“We will continue to serve the more than 9,000 inmates enrolled in the religious dietary program meals that comply with the tenets of their faith,” she said.
The fight over kosher meals in Florida prisons has dragged on for more than a decade.
The department started offering kosher meals in 2004 to Jewish prisoners at 13 facilities and transferred inmates who were eligible for the meals to those institutions. The agency expanded the program to inmates of all faiths in 2006 but halted it the following year before reinstating it as a pilot project at a single prison in 2010, serving fewer than 20 prisoners.
A year after the Justice Department filed the lawsuit in 2012, the state again began serving kosher meals and promised to have the meals available to all inmates by last July.
About 9,000 of the state’s 100,000 prisoners are receiving kosher meals, according to Glady. As of Monday, the state was spending $3.32 per inmate per day on kosher meals, compared to about $1.97 for the regular diet.
POLITICAL MUCKRAKING
Amid a blossoming problem with toxic algae linked to water releases from Lake Okeechobee, the state this week opened its bridge-loan program to businesses in Southeast and Southwest Florida that have been hurt by the crisis.
By Thursday, 59 businesses — mostly in Martin, St. Lucie and Lee counties — had reported some form of financial impacts from the toxic blooms.
Florida Department of Economic Opportunity Executive Director Cissy Proctor said the impacts include such things as a decrease in tourists to the counties, fewer people going to restaurants and fewer people using recreational facilities on or near the water.
“We’ve seen the reports of these blooms not only on our local news, but on the national news,” Proctor said. “And we’re also seeing that even if (people) are going down to visit, they’re not going out on their boats. They’re not going out to see the manatees. They’re not going out to do the things that you normally do, especially in these areas on the water that are recreationally or are part of these folks’ livelihood.”
The loans are available only to businesses in four counties in which Gov. Rick Scott has declared an emergency: Martin, St. Lucie, Lee and Palm Beach.
But assistance for businesspeople affected by the problems also caused a political storm this week after Scott’s office posted on the state’s Sunburst email system a chain of emails in which Democratic Congressman Patrick Murphy’s office on Monday requested a delay in announcing the opening of a Small Business Administration recovery center. The potential delay could have led to an announcement during a press conference Murphy was holding Thursday about the algae issue.
Opponents on both sides pounced on Murphy’s request. Congressman Alan Grayson, who is running against Murphy in the Aug. 30 Democratic primary for a U.S. Senate seat, called Murphy’s action an abuse of power.
“Putting his own political fortunes in front of the needs of legitimate small business owners is stunningly shameless,” Grayson campaign manager Michael Ceraso said in a release.
Meanwhile, Carlos Beruff, a developer from Bradenton seeking to become the Republican Senate nominee, went further, demanding Murphy “resign his office immediately” and be investigated by the House Committee on Ethics.
But Murphy’s campaign fired back, saying it was Scott’s office “looking to score partisan points” that took out of context a “standard request to coordinate a media strategy with a federal agency.”
“Of course our office did not request for this program to be delayed,” Murphy campaign spokesman Anthony Kusich said in a statement. “Anyone who reads the original email can see that we did not. The official emails that Republicans are distributing to press intentionally leave out the Small Business Administration’s email to our office on Monday morning, which suggests no impending announcement.”
STORY OF THE WEEK: Polls showed both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in the lead in Florida’s presidential race, pointing to the likelihood of another close campaign for the state’s 29 electoral votes.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “The United States Supreme Court has recognized that there is a guerilla war currently occurring against the death penalty in the United States. Anti-death penalty groups have been on a crusade against those legally involved with executions, harassing and threatening them until they feel pressured to withdraw their participation. … In Florida, the plight has not been any different.”— Florida Chief Assistant Attorney General James Lee Marsh, in a filing asking a federal judge in Tallahassee to quash a subpoena from a case involving seven Arizona Death Row inmates.
by Brandon Larrabee, The News Service of Florida