Gulf Power Employees Help Point The Way In The Blackwater Forest
November 21, 2017
Gulf Power’s Plant Crist and Environmental Affair’s stewardship teams spent a recent day volunteering in Blackwater River State Forest to help make sure hunters, hikers and other users don’t get lost.
Sixteen employees teamed up with forestry staff and fanned out in the 211,000-acre forest, where a maze of paved and dirt roads crisscross through the massive pine landscape. Armed with maps, dotted with stars denoting the signposts, they hunted for the weathered concrete pillars, some barely readable.
One-by-one they scraped off flaking paint and years of dirt, rolled on a new coat of bright, yellow paint and stenciled on road names. The newly painted posts stood out like beacons against the dark greens and browns of the forest.
The posts have not been repainted since 2011. Eric Howell, Forestry resource administrator, said his staff had completed maintenance on about half of the signs on the 800-plus miles of roads through the forest, but they still had 250 remaining.
“These volunteers were very helpful to our crews who have been busy with other projects,” he said. “Our road and fire crews have been deploying for wildfires and hurricanes and working on road washouts, and we’ve not been able to get this project done.”
While the project seemed simple, it took time for the Gulf Power team to travel to each post, clear away brush and hunt through a bucket of letters and numbers to assemble the street names inside of a stencil. They were able to complete about a fifth of the posts needing painting, progress Howell said is a “huge step forward.”
Volunteer workdays are part of the mission of the Gulf Power’s Environmental Stewardship program that focuses on protecting, conserving and restoring the region’s ecosystem. Employees volunteer several times a year to help organizations from Pensacola through Panama City with projects that benefit the environment and the people who use the environmental resources.
Jeff Cole, Gulf Power’s Stewardship coordinator, said this is the first time the company has volunteered for the state forestry service. Cole has a special affinity for the area, having grown up in north Santa Rosa County.
“Gulf Power with our parent company, Southern Company, have supported Longleaf Stewardship Fund grants that have helped with restoration in the Blackwater River State Forest,” he said. “We wanted to get our employees out to see what’s being done and help out the forestry service with maintenance. Having these roads marked clearly and all of the names updated and repainted where they are visible, really helps people more enjoy the forest instead of riding around lost.”
“It’s an impressive forest,” he said. “It covers the whole north ends of Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties. Blackwater River and Coldwater Creek and a lot of other interesting creeks run through it that you can canoe and enjoy. There’s a lot of recreational activities for the public out here, and I’ve always enjoyed it my whole life.”
Ryan Cowart, Environmental Affairs engineer, was volunteering for the second environmental stewardship day since joining Gulf Power in 2016, and he was impressed with the forest.
“I’m in the office most of the time, so I enjoy the opportunity to learn more about the community and its recreational opportunities and how we can help out,” he said. “This is the first time I’ve been to this state forest. I’ve been to Tuskegee National Forest in Alabama, but this place is much larger and has nicer roads and better signage.”
The workday opportunity gave Michael Weeden, Gulf Power’s newest Environmental Affairs cooperative student from the University of West Florida, a taste of what the Land Management degree he’s pursuing could entail.
“I never thought I’d be painting sign posts,” he said. “I’m enjoying it.”
Courtesy photos for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Century Audit Finds Millions To Be Repaid To Special Fund, Deteriorating Financial Conditions
November 20, 2017
A recent audit has uncovered numerous financial problems in Century during the fiscal year ending September 30, 2016. Those findings included deteriorating financial conditions that could result in a future “financial emergency”, $3.83 million in transferred special revenue funds that must be repaid, $1.4 million in expenditures in violation of state statutes, over $5,000 in a bank account that did not appear on the books and other deficiencies.
According to the audit obtained by NorthEscambia.com:
- The town’s overall financial condition demonstrates signs of deterioration which, if not corrected, could result in a future financial emergency. The town’s general fund borrowed $285,248 from its special revenue fund to cover general operations of the town during the year under audit. As of September 30, 2016, the general fund owes the special revenue fund approximately $3.83 million. The revenues in the special revenue fund are restricted for specific purposes, and therefore, these funds will have to be repaid or it will be considered an inappropriate use of the restricted revenues.
- The town reported 2016 fiscal year expenditures in excess of budgeted amounts of $1,424,694 for the general fund, which is in violation of Section 166.241(3), Florida Statutes. Budget-to-actual comparison schedules were not provided to town council on a regular basis during the fiscal year under audit.
- A bank account for utility payment receipts was not recorded or reconciled in the town’s accounting software and was not recorded in the general ledger. However, the account held a year-end balance of $5,078.
- Capital outlay was not properly recorded and the capitalization threshold policy of $500 was not properly followed during the year under audit. Audit adjustments were necessary to correct capital asset account balances in all funds. In addition, capital assets purchases are not consistently identified and therefore these items are not properly tagged and inventoried. This inconsistent recording and tracking of capital assets causes asset balances to be misstated and allows for possible misappropriation of assets.
- Several general ledger accounts were not reconciled to detail supporting ledgers in a timely manner, and audit adjustments from the 2015 fiscal year audit were not posted until June 2017. Town management adjusted several general ledger accounts, resulting in $163,386 recorded in miscellaneous expenditures in the general fund.
- Bank reconciliations were prepared each month, however these reconciliations did not properly reconcile to the general ledger, and lacked adequate and timely review. The review of the September 30, 2016 bank reconciliations, and posting of necessary adjustments for proper reconciliation to the general ledger records was not completed until August 2017.
- The town does not have a formal written travel policy. The mayor is receiving a travel stipend of $590 per month. The auditors recommend town management establish a formal travel policy that is compliant with Florida Statute 112.061.
- The town did not follow Florida statutes regarding the required submission of financial reports for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2016.
According to the 58-page audit, the town is in agreement with the findings and will put a corrective action in place to address the issues.
NorthEscambia.com file photo.
Deadline Is Wednesday For Annual Peanut Butter Challenge
November 20, 2017
Time is running out to donate to the UF/IFAS Extension Annual Peanut Butter Challenge — the deadline is Wednesday, November 22.
During their Sunday meeting, the youth member of the Barrineau Park 4-H brought in jars of peanut butter to do their part.
In an effort to boost the supply of the most requested food pantry item, peanut butter, UF IFAS Escambia County Extension is teaming up again with the Florida Peanut Producers Association to help “Take a Bite out of Hunger” by participating in a local peanut butter drive.
Donations can be dropped off at:
- Escambia County Administration, 221 Palafox Place, 4th Floor
- Escambia County Extension Office, 3740 Stefani Road
- Escambia County Farm Bureau,153 Highway 97, Molino
- Escambia County Public Safety, 6575 North W Street
- Gilmore Services, 31 East Fairfield Drive
Pictured: The Barrineau Park 4-H proudly took part in the Escambia County Peanut Butter Challenge. During their Sunday meeting, the youth brought in jars of peanut butter. Photos for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Volunteer Sought For Escambia County Value Adjustment Board
November 20, 2017
The Escambia County Board of County Commissioners is seeking Escambia County residents interested in volunteering to be considered for an appointment to the Value Adjustment Board. The VAB provides for the hearing of all petitions, complaints, appeals and disputes concerning taxable assessment of properties. The term of office is one year.
Escambia residents interested in serving on the Value Adjustment Board are asked to submit a resume and letter indicating their desire to serve by 5 p.m. Friday, Dec. 1. Resumes and letters should be submitted via email to jhwitter@myescambia.com or by mail to:
Judy Witterstaeter, Program Coordinator
Escambia County Board of County Commissioners
P.O. Box 1591
Pensacola, FL 32502
Resumes submitted for consideration are subject to public records requests and are included in Escambia County Commission meeting information, including the agenda and official meeting minutes.
The board of county commissioners’ VAB appointee must meet the following requirements to be eligible to serve:
- Must own homestead property in Escambia County.
- Cannot be a member or employee of any taxing authority.
- Cannot represent property owners in any administrative or judicial review of property taxes.
The VAB was established in accordance with Section 194.015, Florida Statutes, which was revised on Sept. 1, 2008. The VAB meets for approximately 30-40 minutes twice a year, usually in September and December.
FDOT: Weekly Traffic Alerts
November 20, 2017
Drivers will encounter traffic variations on the following state roads in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties as crews perform construction and maintenance activities. For the upcoming Thanksgiving holidays, there will be no lane closures on the interstate or state roads beginning at 7 a.m. Wednesday, November 22, and ending at 11:59 p.m. Sunday, November 26. All major roads will be open to normal traffic.
Escambia County
- Interstate 10 (I-10)/U.S. 29 Interchange Improvements Phase I - The following traffic impacts are planned on I-10 and U.S. 29 near the interchange (Exits 10A and 10B) from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. through Tuesday, Nov. 21:
Alternating lane closures on I-10 east and westbound and U.S. 29 north and southbound.
The U.S. 29 on-ramps to I-10 eastbound will be intermittently closed. Traffic will be detoured on U.S. 29 to access I-10 eastbound.
The exit ramp from I-10 westbound to U.S. 29 south (Exit 10A) will be intermittently closed. Traffic will be detoured to Exit 10B.
Alternating lane closures on the I-10 westbound exit ramp to U.S. 29 north (Exit 10B). - I-10 Widening from Davis Highway to the Escambia Bay Bridge- Drivers will encounter the following traffic impacts from 7 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. as crews perform paving work.
Alternating lane closures on I-10 east and westbound near Scenic Highway Friday, Nov. 17 and Sunday, Nov. 19 through Tuesday, Nov. 21.
The on-ramp from Scenic Highway to I-10 westbound will be intermittently closed through Tuesday, Nov. 21. Traffic will be detoured on I-10 eastbound to Avalon Boulevard (Exit 22) to access I-10 westbound.
The I-10 eastbound off-ramp to Scenic Highway will be intermittently closed through Tuesday, Nov. 21. Traffic on I-10 eastbound will be detoured to Avalon Boulevard (Exit 22) to access I-10 westbound to Scenic Highway. - U.S. 98 (S.R. 30) Pensacola Bay Bridge Replacement – Alternating east and westbound lane closures on U.S. 98 (Bayfront Parkway), between 14th Avenue and the bridge, from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. through Tuesday, Nov. 21 as crews place temporary lane separators and barrier wall.
Santa Rosa County
S.R. 87 Multilane from Eglin AFB boundary to Hickory Hammock Road – Traffic between County Road 184 (Hickory Hammock Road) and the Eglin AFB boundary is restricted to loads less than 11-feet wide. The restriction will be in place until the project is complete.
Seminole Tribe, Disney Pour Money Into Gambling Initiative
November 20, 2017
The Seminole Tribe of Florida and Disney Worldwide Services spent $1.55 million in October to back a proposed constitutional amendment that would make it harder to expand gambling in the state, according to a newly filed finance report. The money went to the political committee Voters In Charge, which is trying to get the proposal on the November 2018 ballot.
The Seminole Tribe, which operates casinos in various parts of the state, contributed $1 million in October, while Disney added $550,000, the report shows.
In all, the committee had raised $4.1 million as of Oct. 31, while spending about $3.44 million. Voters In Charge had submitted 391,783 valid petition signatures to the state and needs to submit 766,200 to get on the ballot.
The initiative would change the state Constitution and give voters the “exclusive right to decide whether to authorize casino gambling” in the state.
It would require voter approval of casino-style games in the future.
“Our message of giving Florida voters, not politicians, the ultimate authority on gambling decisions is resonating throughout Florida,” Voters In Charge Chairman John Sowinski said in a prepared statement Monday. “We are on target to complete our petition drive by year’s end, after which we will turn our full attention to building voter support for our amendment through a broad grassroots effort and robust statewide campaign.”
by The News Service of Florida
Jim Allen Elementary School Names Students Of The Month
November 20, 2017
Jim Allen Elementary School has named Students of the Month for November. They are Mykamia Padgett (left) and Eli Langreck. Courtesy photo for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
American Diabetes Month: Floridians Impacted In Large Numbers
November 20, 2017
November is American Diabetes Month. As the prevalence of the disease continues to rise across the state and nation, the number of Floridians with diabetes is expected to increase.
David Becker, a spokesman for the American Diabetes Association, says the latest numbers show 29 million Americans with diabetes, and the toll on health can be great, including kidney failure, blindness, amputations and more.
“There are a lot of co-morbid diseases as far as diabetes and cancer and heart disease,” he points out. “It all kind of is interrelating.”
Becker says about 95 percent of those people who have diabetes have Type 2, which healthier lifestyle choices with nutrition and physical activity can help prevent.
In Florida a little more than 1.7 million have diabetes, but that is expected to increase to nearly three million by 2030, according to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Becker notes that even some simple, small changes with healthy eating and regular exercise can yield big results. “If you lose just 7 percent of your body weight, you can decrease your chances of getting diabetes by 58 percent,” he stresses.
If the current trends don’t change, it’s estimated that by 2050, 30 percent of all Americans will have diabetes.
by The Florida News Connection
Judge Blasts State Prisons Over Hepatitis Care
November 20, 2017
In a scathing ruling issued Friday, a federal judge found that Florida corrections officials have a “long and sordid history” of failing to treat inmates infected with the Hepatitis C virus and ordered the state to immediately come up with a plan to properly provide care.
U.S. District Judge Mark Walker found that the Department of Corrections and its health care contractors had for years refused to treat infected inmates with antiviral medications, known as “direct acting antiviral” drugs, because of the cost.
Between 7,000 and 20,000 of the state’s 98,000 prisoners are believed to be infected with Hepatitis C, but only 13 have been treated with the antiviral drugs since 2013, and three of those who received the treatment were plaintiffs in the lawsuit, according to court documents.
The treatment, which originally cost up to $75,000 when first released in 2013, now costs about $37,000 for a 12-week regimen and cures the virus 95 percent of the time.
But in a harshly worded 32-page order, Walker wrote that cost is no excuse for not providing the treatment, scolding the agency for being “deliberately indifferent” to the medical needs of inmates, a violation of their constitutional rights.
“Preventable deaths from HCV (Hepatitis C virus) are occurring within the prison system,” he wrote.
Walker ordered the department to update its Hepatitis C treatment policy and to formulate a plan to implement the policy by screening, evaluating, and treating inmates in line with directions and timelines set out by its expert witness.
And he told the corrections agency to come up with the plan “with alacrity,” writing in the order that “this court will not tolerate further foot dragging.”
Michelle Glady, a Department of Corrections spokeswoman, said in an email that the agency has asked the Legislature for $19 million “to expand the treatment for inmates with Hepatitis C” and that it contracts with the firm Centurion “to provide comprehensive health services to all inmates in Florida.”
“FDC (the Florida Department of Corrections) is absolutely committed to ensuring all inmates in our custody are provided medically necessary treatment that is in line with national standards and our constitutional responsibilities,” Glady said in the email.
Hepatitis C is usually contracted through intravenous drug use but can also be transmitted through tattooing or blood transfusions. The disease causes liver scarring, which can significantly impair liver function and ultimately lead to death.
The lawsuit was filed in May by the Florida Justice Institute on behalf of three inmates and a class of others infected with the virus. Walker also certified the case as a class-action lawsuit on Friday.
“We are very pleased with Judge Walker’s order, and we hope that it will result in thousands of inmates getting much-needed treatment so they will not die,” Randall Berg, executive director of the institute, told The News Service of Florida on Friday.
Corrections officials maintained that the case was moot because they had made several changes to their policy about treating infected inmates since the lawsuit was filed.
But even the most-recent revision — finalized a week before a five-day hearing in the case last month — is inadequate, Walker found.
“FDC needs to clear up the loosey-goosey language in its treatment policy so that it can no longer hide behind the consequences of its own obfuscations,” Walker wrote in a footnote.
The department’s latest policy doesn’t guarantee that inmates will be screened or receive treatment quickly enough, Walker found, based on testimony from the corrections department’s own expert.
The judge gave the department until Dec. 1 to come up with a new plan and ordered the agency to “increase its capacity and outline a timetable for doing so” because agency officials have maintained they do not have enough staff to start screening all inmates who could be at the highest risk of having advanced liver disease due to Hepatitis C.
“This court has no doubt that without a court-ordered injunction, FDC is unlikely to treat inmates in a constitutionally appropriate manner,” Walker wrote.
In a footnote, Walker wrote that funding issues could excuse some delay, but not to this extent.
“For instance, if DAAs (direct acting antivirals) were released yesterday, this court would not expect FDC to wave a magic wand and suddenly treat thousands of inmates overnight,” he wrote. “But that is not the case. FDC has had since late 2013 to respond to this problem, and it has only just recently started doing what it should have done years ago.”
by Dara Kam, The News Service of Florida
Pictured: The Medical Classification Unit inside the Century Correctional Institution. NorthEscambia.com file photo, click to enlarge.
Cantonment Dollar General Robbed Saturday Night
November 19, 2017
The Escambia County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the Saturday night robbery of a Cantonment business.
The Dollar General on Highway 29 and North Tate School Road was robbed about 9:55 p.m. Multiple Escambia County deputies responded to the robbery, including a K-9 unit. There was no word of any arrests.
No injuries were reported.
Further details were not released by the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office.
NorthEscambia.com photos by Kristi Barbour, click to enlarge.
