Less than a month before the primary election he was desperately trying not to lose, Flagler County Commissioner Joe Mullins ballyhooed what he claimed would be a big win for the county: the impending sale of the former Sheriff’s Operations Center building in Bunnell, and its transformation into a much-needed in-patient treatment facility for people addicted to drugs or alcohol.
Mullins crashed David Ayres’s Free For All Fridays radio show to make the announcement live, and Ayers patched in the prospective buyer, Duke Vinson, who’d not long ago operated a high-end drug treatment facility in St. Augustine. That facility closed. Mullins could not contain his excitement, and Vinson said the building was under contract. (See: “Possible In-Patient Facility for Addicts in Place of Former Sheriff’s ‘Mold-Ops’ Raises Some Eyebrows.”)
Plenty of skepticism surrounded the announcement, not least because it Mullins headlining it. Mullins has a record of exaggerating or making things up. His re-election bid was in SOS mode, desperate for lifelines. But Vinson’s record was also checkered, his associations with various organizations no longer current.
The skepticism was warranted. The sale of the 36,000 square foot building has fallen through.
Listed as “under contract” until recently, it is no longer so. The sales price has been lowered from $3.95 million, when it was first listed, to $2.9 million.
Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly, who chairs the Public Safety Coordinating Council, relayed to the assembled members of the group at the end of this morning’s meeting a conversation he had with Palm Coast Mayor David Alfin, a Realtor, describing how the sale collapsed.
Alfin confirmed it this afternoon. “The buyer was my client,” he said.
“They thought originally it was ideal because of the way it was laid out,” he said. Tenant improvements had initially been estimated at $500,000. After more analysis, that figure tripled to $1.5 million to properly outfit the entire building. “That exceeded the financial model that this group was comfortable with. The bottom line was the building was just too big for their model and the return on investment,” Alfin said. But he said the buyers were also leery about the size of the facility: it is too large for their purposes.
The soundness of the building was not in question, Alfin said. The potential buyer had an air quality test done and it passed, “so there was no issue with the previous concern over the air quality,” Alfin said, “because the previous owner had done a significant amount of repair and renovation work to the building since it was vacated by the sheriff.” Vinson would have operated the facility, with backing from a financial group that specializes in this type of facilities. “That was the money,” Alfin said.
“It’s risky to promote a conclusion in advance of an actual hard money transaction,” Alfin said, a reference to the pre-mature promotion of the sale in July. “Most of these deals, they really take shape after a due diligence is completed and a significant prepayment goes hard, so there’s no return of those funds. Personally I wouldn’t promote a real estate transaction on the commercial side before there’s a hard money date.”
The bottom line was that the building would not be turned into a residential treatment center. The center, as Vinson and Mullins had described it, was expected to bring 50 to 100 jobs, but draw on patients wealthy enough to pay for the treatment–not on the uninsured or under-insured, and likely not on local residents.
The sheriff vacated the building in June 2018 after employees persistently complained of symptoms similar to those suffered by people who endure sick-building syndrome, and after several employees had asked for and were granted permission to work off site because of their symptoms, some of them severe. The sheriff relocated much of his operations to the county courthouse, pending the construction of a new operations center on Commerce Boulevard. That facility is expected to be completed soon.
While an in-patient treatment facility is “sorely needed,” Staly said this afternoon, “I was always skeptical that this facility would be safe for anyone, and so between the renovation cost to do that and make it into a treatment facility, it became cost prohibitive.” The sheriff still doubts the building can be made safe for long-term occupancy. “It may be safe if you’re in and out quick, but long-term, I don’t believe that building could be safe based on my experience.”
The old building off Moody Boulevard in Bunnell had once been a hospital. It was nicknamed “Mold-Ops” by sheriff’s personnel. Its history was another reason why the prospect of turning it in to an in-patient facility caused some surprise. Still, the proposed facility quickly won support by local governments, including Bunnell and the county, and from the sheriff, who has been pressing for more treatment options for years: the county jail is in effect the only de facto in-patient treatment facility in the county for males. SMA Healthcare runs Project Warm at what used to be the Vince Carter Sanctuary, near the jail, but that’s for young women.
“Based on that company’s model, it was never going to be for the uninsured or the under-insured. That company, their programs are all higher-end, private pay,” Carrie Baird, the CEO of Flagler Cares, said. “We definitely need more resources in the county for people who are uninsured.” Baird referred to the way the Vince Carter Sanctuary, on Justice Lane, the road leading to the county jail, had started as a private pay facility. It did not make it as such. “Someone who wants to pay $60,000 probably wants to be on the beach, not near the jail. But we definitely need more resources for the uninsured.”
Alfin, speaking as Palm Coast’s mayor, said he was “very disappointed because with the opioid and the overdose crisis we have in Flagler County, I thought this could fill a regional need very, very well.” Even if another facility may be in the works, “How many folks are doing to die in the next two to five years before that’s completed?”
Flagler County still intends to focus on developing a private-public partnership to build an in-patient drug-treatment facility for the uninsured and under-insured. Holly Albanese, the county’s legislative liaison, summed up the goal at a September workshop before the County Commission. “Our part in this would be providing the land, hopefully getting the money from the legislature to be able to build the facility,” Albanese said. SMA “would also look to the legislature to provide funding for operations for this new facility.”
It would be a 10,000 square-foot, 20-bed stabilization unit to treat substance abuse. It would accept “voluntary and involuntary clients,” meaning that it would take in patients referred by the courts. It would be for short-term stabilization until longer-term care is arranged elsewhere in the community. “The new treatment unit will also be structured with individual group, community based therapy,” including medical-assisted treatment, which uses medication to wean addicts from drugs.
“What we’re asking the legislature to do is provide $6 million to actually construct the facility,” Albanese said.
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Doug says
The political name in the title of this article said all we needed to know. Joe Mullins. Hopefully, he will move back to Georgia.
Realist says
Amen to that.
Keep Flagler Beautiful says
Thank God Almighty we got rid of that guy. Everything Mullins touched turned to…. yes, that.
Shady says
I do not like the fact the our Mayor and city council members all have their hands in some kind of real estate purchase. They are not putting the citizens of Palm Coast first.
Judy says
I agree!!! We shouldn’t have real estate brokers on our city council their deals may be done with an ulterior motive in mind
coyote says
Totally agree. Didn’t we have a flap a few years ago with Mayor Holland using her (non-government) business contacts to do some business for the City?
Now we have a realtor as a Mayor who admits that a politically-charged potential real estate sale involves ‘his client’?
Can you say Goose? Very good. Now say ‘Gander’.
Charles says
I agree with you, it appears Alfin is getting his hands into real estate deals while he is representing the City of PC, it sounds very shady to me and it needs to be looked at more seriously.
Denali says
Shady, Judy and Coyote; You all do realize that this is a county building which is not located in Palm Coast, don’t you? The city has nothing to do with what the county does with its property.
Wow says
Seconded. Isn’t that a clear conflict of interest?
Purveyor of Truth says
In the words of the late Gomer Pyle, “Surprise, surprise, surprise!”
America First 81 says
This was one of the BETTER Deals Mullins tried to make it happen! Now that Mullins lost the Primary Election; W’all Must Work hard to Remove Palm Coast’s Realtor(CONFLICT of INTEREST) Mayor with his CRAZY promotion of a Sports Complex! Time to RECALL the Palm Coast Mayor and STOP the CORRUPTION and CONFLICT of INTEREST in Palm Coast!
David S. says
He is nothing but a useless turd floating in a punch bowl. Get rid of him now please 🙏.
Jimbo99 says
All Mullins was doing was being a Flagler County fan boy. Is that such a horrible thing to be optimistic (perhaps overly optimistic is the worst descriptor that can be applied) & overjoyed at the good news ? The building was under contract, how is that Mullins fault the deal fell thru ? This is Alfin’s client ? We don’t know what that means exactly. Let’s see, the Fed raises interest rates, the repairs to the building are materially mis-stated by the self proclaimed experts at $ 500K instead of the real $ 1.5 million it will take as a cost overrun that not even 20+ months of Biden Inflation can explain away. Why did the St John’s/St Augustine center close down ?
Any one else just relieved that the Flagler County Tourist Center property was sold before the taxpayers overpaid on the land off A1A ? And now there’s going to be yet another boondoggle for a Sports Facility feasibility study of $ 114K.
c says
I think we should do a Feasibility Study as to whether or not Feasibility Studies are actually useful.
Blossom says
Mullins is a developer. Did you know that?
Keep Flagler Beautiful says
Not just a developer, but he purports to be a sports arena developer.
tulip says
The price of the building has now been reduced by about 1 million dollars? Maybe that’s the reason they were willing to sell it to an unstable buyer with a bad business history;. It sorta sounds like perhaps Alfin and Mullins were going to going to split a million between the two of them. And how much of the exact truth of the building’s problems were relayed to the so called buyer by Alfin as is required. I bet that was played down. Just my thought on the subject.
Pamela Andrews says
Again his dirt comes to light…
Let us not forget who brought him here, who stood by him, who filmed that piece with him, who raised a ton of money in a foodathon while recieving for food already yet stopped Access at Cattlemans Hall, and for those in the county with the highest food insecurities (West Side) get scraps and leftovers no one wants…and should be audited, and comply with a check and balance system… Silano
jmull has others in his court who needs to leave the state, or rather be held in state custody…
one day they will meet God, and Karma hard…
Pissed in PC says
So Mullins hooks the Mayor up with a fraud who’s facility in St. Augustine closed (probably for lack of rich clientele), the Mayor falls hook, line and sinker. Then the so called money people if there was really any pull out leaving Mullins and Alfin with egg on their face but Staly knew the guy was shady AF with his plan but said nothing. This city and county is so fucked up that they all need to be removed! Hey Mullins we’ll be at your house soon to pack your 💩 and send you on that midnight train back to Georgia.
Blossom says
Dear Pissed,
Betting you voted for this man without checking him out. Neither man got there by himself. The voters put them there. Stop asking your neighbors or the election workers whom to vote for. You would be amazed how many make decisions that way.
James says
I think one of the problems (with Palm Coast anyway) is that there really isn’t a community here. Half the folks that own property here are probably here two months out of the year (although I’m sure some of them claim to live here six for tax purposes). To them everything is fine… and of course it is, compared to where they’re coming from. But try living here 365 days a year, year in. year out… pretty tough. And then consider the folks that were born here… that’s why most leave, to make something of their lives elsewhere. Come to think of it, isn’t that the story everywhere?
Build more libraries… just my opinion.
David S. says
To Mr Pissed you said it right none of these clowns 🤡 need to be in office. I will supply the dog 🐕 shit and you the trailer. Yes haul them on the mid night trailer to China.
James says
In defense of Mullins… yeah, a crazy thought, I know… the man once said something to the effect that “this is Florida, this is how it’s always been.” He’s right folks… he might have been a disturbed, troubled man (and probably still is), but in that he was honest.
Stop whipping a dead horse and face the truth… this is the end of the line.
Pissed in PC says
I never voted for him. I’ve been here almost 12 years. I do my research and I’ve only voted in person once. I get the mail ballot so I can mark it while I’m researching each candidate then drop it in the drop box. I’m a far cry from uninformed.
Jonathan says
When I read Mullin and Alfin are involved with a real estate deal you can be sure sooner or later it will come out that it was a shady deal. Don’t trust either of them, they are out for themselves.
James says
“… Palm Coast Mayor David Alfin, a Realtor, …”
Should read… “Palm Coast Realtor-Mayor David Alfin,” just my opinion.
Don’t get me wrong, there are a few good realtors out there, but this guy is starting to put that whole profession to shame in my opinion.
Oh my...... says
The dude is broke so he don’t have the $$$ to put it together hence it’s failure!
Joe ya gotta go………
sick of it says
Realtors are like sleazy used car salesmen and don’t belong in any local government position. Ever!!