Mealy and Newcomer Sherman Win in Flagler Beach, Incumbents Barnes and Schultz Win in Bunnell

In Flagler Beach, long-time Commissioner Jane Mealy, one of the city’s more popular elected officials for over a decade and a half, again won handily, taking 37 percent of the vote. James Sherman, at 36 the youngest member of a commission whose average age was 65, was second, with 32 percent. The top two vote-getters were elected. Belhumeur polled just over 30 percent.

In Bunnell, Bob Barnes was the leading vote-getter with 43 percent of the vote, with Tina-Marie Schultz also winning re-election, with 31 percent. Young, the recently retired Florida Highway Patrol trooper and long-time Bunnell resident, who had approached the race with more confidence than campaigning, was a distant third, at 26 percent.

Turnout was brisk in Flagler Beach, with voters at one point having to cue up several voters deep, at least early in the morning. It was not at all brisk in Bunnell, where the move of the voting location from the usual old coquina City Hall location  to the Carver Center (or Carver Gym) on East Drain Street took its toll, whether because of people’s prejudices against South Bunnell (the predominantly Black neighborhood), a little extra laziness, or confusion.

Two hours into voting, 93 people had turned up in Flagler Beach, just 20 had turned up in Bunnell. The same proportion held with just a few minutes of voting time left on Election Day: Flagler Beach had drawn 527 in-person voters, Bunnell just 155. Flagler Beach also drew almost four times more mail-in ballots: 824 to Bunnell’s 284.




The two cities have a combined 7,053 registered voters, about two-thirds of those in Flagler Beach. Historically, turnout has been notably higher in Flagler Beach than in Bunnell, whether in municipal, state or national elections, though that’s beginning to change somewhat as Grand Reserve, the mammoth development in Bunnell, begins to influence the city’s demographics–and politics.

The old City Hall location was not available because of mold issues there. “This was a close-by location and it’s county-owned buildings, so that works out, and it’s actually really nice inside, it’s a fine location,” Supervisor of Elections Kaiti Lenhart said of the Carver Center. There’s ample parking, its quiet, it’s not hampered by heavy vehicle traffic. “I know that we’ve gotten some complaints from voters that were concerned about voting here, but so far today, everything’s been fine.” Someone had been making donuts with his car earlier in the parking lot, but that was quickly taken care of. So what were the concerns? “They didn’t want to have to come down I guess into this area of Bunnell. I don’t really understand it,” Lenhart said. “It’s less than a half mile from their polling site. So it doesn’t make any sense to me, honestly.”

In Flagler Beach, voting took place as it always does in municipal elections, in the commission chambers at City Hall. Candidates lined South Central Avenue, some with their volunteers.

Mealy, among the sharpest elected officials in the county, was her usual, quietly self-assured self. She was first elected in 2006. She is not getting tired of it, even now with a soured political climate. “With all the negativity that there is all over, I don’t feel it here at all, except on the weekend,” she said, nodding her head in the direction of the corner of State Road A1A and Old Moody Boulevard: that’s where on most weekends that band of bothers gathers with tawdry anti-Biden signs inspired by fealty to the Trump cult. City officials have had many discussions about those gatherings, apparently by people from across the bridge or elsewhere who nevertheless keep giving Flagler Beach a black eye weekend after weekend. But their obscenities are protected by the First Amendment.




It’s a different story on the city commission. “We obviously get along with each other. Whoever wins I think will be good for the city. I still like doing it, I still think I have a good amount to offer for the city,” Mealy said. The oasis of civility endures in Flagler Beach, Mealy said, is because “I truly believe that we are all not political people. We’re not associated with parties openly, and I think that helps. We don’t owe allegiance to a national group, and I think that helps–or a city, or local level, and I think that helps, so we can focus on what’s good for the people of Flagler Beach and not what’s good for the Democratic Party or the Republican Party.”

But the commissioners in Flagler Beach–and the commissioners in Bunnell–are the wonkish, nuts-and-bolts type of commissioners (for the most part, anyway) who like to get in the thick of policy analysis and deconstruct their meeting materials, none more so than Mealy: even 16 years into her uninterrupted tenure, or maybe because of that long tenure, she still spent about eight hours studying the coming Thursday meeting agenda. Sometimes it takes more than a day to go through it, in preparation.

Mealy’s goals over the next three years? a renewed focus on code enforcement, getting a new pier built, the dunes reconstruction project first talked about a decade and a half ago, done, and “I want to see the golf course being run like a golf course is supposed to be run.” That was a reference to the Ocean Palms Golf Club, whose relationship with the city has been troubled for years. The golf course’s management company director, Belle McManus, and the commission are expected to have a head to head meeting on Thursday. (See: “Ultimatum from Flagler Beach, Husband in Prison: Ocean Palm Golf’s Unintended Owner Tells Her Story.”)

Sherman had brought a cooler with soft drinks and water and a few snacks for volunteers. He projected the same self-assurance and cheer he had in interviews or at a campaign forum. “The people here in Flagler Beach were very embracive to me,” he said. “I’m a little bit on the younger side, trying to bring a fresh perspective and a new energy to the commission.” He’d gone door to door a few times, was interviewed on two radio stations and a podcast.

He appreciated the relative civility of the campaign. “All three of us have a deep love for this community and want to serve and give back. Each one of us has our own story of what Flagler Beach means to them and why we all want to give back to this community,” Sherman said.

He had an ace in his corner, the ace who helped get Suzie Johnston elected Flagler Beach mayor last year, and who helped Milissa Holland get re-elected Palm Coast mayor in 2020.

“James Sherman is of my children’s generation. I’m big on this,” Gail Wadsworth, the former, long-time Flagler County Clerk of Court and a Flagler Beach resident, said, as she held a Sherman sign near City Hall this morning. “I really truly want younger people to take office while they have those of us around who’ve been there, to mentor them. How do you ask a question of Gail Wadsworth if she’s been in office till she’s 94? You don’t, because so many people die in office. So I  really believe it’s this generation’s turn to pick up the ball and follow. They have us around to day: how did you do this?”




Sherman’s ideas, Wadsworth said, “are a lot like mine. Let’s keep the city, not let anyone take advantage of the city. But make it a place that is friendly to all generations.” (She wouldn’t mind a sidewalk in front of her house, to stop people from running over sprinkler systems up and down the road.)

Belhumeur sat amid a small forest of yellow and black Belhumeur signs, some of them repeating the “Extravagant Spending” line that sent fellow-Commissioner Ken Bryan on a sharp soliloque at the last commission meeting against Belhumeur’s claim, without naming him. (See: “In Unusual Break with Meeting Customs, a Flagler Beach Commissioner Blasts Another Over Campaign Claims.”)

“I’m just being myself,” Belhumeur, who was first elected in an uncontested election six years ago, said. “I figure that’s good enough. I’m not going to try and change somebody’s mind with gimmicks or anything like that. I’m just trying to raise awareness that I’d be one to address some things going on.”

Belhumeur wasn’t worried about losing. He had a plan, even in loss. “I doubt that I would disappear,” Belhumeur said. “I would certainly stay involved. Sometimes people barking at the podium can do more than I can on the commission. You know, I go way back before my first election, bringing up issues that I feel are overbearing on the residents.” Belhumeur’s father, who died in 2010, had been a city commissioner, though it wasn’t well after that that Belhumeur himself developed his interest in city issues. His son, who lives in maryland, had traveled down to help with the election, holding signs this morning before City Hall. He was due home back in Maryland tonight.

Bob Barnes was the only one of the three Bunnell candidates present at the Carver location this morning. Schultz had to work. Young, who retired on Jan. 1 from FHP, was never intent on too much campaigning. Barnes, relaxed and soft-spoken, as he usually is at commission meetings, spoke as his fellow-candidates would in both elections, complimenting rather than castigating: “We have good candidates. We have good people on the commission,” he said. “I think we’re pretty fortunate. We don’t have a lot of the divisiveness that you see in other places, so we can still have a discussion and still be civil.”

That said, he’s intent on seeing the city focus on infrastructure improvements and handling the expected growth ahead, some of it in Bunnell. “I think you’re going to see some development moving out toward the west,” he said. “I think very clearly the city is poised to start to develop and when we develop, we want to make sure that we put the foundation in place so that we can develop correctly. And we want to look at a mix of commercial and residential. We want to make sure that it really is ready for the growth, and then we can handle whatever’s coming in from an infrastructure standpoint. We’re not there today.”

Barnes and Schultz had been appointed to the commission when former Commissioners Bill Baxley and Donnie Nobles resigned, Baxley to move to New Hampshire, Nobles due to health issues. It was Barnes’s first competitive race, but not Schultz’s, who had run for city commission previously. Barnes works for the Federal Aviation Administration, running an office called the run an office called the Transport Aircraft Evaluation Group.

2022 Bunnell and Flagler Beach Election: Final Results

Candidate and Race	Votes	Percent
Bunnell City Commission
Robert Edward Barnes	277	42.75
Tina Marie Schultz	202	31.17
Pete G. Young	169	26.08
Flagler Beach City Commissioner
Rick Bellhumeur	691	30.39
Jane Mealy	847	37.25
James Sherman	736	32.37