Increasingly troubled by a perceived if amorphous failure of communication between the city and residents, the Flagler Beach City Commission considered then rejected the possibility of contracting with a local Realtor to run a city-related website, then opted to develop a new Facebook page and launch a new app on Monday.
Flagler, Palm Coast & Other Local News
Dad’s Alert Over His Son’s Gun Thefts Leads to Arrest of Boys, 15 and 16, Before Confrontation
A 15-year-old and a 16-year-old resident of Palm Coast were arrested on grand theft and other charges after allegedly stealing two firearms in a plan to intimidate or fight other juveniles at Holland Park in Palm Coast. The posturing preceding the boys’ arrests was similar to incidents that led to the shooting deaths of five teens in Palm Coast and Bunnell since 2019.
Mysterious Boom Reported Thursday Night Across Flagler Attributed to a Possible Meteorite
Palm Coast and Flagler County residents were abuzz with reports of a mysterious boom heard across parts of the county at 11:15 p.m. Thursday night. There were also unconfirmed reports of a fireball spotted in St. Johns County around the same time.
‘You’re Killing My Husband,’ Flagler Beach City Manager Whitson’s Wife Tells Commission
Becky Whitson, Flagler Beach City Manager William Whitson’s wife, publicly accused the city commission of tormenting and killing her husband. She spoke late this evening during a workshop on the city administration’s communications with the public, and on meeting the commission’s priorities.
Brother and Sister Face Several Felony Charges in Beating and Hit-and-Run at Wickline Park
Gabriella Hope Alo, 18, and her brother Nicholas Dean Alo, 21, face several felony charges stemming from an alleged beating of a teen-age boy, running over a 29-year-old woman and leaving the scene at Wickline Park in Flagler Beach last week.
‘Unbossed’ Spirit of Shirley Chisholm, Former Palm Coast Resident, Takes the Stage at AACS
“Unbought & Unbowed” is a one-woman show starring New York actor Ingrid Griffith in the role of Shirley Chisholm, who made history as the first woman to run for president from a major party, and who lived some of her last years in Palm Coast. The play is staged at the African American Cultural Society Saturday and Sunday.
Custodial Services’ Renee Berry and Matanzas Math Teacher Lee Winfree Win District’s Top Honors
Renee Berry, the Custodial Services department secretary, was named the Flagler County School District Employee of the Year, and Lee Winfree, a math teacher at Matanzas High School, was named the District Teacher of the Year at the annual celebration at Flagler Auditorium Wednesday evening.
In a First in Flagler, Sheriff Goes Civil Route to Evict Repeat Drug Offenders in Mondex
For the first time in the county, the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office invoked a civil nuisance abatement law to evict a homeowner from a homesteaded property that had been used “to facilitate criminal activity,” including drug use and sales, according to the judge’s order granting the eviction.
DeSantis Administration Wanted ‘Mental Examination’ of 12-Year-Olds Suing Over Trans Rights
Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is asking a federal judge for permission to perform “mental examinations” on a pair of 12-year-olds who are plaintiffs in a challenge to a state rule preventing Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming care for transgender people.
Cramped and Neglected Flagler Health Department Tells County Commission: ‘We Need Your Help’
The Flagler County Health Department is pleading with county commissioners for more money to improve an ageing facility and expand services that touch the lives of a third of the county’s population. The department hopes to open a facility in Palm Coast. While commissioners are not indifferent, finding a source of money will be a challenge.
In Bunnell, Rogers and Gordon and, Finally, Pete Young All Elected Without Opposition
Commissioner John Rogers was re-elected for his fifth term, uncontested for the first time. Incumbent Commissioner Tonya Gordon ran in the special election to fill the seat Bob Barnes vacated last year, what will be a two-year term.
Flagler School District Will Ask Its Employees: Do You Want to Be Armed on Campus?
The Flagler County school district will survey its 1,600 employees to gauge whether there’s interest among them to be armed in the district’s nine campuses. The survey will not ask whether employees support or oppose such a program–only whether the individual taking the survey is himself or herself interested in being armed on campus, and providing security in case of an emergency.
Palm Coast Council Very Conditionally Approves Controversial Harborside Development
The Palm Coast City Council is looking for a compromise on the controversial 17-acre Harborside proposal that would total 432 apartments and housing units, mostly in a massive, U-shaped tower by the Palm Coast Marina. The number includes 72 units in an existing tower.
Jordan Munoz, 21, Faces Felony Charge After Firing a Gun During an Argument in Palm Coast’s Woodlands
Jordan Munoz, a 21-year-old resident of 20 Blackwell Place in Palm Coast, was booked at the Flagler County jail last week on a felony charge of aggravated assault and two lesser charges after allegedly firing his gun in the open air during an argument with his girlfriend outside the house on Blackwell, a heavily residential area in the Woodlands.
Florida Press Club Names FlaglerLive State’s Best Independent News Site, Among 3 Awards
FlaglerLive won the Florida Press Club’s top award as Florida’s best online independent news site in all divisions. FlaglerLive also won first place in education reporting, and FlaglerLive Editor Pierre Tristam won second place in commentary.
Jersey Mike’s Opens at Palm Coast’s Island Walk, Near Brass Tap, on Wednesday
Jersey Mike’s Subs will open its first location in Palm Coast or Flagler County on Wednesday at Island Walk, where it’ll be sandwiched between Brass Tap and Tropical Cafe on one side and Metro Diner on the other.
Emerging Romantics: The Rickman-Acree-Corporon Piano Trio Takes on 3 Giants Jan. 29
The Rickman-Acree-Corporon Piano Trio will play the music of Clara Schumann, Franz Schubert and Johann N. Hummel during its concert at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 29, at Lighthouse Christ Presbyterian Church, 1035 W. Granada Blvd., Ormond Beach. The trio includes pianist Michael Rickman, violinist Susan Pitard Acree and cellist Joseph Corporon.
3 FPC Student Athletes Among 5 Injured in T-Bone Crash at Pine Grove and Belle Terre Parkway
Five people were injured, at least three seriously, in a t-bone crash at the intersection of Pine Grove Drive and Belle Terre Parkway in Palm Coast minutes after 3 p.m. today.
Divided Flagler Beach Commission Will Require Inspections of Street Golf Carts Every 2 Years
A divided Flagler Beach City Commission agreed Thursday evening to change the frequency of required inspections of golf carts used as street vehicles from every year to every two years. Some commissioners and the mayor wanted only one inspection, and none after that. The city has a few hundred residents using golf carts as street vehicles.
Storied Ukrainian Orchestra Picks Flagler Auditorium as Rehearsal Venue Ahead of 37-City Tour, to FYO Thrills
The Lviv National Philharmonic Orchestra of Ukraine and its conductor, Theodore Kuchar, a frequent visitor to Palm Coast, chose the Flagler Auditorium to rehearse Thursday ahead of a 37-concert, 20-state tour that begins this evening, and opened their doors to Flagler Youth Orchestra students for the unique experience of watching a professional orchestra at work.
Army Corps Must Redesign Entire Flagler Beach Dunes Project, ‘Substantially’ Delaying It Again
Because of years of delays and further erosion, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers must redesign the entire project to rebuild 2.6 miles of dunes on the critically eroded shoreline south of the Flagler Beach pier, now that the current design is out of date. That will further delay for at least a year or more a project 20 years in the works. Meanwhile, the coast continues to erode, threatening or damaging A1A.
Jacob Perry, Who Shot Up His Grandfather’s House, Invokes Scriptures and Being ‘Chosen’
Jacob Perry, 24, faces five felony charges following his admitted shooting at his grandfather’s car and house on Tuesday in Palm Coast. He cited a chapter from Isaiah in the Old Testament, telling deputies they could understand a lot about him from it. That may raising questions about his competency.
Palm Coast Traffic Still a Long Way from Calming Its Discontents as Council Bumps Against Limitations
The Palm Coast City Council has been well aware of its traffic problem for years, and discussed it again at a workshop this week, but it faces the same limitations previous council have: traffic calming devices are unloved, data on speeding exists but isn’t made public, and the city’s layout presents its own challenges.
Taking the Edge Off, ‘Honky Tonk Angels’ Countrify City Repertory Theatre
In a bit of a departure for Palm Coast’s City Repertory Theatre, this musical features three women with Southern roots, who are variously bored or frustrated or antsy about their lives, and who decide to pursue their country music dreams in Nashville, and they meet and take up singing at a bar appropriately named Honky Tonk Heaven.
As Green Lion Closes and Loopers Winds Up, Food Trucks Will Fill Cravings’ Gap
Two food trucks will rotate service over the next few weeks at Palm Harbor Golf Club as the Green Lion Cafe ends operations on Sunday and Loopers, the new restaurant and bar taking its place, ramps up operations, first with a significant amount of renovations.
In ‘Extremely Rare’ Event, Killer Whale Beaches and Dies in Surf Near Hammock Dunes Club
A killer whale was found beached at dawn this morning in the surf opposite Hammock Dunes Club. The female orca was dead. It was being transferred to SeaWorld in Orlando for a necropsy.
Shooting On Palm Coast’s Farnum Lane Results in Arrest of 24-Year-Old Grandson of Resident
In a matter of 60 minutes late this afternoon, Flagler County Sheriff’s units got the report of a shooting in the F-Section and a suspect on the loose. They set chase by ground and air. By 5 p.m., they had the suspect in custody–the 24-year-old grandson of the man living at the property he’d allegedly shot up.
Palm Coast Surveys Cost of Dredging Saltwater Canals, But Who Will Pay Is Big Question
The saltwater canals in Palm Coast’s C-Section and a sliver of the F-Section have been an attractive amenity since the city’s origins in the 1960s and 70s, when ITT Levitt dug them out. But they’ve never been dredged since. Who should pay for the job–residents of the C Section, or all of Palm Coast’s residents?
One Term In, Flagler Beach Commissioner Ken Bryan Decides to Pull Out of Re-Election Run After All
Ken Bryan, a one term Flagler Beach city commissioner and currently the chairman of the panel, has decided not to seek re-election after all. His decision still leaves five candidates, including incumbent Deborah Phillips, running for the two seats in the March 7 election.
Judicial Nominating Commission Begins Process to Fill County and Circuit Judgeship
The Judicial Nominating Commission for the Seventh Judicial Circuit that includes Flagler County will map the process that will lead to the nomination of candidates to fill two judgeships that have come open in the circuit: a circuit judgeship in Volusia, after the retirement of Margaret Hudson, and a county judgeship in Putnam, after the elevation of Joe Boatman.
Flagler County Approves Latest ‘Band-Aid’ in $14 Million-Worth of Emergency Dune Repairs
The county will rebuild only six miles of Flagler County’s dune-less 18-mile shoreline. The millions of dollars will rebuild the same kind of narrow, emergency dunes that the county rebuilt in the aftermath of Hurricanes Matthew and Irma, in 2018–sands that, by last year, had entirely washed away. The county engineer says it’s still all just a “band aid” approach.
Bunnell Man Faces Felony Charge Over Stoning a Puppy With a Paver
John Benning, a 56-year-old resident of Tangerine Avenue in Daytona North, was booked at the Flagler County jail for the second time in a month over the weekend, this time on a felony animal abuse charge after allegedly throwing a paver at a puppy out of anger, injuring the dog.
Maga Insurrection 2.0
Florida’s Matt Gaetz and his maga-hatted contras reenacted the Jan. 6 insurrection by other means this week. This insurrection is from within. It’s just starting. They’re about destruction, not achieving the country, their mentality comparable only to the psyche of the suicide bomber.
Rob Smith and Flagler Beach Take an Environmental Stewardship Award for ‘Big Blue,’ the Glass Recycling Crusher
Flagler Beach’s “Big Blue” recycling program, created by Sanitation Director Rob Smith, won the stewardship award from the Northeast Florida Regional Council.
Court Running Out of Patience With Sex-Offender Probationer Who Keeps Violating Rules
Bryan Lemus was spared prison three years ago after a plea deal that reduced charges of molesting a minor to child abuse. He was sentenced to probation, but has since violated his probation twice, the last time in December after violating a prohibition on using social media to exchange explicit images with a woman.
DOT Will Seek Public Input on More Permanent Protection for A1A, But Options Are Limited
After two months of closed-door sessions involving state, federal and local officials on how to more permanently secure State Road A1A in Flagler and Volusia counties from storm damage and rising seas, the Florida Department of Transportation will seek public input in two sessions later this month–one in Flagler Beach, one in Volusia County, and present a half dozen options or so.
Brenan Hill Now Faces Murder Charge as Savannah Gonzalez, Victim in Microtel Shooting, Dies
Brenan Hill now faces a second-degree murder charge in the shooting of Savannah Gonzalez near the Microtel in Palm Coast in March 2021. The State Attorney’s Office today filed the new charge. Hill is scheduled for an August trial.
Ex-Palm Coast Doctor Facing Rape and Deceit Allegations Says He Was Never Served
A year and a half after a civil lawsuit was filed against him, claiming he deceived, drugged and raped a woman at a condo in Palm Coast, Dr. Gerard Abate says he was never served. A judge will decide whether Abate or a process server are telling the truth at a hearing next week.
Flagler Jail Eliminates All Hard-Copy Mail to Inmates as Scanning and Tablets Replace Paper
All hard-copy mail delivery to the Flagler County jail’s 225-some inmates has been replaced by scans of mail. It is part of a sweeping change in the handling of inmate mail across the state at least 14 other states as prisons and jails cut down on incoming materials. The switch has drawn sharp criticism from prisoner advocates and strong support by those implementing it, as in Flagler.
In Putnam, a 38-Year-Old Man Is Sentenced to Die, Again, and a 21 Year Old Will Serve Life in Prison
Timothy Wayne Fletcher, 38, was sentenced to die at the state’s hand for the murder of his stepgrandmother Helen Googe in 2009. Anthony Foxx will serve life in prison without parole with the stabbing death of his Ayana Belton, who was 16.
A Defendant Says he’s Going to Prison for Doing What His Domestic Violence Classes Told Him to Do
Leon Marcus Criswell was sentenced to 17 months in state prison in a domestic battery case, but he says his case was aggravated because he did just what his counselors in domestic violence classes taught him to do: he sped away from what he saw as trouble before it got physical.
Divided Appeals Court Rejects Protection for Transgender Bathroom Use in St. Johns School Case
After a five-year legal battle, and reversing a lower court ruling, a sharply divided federal appeals court upheld a St. Johns County School Board policy that prevented a transgender male student from using boys’ bathrooms at a high school.
American Impressions 9 | South Dakota: Crazy
For the Sioux of South Dakota it’s been a tragic, unresolved legacy of exploitation in the Black Hills. The rape of the mountains by gold and uranium prospectors was followed by the carving of Mount Rushmore and, for the past 75 years, the ongoing desecration of the hills in the name of Crazy Horse–what was to be the largest sculpture in the world, but has turned into a lucrative tourist trap.
American Impressions 8 | North Dakota: A Life in Missiles
Virginia Lillico and her family spent their life in their homestead on land in the shadow of an ICBM missile silo in North Dakota at the height of the cold war and beyond. She never took safeguards seriously, thinking it was pointless.
Man Dies in Single-Vehicle Crash on I-95, North of Palm Coast Parkway
A 29-year-old man died in a single-vehicle crash when his SUV veered into the wood-line on I-95, a mile north of Palm Coast Parkway, Sunday morning.
American Impressions 7 | Montana: Ghost of the Prairie
It rises from wild grasses in Montana’s Golden Triangle, at the western extremity of the Great Plains, a massive hulk of concrete that makes no sense, that is as out of place as could be, and that will be there for thousands of years. It is a ghostly monument to the follies of the nuclear age.
Collin Calvert, 21, Charged with Mobil Station Armed Robbery in Palm Coast, Plus 8 Volusia Charges
Collin Ray Calvert, a 21-year-old resident of Tropical Drive in Ormond Beach, was charged on Friday with first degree armed robbery in connection with a Dec. 19 incident at the Mobil gas station on Pine Lakes Parkway in Palm Coast. He also faces grand theft, armed burglary and other charges in Volusia County, where he is jailed.
Jacob Oliva Is Headed to Arkansas to be Gov. Huckabee’s Education Secretary
Jacob Oliva, a senior chancellor at the Florida Department of Education and a former Flagler County superintendent who maintains family ties locally, will be the next Arkansas secretary of education in incoming Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’s administration.
American Impressions 6 | Montana: Backtracking Lewis and Clark
Lewis and Clark traveled the longest distances of any state in Montana. Backtracking their trail is an exercise in contrasts: Indian voices could now be heard as they couldn’t then, but so can those of Lewis and Clark, vividly, wonderfully and sometimes disturbingly, while the landscape has either been remade or remains as intact as it was then.
American Impressions 5 | Alaska Highway
The endless Alaska Highway is a famed road shrouded in impossible isolation and amnesia, where boundaries disappear into a twilight zone of the beautiful and the bizarre. It is an endless wormhole where the unexpected and the sublime are so common that they become monotonous, where the emptiness is so complete that you can feel like the last person on earth.
