The Palm Coast City Council is embarking on an ambitious plan to explore and perhaps develop and finance, in a private-public partnership, an enormous sports complex on the west side of the yet-undeveloped city. A consultant encouraging the project is projecting rosy figures that would not mortgage tax dollars yet yield ample profits while drawing up to 250,000 athletes and spectators a year. The figures are speculative and do not easily stand up to scrutiny.
Backgrounders
Palm Coast Searches for Its New Attorney In the Open. School Board Chooses Secrecy.
The Palm Coast City Council and the Flagler County School Board are searching for new attorneys to represent them in two very different ways. The council is conducting its search entirely in the open, ensuring that all related documents are public, providing them on request, and interviewing the firms in open forum. The school board, in contrast with its own precedents and with all other local governments, possibly in violation of law, is not.
St. Mary Catholic Church in Korona, a Legacy of Immigrants, Is Listed on the National Register of Historic Places
The community of Korona’s St. Mary Catholic Church (also known as the St. Mary Mother Church) at 89 St. Mary’s Place in Bunnell was listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) on Jan. 25. The structure meets several NRHP requirements for historic significance including: architecture, ethnic heritage (European, Polish), and exploration/settlement. The very unique Shrine of Saint Christopher, a short distance north of the church, was also listed as a contributing resource.
7 Years in Prison for Unrepentant Man, 48, who Stalked and Solicited 14-Year-Old Girl, and Still Blames Her
Palm Coast’s Jerome Byron Malerba, 47, was sentenced to seven years in prison, two years on probation and a lifetime as a sex offender for luring and soliciting a girl starting when she was 13–when he offered her pot–and going on for 18 months. The judge used unusually strong language to describe Malerba as “creepy” and as a man who still blames the victim and covers himself in self-pity.
Palm Coast’s $13.7 Million Southern Recreation Center: A Facility Designed for Way More than Pickleball and Tennis
Between its gathering and lounging areas, its food concessions, its trailhead, dog park, community garden and other amenities, the most important thing you should know about Palm Coast’s new Southern Recreation Center is that you don’t have to be a tennis player or a pickleball player to go there. That’s why the emphasis on that happily open-ended word: Recreation. You can fill in your own kind of fun. Here’s a tour.
DOA: Behind the County’s Clumsy Push to Defund School Deputies
Whichever way you look at it, the Flagler County Commission’s and its administrator’s letter to the school district calling for a plan to defund the county’s portion of money for school deputies was clumsy, terribly timed, and an unnecessary invitation to political grandstanding in an election year. Deputies aren’t going anywhere, nor is the county’s funding. But nor should this be another invitation for the School Board to consider harebrained ideas like arming staffers.
Palm Coast Council Postpones Water Rate Increase in Face of Opposition, But Raises Utility Impact Fees on Builders
There will be no water and sewer rate increase in Palm Coast for now: the Palm Coast City Council today voted 4-1 to postpone a rate increase, while significantly raising “capacity,” or utility impact fees, the one-time levy on builders of new homes and businesses. That revenue is used to defray the cost of growth on the city’s utility infrastructure.
Palm Coast P-Section’s Last 35 Acres of Trees Leveled to Make Room for 74-Home ‘Ponce Preserve’ Gated Community
The 74-home gated community of Ponce Preserve will be built by in a 35-acre expanse–the last undisturbed expanse in the P-Section–between Point Pleasant Drive, Ponce de Leon Drive, Pony Express Drive and Port Royal Drive. Because it’s under 100 homes, the development did not need to go before either the planning board or the City Council.
Palm Coast Has No Money to Pave Your Neighborhood Streets. It’ll Apply a Cheap Sealant and Hope for the Best.
Facing a $10 million deficit in road repairs and no new revenue identified, the Palm Coast City Council approved a diminutive $1 million plan to “microsurface” 29 neighborhood roads and $2.7 million to resurface a few arterial roads. Microsrufacing is not traditional paving. It’s more like a tooth sealant, but for roads: cavities aren’t fixed. They’re covered up. The tentative approach points to the consequences of a council deferring infrastructure needs while rolling back the tax rate.
Flagler Beach Steps Back from Pushing Changes to Mayor’s Powers, Opting for Charter Review Instead
With a majority of city commissioners and the public speaking their skepticism about changing the make-up of the Flagler Beach City Commission, giving the mayor more voting or veto power, or changing the lengths and limits of commissioners’ terms, a proposal to go down that road appears to be teetering on the edge of a failing vote, if it comes to that. But it won’t.