Today at the Editor’s glance: Weather: Sunny. Highs in the mid 70s. Monday Night: Partly cloudy. Lows in the upper 50s. Highs in the lower 80s. It’s the first day of spring.
In Court: It’s trial week for Circuit Judge Terence Perkins, with a few re-runs on the docket, among them Dan Priotti, a DUI case (three times within 10 years) that’s been continued more times than could be counted by most 1970s calculators, plus Matthew Hargwood (battery by strangulation, fleeing cops), and Kwentel Moultrie (first degree felony sexual battery). Keep in mind, this is the same Moultrie now accused of 2nd degree murder in the shooting death of Zaire Roberts at the end of 2021 in the R-Section. Moultrie didn’t shoot Roberts. He was allegedly conspiring with him to rob a drug dealer at the R-Section address. The drug dealer killed Roberts. But since Moultrie was accused of orchestrating the armed robbery, he now faces the second degree murder charge, as does Taylor Renee Manjarres. The sexual battery (in other words, rape) case of a 16 year old girl predates that. He’d bonded out on that charge. See: “Palm Coast Man Accused of Raping Girl, 16, Denies Having Sex With Her Despite DNA Evidence.” It is not usually a winning strategy for defendants to go up against DNA evidence, even when they have rationales that would make magical realists scratch their head. A civil trial is also on Judge Perkins’s docket. It’s likely that some of these cases will either be resolved before trial or continued.
The Flagler County Commission has a 2 p.m. workshop at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell, on its comprehensive plan, the development blueprint that lays out how and where the county sees itself growing. Comprehensive plans are intended to translate “smart growth” into development policy, and must be approved by state review. But the state has so weakened the oversight review that comprehensive plan have become little more than window dressing, as easily altered and amended as yesterday’s zoning change. The workshop is to update county commissioners on a procedural step required by the state every seven years. But it will little effect locally, with some exceptions: now that the state is beginning to take climate change seriously (it calls it “resilience,” because Gov. Rick Scott, Ron DeSantis and the Republican Legislature are like Galileo’s judges on heliocentrism: they will not accept that human-caused climate change is a problem, and will not name it such), “resilience” issues are becoming integrated in the comprehensive plan. And this morning School Board member Colleen Conklin posted this on her Facebook page: “Disappointed to learn that the county commission is entertaining and moving forward with threats to remove school concurrency from the county’s comprehensive plan because of our School Impact Fee proposal. Anyone concerned about overdevelopment in Flagler should be aware of what is happening. The current Comp Plan limits the county’s ability to approve development if there is limited capacity in our schools. TODAY at 2 they have a planning board workshop to present MAJOR changes to the comp plan. This was done with little to no forewarning.”
The Flagler County Commission meets at 5 p.m. at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell. It’s a busy agenda, rich in. controversies. The commission will hear the Eagle Lakes rezoning request, which was turned down by the Planning Board earlier this week and has drawn sharp opposition, not least from the Dance family, whose most famous current son, Andy Dance, serves on the County Commission. The Dance family once owned big swaths of what is now Eagle Lakes, and members of the family still live there. The commission will also con sider the latest, revised request from the school board to increase school impact fees, after a protracted and tortuous wrangle: the commission turned down the school board’s initial request to double the impact fees. In lesser portions of the agenda, it is National County Government Month, with a commemoration by Library Director and legislative liaison Holly Albanese (who will nevertheless be addressing an all-Republican commission bred and keen n anti-government rhetoric, but not irony, since the days of Reagan). Speaking of the library: Bernard Barczak is expected to be re-appointed to the Library Board of Trustees, as is Ryan Crab, but to the Tourist Development Council. The council is also expected to approve the $60,000 purchase of an “Emergency Management Field Operations Trailer” from Broward County (if the sheriff is to have his mobile command center, why not emergency management?), the $688,000 contract to repave Mala Compra Road, and a $4.6 million grant from the Florida Transportation Department to partially pay for T-hangars at the county airport. The T-hangar project, which the commission is also expected to approve, is valued at $6.2 million. Somehow, every one of these items just mentioned is in the so-called consent agenda, the portion of the agenda the commission approves wholesale, without discussion (unless commissioners or members of the public request that an item be pulled for broader discussion). The commission, with Andy Dance’s exception, is not known for getting in the weeds of policy and governance. The commission will also hear the first reading of a noise ordinance requested by the Sheriff’s Office. A previous iteration drew considerable opposition.
Notably: Twitter crtr Jack Dorsey tweetd for 1st x this day in 2006 (“just setting up my twttr”). Say no more, don’t break original 140-char. rule. Today is the United Nations’ International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The Florida Legislature, under its freedom agenda, may call a special session to declare it non-operative in the Sunshine State. More happily: It is Johan Sebastian Bach’s birthday.
Now this:
Matthew Broderick is 60 today:
The Live Calendar is a compendium of local and regional political, civic and cultural events. You can input your own calendar events directly onto the site as you wish them to appear (pending approval of course). To include your event in the Live Calendar, please fill out this form.
Flagler County School Board Workshop: Agenda Items
Flagler Beach Planning and Architectural Review Board
Palm Coast City Council Meeting
Bunnell Planning, Zoning and Appeals Board
Palm Coast Code Enforcement Board Meeting
Separation Chat: Open Discussion
The Circle of Light A Course in Miracles Study Group
Weekly Chess Club for Teens, Ages 9-18, at the Flagler County Public Library
Flagler County Republican Club Meeting
For the full calendar, go here.
“I do have a test today, that wasn’t bullshit. It’s on European Socialism. I’m not European, nor do I plan on being European, so who gives a crap if they’re socialists? It still wouldn’t change the fact that I don’t own a car.”
–From “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” (1986).
