Weather: Mostly sunny. Highs in the lower 90s. Northwest winds around 5 mph, becoming northeast around 5 mph in the afternoon. Monday Night: Mostly clear. Lows in the lower 70s. Southeast winds around 5 mph in the evening, becoming light and variable.
Today at the Editor’s Glance:
The Flagler County Commission meets in workshop at 9 a.m. at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell, to hear the final results of a beach-management study it commissioned last year. See the study summed up and analyzed here: “Study: Flagler’s Beaches Are Eroding Critically, and Will Cost County Alone $5 to $13 Million a Year to Slow.”
The three-member East Flagler Mosquito Control District Board meets at 10 a.m. at District Headquarters, 210 Airport Executive Drive, Palm Coast. Agendas are available here. District staff, commissioners and email addresses are here. The meetings are open to the public.
The Flagler County Commission meets at 5 p.m. at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell. Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly is presenting his budget, and arguing that the county is blocking the level of raises he is asking for for deputies. A show of force is expected, with deputies encouraged to attend and wear shirts made for the occasion. Commissioners are also expected to discuss the latest proposed compromise, and agree to a two-month extension, toward an eventual joint agreement with the school board and cities regarding developers’ and builders’ pre-payment of school impact fees in certain cases. See: “Solution in Sight in Months-Long Conflict Over School Construction as Halt to Big Developments Looms.” And commissioners will consider approving a $739,000 tourist development grant to Palm Coast. See: “Palm Coast Lands $739,000 Grant for Regional Recreation Center Through Tourism Council.”
The Republican Liberty Caucus of Flagler County hosts an open forum for all Flagler County School Board candidates in the Aug. 23 primary at 7 p.m. at Cattleman’s Hall at the Flagler County Fairgrounds, 150 Sawgrass Road in Bunnell, on Aug. 15. All seven candidates who have qualified are invited (not all have accepted), as are local media. The event is to be emceed by Alan Lowe, a Palm Coast City Council candidate, hosted by Taylor McCray, with a special appearance by Gerry James, a candidate for state Senate. All candidates will be allowed three minutes to introduce themselves and their platform, followed by about 40 minutes of questions from the moderator, and 30 minutes of questions from the audience.
Keep in Mind: The Flagler Youth Orchestra Strings Program, a special project of the Flagler County School District, is launching its eighteenth season. Visit the string program’s website at www.flagleryouthorchestra.org to enroll online. Enrollment is open now and until Sept. 14. An open house and information session will be held August 31 from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at the Flagler Auditorium, 5500 State Road 100, in Palm Coast. Flagler County’s public, private, charter and home-schooled students, 8 years old and older, may sign up to play violin, viola, cello, or double bass. Beginner, intermediate and advanced musicians are welcome. Tuition is free. Limited instrument scholarships are available. Students will learn about the enriching world of classical music and many other genres while receiving comprehensive string instruction in a player-friendly environment twice a week after school. One-hour classes are held at Indian Trails Middle School on Mondays and Wednesdays between 3:30 and 6:30 p.m., depending on your child’s time slot. Some scheduling restrictions apply. Attend the August 31st orientation at the Flagler Auditorium to learn more about the strings program and how to get started. For more information about the program, call (386)503-3808 or email [email protected].
Notably: We have Florida Man. But there is also Lebanon Man: on Aug. 11, Bassam al-Sheikh Hussain, a 42-year-old Lebanese man, walked into Federal Bank in Beirut’s Hamra district–his bank: he had $200,000 on deposit there–and held up the staff hostage for six hours, after he was refused a request to withdraw $2,000 of his own money. As the standoff developed, protesters gathered outside, to voice their support for Hussain. Lebanon never failed as a state even at the depth of its Civil War between 1975 and 1990. But it has failed since 2019, after a massive economic collapse brought on by its own leadership’s stunning corruption and mismanagement of the nation’s finances. Half the country’s people are living in poverty. Banks have refused to allow account-holders to withdraw money except on the banks’ terms, if even then. Hussain’s act was not a surprise, other than it took so long for such an act to be carried out. Negotiations finally led to an agreement. He would not be harmed. He would be allowed to withdraw $30,000 (he had asked for the full amount the bank owed him, the entirety of his cash deposit). He then turned himself in to police. He’s been in jail since, despite police pledges not to incarcerate him. He is now threatening to kill himself, and has gone on a hunger strike. He is increasingly the hero in a nation bereft of any.
Now this:
Flagler Beach Webcam:
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.
June 2025
Flagler Beach Farmers Market
Coffee With Flagler Beach Commission Chair Scott Spradley
Grace Community Food Pantry on Education Way
Pride Month Dance Party Rally on I-95 Overpass
Peps Art Walk Near Beachfront Grille
ESL Bible Studies for Intermediate and Advanced Students
Pride Month Finale Freedom Walk
Grace Community Food Pantry on Education Way
Palm Coast Farmers’ Market at European Village
Al-Anon Family Groups
For the full calendar, go here.
California, where earthquakes, droughts and wildfires have shaped life for generations, also faces the growing threat of another kind of calamity, one whose fury would be felt across the entire state. This one will come from the sky. According to new research, it will very likely take shape one winter in the Pacific, near Hawaii. No one knows exactly when, but from the vast expanse of tropical air around the Equator, atmospheric currents will pluck out a long tendril of water vapor and funnel it toward the West Coast. This vapor plume will be enormous, hundreds of miles wide and more than 1,200 miles long, and seething with ferocious winds. It will be carrying so much water that if you converted it all to liquid, its flow would be about 26 times what the Mississippi River discharges into the Gulf of Mexico at any given moment. When this torpedo of moisture reaches California, it will crash into the mountains and be forced upward. This will cool its payload of vapor and kick off weeks and waves of rain and snow. The superstorm that Californians have long feared will have begun…. this one would be worse than any in living memory.
–From “The Coming California Megastorm,” by Raymond Zhong, The New York Times, Aug. 12, 2022.
Laurel says
Could be.