News Archive

Santa Rosa County will hold a Board of County Commissioners meeting on Sept. 22 at 8:30 a.m. at the Santa Rosa County Administrative Building in Milton. The county calendar confirms the regular meeting for that date and time.

Damaged metal signposts are getting a second life as underwater microhabitat for marine life in Northwest Florida.

The “reef-cycling” initiative is the result of a collaboration between Escambia and Santa Rosa counties. According to Escambia County, the two counties are incorporating the signposts into concrete artificial reef modules as part of a pilot project.

Santa Rosa County has received a low bid of more than $8.3 million for the proposed Navarre Beach Boardwalk, a project that has dominated public comment at county meetings for nearly a month.

(By Jim Turner) Visit Florida President and CEO Bryan Griffin this week highlighted his staff’s work to keep tourism close to record numbers as travelers have been “tightening their belts.”

A recent report from the agency showed tourism was down 1.4 percent over the first half of the year compared with the same point in 2025, when the state handled about 74.5 million of its record 143.3 million visitors.

The grant finalists for IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area’s annual meeting have been announced.

The philanthropic women’s organization has selected 20 nonprofit organizations for 2026. According to IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area, 13 of the 20 finalists will receive a grant of $101,000 during the annual meeting. The meeting will be held Oct. 11.

On Tuesday, Sept. 8, at approximately 8:30 a.m., a storage tank on Hurlburt Field released fuel that found its way to a secondary containment system. While most of the fuel was recovered and placed into appropriate storage, around 10 to 25 gallons of residual fuel was found to have been released from the secondary containment into the base’s stormwater systems going toward Santa Rosa Sound.

This secondary fuel leak took place Sept. 10.

The First District Court of Appeal handed down a decision in the case of Romi White v. Holley-Navarre Water System on Thursday, Sept. 3.

According to the court document, the Circuit Court for Santa Rosa County’s decision, which was in favor of HNWS, was upheld. The official finding of the First District Court of Appeal was per curiam affirmed.

A group of citizens saw a need in their community and decided to do something about it.

The Navarre Urbanists, a citizens group founded last year to promote better infrastructure around Navarre, recently organized a trash cleanup in the ditch between Days Inn and the parking lot around Pizza Hut.

Florida residents will be receiving tax relief on firearms, ammunition and a range of hunting, fishing and camping supplies September through Dec. 31.

On Monday, Sept. 14, Gov. Ron DeSantis announced the start of Florida’s Second Amendment Sales Tax Holiday. This is the second year of the tax holiday.

The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLSHMV) is reporting a data breach of the state’s Driver and Vehicle Information Database, also known as DAVID.

The department learned of the breach Sept. 4. According to the department, the breach was contained quickly and originated from a Plant City Police Department user.