Ellis Maurer loved sports and kids.
“He was the kind of guy who’d come in here with his case full of cards, ready to trade, and any kid who came in he’d ask, ‘Who’s your favorite team?’” remembered Mike Simpson, a co-owner of Northwest Florida Collectibles Show/Coins, Sportscards & Racing Collectibles in Gulf Breeze.
Tallahassee — With backing from Speaker Paul Renner, a House panel last week approved a bill that would lower the minimum age to buy rifles and other long guns in Florida from 21 to 18.
The bill (HB 1543) would reverse part of a 2018 law that set the minimum age at 21 after a gunman killed 17 students and faculty members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland. Nikolas Cruz, then 19, used a semi-automatic rifle to carry out the attack.
Developers plan to build a 16-story Hilton hotel/condominium building at 8469 Gulf Boulevard on Navarre Beach and, because the property’s lease is more than 40 years old, there apparently is very little Santa Rosa County can do about it.
The newest member of the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office K9 unit is named in honor of a longtime member of the agency.
Chief Deputy Joe McCurdy is retiring this summer after 33 years of service to the citizens of Santa Rosa County. In gratitude and recognition of McCurdy’s service, Sheriff Bob Johnson has named the new bloodhound Chief.
The family of a disabled boy is suing the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office, school board of Santa Rosa County, High Road School of Santa Rosa and multiple individuals for a December 2021 incident involving the Baker Acting of the then 8-year-old boy.
The lawsuit, filed Feb. 13 in the U.S. District Court in Pensacola, accuses David Daniels, a former school resource officer at High Road School of Santa Rosa, of unlawfully “manhandling, handcuffing and Baker Acting” the boy, who is referred to as “Little B” in the lawsuit.
Sam Parker apologized Thursday for using an ethnic slur attracting international attention while critics continue calling for his resignation from the Santa Rosa County Board of County Commissioners.
At the District One Medical Examiner Services (DOMES) board’s meeting in December, legislative funding for a new facility was a big topic of concern. Dan Schebler, director of operations for DOMES, proposed taking the interlocal agreement the counties had put to the wayside and bringing it forward to Northwest Florida’s legislators with a $3 million buy-in from each county as had been discussed in July 2022.
Over the past couple of months since that meeting, the DOMES board has met monthly to try and hammer out a plan for the upcoming legislative session, which is set to begin March 7. The legislative session is important as DOMES is looking for matching state funding for a proposed facility in Santa Rosa County.
On March 1, the DOMES board met to decide what the interlocal agreement would look like and who would be a part of it. They also discussed potential changes to the size and scope of a new facility.
Florida Highway Patrol and others responded Saturday, March 4, to the Navarre Beach Bridge after a 28-year-old Panama City man jumped off the east side of the bridge.
According to a FHP report, shortly before 2 p.m., a trooper was dispatched to a crash on the Navarre Beach Bridge. When the trooper arrived on scene, a male subject was driving a U-Haul in the southbound lane and allowed it to travel into the northbound lane. When his vehicle reached the top of the bridge, the driver exited the vehicle while it was still in motion and ran to the side of the bridge and jumped off.
