“Spotlight” winning best picture this week at the Oscars is a testament to the hard work of local investigative reporting that should be occurring everywhere. We know we are committed to the calling of investigative journalism at Navarre Press. If you see people squirming after a story it’s because we have hit a nerve. And, we saw them squirm on social media this week. We appreciate investigative journalism and feel it is our responsibility even though it involves a lot of time and effort – and we get a lot of grief. However, we are very responsible with the information we gather. We have been told on several occasions that we uncovered more than the subjects of our articles even knew themselves.
The Destin Fort Walton Beach Airport welcomes Allegiant to the airport. They are now offering nonstop service to St. Louis and Cincinnati. Visit www.FlyVPS.com for more information.
The Presidential Preference Primary Election will be held on March 15th. Absentee ballots are now available. Any registered and qualified voter may vote an absentee ballot. In addition, all members of the Armed Forces, their family members and members of the Merchant Marine and their family members, who are U.S. citizens, may vote absentee. For more information on overseas absentee voters (UOCAVA), please visit the Federal Voting Assistance Program website at www.fvap.gov.
Tonight (Thursday) is the Girls’ Basketball Regional Quarter Finals and they are being held at Navarre High School. When they win…they will play Tuesday either Niceville or Lincoln, depending on the outcome of their games tonight. If for some reason the unforeseen happens – then they will have had a great season otherwise.
This weekend starts the Mardi Gras festivities in Navarre. Friday night Juana’s will have a Mardi Gras Glow Party beginning at 9 p.m. and $5 gets you “Glow Bling.” For more information, see their ad in this issue. Don’t miss the after-parade party at Juana’s.
This Saturday at 9 a.m. is the Health and Business Expo at the Navarre Conference Center. This is free and open to the public. The expo includes health screenings, a blood drive, door prizes and much more. See our Mind, Body & Spirit section of the paper for more details including great content and information on the layout of the expo and vendor names.
Water board elections are upon us and every year we have people call us with a lot of questions. What looks like a ballot with your water bill is not a ballot. It is a proxy. Basically, if you sign your proxy and bring it to the water department or mail it – you are giving away your vote to the board member you select. To actually vote, you need to show up at the Holley Navarre Water System on Jan. 19 between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. and vote in person. You cannot phone it in or consider that ballot an absentee ballot – because it isn’t. It is very confusing and has been for more than 20 years. However, several board members felt that it was more confusing to make this an absentee ballot or a directed proxy – where you could vote for whomever you wanted to vote for without showing up on Jan. 19. Let’s just say Daryl Lynchard and Troy Bossier considers you – to be smart enough to handle a change for the better. The others – think you can’t handle it. So, the board pushed it off to next year – again. There is still no mechanism in place to prove the person who gave away their proxy is in fact the correct individual and a bonafide HNWS member and has the right to assign the proxy. Though they discussed adding safeguards to the process, what is redundant is that you or someone else not authorized repeatedly gives their vote away.
The Navarre YMCA wants to help with your New Year’s resolution. Take advantage of their January “Pay the Day” promotion and get a discounted Joiners Fee. Pay the day works by – paying the day. The paper comes out on Jan. 7 – therefore it would only cost you a $7 joiner’s fee. If you wait until tomorrow – it will be $8. That is a great deal – and the YMCA is a great place to work out or take a fitness class. You may want to refer to our articles this week on the Healthy Living Pages 4C and 5C to help get you started healthfully on your new year. We did this with you in mind!
I found out a very valuable piece of information that I would not have known if I had not gone to the South Annex last week to transfer car titles. My daughters have cars that were still in my name and their name. The tags were up for renewal so I thought it was time to transfer the titles into their names alone – and give them their first real asset on their balance sheet. We are trying to teach real life finances before they actually leave home and we also want to make sure they know the cost of owning a car since they have had it pretty easy up until now. I paid two years of taxes on the vehicles and told them that insurance, oil changes and repairs from now on – were on them. The valuable piece of information for parents out there is that if you still own a car in your name and your child’s name, make sure you transfer the title while they still live at home. That will save you $225 – each. Apparently there is a $225 fee if they have to put a different address on the car title when it is transferred. Merry Christmas. I need to start “Life Hacks for Santa Rosa County.” We need contributors – so if you run into something like this – please let us know.
This Friday, the Pensacola Ice Flyers will be playing the Louisiana Icegators at Home. Santa will be there and you are asked to wear your ugliest Christmas sweater. Don’t forget, if you are a Navarre Press All Access subscriber, we have tickets for you! We also have tickets for this weekend to the Pensacola Little Theater for the showing of “White Christmas.” Last weekend we had tickets to the Pensacola Children’s Chorus and a Sinfonia Concert in Destin with a Broadway star. It really pays to be “All Access.”
