Opinion Archive

The American Press Institute commemorates and celebrates Newspaper in Education Week annually the first full school week in March. Florida Press Educational Services is honored to commemorate Newspaper in Education Week 2017 and encourages teachers, parents and students to read the newspaper daily in school and at home to enrich their lives. FPES encourages publishers and marketing, news, circulation and advertising directors to learn the importance of Newspaper in Education (NIE) programs, too.

In a recent column your publisher claimed that the Navarre Press was unbiased and then called out several other major news outlets for not positively reporting on the “Trump Bump” in the stock market.

The $650 million replacement Pensacola Bay Bridge as proposed would not permit the current or anticipated traffic flow to pass between Pensacola and Gulf Breeze, or Pensacola Beach, any faster than the current Bridge.

Why is tweaking “Obamacare” not an option? Because it violates “We the People’s” right of choice given to us in our Constitution!

We are about to be inundated with Spring Breaking students and families. We have a schedule on our 10B. The biggest week of breakers is March 11-18. And, they will be constructing the turn lane during that time due to a delay with AT&T cable, and more. Hopefully the light is fixed. After Mardi Gras, the light leaving the causeway onto 98 was only staying green for 10 seconds – enough time to let 3-4 cars through.

1) Costs

Despite repeated promises of premium reductions, Obamacare has delivered major increases. In the employer-sponsored market, costs continue to increase. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, average family premiums for employer-sponsored plans have increased almost 32 percent from 2010-2016.

What happened Monday in the county commission meeting is an embarrassment to our county and especially to Navarre. What is even more embarrassing is having two chambers of commerce. One, Navarre Beach Area Chamber of Commerce which has been in existence for 41 years and the other, which has been in existence for less than a year. There is not a truer verse in the Bible for a situation such as this, Matthew 12:25 “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand.” The full context is dealing with the casting out of demons, but I’m not going that far.

I’m sure everyone remembers December 2013 when the commissioners made a strange scoring system to rebid for new  Pier management. The scoring system was made to deny Ms. D. Slye from managing the Pier again. The commissioners picked Rayner, TC’s Coastal Porch, last of the original four. The original four almost broke their arms patting each other on the back about what great business people they were. TC’s Coastal Porch was to have periodic weekend famer’s markets and establishment of an ANNUAL $1,500 scholarship plus do other things and the commissioners fell hook-line and sinker for the story and did no enforcement. We tax payers continue to lose money because the Pier continues to be subsidized by us tax payers. What was a Jewel turned into a nightmare because of another of the commissioners decisions. Oh, by the way, Commissioner Cole, Lynchard and Salter voted for TC’s Coastal Porch.

Monday’s county commission meeting was interesting to say the least. Two chambers on the agenda presented applications to host the same event in different years. It is the same event that the Navarre Beach Area Chamber of Commerce (NBACOC) has hosted for 10 years with a new venue. They built the event, grew it and made it a great success. And now the Greater Navarre Area Chamber of Commerce (GNACOC) wants to ride on their coattails by snatching the event out from under the NBACOC in 2018. But let’s be honest, the divide goes much deeper than one event.

You may have noticed driving down 98 in Navarre – and west of Navarre, there is a lot of building going on which means that people are investing in our area. Across from The Sound at Navarre – the 250-unit luxury apartment homes, you can see the excavators getting ready for the new Walmart Neighborhood store. This will also have an outparcel for a fast food location which is yet to be determined. On the corner of Lowe Road, there is an assisted living facility that we reported on in July. Farther west towards Gulf Breeze, you will see The Reserve completing their additional apartment homes.  Sacred Heart is working on the reported-on clinic at Tiger Point and then there is a Sacred Heart Pediatric facility going in just west of Panera.  You can read about several of the projects mentioned above on page 1B.