Author: Wendy Victora Rudman

If you missed District 4 Commissioner Dave Piech’s monthly Zoom meeting, here are some of the hot topics he covered:

A 33-year-old man was arrested after the vehicle he was driving struck a child who got out of the backseat of another car and darted across Gulf Boulevard. The accident happened about 7 p.m. Saturday on Navarre Beach.

Ryan Morgan of Fort Lauderdale was charged with driving without a valid license. According to a Florida Highway Patrol media release, Morgan was driving westbound when the 10-year-old boy got out of another vehicle and ran across the road. The Pace boy, who first responders said has autism, was critically injured but expected to recover, the release said. The road was dark and the shoulder was limited, the report said. Morgan stopped immediately after the crash.

Florida Department of Transportation officials have once again suspended tolls on the Garcon Point Bridge, which is being used as a detour during the outage of the Pensacola Bay Bridge. Officials have been suspending the tolls for a month at a time. Local officials have asked that the tolls remain suspended until the Pensacola bridge is brought back to a four-lane capacity. It is hoped that two lanes of the bridge will reopen the week of May 31.

A young autistic boy was struck by a car in the 8000 block of Gulf Boulevard on Navarre Beach Saturday evening and knocked under another vehicle parked on the side of the road, according to Chief Danny Fureigh of Navarre Beach Fire Rescue. The impact knocked the boy unconscious but by the time firefighters arrived, he was alert. The accident happened at about 7 p.m. He was flown to a trauma center by medical helicopter.