The Navarre YMCA wants to help you reach your New Year’s resolution. They offer a variety of programs, KidZone childcare and nationwide membership options. Visit ymcanwfl.org for more information.
First Baptist Navarre is having Care Groups every Monday starting Jan. 15. These are open to everyone and you can attend anytime. See their ad on the Faith and Family page for details.
You will read about a lot about our water company in this issue of Navarre Press. We sometimes forget that not everyone knows what we know when we write articles. And, sometimes, the issue of the paper you are reading might be your first paper or your 20th. You don’t have the advantage of knowing everything we have written over the previous 17.5 years. However, you could by subscribing to our “All Access” subscription. We don’t know of any other paper in the area that has every single issue of their paper online and available for research, casual reading or just plain curiosity.
We had our most recent aha moment when Earl Dean walked into our office with his recently received Holley Navarre Water System (HNWS) Membership Certificate in hand. “I had no idea I had to be a member of the water department to get my water. I just want water from a utility like I get my electricity from Gulf Power.” Mr. Dean went on to explain he doesn’t want to be responsible for the water departments good or bad decisions, he just wants his water. Mr. Dean also wrote the county commissioners and said, “I don’t want to be responsible for a loan or lien they might take out on the water company. This should have been put before the County Commissioners and placed on a ballot for the voter to say yes or no.” As you will read in this issue’s Water company 101, the county commissioners gave the water system a franchise agreement to provide us water. Currently they believe they fall under Florida State Statute 617 and do not have to follow Sunshine Laws. And, the elections every year are a travesty due to the way the water system predominantly uses proxies.
Article 7 Section 5 of the HNWS by-laws state, “Voting by proxy shall be permitted.”
This means that they are permitted, but aren’t necessarily the only way to vote.
What is voting by proxy? Voting by proxy means that you are assigning a person to vote for you. You are not telling them how to vote, but are allowing an assigned person to vote their conscious – not yours.
Holley Navarre Water System has the choice to decide how voting by proxy is permitted. Currently, every member receives a proxy by mail. They could just as easily mail you an absentee ballot, but they don’t. If you want an absentee ballot, you must request one to be mailed to you or you must go to the water system and pick one up. And, oddly enough, absentee ballots are a new phenomenon. They have only been allowed in two other elections that we know of. This means that people either had to give their vote away or show up at the designated time and place to vote. The designated time and place to vote is at the Holley Navarre Water System office from 7 a.m. – 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 16. It would be awesome if this would be the first year that we have more citizens show up to vote than voluntarily gave away their vote.
Quote of the Week: A preoccupation with the future not only prevents us from seeing the present as it is but often prompts us to rearrange the past. Eric Hoffer, The Passionate State of Mind, 1954 (1902 – 1983)