Byrneville Elementary Eyes Possible Building Project
January 27, 2017
Big improvements could be on the horizon for Byrneville Elementary School with the construction of a new building.
Currently, over one-half of Byrneville’s classrooms are located in eight aging wooden portable buildings with administration, a lunchroom and a few classrooms located in a wood frame brick building constructed in 1941.
Byrneville has been a “conversion charter” school since 2002 when the Escambia County School District closed the existing Byrneville Elementary School and converted it into charter school operated under its own board of directors.
Funding for the school is still provided by the state and local government, with the local school district providing the campus and major maintenance services.
Now, longtime Principal Dee Wolfe-Sullivan says it is the time for Byrneville to become a full charter school, taking over building ownership and becoming eligible to construct a new permanent building to replace the portables.
“It’s almost like the final snap of the apron strings,” she said. The school would become more directly responsible for its finances, including funding the building construction, but the funds would still come from the county and state coffers. Essentially the change would mean little, she said, other than Byrneville could construct facilities using capital outlay funding that they do not currently receive.
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“Financially, we shouldn’t go broke, right?”, Byrneville board of director member Michelle Driskell asked at a board meeting Wednesday.
“I don’t see us having a problem,” Sullivan replied.
Sullivan said that a new building would allow space for the approximate 200-student elementary school to expand enrollment within class size limits.
“Plus it will be a better learning environment, and much safer. What if that tornado had hit these portables,” Sullivan said, referring to the February 2016 EF-3 tornado that devastated an area of Century about four miles from the Byrneville Elementary School campus.
The new building, if approved by the board of directors and if financing is approved, would be constructed on the Byrneville Elementary School’s current four acre property at 1600 Byrneville Road. While there is no construction timetable in place at this time, the building could open within about two years of final approval.
The school will organize a public meeting to further explain the process to parents and answer any questions. No date for that meeting has been set.
Pictured top: The main building at Byrneville Elementary was constructed in 1941. Pictured below: One of the portable classrooms on the Byrneville Elementary campus. Pictured middle: Principal Dee Wolfe Sullvan addresses the Byrneville Elementary Board of Directors. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.
Century Changing Uniform Companies, Saving Thousands
January 27, 2017
Newly elected Century Mayor Henry Hawkins switching the town’s uniform supplier, a move that will save several thousand dollars per year.
The town currently utilizes Aramark Uniform Services at an annual cost of $8,026. Most of that contract will be dropped, and the town will purchase utility department uniforms from Reflective Apparel Factory for a one-time fee of $4,410.
Under the new arrangement, employees will be responsible for washing their own uniforms, rather than receiving cleaned uniforms from Aramark.
A small portion of the contract with Aramark will be retained for rugs used by the utility department.
Escambia Man Faces Life Sentence For Armed Robbery
January 27, 2017
An Escambia County jury has found Demeko Sims guilty of robbery with a firearm and petit theft.
On October 24, 2015, the Kwik Mart on Fairfield Drive in Pensacola was robbed by two masked gunmen who stole money from the cash register. Sims and his co-defendant, Joseph Vaughn, were developed as suspects. On November 2, 2015, Sims and Vaughn were detained while riding together in a truck A search of the truck returned the firearms and clothing from in the robbery.
A search warrant of the apartment where Sims and was staying returned additional clothing Sims wore during the robbery. Sims confessed to the robbery when interviewed at the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office.
Sims qualifies as a prison releasee reoffender and will serve a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole. Sentencing is scheduled for March 10 before Judge Joel Boles.
Late last year, Vaughn pleaded and was sentenced to 10 years in state prison.
Suspect Arrested In Nine Mile Road Shooting Death
January 27, 2017
A suspect has been arrested into connection with a January 6 shooting death off East Nine Mile Road.
Shaquille Kushun Jordan was charged with the homicide of Allen Ray Elliott. Elliott died from a gunshot wound to the head after what the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office described as a drug deal gone bad he was found face down in the parking lot of an apartment complex behind Vannoy’s Tires.
Authorities say the suspect and his girlfriend made up a story about being carjacked in order to create an alibi for the crime.
Jordan is being held without bond in the Escambia County Jail.
The Escambia County Sheriff’s Office is still looking for another unknown suspect in this case. Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (850) 433-STOP or the ECSO at (850) 436-9620.
NorthEscambia.com file photos.
New Radio Station Takes To The Airwaves
January 27, 2017
The area’s newest radio station took to the airwaves Thursday afternoon for their first official broadcast.
WGYJ-LP, The Light is a low power station broadcasting at 93.5 FM in Atmore. The station, owned by Gospel Light Church, is operating at a diminished power at the present time. Once a tower and new equipment are installed in the coming months, the station will broadcast with a power of 100 watts from 100 feet high…giving it expected coverage area of Atmore, Poarch, Canoe and small area of North Escambia around Bratt and some of Walnut Hill.
The Gehman family behind the station was synonymous with broadcasting in Atmore for a numbers of years, with brother Dale, David and Jerry operating WASG AM 550 radio beginning in November 1981 and eventually WYDH-FM before selling both stations in the early 1990’s. David and Jerry, along with other family members and friends, will be involved in the new station.
Sadly, brother Dale Gehman passed away last November unexpectedly after completing most of the engineering work to bring the new low power FM on the air. Much of the station’s first official hour on the air Thursday was devoted to remembering Dale.
The station currently broadcasts from inside the sanctuary of Gospel Light Church on Trammell Street. They plan to move into the renovated space in the church’s education building soon.
The station’s initial broadcast schedule will be 6 a.m. until 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. until 6 p.m. until additional equipment is installed. At that time, WGYJ-LP will broadcast a Christian format 24 hours a day with an emphasis on local news, weather and other Atmore information.
Pictured: WGYJ-LP 93.5 FM took to the air for its first official broadcast Thursday afternoon with David Gehman behind the microphone and guests that included his parents, Martin and Verna Lee Gehman. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.
Sides Lining Up On Ending Dog Racing, Allowing Slots
January 27, 2017
Both sides of the issue gave a House gambling panel dire warnings Thursday as lawmakers consider allowing Florida’s pari-mutuel operators to do away with horse and dog racing or jai alai games while maintaining other activities like cardrooms or slots.
The House Tourism and Gaming Control Subcommittee heard from the thoroughbred industry, a dog-track operator, a greyhound advocate and the head of an anti-gambling expansion group as lawmakers again gear up to consider sweeping legislation that could alter Florida’s gambling landscape.
The House meeting came a day after a Senate panel unanimously approved a leadership-backed plan that would widely expand slot machine gambling in the state and allow all pari-mutuels but thoroughbred tracks to do away with racing or jai alai games while keeping other gambling activities, a process known as “decoupling.”
Saying that greyhound racing is a dying sport, dog-track operators have urged lawmakers to do away with race requirements. The greyhound advocacy group Grey2K also has pushed Florida — one of just six states that currently allow dog racing — to put an end to the sport.
Over the past decade, pari-mutuel wagering has declined nearly 50 percent, generating more than $30 million in revenue for the state in 2006 and less than $12 million last year, according to an annual report issued by the Department of Business and Professional Regulation.
“We have a product that the audience is not interested in. Frankly, if it wasn’t for the addition of poker, a lot of the pari-mutuel operators would be closed,” said Dan Adkins, vice president of Hartman & Tyner, which owns Mardi Gras Gaming in Hallandale Beach.
Florida’s greyhound tracks got their start nearly a century ago, Adkins said, “but we still need to have products that people are interested in or we can’t survive.”
Adkins’ facility is among pari-mutuels in Broward and Miami-Dade counties that are allowed to have slots. The Senate plan (SB 
would allow “racinos” like Mardi Gras to also operate 25 blackjack tables.
Cary Thiel, executive director of Grey2K USA, maintained that dog racing is not only a thing of the past but is costing the state money and has led to the cruel treatment of racing animals by some operators who use the greyhounds as a means to operate more lucrative poker rooms.
“This industry has found itself out of touch with where mainstream values are regarding the humane treatment of animals,” Thiel said, pledging that his group would continue its crusade to end dog racing until the activity is eliminated.
Lonny Powell, CEO and executive vice president of the Florida Thoroughbred Breeders’ and Owners’ Association, cautioned that eliminating thoroughbred racing — now taking place only at Gulfstream Park and Tampa Bay Downs — would decimate an industry that generates billions of dollars in revenue and thousands of jobs.
Lawmakers’ discussion of decoupling over the past few years has injected an element of fear into the state’s horse industry, Powell said.
“It’s like an anvil hanging over your head every day with a real thin rope,” he said.
Decoupling all horse breeds — not contemplated in the Senate proposal — would have a “nuclear” effect, Powell warned.
“The industry will quickly dissipate. It would be cataclysmic for the second-largest thoroughbred breeding industry in North America,” he said.
Powell also called slot machines pari-mutuel racing’s biggest threat.
“Slot machines, once they’re out, they clobber all forms of gambling,” especially due to “their ability to offer quick, mindless action,” he said.
The Senate bill would not decouple thoroughbreds, but would require a portion of the revenue from slot machines to go toward purse pools for horse races, something that Adkins characterized as an unfair “subsidization” of his competitors.
A former gambling regulator once characterized Florida’s highly competitive pari-mutuel industry as one in which operators “care more about what the other guy doesn’t get” than what the operator can obtain.
Adkins reflected that the gambling industry in Florida, with more pari-mutuel operators than any other state, can sometimes be its own worst enemy.
“We’re dysfunctional. The industry needs to get its act together, literally,” he said.
Lawmakers are considering the gambling legislation as the state renegotiates a 2010 agreement, called a compact, with the Seminole Tribe. A portion of the compact that gave the tribe the exclusive rights to operate “banked” card games, such as blackjack, expired last summer.
Despite the expiration, a federal judge ruled in November that the Seminoles could continue to offer blackjack because the state had breached the agreement by permitting controversial “designated player” games at pari-mutuel cardrooms.
Meanwhile, the Florida Supreme Court is poised to rule on a case focused on whether pari-mutuels in counties where voters have approved slot machines can expand their operations without the express approval of the Legislature.
John Sowinski, president of the group No Casinos, said Thursday that lawmakers shouldn’t permit pari-mutuels to quit conducting the activities that allowed them to get licenses for other gaming operations, even if they are more lucrative.
For example, Sowinski said, his father once owned a television repair shop.
“But nobody offered me the exclusive license to sell Apple computers because my dad owned a TV store,” he said.
by Dara Kam, The News Service of Florida
Free Beans And Rice Giveaway Saturday In Cantonment
January 27, 2017
Saint Monica’s Episcopal Church, will be distributing free rice and dried beans and other non-perishables on Saturday from 9 until 11 a.m. at the church located at 699 South Hwy 95-A in Cantonment. Recipients are also invited to enjoy a free sausage biscuit and coffee. For more information, call the church office at (850) 937-0001.
Escambia Fire Rescue Sharpens Extrication Techniques
January 27, 2017
Escambia Fire Rescue members recently sharpened their extrication techniques with the help of Butler Auto Recycling. Butler provided the vehicles for the training, staging them in various wrecked scenarios. Photos for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
IP Explosion: Crews Continue To Scrub Neighborhoods
January 27, 2017
The cleanup continued Thursday in neighborhoods impacted by the Sunday night explosion at International Paper in Cantonment.
For the fourth day, IP representatives and cleanup crews were in the Woodbury neighborhood — including Woodbury Lane, Woodbury Drive and Woodbury Circle. Remediation teams, made up of more than 100 individuals, are dispersed throughout the surrounding area and remediation efforts are in full operation. The cleanup efforts are expected to take several weeks to complete.
At individual homes, teams are cleaning roofs, gutters, windows and exterior surfaces along with driveways, yards and other exposed surfaces.
When the teams clean black liquor and other material expelled during the incident from household roofs, they use low-pressure, high volume water before capturing the runoff to keep it out of the soil.
IP teams are continuing to visit with residents to answer questions and get signatures on a required access agreement to allow private property cleanup. Anyone needing additional information should contact the Joint Information Center at (850) 968-4208. Since Monday, over 170 calls have been processed.
Environmental monitoring and sampling is being conducted and will continue until cleanup is complete.
According to Center for Toxicology and Environmental Health Senior Toxicologist Dr. Paul Nony, who is onsite as part of the remediation team, the material released as a result of the explosion has no way to get into the drinking water system, and any overnight rain was prevented from accessing storm drains.
NorthEscambia.com photo, click to enlarge.
Former Century Hospital Property On The Auction Block
January 26, 2017
The former hospital building in Century is now on the auction block.
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection, owner of the building, is asking for a minimum bid of $13,500 for the 1.69 acre property and 24,000 square foot building at 7600 Mayo Street.
Dr. Christian Bachman, who was at the time the last doctor in Century, vacated the building at some point following the February 15, 2016, EF-3 tornado that damaged the building and surrounding neighborhood.
“We mutually agreed to terminate the lease and have a termination agreement with Dr. Bachman,” Jason Mahon, public information specialist for the Florida Department of Environmental Protection said.
Mahon said there were no provisions to allow Century, Escambia County or other governmental entity to acquire the property, except to submit the highest bid. Bids on the property are due by 2 p.m. EST on February 16.
Bachman’s 50 Year Lease
In a letter dated August 26, 2015, Century Health Care Access (CHCA) and Dr. Bachman, president of CHCA and physician for Mayo Street Medical, were ordered to vacate the facility by September 30, 2015, by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
The eviction date passed, with Bachman and his medical practice receiving much media attention that began with a NorthEscambia.com story. As a result, Bachman said, DEP shifted their position, which at first seemed like a positive breakthrough. But with time, he said he realized it appeared the DEP simply changed their strategy to making “impossible demands”.
The Florida State Fire Marshal’s Office also demanded changes that the doctor said were impracticable to impossible. Demands included repairs to large areas of ceilings that were patched by DEP or their contractors in the 1990’s to install a new fire sprinkler system. He said it was not possible to obtain the permits for the work in a short time period, much less make the costly repairs.
Bachman refused to budge, continuing to operate his medical practice, seeing patients regardless of their ability to pay and even making house calls.
On Friday afternoon, February 12, 2016, law enforcement officers served Bachman a cease and desist order that demanded that no member of the public be allowed inside the building due to fire code violations.
A Stormy End
Bachman said the cease and desist order from the State Fire Marshal’s Office was served on him about 3:45 to 4:00 on that Friday afternoon, with a 72-hour provision to comply. Almost exactly to the minute 72 hours later, the most powerful tornado to hit Escambia County in 45 years roared through Century with winds over 150 mph, and wiped out numerous homes in Century around Bachman’s office. The hospital building suffered damage, but the structure survived intact.
Bachman told NorthEscambia.com at the time that he found great irony in the fact that the building was deemed unsafe, but it was the very place many Century residents ran to for shelter during and after the EF-3 tornado.
When Gov. Rick Scott toured the tornado damage in Century in late Feburary 2016, it presented Bachman with a sudden and unexpected opportunity to discuss his battles with state government face to face with the state’s top elected official.
As Scott walked along Mayo and Church streets, toward the old Century Hospital, he had been briefed on the facility and Bachman’s plight. As Scott and his entourage continued to walk down Church Street, just outside the boarded-up windows of Bachman’s research lab, Bachman grabbed the chance to plead his case and hand over a support petition.
Pictured above and below: The former Century Hospital on Mayo Street as seen Wednesday, January 25. Pictured above inset: Dr. Christian Bachman pleads his case with Gov. Rick Scott on the street outside the former Century Hospital.
