Register For Science In The Summer Programs At Your Local Library
June 5, 2016
This summer, the Pensacola MESS Hall is presenting GSK Science in the Summer at West Florida Public Libraries, a free science education program.
This year, students will learn about electricity and magnetism through exciting, hands-on activities and experiments like building an electrical circuit and observing the affects of magnets on different materials.
Programs begin the week of June 6. Participants attend a one hour workshop each week for four weeks. Preregistration is required.
Students in grades 2-6 are eligible to participate in the series of four, one-hour lessons, presented at the same time each week. Participants must be able to attend all four sessions. The program is free for participants. Preregistration is recommended since space is limited. Registration will be online. You can register from work, or home, or come into any of our libraries to use public computers.
Pre-Registration Required – Click here to register online!
Programs begin the week of June 6 and continue through July 1.
Tuesdays:
- 10:30 a.m. Pensacola Main Library
- 3 p.m. Molino Branch Library
- 6 p.m. Century Branch Library
Wednesdays:
- 10:30 a.m. Tryon Branch Library
Thursdays:
- 10 a.m. Southwest Branch Library
- 3:30 p.m. Pensacola Library
No Injuries In Highway 29 Rollover
June 5, 2016
There were no injuries in a single vehicle rollover crash about 4:45 a.m. Sunday morning on Highway 29 near Hazzard Lane. The driver of the vehicle refused medical treatment at the scene. The accident is under investigation by the Florida Highway Patrol. The Cantonment Station of Escambia Fire Rescue and Escambia County EMS also responded to the wreck. NorthEscambia.com photos by Kristi Barbour, click to enlarge.
Florida Gov’t Weekly Roundup: Shall We Play A Game?
June 5, 2016
The game’s the thing, or at least it was this week in Florida politics. A judge grappled with the future of high-stakes card games, while a state panel tried to map out a plan for a controversial sport.
The judge in question was dealing with how pari-mutuel facilities are running popular card games. The state panel was the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, facing new pressure to allow another round of bear hunting in Florida.
There were also less recreational issues at play, such as a challenge to a new abortion law by Planned Parenthood. No one on either side was likely to term that battle a game.
HARASSMENT OR CONSTITUTIONAL?
On an otherwise largely slow news week, the biggest story might have been Planned Parenthood’s decision to file a federal lawsuit Thursday challenging a major new Florida abortion law. The group accused the Legislature of seeking to “punish, harass, and stigmatize the state’s abortion providers for their and their patients’ exercise of constitutional rights.”
The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in Tallahassee, seeks a ruling that three parts of the law are unconstitutional and an injunction against those parts of the law, which Gov. Rick Scott signed March 25.
The complaint, in part, targets a section of the law that seeks to prevent state agencies, local governments and Medicaid managed-care plans from contracting with organizations that own, operate or are affiliated with clinics that perform elective abortions.
While government agencies are already barred from funding elective abortions, Planned Parenthood argues that the new law would prevent clinics from receiving money to provide other health services for women, such as tests for cervical cancer, pregnancy testing and screening for sexually transmitted diseases. The complaint also challenges part of the law requiring the state Agency for Health Care Administration to inspect at least 50 percent of abortion-clinic patient records each year.
The organization contends the requirement violates equal-protection rights because it unjustifiably treats abortion clinics different from other types of health-care facilities.
The complaint also challenges a section of the law that changes the state’s definition of trimesters of pregnancy. That change in definition came after a controversy last year in which the Scott administration alleged that some clinics were performing second-trimester abortions without proper licenses — an allegation refuted by the clinics, which said the administration tried to use a new definition of trimesters.
The Republican-dominated Legislature approved the law largely along party lines in March, with Republicans saying they had taken steps to make sure the measure would meet legal tests — like the ones now coming from Planned Parenthood.
“Our intent is to put forward a piece of legislation that is constitutionally sound,” Rep. Colleen Burton, a Lakeland Republican who sponsored the bill, said during the session.
The lawsuit filed Thursday is not the only one focused on the politically volatile issue. The Florida Supreme Court is considering a challenge to a 2015 law that would require women to wait 24 hours before having abortions.
CAN THE STATE BEAR ANOTHER HUNT?
Gun-rights groups who defend the right to bear arms were putting some extra emphasis this week on the “bear,” pushing the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission to once again allow hunters to open fire on Yogi and his friends.
National Rifle Association lobbyist Marion Hammer, a past president of the organization who also serves as executive director of the Unified Sportsmen of Florida, penned a letter to the commission that also called for steps such as increasing the number of days to hunt. She painted the issue as essentially a matter of self defense.
“Bears continue to terrorize homeowners and prevent families from allowing children to play outside in some areas,” Hammer wrote. “And while FWC (the commission) is working to educate people about securing trash and is trying to move dangerous bears out of residential areas, those programs are helpful but cannot succeed without hunts to reduce the population.”
Commissioners, who approved a controversial bear hunt last year but have not made a decision about another round, are expected to receive a staff recommendation before a meeting later this month in the Franklin County community of Eastpoint.
The October 2015 hunt — the first in the state in more than two decades — was scheduled for seven days, but ended after two days as hunters killed 304 bears. The state agency had put a 320-bear quota on the hunt and later acknowledged it “underestimated the hunter success for the first day.”
The bears, of course, have no voice in the matter. But they do have advocates.
Kate MacFall, Florida state director for The Humane Society, said while hunt opponents push for non-lethal means to reduce human-bear conflicts and see opposition growing against another hunt, they believe commissioners have already decided.
“It’s trophy hunting, which we certainly don’t support,” MacFall said. “Floridians love bears. Their (the bears’) subpopulations are already fragmented. They’re already having a tough time with habitat destruction, huge developments, so many people moving to Florida … there are so many challenges that these bears already face.”
Local government officials from Seminole, Miami-Dade and Volusia counties have also voiced opposition to a repeat of the 2015 hunt.
Commission staff members have been holding a series of webinars that recap the 2015 hunt, offer the latest estimates on the numbers of bears in Florida, summarize efforts to reduce incidents involving humans and bears, and take public input.
Harry Dutton, leader of the commission’s hunting and game management division, said last week that “for a possible future hunt” officials are looking at the length and time of year for the hunt and limiting the number of permits — a step that wasn’t taken last year. Also, they are looking at how check stations are monitored, rules for hunting on wildlife management areas, the prohibition on baiting bears, the use of dogs to track bears and the minimum size of bears that could be killed.
The agency estimates, based on recent surveys, 4,220 bears are in the state, up from 2,640 in 2002. The population growth has been called robust as the estimated bear count was as low as 300 to 500 in the 1970s, when bears were put on the state’s list of threatened species. Bears were removed from the list in 2012.
BANKING ON A RULING
Meanwhile, lawyers for state regulators and those for a Jacksonville pari-mutuel showed their hands in front of an administrative law judge this week.
While the case is technically limited to Jacksonville Kennel Club, Inc., it could have wide-ranging implications for pari-mutuels throughout the state. Most of those establishments are hosting “designated-player” card games — also known as “player-banked” card games. The games have eclipsed other poker games like Texas Hold ‘Em among Florida gamblers.
Regulators first authorized the designated-player games, in which a player serves as the “bank,” more than four years ago, but in December filed complaints against seven pari-mutuels over the games.
“If the petitioner (the department) allowed something that should not have been allowed, shame on us,” Department of Business and Professional Regulation lawyer William Hall told Administrative Law Judge Suzanne Van Wyk during closing arguments Wednesday. “But … are these games legal, or are they not?”
Hall said that the way the games are being conducted — not the games themselves — violates state gambling law, which prohibits pari-mutuels from acting as the “bank.” Under Florida law, a “banking game” is defined as one “in which the house is a participant in the game, taking on players, paying winners, and collecting from losers or in which the cardroom establishes a bank against which participants play.” Pari-mutuel cardrooms are allowed to conduct games in which players compete only against each other.
At the Jacksonville facility, also known as bestbet Jacksonville, designated players who work for third-party companies sit in front of trays of chips but do not actually play the games. Dealers, who work for the cardroom, dole out the chips to the other players at the table. Hall said the Jacksonville facility has essentially established a “bank,” even if it does not directly operate it.
But John Lockwood, who represents the Jacksonville facility, argued that the law is open to interpretation.
“Nowhere does it say you cannot play designated player games. Nowhere does it say you cannot play player-banked games. This is simply an interpretation of the phrase ‘or in which the cardroom establishes a bank against which participants play,’ ” he said.
The outcome could be costly for the facilities. Jacksonville Kennel Club President Jamie Shelton testified Wednesday that the games, launched in September, bring in about $1 million a month. The company invested about $350,000 in setting up the designated-player games, and 85 employees would lose their jobs — paying between $45,000 and $60,000 a year — if they went away, Shelton said.
Lockwood accused regulators of abruptly changing their view of the games after Gov. Rick Scott and the Seminole Tribe signed a proposed $3 billion gambling deal in December. The deal was never approved by the Legislature and never went into effect. The designated-player games are also an issue in a lawsuit between the tribe and the state over banked card games. A five-year deal giving the tribe exclusive rights to operate the banked games expired last summer, prompting that lawsuit.
STORY OF THE WEEK: Planned Parenthood filed a federal lawsuit Thursday challenging a new abortion law approved by the Legislature this spring.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “If a mannequin was sitting in the designated player’s seat, or you just put a Coke can there, the games would play no differently than if a living, breathing, human being was sitting there. They’d play the exact same way. Literally, all the designated player does is sit next to the chips.”— Department of Business and Professional Regulation lawyer William Hall, during a hearing on controversial card games offered at many pari-mutuels.
by Brandon Larrabee, The News Service of Florida
Molino Residents Left Without Power After Wreck
June 4, 2016
About 500 Gulf Power customers in the Molino area were left without power early Saturday morning after a truck hit a power pole.
The accident happened about 4 a.m. on Highway 29 near the Tom Thumb. The driver had left the scene in a private vehicle prior to the arrival of first responders.
The accident is under investigation by the Florida Highway Patrol.
IP Awards $75K In Grants To Local Schools, Groups
June 4, 2016
In honor of its 75th anniversary, International Paper Pensacola Mill awarded $75,000 in foundation grants to local community organizations. Grants are awarded by the IP Foundation in Memphis, Tenn., which focuses on environmental education, literacy, employee involvement and critical community needs.
“We are privileged to be able to assist our local community organizations in their efforts to make a difference in the lives of the residents and children of Northwest Florida,” said Janice Holmes, communications manager. “Their efforts serve to strengthen our community.”
Local community organizations and their projects that were awarded grants for 2016 are:
- Autism Pensacola “Kids for Camp Summer Learning Lab”
- Ballet Pensacola, “Discover Dance”
- Council on Aging of NWFL, “Big Green, Little Green Hydroponics!”
- Creative Learning Academy “Enhancing Libraries”
- Ernest Ward Middle “Eagles Read” and “Fruit Trees 101”
- Escambia County Extension 4-H “4H Natural Resources and Environmental Education Program” — Escambia County 4-H is an educational program focused on learning leadership, citizenship, and life skills through experiential training in various fields including science, technology, agriculture and livestock, and arts. The grant funds a program that includes a series of camping events. Each event focuses on a particular theme related to natural resources and environmental conservation.
- Escambia County Public Schools Foundation for Excellence, “Literacy and Environmental Classroom Grants”
- Every Child a Reader in Escambia “Project Ready 2016”
- Greater First Baptist Church, “Community Literacy Mentoring and Tutoring Program” — The grant funds materials and supplies for a continuum of supplemental reading and writing activities, including reading and writing materials for their tutoring, homework assistance and mentoring program.
- Jim Allen Elementary School, “Let’s Get EGGS cited about Reading!” — The grants funds materials and supplies including Reading Egg literacy modules.
- J.M. Tate High School “Reservations for Preservation” — The grants funds specimen collections, as well as specimen slides for microscopes.
- National Flight Academy “STEM Saturday Program”
- Navarre Beach Sea Turtle Conservation Center “STEM Sea Turtle Education Models”
- Partnership for Community Programs “Bay Day 2016” and “Stormwater Estuary Education Program
- Pensacola Mess Hall “MicroEye Microscope Station”
- Pensacola Opera “From Words to Music”
- Pensacola Promise Chain Reaction “Chain Reaction Service Learning”
- Quintette Community Park Association “Senior Citizen and Youth Programs” — The grant will help the Quintette Community Park Association to promote the safety, beautification, and well being of the Quintette/Cantonment community, and strives diligently to eradicate those elements that degrade the neighborhood by encouraging the enforcement of the original restrictive covenants; promoting good, clean and environmentally safe streets, anti-littering campaigns, neighborhood crime watches, and other avenues we deem necessary in order to enhance the quality of life in our community.
- The Global Corner “China and Activity Book for Children”
- UWF Foundation, “UWF Community Garden,” “Emerald Coast BEST Robotics Hub,” “Summer Institute for the National Writing Project,” and “Summer Camps for Environmental Literacy”
Cantonment Woman, 92, Helps Raise Hundreds For Century Tornado Victims
June 4, 2016
Connie Gooden of Cantonment, age 92, collected funds for Century tornado victims through mission work at the Gonzalez United Methodist Church. Friday, she presented a check for $800 to Century Mayor Freddie McCall. She said she told church members that she wanted to help the people of Century, and they were happy to donate. Photo for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Take Stock In Children Awards $215K In Scholarships To Local Students
June 4, 2016
Take Stock in Children and the Escambia County Public Schools Foundation awarded $215,000 in scholarships at the June 2 “Graduation & Unsung Hero Celebration”. The event honored 17 graduating seniors who received four-year tuition scholarships. In addition, each graduate received a laptop computer.
The 2016 Take Stock in Children graduates are:
Escambia High: Ashleigh Bell, Shelby Butts, Austin Travis:
Northview High: Ureil Codrington, Amber Freeman, Carly Ward;
Pensacola High: Destinee Brundidge, Savion Henderson, Jazmin Womack;
Pine Forest High: Tara Vanderburg;
Tate High: Brianna Holmquist, Alicia Presswood;
Washington High: Alyssa Barnes, Courtney Greene, Donald Vaughan;
West Florida High: Nikita Babkin, Mariah McMullen
Take Stock in Children was established in 1995 as a non-profit organization in Florida that provides a unique opportunity for deserving low-income students to escape the cycle of poverty through education. Students receive college scholarships, caring volunteer mentors, and hope for a better life. Students are selected through a need-based application process in middle school and comprehensive services continue through high school and include the students’ transition into college. Scholarships are funded through a unique public-private fundraising model in which local scholarship donations are matched by the Florida Prepaid College Foundation when scholarships are purchased each year. Each student is matched with a volunteer mentor who meets with the student weekly at school.
Pictured: 2016 Escambia County Take Stock in Children graduates (front, L-R) Carly Ward, Courtney Greene, Nikita Babkin, Savion Henderson, Ureil Codrington, Destinee Brundidge, Jazmin Womack, Shelby Butts, (back, L-R) Donald Vaughan, Alyssa Barnes, Ashleigh Bell, Austin Travis, Tara Vanderburg, Mariah McMullen, Alicia Presswood and Amber Freeman. Photo for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
ECSO Placing The Number ‘6′ On Vehicles To Honor Blue Angel Pilot
June 4, 2016
The Escambia County Sheriff’s Office will honor fallen Blue Angel Capt. Jeff Kuss by place the number “6″ on the back of patrol vehicles.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the family of Capt Kuss and with the U.S. Navy Blue Angels crew,” the Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook post.
Courtesy photos for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
License Free Fishing Weekends
June 4, 2016
This weekend, June 4 and 5, is a license-free saltwater fishing weekend, and June 11 and 12 will be a license-free freshwater fishing weekend for Florida residents and visitors. On these weekends, a fishing license is not required.
Governor Scott said, “Florida is the fishing capital of the world, and I am excited to announce two license-free fishing weekends this month that include both saltwater and freshwater fishing opportunities. As children get out of school for 
the summer break and more tourists visit our state, I encourage every family to take advantage of these weekends to enjoy Florida’s great outdoors with their loved ones.”
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) is hosting these four license-free fishing days near National Fishing and Boating Week, a national celebration of fishing and boating. The Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation’s www.TakeMeFishing.org website offers information on events sponsored by businesses and communities during National Fishing and Boating Week, as well as locating fishing sites, identifying recreational species and finding fishing tips.
This free fishing weekend is a part of the eight total license-free fishing days the FWC offers each year. All bag limits, closed areas and size restrictions apply on these dates. To learn more about license-free fishing days, visit MyFWC.com/License.
Convicted Man Faces Up To Life For 2014 Beulah Murder
June 4, 2016
An Escambia County man has been found guilty of a 2014 murder in Beulah and is facing up to life in prison.
Terrance Soles was convicted by an Escambia County jury of second degree murder in the killing of Skky Shine.
On November 10, 2014, Soles was driving a white Toyota Avalon with the victim Skky Shine in the front passenger seat. Soles made a 911 phone call at approximately 1:30 a.m., and in that phone call Soles can be heard telling the victim, Shine to put his hands on the dash and not to move. Before the call ends, victim Shine can be heard saying “don’t shoot me.” Within minutes, Soles calls 911 back requesting law enforcement to his mother’s home and eventually says on that 911 call “we were going through it here in the car and I shot him.”
Sheriff’s deputies responded to Soles’ mother’s home where Soles drove up flashing his lights and was found to have a 9mm pistol in his lap. The victim, Shine was in the passenger seat with a single gunshot wound to the head.
In the Toyota Avalon, crime scene technicians found one spent 9mm casing and one projectile. FDLE confirmed that the casing was fired from the weapon that the defendant had in his lap. FDLE was also able to identify Shine’se DNA on the 9mm pistol and casing. It was later determined that Soles purchased the 9mm pistol in 2012 from a dealer in Louisiana. During the autopsy, the Medical Examiner determined that the gun was fired from a close range of two inches or less by the presence and location of gunpowder particles on the victim.
Circuit Judge John Miller ordered a presentence investigation and set sentencing for July 12. Soles is facing a minimum sentence of 25 years with a maximum sentence of life in state prison under Florida’s 10-20-Life statute.