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Improvements Continue At Showalter Park In Century

The Town of Century is continuing to make improvement at Showalter Park.

Last year, the town opened a new playground funded with a $50,000 grant from the Florida Recreation Development Assistance Program. The labor to demolish the previous playground and  install the new equipment was provided by the town and state inmate labor, saving grant dollars and allowing for the purchase of more equipment.

Century received a $50,000 grant, also from the Florida Recreation Development Assistance Program, to install a splash pad at Showalter Park. It is expected that the new splash pad will be open by this summer

Now, during this winter season, the town is using inmate labor to construct a restroom facility at the park.

Pictured above and below: Restroom facilities under construction at Showalter Park in Century. Pictured below: The new playground equipment at the park. Picture bottom: An artist rendering of the new splash pad planned for the park. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.

One Week: Search Continues For Missing Teen

Authorities are continuing their search for a missing teen from Brewton, now about a week since she was last seen.

Brooke Lee Bridges is a 16-year old white female with blue hair that was last seen at her family home in Brewton about 11 p.m. on Sunday, February 7.

The FBI Child Abduction Rapid Deployment team from Quantico, Virginia, has become involved in the search, canvassing the neighborhood and follow up on leads as they come in. Agencies from across the area have been involved in the search, including Escambia Search and Rescue.

Authorities have also searched a lake for any possible clues.

The search has reached to the air. Escambia County Sheriff Grover Smith was uninjured Friday when the department’s small plane crashed during an aerial search Friday afternoon.

Bridges was last seen wearing a t-shirt and black sweatpants at her family home in Brewton around 11 p.m. on Sunday. She has brown eyes, is 5′3″ and weighs 100 pounds.

Anyone with information on her whereabouts is asked to call the Brewton Police Department at (251) 867-3212 or 911.

FWC Law Enforcement Report

The Florida FWC Division of Law Enforcement reported the following activity during the weekly period ending February 11 in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties.

ESCAMBIA COUNTY

No report submitted.

SANTA ROSA COUNTY

While Officers Miller and Land were patrolling Eglin WMA, they located multiple tree stands placed in close proximity to several illegal food plots. The following morning, the officers returned to the area and located two hunters exiting the woods.  One of the hunters claimed to be stalk hunting even though he was wearing a harness used for hunting from a tree stand.  The second hunter stated that he had been hunting from a nearby ladder stand.  The hunters took the officers back to the area where they had been hunting; the same area that had the illegal food plots.  After questioning, the two hunters admitted to placing bait within the management area and planting the food plots.  Both hunters were issued a notice to appear for placing/hunting over bait on a management area and their Eglin Permits were seized by Range Patrol.

Officers teamed up with other FWC staff to work the Blackwater Hutton Unit Mobility Impaired Hunts over the last two weekends.  As they have for the last several years, the officers helped to provide the hunters and guests with a full meal each day, assistance with cleaning their game, and assistance tracking and recovering game.  Several members and groups within the community stepped up to donate money, food, and time to help make this a successful hunt.  Several hunters bagged deer and all of the hunters enjoyed their hunt. Many thanks to all of the staff that volunteered their time and efforts towards making this hunt one of the best in the state!

This report represents some events the FWC handled over the past week; however, it does not include all actions taken by the Division of Law Enforcement. Information provided by FWC.

Atmore Man Arrested With $1K In Counterfeit Cash

An Atmore man was arrested this weekend with about $1,000 in fake cash.

Robert Edward Lowery, 34, was arrested by Atmore Police and charged with possession of a forged instrument. He was booked into the Escambia County Detention Center in Brewton.

Lowery was discovered with about $1,000 in fake $20 bills at a Kangaroo convenience store on Highway 31 in Atmore after police were tipped off by a store clerk. Police said the $20 bills all had the same serial number and were not cut to a uniform size.

Anyone that believes they may have received any of the counterfeit cash or that may information on the case is asked to call the Atmore Police Department at (251) 368-9141 or their local law enforcement agency.

High School All-Star Soccer Team Rosters Announced

The Pensacola Sports Association has announced the tentative rosters for the 9th Annual Subway High School All-Star Soccer game to be held Thursday, February 18 at Ashton Brosnaham Park beginning at 5:00 p.m.

The coaching staff for the West Girls Team:

-Head Coach, Peter Stephens of West Florida Tech High School

-Assistant Coach, Ellie Henriquez of Escambia High School

The coaching staff for the East Girls Team:

-Head Coach, Ryan Davenport of Gulf Breeze High School

The coaching staff for the West Boys Team:

-Head Coach, Greg Garrett of Pensacola High School

-Assistant Coach, Del Greatwood of Catholic High School

The coaching staff for the East Boys Team:

-Head Coach, Chris McDaniel of Choctaw High School

-Assistant Coach, Jamie Cortes of Fort Walton Beach High School

Church To Host ‘True Beauty’ Young Women’s Conference

Ray’s Chapel Baptist Church will host “True Beauty”, a young women’s retreat, this Friday night.

The keynote speaker will be Beth Harris, and small group leaders that will lead participants in a study based upon the “True Beauty” by Carolyn Mahaney and Nicole Whitacre. Young women high school through college/career are welcome to attend.

Tickets are $20 with a t-shirt, or $10 without a t-shirt. The event will be held 5-10 p.m. at Ray’s Chapel Baptist Church at 170 West Bogia Road in McDavid. Dinner is included.

For more information, call (850) 375-4652 or visit Facebook.com/TrueBeautyYoungWomensRetreat/

Appeals Court Weighs 24 Hour Abortion Wait

An appeals court last week heard arguments in a battle about a Florida law that would require 24-hour waiting periods before women could have abortions.

Gov. Rick Scott signed the measure (HB 633) in June. But in a pair of rulings in late June and early July, Leon County circuit judges blocked the law from taking effect amid a constitutional challenge.

Charles Francis, who served then as chief circuit judge but has since retired, ruled the law likely violated the Florida Constitution’s strong privacy protections.

“In simple terms, the question presented to this court is whether plaintiffs have sufficiently shown that the requirements of HB 633 impose a ’significant burden,’ as opposed to insignificant burden, on a woman’s right to an abortion,” Francis wrote in a June 30 ruling.

Francis found that the plaintiffs — Gainesville Woman Care LLC and Medical Students for Choice — had met a four-part test for a temporary injunction. He said they’d shown the likelihood of success on the merits of their case, and that “irreparable harm will result if the law is not enjoined, that they lack an adequate remedy at law, and that the relief requested will serve the public interest.”

However, a three-judge panel at the 1st District Court of Appeal expressed skepticism about that ruling.

“The trial judge said in the order, ‘I don’t have evidence on this point, but I’m going to grant the injunction anyway,’ ” Judge Brad Thomas said.

Denise M. Harle, who represented the Florida Attorney General’s Office in the appeal, said an injunction is an “extraordinary remedy, as this court knows.”

“Your argument is, not only is the trial court’s order flawed as a matter of law, it’s flawed procedurally, right?” Thomas asked her.

“Our argument is that the trial court’s injunction must be reversed, because there are no specific fact-findings supporting any of the four elements,” Harle said.

Julia Kaye, a staff attorney with the American Civil Liberty Union’s Reproductive Freedom Project who represented the plaintiffs, cited a landmark 1989 Florida Supreme Court case, known as “In re TW,” that abortion-rights advocates say provides a powerful legal shield for women seeking abortions.

“Where the government is affirmatively preventing a woman from exercising her constitutional right to abortion for at least 24 hours, that is a significant restriction as a matter of law on its face,” Kaye said.

It is unclear how long it will take for the appeals court to rule.

Rep. Jennifer Sullivan, a Mount Dora Republican who sponsored the waiting-period bill during last year’s legislative session, attended the arguments. Meeting with reporters afterward, she said six other states had used the same language as her bill, and of those, just one had been challenged — and had been upheld.

“If you look at the other states that have a reflection period, there is no undue burden,” Sullivan said. “There is no proof that there is a burden. So I think that’s what the judges will find, and I think that you saw that in the questions that they were trying to draw out and get to the point of the challenge.”

The ACLU’s Kaye disagreed.

“This law will put up roadblocks for all women seeking abortion care in Florida,” she said. “It will be particularly burdensome for low-income women, many of whom will have to miss work, miss school, pay for additional child care and travel arrangements just to access health care.”

Kaye’s co-counsel, Richard Johnson of Tallahassee, said there was no way to prove how many women would lose access to legal abortions under the law.

“Nobody knows,” he said. “You’d have no way of knowing that a woman who didn’t come back to your clinic didn’t go to some other place.”

For instance, he said, a woman from Live Oak might not return the next day for an abortion in Tallahassee, but instead might travel to Atlanta, where clinics don’t have to wait 24 hours.

Johnson also criticized the questioning, calling it “as bad as it gets. … Judge Thomas, I felt, was making a political speech rather than trying to achieve an understanding of the legal issues.”

Kaye, meanwhile, pointed to another abortion-related bill that passed the House Health & Human Services Committee on and is ready to go to the House floor.

The measure (HB 1411), by Rep. Colleen Burton, R-Lakeland, would place additional regulations on abortion, address the definitions of pregnancy trimesters and ban public funding for groups affiliated with abortion clinics.

Kaye said the bill had much in common with the 2015 law in that it would further reduce the ability of abortion providers to survive financially.

“The (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Provider) laws and the mandatory delay law are part of a coordinated national strategy being executed state by state to chip away at the right to an abortion,” she said.

But Burton said her bill is focused on women’s health and safety.

“Is it really about that? Absolutely it is, and to this day continues to be the forefront,” she said. “The most important issue, as far as we’re concerned, is the health and safety of patients walking into a clinic anywhere across the state of Florida to get a legal abortion.”

by Margie Menzel, The News Service of Florida

ECUA, Escambia County Break Ground On Recycling Facility

In a few short months, recycling in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties will be back to normal. The Emerald Coast Utilities Authority  and Escambia County held a groundbreaking ceremony Friday  at the future site of the Interim Materials Recycling Facility (IMRF) at the Escambia County Perdido Landfill.

The facility will provide a solution to the recycling woes experienced by ECUA over the past few years.

ECUA board members and Escambia County commissioners were present for the ceremony, highlighting this inter-governmental partnership.  Escambia County and ECUA are working together toward the achievement of the Florida’s 75 percent recycling initiative, and the manifestation of a long-term recycling solution for the county through this cooperative venture is an extremely positive step toward meeting this goal.

Escambia County Commissioner Steven Barry and ECUA Board Member Larry Walker, who both represent the county’s northern District 5, expressed their excitement over the combined efforts on the facility.

“I think this is another example of two of your elected bodies working together in a manner that is absolutely the best way when you are talking about public money, or ratepayer money,” Barry said. “I hope the citizens will view it as the benefit it is to see their dollars working together.”

“I’m excited about this cooperation between Escambia County and ECUA,” Walker said. “It is what I and the ECUA board wanted for years. It is a thrill to see it happening. It is nice to be standing here on county commission property at an ECUA facility. This is great.”

The new IMRF will include a 50,000 square-foot fabric building that will house the material sorting equipment. The IMRF is projected to handle 165 tons of recyclable materials per day, with an estimated annual capacity of 40,000 tons.

After the flooding, closure and bankruptcy of West Florida Recycling in Pensacola, ECUA  entered into a two year agreement with the Infinitus Energy Park (IREP) in Montgomery. Even with transportation costs, ECUA was making a net profit of a few dollars per ton off the deal.

After the center abruptly closed in October 2015, ECUA began transporting recyclable materials to Tarpon Paper Co. in Loxley, AL.  ECUA stopped  transporting recyclables to Tarpon in December when they implemented a $12.50 per-ton tipping fee.

Until the IMRF is completed, all recyclables collected in Escambia County are being dumped in the Perdido Landfill, and the Santa Rosa County Landfill is receiving materials collected in that county.

The ECUA Board has awarded the following contracts for the IMRF project: Brown Construction for approximately $1.49 million to complete site work; $1.4 million to Big Top Inc. for the fabric building; and $5.5 million to Bulk Handling Systems for the recyclables processing equipment.

The IMRF is scheduled to be fully operational this summer.

Pictured top: The official groundbreaking for a new recycling facility at the Perdido Landfill Friday afternoon. Pictured inset: Escambia County Administrator Jack Brown. Pictured below: ECUA board members and Escambia County commissioners discuss the joint facility. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.

School Grades Released

The Florida Department of Education released school grades on Friday, and they were mostly good news for schools in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties.

The Escambia County School District’s grade improved from a C during the previous three years to B for the 2014-15 school year. Santa Rosa County earned an A for the 12th consecutive year.

Thirteen Escambia County School earned an A, while three schools – Montclair, O.J. Semmes and C.A.Weis — were F schools. Five Flags Academy, a charter school that shut down last year, also rank an F.  In Santa Rosa County, 21 of 27 total schools received an A, while no school was grade below a C.

In the North Escambia area:

• Molino Park maintained its A grade; while Ransom Middle and Tate High remained B schools.
• Lipscomb Elementary improved from a C to an A.
• Pine Meadow Elementary improved from a  B to an A.
• Jim Allen Elementary, Bratt Elementary, and Northview high schools improved from a C to an B.
• Byrneville Elementary and Ernest Ward Middle School slipped from an A to a B.
• McArthur Elementary dropped from a B to C.

Complete school grades for Escambia and Santa Rosa counties are below:

Prison Health Contract Under Scrutiny

Department of Corrections Secretary Julie Jones is under fire for signing a $268 million, no-bid contract for prison health services after one of the state’s two vendors walked away from a five-year, $1.2 billion deal three years early.

Jones signed the new contract with Centurion of Florida LLC in January, a little more than a month after Corizon Health exercised a 180-day cancellation provision in its contract with the state. Corizon Health, which handles care for more than three-fourths of Florida’s 100,000 inmates, will continue to operate health services for prisoners until the end of May.

But Wexford Health Sources, which provides health care for about 18,000 prisoners in the southern portion of the state and wanted the temporary contract, is questioning Jones’s handling of the agreement with Centurion.

Wexford is criticizing the terms of the “cost plus management fee” contract, in which the state has agreed to pay Centurion a 13.5 percent fee for administrative and overhead costs — an amount that could exceed $31 million — on top of the company’s actual costs.

Wexford President Dan Conn told The News Service of Florida on Friday that the company intends to challenge the award of the contract, even after Jones told Wexford it couldn’t.

Because the contract was issued for health services and was prompted by an emergency, Jones said the department “is under no requirement to enter into a bidding process.”

Even so, Jones said she sought quotes from four potential vendors prior to selecting Centurion, which came in the cheapest and which she said had an “outstanding reputation” in the other five states in which the company provides health services for inmates. One of the vendors dropped out, leaving Wexford in competition with two others.

“This is a classic case of how vendors react when they bid higher and they’re not selected. They’re trying to undo this procurement instrument in order to come in again to try to get the work. They had their chance,” Jones said Friday during an interview in her office.

Two of the potential providers offered estimates based on cost-plus calculations, while Wexford submitted a quote based on the per-inmate, per-diem — or “full risk” — rate under which it is currently paid.

Comparing the different types of cost estimates is like comparing “apples to bananas,” Conn said.

“We are very disappointed that there was no process to obtain comparable apples-to-apples bids. Therefore, the department cannot ensure that the most responsible, cost-effective bid was obtained for the Florida taxpayers. That’s what bothers us,” Conn said in a telephone interview.

Jones said she needs an extra $34 million — on top of $229 million currently budgeted for prison health services — to fund the additional cost of the Centurion contract for the 2016-2017 fiscal year.

Sen. Joe Negron, who chairs a subcommittee that controls prison spending, said he “generally supports” the direction in which Jones is headed, but would have preferred that she enter an agreement with the vendor that would eventually take over for a longer period.

“Now we’re opening up the possibility that we could have one company doing a short-term arrangement under exigent circumstances and then having to transition to perhaps another company. Every time we change contractors or vendors, it doesn’t go well and it’s more expensive,” Negron, R-Stuart, said.

House Speaker Steve Crisafulli said Jones’ signing of the contract took his staff by surprise.

“We were not apprised that the Department of Corrections had signed a contract. We are only now finding out the details. While we have been generally supportive of the direction Secretary Jones has been taking, our members have lots of questions about her recent decisions,” Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, said in a statement.

Under the agreement, the state can renew Centurion’s contract — slated to run from May through January, 2018, when the agency is expected to select new health service providers — for up to three years.

The contract will allow Centurion — whose lobbyist is Dean Cannon, a former House speaker — to give the state a 60-day notice if it intends to leave the state, four months shorter than Corizon’s 180-day termination notice requirement.

Wexford filed a notice of intent to protest the contract with Jones, but the secretary rejected that attempt on Wednesday. The company intends to file an administrative complaint that “will lay out all of the things that we find objectionable about the actual contract that they signed and the process they used,” Conn said.

Nearly all corrections agencies and managed health care plans have stopped using cost-plus contracts because of the risk involved, Conn said.

“The problems with cost-plus contracts are the fact that there’s nothing to stop you from continually spending money,” he said.

But Jones said Centurion will have to submit monthly billing statements, which will allow the agency to scrutinize the vendor’s spending. The information will also give the department “a competitive edge in future health care contract negotiations,” Jones said.

The public dispute puts Wexford in an uncomfortable position — it still has a contract worth about $48 million a year with the state, and it is hoping to secure a more lucrative, long-term agreement in the future.

“I like the secretary. We work well with her. We just want to get the points out so that everybody can understand what the issues are. We just want to get the facts on the table,” Conn said.

Allowing a new company to reap $30 million more than what it is spending may have touched a nerve — Corizon and Wexford both claim they are losing money on the health care contracts. Jones said last year that Corizon estimated it was losing about $1 million a month providing health care to more than 80,000 inmates.

It is unknown how much Wexford would have charged the state under the temporary contract because the company has said the information is a trade secret and, therefore, should be shielded from the public. Jones’ office is trying to get the company to change its position on keeping the quote private but said the proposed amount was “significantly higher.”

Jones, who has been highly critical of the current contracts with Wexford and Corizon, is using what is known as an “invitation to negotiate,” or ITN, process to select new health care vendors.

Some lawmakers are also questioning whether the privatization effort has been a failure.

“That’s an open question right now,” Negron said, pointing out that the state’s costs for health care for inmates were skyrocketing and “the quality was suspect” when the Legislature decided to outsource the services.

Lawmakers can now compare the services under both scenarios, but, if it decides to stick with a private contractor, should pick one that has a “track record of success” in Florida and other states.

“The predicament we find ourselves in now is awkward,” he said.

But Jones blamed the privatization problems on the agency’s original contracts with Wexford and Corizon, inked before Gov. Rick Scott appointed her to take over as secretary a year ago.

“I think these vendors underbid. Knowing all of this now, I think we have a much better landscape, using the ITN process, and we have a lot more information on how to privatize in order to hold vendors accountable,” she said. “So, no, I don’t think it’s a failed experiment in that, should we have not done it? I can’t answer that question. Was it done correctly? In my estimation, no. Is it worth another try at privatizing? Yes.”

by Dara Kam, The News Service of Florida

Pictured: The medical facility inside the Century Correctional Institution. NorthEscambia.com file photos, click to enlarge.

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