Opposition Continues To Grow Against Landfill Near North Escambia
February 21, 2011
The list of governments opposed to a new landfill in Conecuh County, Alabama, continues to grow. The new 5,100 acre landfill will be located only about 25 miles north of Century and the North Escambia area.
Worries range from environmental impacts, property values to negative effects on roads, bridges and even tourism.
Escambia County, Fla., Escambia County, Ala., Baldwin County, Monroe County, Atmore, Flomaton, Brewton, East Brewton Excel, Frisco City, Excel, Monroeville, Repton and the Poarch Creek Indians have all passed resolutions in opposition to Conecuh Woods. Monday night, the Town of Century also voted to take a stance against Conecuh Woods.
Conecuh Woods LLC has formally applied for the landfill, which will include a 1,600 acre “disposal cell” from Range to Repton to near the Big Escambia Creek. Big Escambia Creek flows southward into Escambia County, Alabama, through Flomaton and drains through a North Escambia swamp into the Escambia River and then Escambia Bay.
Escambia County (Fla.) commissioners have said the dump could have an indirect environmental impact in Florida.
Conecuh Woods does not call their facility a dump or even a landfill on their website. Instead, they refer to it as a “state of the art waste disposal and green energy facility” that will be “environmentally safe” and “economically sound”.
The Citizens for a Clean Southwest Alabama has hired a law firm to fight the proposed dump. Holding signs that proclaimed “No Dump!”, the protesters gathered as the Conecuh County Commission met last week to discuss plans for public hearing next month on the landfill, which will accept about 15,000 tons of waste per day from across the country.
And even health officials have spoken out against the landfill.
“This project, if enacted, will be one of the mega threats to public health issues today and for generations to come,” said Ruth Harrell of the Coalition for a Healthier Escambia County (Ala.). “This project poses health risks to the entire region, and to the state…not just to Conecuh County.”
A public hearing for the Conecuh County Commission to consider approval for Conecuh Woods is set for March 10, 9 a.m., at Reid State Technical College in Evergreen. The commission has until April 2 to make a decision on the proposal.
Pictured: Residents gather last Monday in Evergreen, Ala., to protest a planned 5,1000 landfill. File photos courtesy WALA FOX 10 for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Ronnie Gilmore Of Molino Named BBB Trustee
February 21, 2011
Ronnie Gilmore of Molino has been named a new trustee of the Better Business Bureau Foundation of Northwest Florida.
Gilmore is the owner of Gilmore Services, a business started by his father in 1955 and run by Gilmore since 1979. Gilmore Services has been a BBB Accredited Business since 2001.
Gilmore joins returning trustees Gary Barnes, Walmart, Creighton Road; Lori Clause, Studer Group; Will Clause, Southern Breeze One Hour A/C & Heating; Jim Cox, retired; Mike Grossman, Cox Communications; Ted Kirchharr, Landrum Companies; and Bobby Taylor, All Pro Sound.
The BBB Foundation of Northwest Florida is a 501(c)(3) charitable corporation formed to allow the BBB to provide community education and recognition programs.
Escambia Awarded For Methane Gas Power Project
February 21, 2011
Escambia County Division of Solid Waste Management was awarded the United States Environmental Protection Agency Landfill Methane Outreach Program (LMOP) 2010 Community Partner of the Year award.
On November 15 Escambia County Solid Waste Management was nominated to receive the award for their dedication to the landfill gas industry through their development of Gulf Power’s Landfill Gas-to-Energy Project, located on Escambia County Perdido Landfill property.
Escambia County chose Gulf Power as the successful bidder to develop a 3.2 MW (mega watt) electrical generation project. This is the first landfill gas-to-energy project in Gulf Power’s service territory. The plant has been operating at greater than 97 percent since start-up on October 7.
Pictured: Gulf Power Company’s Landfill Gas-to-Energy facility, including two 1,600-kilowatt landfill gas generators. Submitted photos by Sean Smith, Gulf Power, for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
Two Escambia Men Facing Up To Life In Prison For Armed Robberies
February 21, 2011
State Attorney Bill Eddins has announced that two Escambia County men face maximum sentences of life in prison after being convicted on armed robbery charges for two separate crimes.
Dymielle Chandler, 19, was convicted by an Escambia County jury last week of robbery with a weapon, burglary of conveyance armed with explosives or deadly weapon, and aggravated battery with great bodily harm.
On January 27, 2010, Chandler was waiting inside the victim’s pizza delivery truck when he robbed her with a knife to her throat then fled on foot. Chandler was located by the Escambia County K-9 Unit hiding under a house which was located directly behind the parking lot where the victim’s car was parked. Also, the victim’s blood was found on the jacket that Chandler was wearing when he was apprehended, according to the State Attorney’s Office.
Judge Joel Boles scheduled sentencing for May 19, 2011. Chandler faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Kadeem Phillips, 19, was convicted by an Escambia County Jury of robbery with a firearm.
On January 20, 2010, Nakeil Johnson was walking down Jackson Street when Phillips approached him, pointed a gun at him and demanded money. Because Johnson had no money, Phillips forced him to turn over his wedding ring, according to the State Attorney’s Office.
Judge Michael Allen scheduled sentencing for March 25, 2011. Phillips faces a maximum of life in state prison with a 10-year minimum mandatory.
State Approves Escambia Comprehensive Plan
February 21, 2011
After more than a year of non-compliance, the State of Florida has signed off on Escambia County’s Comprehensive Plan.
County Administrator Randy Oliver said that the Florida Department of Community Affairs found Escambia County’s Comprehensive Plan to be in compliance with the State of Florida’s Local Government Comprehensive Planning and Land Development Regulation Act. The county’s Comprehensive Plan had not been in compliance since October 2009.
Escambia County’s Comprehensive Plan is a long-range master plan that addresses future land use, housing, transportation, infrastructure, coastal management, conservation, recreation and open space, intergovernmental coordination and capital improvements.
The Comprehensive Plan includes the Mid-West Escambia County Optional Sector Plan. The Sector Plan is a long-term planning process that encourages cohesive and sustainable development patterns within central Escambia County, emphasizing urban form and the protection of regional resources and facilities.
Based on an analysis of its Future Land Use categories, the county has consolidated the previous 36 categories to 11 categories for simplicity and efficiency. The goals, objectives and policies of the Comprehensive Plan were also revised to be consistent with these newly adopted future land use categories.
A Comprehensive Plan serves as a guide for making local land use decisions and helps the county prioritize capital projects. The Comprehensive Plan also serves to protect and preserve the county’s economic base, its rich heritage and abundant natural resources. Finally, the Comprehensive Plan seeks to protect and enhance quality of life for residents and visitors alike through the year 2030.
To Escambia County’s Comprehensive Plan and related information, click here.
Tickets Still Available For Northview FFA Blue Jacket Jamboree
February 21, 2011
Tickets are still available for the Northview FFA Blue Jacket Jamboree.
A man that achieved legendary status in country music — 13 number one singles, 22 songs on the charts, a Grammy Award, and a CMA Vocal Group of the Year trophy — will headline the March concert in Bratt.
The Northview FFA Alumni Scholarship Fund and NorthEscambia.com will present the Northview FFA Blue Jacket Jamboree featuring Marty Raybon at 5 p.m. on Saturday, March 5. Marty Raybon will be joined by the Southern Gospel quartet Lookin’ Up and Northview’s own Ashton Gibbs in the Northview High School Theater.
Marty Raybon is perhaps best known as the former lead singer of the country mega-group Shenandoah from 1985-1996. He led Shenandoah to 22 singles on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts, including thirteen number one singles, such as: “The Church on Cumberland Road” (1989), “Sunday in the South” (1989), “Two Dozen Roses” (1989), “Next to You, Next to Me” (1990) and “Butterfly Kisses” (1997). At the top of the charts, Raybon became known for his bluegrass and gospel-influenced semi-traditional country sound.
Tickets for the Northview High School FFA Alumni Blue Jacket Jamboree are $15 and are available now at Smith Tractor in Atmore, Scott’s Pharmacy in Molino and Ann’s Hallmark on Nine Mile Road in Ensley.
Pictured: Grammy award winning Marty Raybon performs last year at Northview High School. NorthEscambia.com file photo, click to enlarge.
Food Check-Out Week Focuses On Healthy Eating On A Budget
February 20, 2011
It’s Food Check-Out Week , which focuses on helping consumers eat healthy meals, despite dealing with tight food budgets.
The Escambia County Farm Bureau is celebrating the week into the new year where the average household will have earned enough to pay for its food for a year.
“Food Check Out Week is February 20-26 and is devoted to helping Americans eat healthy nutritious food and stretch their food dollar,” said Martha Carpenter of the Escambia County Farm Bureau Women’s Committee.
The average cost of food in America remains affordable overall, the group said. According to the most recent information from the Agriculture Department’s (USDA’s) Economic Research Service, American families and individuals spend, on average, less than 10 percent of their disposable personal income for food.
With the continuing economic squeeze, many Americans are concerned that the cost of a healthy diet is out of reach. However, according to an Agriculture Department study, the cost of eating healthy has not changed as much as less-healthy alternatives. But eating healthy food within a budget does require smart shopping.
“American Farmers and Ranchers are committed to producing safe, healthy food. They share a common concern with the consumer when it comes to putting nutritious food on the table,” said Carpenter.
U.S. consumers still spent under 10 per cent of their disposable income on food according to the latest USDA data. Consumers in other countries spend much more: France- 14 percent; Japan-15 percent; China-35 percent; Philippines-37 percent and Indonesia- 46 percent.
A recent USDA report favorably supports the economics of healthier eating. Recent food price data show that prices for unprepared, readily available fresh fruit and vegetables have remained stable relative to dessert and snack foods, such as chips, ice cream and cola. Therefore, as defined by foods in the study, the price of a “healthier” diet has not changed compared to an “unhealthy” diet.
Here are some tips that consumers can follow to help stretch their food dollars :
Plan ahead before going to the grocery store. Make a list of the foods you want to serve during the next week. Check your newspaper for grocery store ads and coupons. Stick to your list. Do not go to the cookie or snack aisle if you don’t “ need” to. Shop the perimeter of the store. Produce, dairy products and meat are generally found on those outside walls. A tip for keeping produce fresh longer is to store it in a perforated plastic bag. This stops condensation and shriveling. Make holes in a plastic bag with a paper punch, knife or another sharp object about six inches apart all over the bag. When you get home, immediately store any fresh or frozen products especially meat.
For more specific information on nutrition , meal planning and food preparation, contact a registered dietitian.
Atmore Wreck Kills Pensacola Man, Injures Four Others
February 20, 2011
A Pensacola motorcyclist was killed in a two vehicle accident that injured four other people Friday night in Atmore.
Carl Edward, Deleo, Jr., 45, was pronounced dead at Atmore Community Hospital following the accident about 10 p.m. Highway 21 at Sunset Drive. Deleo and Elizabeth Rucker, 60, of Pensacola, were thrown from their Honda Gold Wing in the crash. Rucker was transported by ambulance to Atmore Community Hospital. Her condition was not available.
Authorities said it appeared a pickup truck driven by Robert Ear Lee, 59, of Uriah, pulled into the path of the motorcycle as it was northbound on Highway 21, according to Alabama State Troopers. The force of the crash caused the pickup truck to overturn onto its side.
Otis Lanell Jackson, 38, of Uriah, Ala. and Malika Moore, 24, of Uriah were transported by ambulance to a Bay Minette, Ala., hospital. Lee, 59, was transported to the USA Medical Center in Mobile. Two other people in the truck received minor injuries.
Further details were not available as the Alabama State Troopers continued their investigation into the crash.
Florida Weekly Government Roundup: Scott Finds Pesky Little Thing
February 20, 2011
Gov. Rick Scott found out this week that there is this pesky little thing called the Florida Legislature as lawmakers pushed back on a couple of his decisions for the first time.
Whatever leftover warm-and-fuzziness there was with lawmakers from Scott’s inauguration came to a screeching halt at least as sudden as the one he put on a proposed Tampa-to-Orlando high speed rail by rejecting 2.4 billion federal dollars to build it.
If that wasn’t enough transport angst, the Senate chief budget writer brought some turbulence to Scott’s much-ballyhooed sale of the state aircraft fleet by saying that the get to work governor may have violated state law and even the constitution by selling off the planes.
If they ever had been honeymooners, several lawmakers skipped the muttering of “one of these days… one of these days,” this week. A veto-proof number of them got right to work themselves trying to detour around Scott to take the train money anyway.
Led by rail supporter Sen. Paula Dockery, a bipartisan group of 26 Florida senators sent a letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood suggesting the Passenger Rail Commission and Rail Enterprise could accept the cash.
Also picking up steam by the end of the week was the possibility that cities and counties or transportation planning organizations in central Florida could bypass the state and directly accept the cash.
Dockery so vocally supported Scott’s campaign that she was rumored to be under consideration to be his lieutenant governor or transportation secretary. But by week’s end, she was the conductor of the anti-Scott train.
“I’m hearing from central Florida that the mayors are getting together talking about what they can do, I’m hearing that the (metropolitan planning organizations) are talking about what they can, I’m hearing that Chambers of Commerce in Miami and other places are talking about what they can do…so there’s a lot of efforts going on,” she told reporters as she collected signatures for her letter to LaHood.
Senate Democratic Leader Nan Rich indicated this week that her 11-member caucus would be willing to participate in any legislative effort to create an end-run around Scott on rail, and indeed all of them signed onto to Dockery’s letter.
The public backlash is not to suggest that there was not also quiet muttering about Scott’s decision this week. Most of it wasn’t fit to print.
“At least today I’m not using four letter words,” said Rich Templin, vice-president of one of the state’s largest labor unions, the AFL-CIO, said the day after Scott’s decision. “This is a tragedy, a disaster of unmitigated proportions.”
One of the capital’s newspaper bureaus quoted an unnamed source in the Legislature asking if Scott was “****ing crazy.”
There were some cheers for Scott’s decision coming from the fourth floor of the Capitol, though it took three days before even a peep was heard from Senate President Mike Haridopolos. When the aspiring U.S. Senate candidate finally decided to speak, he was definitely not saying “all aboard.”
“The federal government has earmarked $2.4 billion to finance part of the cost of construction of the proposed Florida high-speed rail project,” Haridopolos said in a statement. “But to do so, Washington would borrow 100 percent of that money, which would be financed in large part by foreign, non-democratic governments.”
Haridopolos quickly steered the conversation toward President Barack Obama however, making clear that high speed rail may be the new stimulus – a dirty word to conservatives – in Florida politics.
There were no physical hugs involved this time around, but Scott did quickly embrace the support he got from Haridopolos.
“President Haridopolos recognizes that cost overruns from the project could put Florida taxpayers on the hook, ridership and revenue projections are historically overly-optimistic, and if the project becomes too costly for taxpayers and is shut down, the state would have to return the $2.4 billion in federal funds to D.C,” Scott said.
WOULD MILLION AIR RETURN TO ITS GATE?
The skies weren’t friendly either for Gov. Scott this week as the chief budget writer in the state Senate said the governor should have checked with lawmakers before he took off with his plan to sell two state airplanes.
Scott’s sale of the state’s planes may have violated Florida law, Sen. JD Alexander wrote in a letter to the governor. It would have been a striking accusation anyway, but the fact that it was coming from a senator who has himself clamored for the planes to be sold for years made it all the more surprising.
But there can only be one pilot of state finances, Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said, and the Legislature should be in the cockpit.
“I support your goal, but not the method,” Alexander wrote. “It is important that the proper procedures for accomplishing a goal we both support be followed.”
“It is my position that you should have sought the approval of the Legislature before undertaking the sale of the state planes and using the proceeds of the sale of Plane One to satisfy the lease obligation of Plane Two,” he continued. “My concern, of course, is that these actions may have violated the law and as such fail to recognize the Legislature by not respecting the Legislature’s constitutional duty to appropriate funds and your duty to spend appropriated funds in accordance with the law.”
As he did with the train, Scott saw nothing wrong with his unilateral decision to ground the state planes, telling reporters “We did it absolutely in compliance with the law. We reviewed it with our general counsel.”
Unfortunately for the get to work governor, that’s not who Alexander would have liked him to have reviewed it with.
I SAW T-PAW
With it being 52 degrees warmer in Tallahassee than St. Paul Friday, Tim Pawlenty probably was not the only Minnesotan in Florida this week. But the former North Star State governor was probably the only snowbird in Tallahassee seriously considered a bet to make a run for the White House.
Senate President Mike Haridopolos delivered on his promise to bring potential Republican U.S. presidential candidates to Florida, introducing Pawlenty to a crowd of mostly GOP lawmakers in the historic state Capitol.
Pawlenty, who was governor of Minnesota from 2003 to 2011, introduced himself and took questions as he tests the waters for a 2012 presidential run.
“In Minnesota, the land of McCarthy, Humphrey, Mondale, Wellstone…and now U.S. Sen. Al Franken, we took spending and cut it in real terms for the first time in 150 year history of my state,” he said.
And politically, Minnesota’s no Florida, Pawlenty made sure to note.
“There was one state that did not vote for Ronald Reagan in the entire nation,” he said. “Guess which one it was? Minnesota. If it can happen there, it can happen anywhere.”
Pawlenty didn’t talk much about Florida-specific issues, with the exception being teacher merit pay. He brought up the bill vetoed last year by then-Gov. Charlie Crist that would have tied teacher pay to student performance.
“I would salivate, I would dream about a bill like that having come to my desk when I was governor. I wish I could have gotten a bill like that,” Pawlenty said.
The mostly Republican audience was not exactly salivating about Pawlenty’s presidential prospects, though they clearly wanted to know more about him. To do so, they took turns peppering him with questions about health care, immigration, national defense and U.S. fiscal policy.
Senate President Haridopolos asked Pawlenty what he thought about President Barack Obama’s signature health care law, which was recently ruled unconstitutional by a Florida U.S. District Judge.
“I’m one of the authors of the amicus brief that was filed with Florida as a venue, so thank you for that,” Pawlenty said, adding that the health care law was “one of the worst pieces of legislation in modern history.”
Sen. Mike Bennett, R-Bradenton, followed up with a question about whether Pawlenty would support a constitutional requirement that Congress balance the federal budget similar to the Florida requirement.
“Budgets get balanced in states because they have to,” Pawlenty responded. “They don’t get balanced in Washington, D.C. because they don’t have to be. We need to make that a requirement.”
Despite his bromance with Haridopolos however, Pawlenty did not endorse the Senate president for U.S. Senate, saying only that he was “a man of great talent.” Haridopolos returned the favor by not making any endorsement of Pawlenty either.
STORY OF THE WEEK: Gov. Rick Scott derailed a proposed high speed train in Florida this week, and possibly his working relationship with the Florida Legislature along with it
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “There is this pesky thing called a constitution that limits authority. I still believe the genius of America isn’t just democracy but its divided government and limitations on each individual’s ability to act unilaterally,” Sen. JD Alexander, expressing what was a common refrain around the state Capitol after Scott put the brakes on the bullet train.
By KeithLaing
The News Service Florida
Featured Recipe: Gooey Turtle Cake
February 20, 2011
This weekend’s featured recipe from Janet Tharpe is a Gooey Turtle Cake. It will create quite a stir when it hits your table with all the gooeyness and flavor of turtle candies in a simple recipe.
To print today’s “Just a Pinch” recipe column, you can click the image below to load a printable pdf with a recipe card.
