Hi, kids!

It’s time once again to turn a jaundiced eye toward the newsmakers of the day – the winners and losers – who, in my cynical opinion, either contributed to our quality of life, or detracted from it, in some significant way.

Let’s look at who tried to screw us – and who tried to save us – during the week that was:

Angel               Mark Bryson

“Mark Bryson’s last act was a selfless one.

The 42-year-old Lakeland man, having already rescued two children from a hazardous rip current off Daytona Beach, swam out to rescue one more person, a family friend. He didn’t make it.

“What he did is who he was,” said his fiancee, Lori McElligott. “Even if it wasn’t our family, if he saw anybody in danger he wouldn’t have hesitated to go rescue them. You know, he helped everybody.”

–Reporter Sheldon Gardner, The Daytona Beach News-Journal, ‘What he did is who he was’: Man dies off Daytona Beach after rescuing others from ocean – Fiancée says hotels, county officials should post more rip current warnings,’ Friday, June 9, 2023

“Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends…”

–John 15:13

I didn’t know Mark Bryson; I doubt you did either. 

But he died a hero. 

On June 2, Mr. Bryson and Ms. McElligott were enjoying a day on Daytona Beach with family and friends celebrating their daughter’s seventh birthday.  At approximately 11:00am, as Bryson built a sandcastle with his daughter at the water’s edge, he heard one of his children, a family friend, and her young child screaming for help. 

Without hesitation, Mr. Bryson courageously ran into the ocean and saved both children before heading back out to help the struggling woman.    

Unfortunately, Mr. Bryson died attempting to save the life of his friend. 

Although responding lifeguards performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation, Bryson was later pronounced dead at Halifax Hospital. 

According to the News-Journal’s report, “The lifeguards rescued the woman and another man who had gone into the ocean to help.”

Tragically, Bryson’s death followed another drowning in Daytona Beach Shores the day before, when a 76-year-old grandfather visiting from Kentucky died after heroically saving his young grandson from a rip current…   

Now, many are questioning why there were no lifeguards on the busy stretch of beach where Mr. Bryson and his family were swimming? 

While Volusia County officials warn beachgoers to swim in front of “staffed lifeguard towers,” the cruel reality is that the lifesaving towers are increasingly few and far between – with beach safety leadership continuing the practice of assigning lifeguards to roam the beach (and Atlantic Avenue) in vehicles – rather than monitoring swimmers from the beach.    

During the Memorial Day weekend, beach safety officials reported hundreds of ocean rescues – so many that some longtime beach activists questioned the numbers – with many saves attributed to the prevalence of dangerous rip currents. 

In fact, on May 30, Beach Safety Captain A. J. Miller said in an interview with WESH-2 news:  

“Anytime you are swimming without a staffed lifeguard tower is risky business.”

Then, on the day of Mr. Bryson’s death, Ocean Rescue Deputy Chief Tammy Malphers was quoted:

“We need people to make sure they come down on the beach and swim in front of a staffed lifeguard tower. If you get down on the beach, there’s not a lifeguard; find one.”

But where? 

Apparently, you need an “app” for that…

In an impassioned open message to clueless members of the Volusia County Council, beach advocate Paul Zimmerman wrote:

“I was on the beach yesterday paddling, again I saw multiple red trucks on the beach, A1A, and Publix etc.  I saw stretches of 2 miles or longer with no red towers. How many tourists must die at 11 AM in the morning in the heart of our tourist district on an unprotected area of our beach?  Isn’t it time to restructure the idiotic model that has county employees, who are trained in lifeguard responsibilities, driving their red trucks around the beachside rather than sitting in towers ON THE BEACH. 

As elected officials and administrators of the beach department when will the obvious along (with) the sad death of this individual motivate you to do your job? I also remind you of the email thread that you all received a couple weeks ago WARNING you of the danger of this model. You did nothing then but make excuses. How many?”

Wow.

Two miles or longer between towers? 

Now, Lori McElligott is seeking answers as to why there was no lifeguard assigned to the crowded section of beach where her fiancée died, and, after some 300 rescues in four days, more wasn’t done to warn visitors of the grave danger of rip currents? 

According to the News-Journal:

“Volusia County Beach Safety did not have a lifeguard on duty at the tower in that section of the beach at the time. County officials urge people to swim in front of manned lifeguard stations.

McElligott said there were no warnings in her hotel about the dangers of rip currents, no one told them about the Volusia County Beaches app, which reports local conditions, and she didn’t see any warnings on the beach. She also said there was no way to tell if a lifeguard was simply taking a break from the tower.”

Look, I complain ad nauseum about what passes for Volusia County’s beach “management” apparatus – a bloated bureaucracy within a bureaucracy that seemingly exists to perpetuate its own existence rather than improve the beachgoing experience – but I have never questioned the incredible courage and dedication of those lifeguards who go into harm’s way to save lives. 

In my view, it is time for County Manager George “The Wreck” Recktenwald to take responsibility for the ongoing mismanagement that allows demonstrably failed practices and policies to remain – and the stagnant status quo to prevail.   

When it comes to these recurring issues on our pole and sign cluttered beach, where does the buck stop?

This problem didn’t happen overnight.   

One year ago, Volusia County officials reported a chronic shortage of lifeguards and announced a $500 bonus for returning staff and new recruits. 

At the time, it was announced that lifeguard pay started at just $13.24 an hour…

Perhaps one day those we elect to represent our interests on the Volusia County Council will understand the inherent risk of failing to objectively evaluate Mr. Recktenwald’s performance each December, the need to prioritize spending on beach issues, and the grave importance of addressing ongoing threats to public safety and our quality of life.

As Mr. Zimmerman warned, “How many”?

Asshole           Ormond Beach Mayor Bill Partington  

This week, Ormond Beach Mayor Bill Partington unveiled his laughable “vision” for closing the barndoor now that the swaybacked nag of malignant sprawl has bolted and is stuck in traffic somewhere on Granada Boulevard…

For the past 20-years, Partington – a perennial politician supported by our “Rich & Powerful” with a reputation for “malleability” on development issues – has loitered around Ormond Beach government, now presiding over the most asinine ‘cart before the horse’ period of explosive growth in our history.

In my view, Hizzoner’s mediocre reign has been marked by a complete lack of effective planning, no identifiable growth strategy, an abysmal environmental record that trades old growth forest for convenience stores and unkempt vacant lots, and a reputation for gross political cowardice that has allowed this once quaint community to be surrounded on all fronts and held hostage by insatiable developers who could give two-shits that our only east-west throughfare is nearing gridlock.

Now that the hue and cry of claustrophobic residents feeling the squeeze of more, more, more internal and external development  – including the looming specter of the gargantuan Avalon Park, which will soon begin the slash-and-burn land clearing required for what we are told will be between 3,000 and 10,000 cracker boxes and a ‘city within a city’ one-million square foot commercial footprint – has become too loud to ignore, Mayor Partington has announced his pie-in-the-sky “Grand Plan” for expanding transportation infrastructure.  

Bullshit.

Sadly, Mayor Partington’s laundry list of pathologically unrealistic desires as published in the Ormond Beach Observer – astronomically expensive transportation infrastructure projects that might be considered for funding around the time the Comet Kohoutek returns – is clearly designed to scam worried residents into believing he has a workable plan for getting us out of the quagmire he and his craven colleagues have created by rubberstamping every project that came across the dais…

For instance, the plethora of projects he wants us to “discuss/debate/consider moving forward to improve the conditions on Granada/S.R. 40 and overall east/west traffic flow in the Halifax area,” include:

A Diverging Diamond Interchange at S.R. 40 and I-95, similar to that proposed for U.S. 1 and I-95.

At least one extra lane both ways on S.R. 40 west of I-95 all the way to Airport Road.

A Hand Avenue overpass/extension.

Create frontage road on S.R. 40 to LPGA on the west side of I-95.

Extend Tymber Creek Road from LPGA to Granada Boulevard.

Additional east/west connectors at Fleming Avenue and Calle Grande Street; Williamson Boulevard to U.S. 1.

Commercial property available west of I-95 (i.e. Publix/bank/fast food/dry cleaners/salon.)

Accelerate/decelerate lanes placed at strategic hot spots to maximize flow.

I-95 interchange access at Airport Road overpass.

And a “…bridge over LPGA to beachside A1A to increase east/west mobility and keep trips south of Ormond Beach.”

Say what?

Considering LPGA Boulevard and Riverside Drive is located within the City of Holly Hill – a community that has worked diligently to keep its “Old Florida” charm and small-town identity despite the insanity of the massive overdevelopment embraced by its irresponsible neighbors – maybe Mayor Partington should stay in his lane and cleanup his own damn house before foisting his “visionary ideas” on other communities that are getting it right… 

In my view, Mayor Partington’s abject arrogance was on full display when he suggested a “…social media campaign on “know when to go” that will encourage retirees to use off-peak times for driving needs.”

If this tone-deaf schlub thinks retirees – who make up an increasingly large number of Ormond Beach voters – are an inconvenient constituency who should stay home and make way for the overcrowding his policies have facilitated, something tells me Mayor Partington’s political ambitions are about to land on that fetid ash heap of history where the careers of all obtuse politicians ultimately end when they lose touch with the realities of We, The Little People…   

Hey, Mayor – as an Ormond Beach resident of over 60-years who pays taxes and has suffered the sweeping ineptitude, asinine spending, lack of strategic thought, and craven cowardice that has marked your political tenure – I feel comfortable speaking for my fellow retirees when I say:  Up yours. 

Although Mayor Partington’s announcement in the Ormond Beach Observer contained a steaming pile of flowery hokum and horseshit touting his commitment to “community engagement” (since when?) – the one glaring omission in his proposal is:

How are Ormond Beach taxpayers (and our great-great grandchildren) going to pay for it all?    

Don’t take my word for it, get a load of Partington’s pandering here: https://tinyurl.com/hrmka4dj

In my view, this latest shim-sham is merely more smoke and mirrors designed to prop up Mayor Partington’s run for the Florida House in 2024 – nothing more.

At the end of the day, the only thing he truly cares about is perpetuating more of the same for his well-heeled campaign contributors – and it should now be frighteningly evident to anyone paying attention that, in Mayor Partington’s desperation, he will say anything – with all the faux empathy for our diminishing quality of life a retread politician can muster – to make long-suffering residents believe he gives a damn about fixing the now insurmountable problems his craven acquiescence and incompetence helped create.

Angel               Sons of the Beach

I half-jokingly subscribe to the Groucho Marx adage, “I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.” 

But I have never regretted my long association with Sons of the Beach – Florida’s premiere beach driving and access advocacy – a grassroots organization comprised of civically active people dedicated to protecting our most important natural asset and preserving our century-old tradition of beach driving.

Most recently, a reinvigorated Sons of the Beach have been sounding the klaxon on the grave threat of coastal erosion and the disastrous policy of continuing to permit development east of the Coastal Construction Control Line – even as residents in Daytona Beach Shores, Wilber-by-the-Sea, and beyond continue incredibly expensive recovery and mitigation efforts following the devastation brought by Hurricanes Ian and Nicole. 

Here in the Real World, most rational beings understand the folly of doing the same thing over and over – putting profit ahead of the public good – while expecting a different outcome.

The very definition of greed-crazed insanity. 

Now, as existing residents struggle to meet rapidly expanding property insurance premiums,  those with the wherewithal to purchase a chip in the game using massive campaign contributions (in a bizarre environment where an individual’s civic intelligence is measured by the size of their bank account) – some out-of-town developers are intent on building more high-rise ‘condotels’ east of A-1-A – blotting out the very sun that brings visitors to our area in the first place.

Fortunately, many concerned residents have come to the logical conclusion that continuing to build on what remains of our protective dune line represents a clear and present danger to public safety, the coastal environment, and our hospitality industry.

Recently, Sons of the Beach marked a victory in the fight against a 27-story condo/hotel project proposed near Silver Beach and A-1-A when members spoke in opposition before the Daytona Beach Planning Board. 

If approved, the planned development would have allowed five-years for permitting and ten-years for “substantial completion” – setting the stage for another interminable “pardon our progress” sign in front of the latest environmental insult on the beachside…   

According to Sons of the Beach, the City of Daytona Beach’s Land Development Code requires that the city take measures to protect the public welfare should a project be located “wholly within or partially within any flood hazard area” – and, according to reports, approximately half of the proposed development is within a flood zone…

“Rich Yost, newly elected President of SONS OF THE BEACH, states “the whole purpose of these policies (per city ordinance) is to safeguard the public health, safety, and general welfare as well as protect against development which may increase flood damage or erosion potential.” 

As it stands, the developer has been granted a two-month continuance…

Many thanks to SOB President Yost and those intrepid members who stood in defense of commonsense and our quality of life in fighting this monstrosity. 

Again, if you haven’t already, I encourage everyone to go to www.sonsofthebeach.org and become a member today.  While donations are appreciated, membership is free, and a great way of joining with friends and neighbors concerned about the future of our coastline. 

Quote of the Week

“Assistant City Manager Annual Salary: $150,936.65”

–City Clerk’s Office, City of Ormond Beach, Florida, Friday, June 9, 2023

Some 13-days after filing a formal public records request through the City of Ormond Beach’s third-party vendor for the Assistant City Manager’s salary and benefits, I received the terse response above – along with an electronic copy of what appeared to be a human resources brochure giving a general overview of employee benefits. 

That’s okay.  The delay gives me another bite at this rotten apple of bureaucratic redundancy.

My request was in response to reports that Assistant City Manager Claire Whitley is representing the city in testy negotiations with the International Union of Police Associations – the Police Department’s collective bargaining agent – who are working hard to obtain reasonable increases in salary and retirement benefits for Ormond Beach police officers in an era where it is extremely difficult to recruit and retain qualified personnel.

In my view, given the increasing demands on law enforcement and first responders – having the superfluous bureaucratic position of “Assistant City Manager” nickel and dime our dedicated officers out of a competitive wage is the height of hypocrisy.

Especially when you consider the starting salary for an Ormond Beach Police Officer is advertised at $46,468… 

For the record, a check of the City of Ormond Beach’s “transparency” portal finds that, last year, the Assistant City Manager received base pay of “$151.11K” – “other pay” of “$8.21K” and an “employer paid amount” of “$32.37K.”

That’s a whopping total of “$191.69K” in 2022 alone. 

For an unnecessary Assistant City Manager?  

Whoa.   

In my view, it is time for Mayor Bill Partington and the Free Spenders to start the process of “rightsizing” exorbitant executive salaries and start paying those at the tip of the spear – the brave souls who put their lives on the line to protect your family and mine – a compensation package that respects their courage, commitment, and dedication. 

And Another Thing!

They call it the old “Bait-and-Switch.” 

A confidence scam employed by old-time grifters like former Daytona Beach City Manager Jim “The Chiseler” Chisholm (who is now practicing his unique brand of “management” in the Lost City of Deltona). 

The ruse is perpetrated when, after several iterations of a controversial development are proposed – and the least-worst of all evils is approved by the elected body – another more onerous project is ultimately substituted after a period of stalling and stagnation.

Sound familiar?  It should.

Does anyone remember the super-secret “Project Delta” – the “brainchild” of the former good old boy’s investment club at Consolidated Tomoka Land Company – a development once billed as a 300-unit apartment complex with grocery store, shops, and an elevated parking garage – proposed on the site of the now demolished First Baptist Church in downtrodden downtown Daytona?   

Me neither…            

Like so many ‘grand reveals’ that make a flash in the pan then fade into the civic ether, Project Delta took on several iterations – including a weird plan floated in the waning days of The Chiseler’s reign that would have declared Daytona Beach City Hall “functionally obsolete” and replaced with a palatial, multi-story municipal complex constructed on the property then owned by CTO Realty Growth, Inc. at International Speedway Boulevard and North Ridgewood Avenue – complete with a five-story parking garage abutting a new “multifamily building” fronting North Palmetto Avenue to the east.

In an August 2020 article by the intrepid Eileen Zaffiro-Kean writing in The Daytona Beach News-Journal, we learned the real reason Chisholm wanted to comingle public and private funds for the project:

“Chisholm said the new development would evolve in stages, with the parking garage built first and a City Hall built later. The company that owns most of the Ridgewood Avenue block between International Speedway Boulevard and Bay Street, CTO Realty Growth Inc., has a developer under contract to build apartments on the site but could use help with the expense of a parking garage…”

This week, Westplan Investors – d/b/a “Accent Daytona Beach LP” – the Dutch developer who purchased the property in 2021, held a “neighborhood meeting” to unveil their latest plan for what is now referred to as “Project Delta West.”   

According to the News-Journal, “At issue are new plans to build five multi-story luxury apartment buildings instead of one on the downtown Daytona Beach property.”

“New plans”?

Wait, what?

In an informative article by the News-Journal’s business editor Clayton Park this week, we learned:

“The new site plan reveals what Westplan has in mind: five multi-story luxury apartment buildings, instead of one, as previously planned. The rest of the property is earmarked for surface parking with the exception of a small pad for potential commercial development.

No longer included in the plans are a grocery store, parking garage, restaurant, and retail store that CTO officials envisioned when they owned the land.

“We are amending the zoning to reflect the current multifamily layout they’re proposing,” said Cobb Cole land-use attorney Jessica Gow, who represents Westplan. “The zoning would still permit other (potential) retail or grocery uses, but those are not contemplated in their design at this time.”

Damn…

Unfortunately, it appears that the Downtown and Midtown neighborhoods will remain a ‘food desert’ for the foreseeable future. 

Many were looking forward to the long-promised revitalization of the area – including the supermarket, eatery, and new retail shops we were assured were part of the “original” Project Delta. 

Now, it appears our always upbeat downtown development gurus are moving the cheese just a little farther out of reach.

According to Jack White, the patient president of the Jack White Land Company, who, with his wife, former Daytona Beach City Commissioner Kelly White, have held on longer than most to see the revitalization of Downtown Daytona come to fruition – explained in the News-Journal that some 2,000 to 2,500 people will need to move into the area before a grocery store is viable…

“Nobody wants to be first,” said White. “Brown & Brown stepped up and built their new headquarters (which opened in January 2021) and then they created the new (Riverfront Esplanade) park across the street. If you think of it as a clock, those were giant cogs, but one of the cogs we’re still missing is getting more people living downtown.”

So, Brown & Brown wasn’t the panacea we were promised? 

I’m confused.                                                

Because I specifically recall being assured by our ‘powers that be’ that the Brown & Brown headquarters was going to solve every social, civic, and economic problem we face from malignant blight to the heartbreak of psoriasis…

In 2017, just weeks after the carefully orchestrated announcement that we would host the headquarters, both the City of Daytona Beach and the County of Volusia ponied up millions-of-dollars in infrastructure improvements, financial incentives, and property tax abatement – which, we were told, would assist Brown & Brown in obtaining even more tax credits from the State of Florida for the promised 600 “new high-paying jobs” the gleaming glass-and-steel HQ would bring to downtown.

As the News-Journal reported at the time, these lucrative spiffs were championed by “some of the city’s heaviest hitters,” to include former Mayor Glenn Ritchey, past County Chair Frank Bruno, and representatives from Halifax Health, the Regional Chamber of Commerce, Cobb Cole, ad infinitum…

There was heady talk around town – exciting words like “rejuvenation,” “recovery,” and “revitalization” were bandied about – as our “heavy hitters” assured us taxpaying pissants that downtown restaurants, shops, and bars would be brimming with free spending Brown & Brown executives – something that gave strapped area merchants reason to hang on by their splintered fingernails just a little while longer. 

(Until Brown & Brown opened a full-service restaurant inside the new building, that is…)

Remember?  I do.

All us rubes who pay the bills had to do was keep our pieholes shut and accept the massive corporate welfare, tax breaks, and other publicly funded “economic incentives” the longsuffering citizens of Daytona Beach and Volusia County showered on the billion-dollar international insurance intermediary to hedge risk and cover overhead – then, in turn, developers, grocers, and entrepreneurs would be fist fighting each other to locate downtown.     

Now we’re being told this cheap watch we were sold is still missing a “cog”?

Whatever.

Naturally, the Pavlovian response of many weary residents when the “new plan” for Project Delta West was unveiled this week was to speculate what “incentives” our economic development shills will lavish on our new friends at Westplan Investors as we await “…the next big thing”?

Stay tuned, folks. 

Because the one constant here on Florida’s “Fun Coast” is the more things change – the more they stay the same…    

That’s all for me.  Have a great weekend, y’all!