850 Business Magazine Fall 2019

BAY PRIDE

A long-closeted community takes its place in the NW Florida sun

AEROSPACE

Marianna hopes to attract aviation contractors to its commerce park

HSU SHINES

Fort Walton Beach entrepreneur leads students to try on STEM curriculum

SPECIAL REPORT

BAY COUNTY BUSINESS JOURNAL

$4.95

FALL 2019

RECOVERY

Corporate support helped storm-damaged Panama City hospital get back on its feet www.850businessmagazine.com

A product of Rowland Publishing, Inc.

Forging a Future DIVERSITY

FLEXIBILITY

Amid devastation, Triumph Gulf Coast Accelerating pace board weighsPanama projects of global change brings City’s mayor with goal of making area business opportunities sees opportunities economy less vulnerable along with disruption

It It allall ItIt all all It allwith starts with starts starts with starts with with astarts connection. a connection. aa connection. a connection. connection.

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We want to be part startups make the connections that can make all the difference. startupswas make the connections that can make all the difference. because meetonsomeone who can make itWe stronger. just ayou sketch a napkin.

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voice story A DV E RT I S E M E N T

FIND YOUR

U

Unintentional complacency about communicating your brand’s relevance enables competitors to take advantage of the opportunity to vault past you.

Before that happens, update your communications plan to be more current and competitive. If your plan needs serious updating, here are seven tips to help get your messaging path back on track for the future:

YO U R T E R M S, YO U R T U R F, YO U R T I M E L I N E. 4

TELL YOUR

INVITE YOUR COMMS TEAM TO THE TABLE. There’s a good reason to invite your communications team to C-suite meetings: The best way to mitigate threats and leverage big opportunities is to make sure your communications strategy is synced up to your overall business plan.

DUST OFF YOUR CRISIS PLAN. Any business, government entity, or nonprofit could face a crisis that threatens its brand.

Revisit your crisis plan at least every year to make sure it includes such essential information as contact information for all your crisis team, logins for your own communications platforms, and basic holding statements that allow you to respond quickly. The crisis before any crisis is being unprepared.

TRAIN LIKE YOU MEAN BUSINESS. The day may come when even the most lowprofile executive has to face the media and deliver a smart, strong, strategic message.

The time to prepare for that day is now — with regular training and even on-camera practice.

HARNESS THE POWER OF STORYTELLING. Social media has elevated the value and power of storytelling to new levels. Be prepared with your positive story, and to push back against inaccurate, misleading, or intentionally damaging comments.

Tell your truth in your own terms, on your own turf, and on your own timeline.

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ASSERT THOUGHT LEADERSHIP. Sharing your insights and expertise to a broader audience is a great way to broaden credibility.

Sometimes the best way to sell is NOT to sell, but rather to give away knowledge. Find opportunities to share your wisdom, through op-eds, blogs, podcasts, interviews or appearances as a guest commentator. And then promote and deepen the reach of that content through your own social platforms.

COMMUNICATE VISUALLY. The information age has left audiences awash in a sea of information, and that’s why the content that performs best uses video, photographs, graphics, and icons paired with a few choice words. It’s time to embrace a more visual strategy.

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE. Learn everything you can about who you’re talking to, what they’re looking for, what they’re thinking about, and what motivates them. Use resources like social media and search engine audits, audience surveys, focus groups, and data visualizations. The tools of research are plentiful and can unlock invaluable insights you need — so, use them!

A CULTURE OF COMMUNICATION With an up-to-date communications strategy and an effective plan to bring it to life, your organization can remain vital in the everchanging modern marketplace. Otherwise, you may end up on a corner shelf, right next to the all-but-obsolete fax machine.

Congratulations

to Michelle Ubben

President/Partner at Sachs Media Group 2019 Pinnacle Award Winner

Celebrating

20 Years

of Service to Sachs Media Group All of Michelle’s colleagues, clients, friends and family salute her bold and dedicated leadership. You inspire us all!

PR News NATIONAL 2018

850.222.1996 | sachsmedia.com Public Relations | Public Affairs | Crisis | Digital Tallahassee | Orlando | Fort Lauderdale | Washington, D.C. 850 Business Magazine

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850 Magazine Fall 2019

IN THIS ISSUE

52 52

FEATURES Human Rights Ordinances

In Bay County and elsewhere in Northwest Florida, efforts are being made to codify what many people believe should go without saying: Discrimination on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation should not occur in areas including housing, employment and access to public venues and services. Advocates at local and state levels are promoting awareness of the economic value and impact of the LGBTQ community.

By Steve Bornhoft

PHOTOS BY MICHAEL BOOINI (58) AND CHANDLER WILLIAMS COURTESY OF OHANA INSTITURE (84)

62

Hsu Foundation In the course of

his career as an entrepreneur, Paul Hsu has demonstrated a knack for identifying unfilled market niches and creating businesses to occupy them. Convinced that the fields of science, technology, engineering and math will present attractive opportunities for today’s generation of students to succeed, he has established a foundation that aims to stimulate interest among the young in subject areas that they tend to avoid.

84 In This Issue 12 14 18 88 90

From the Publisher From the Mailbag News & Numbers Sound Bytes The Last Word from the Editor

Departments THE 850 LIFE 20 Hurricane Michael robbed Panama City of 20-25 percent of its population and reduced the value of taxable property in the city by 15-20 percent. Mayor Greg Brudnicki has been frustrated by the pace and the politics of the state and federal response to the storm. Still, he is optimistic. “We will rebuild like New Orleans and Mississippi and Houston did,” he says.

PERSPECTIVES 24 David Lawrence, a nationally celebrated advocate for children and the chairman of The Children’s Movement of Florida, views school readiness as a moral and practical imperative. “What could be more American than for every child to have a chance to succeed?” he writes.

By Zandra Wolfgram

Special Sections

On the Cover: For native Texan J.D. Wood, manager of the new Panama City Beach Sports Complex, the development represents fields of dreams come true.

Photo by Michael Booini

51 Featured is a premier downtown Pensacola office building that is replete with recent improvements to common areas.

DEAL ESTATE

PROFESSIONAL PROFILES

67 Familiarize yourself with some of the leading professionals in our area, representing a variety of disciplines and specialties. We summarize the credentials and experience that make them regarded and reputable.

Corridors CAPITAL 80 Leon County commissioners voted unanimously in June 2018 to place creation of a Children’s Services Council on the ballot in November 2020. If approved by voters, the council will have the authority to levy a property tax of up to 50 cents for every $1,000 of value to fund services.

EMERALD COAST

84 Student-teacher ratios are tiny at the Ohana Institute in Inlet Beach where the faculty employs a socialemotional approach to education and works to identify all factors that may affect students’ academic performance.

I-10 86 Throughout Northwest Florida, aerospace is becoming a significant factor in local economies, and Marianna wants in on the action. It is promoting the commerce park at its airport as a site well-suited for companies that deal with flying machines.

Special Reports

27

BAY COUNTY BUSINESS JOURNAL

Bay County is given simultaneously to economic recovery and economic development. A year after Hurricane Michael stormed Panama City and neighboring communities, many businesses remain in restoration or rebuilding modes. Developers are working to replenish the county’s housing stock. Nonetheless, the county remains attractive to site selectors and companies looking for new locations to set up shop. As strong as the storm was, it did not stall the momentum that Bay County gained when it landed a GKN Aerospace manufacturing plant at the Venture Crossings commerce park near Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport.

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PROMOTION

Congressman Matt Gaetz, right, served as keynote speaker at the 2019 Air Force Contracting Summit.

He was joined on stage by Defense Leadership Forum chairman William Loiry.

Contracting Summit Provides Insights to Air Force Budgets 8

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PROMOTION

A

national conference and expo, the 2020 Air Force Contracting Summit, will be held Jan. 30-31, 2020, at the Hilton Sandestin Beach Golf Resort & Spa. Now in its seventh year, the event brings together prime contractors, subcontractors, small businesses, military officials, contracting officials, financial experts and defense agencies throughout the country. Bank of America/Merrill Lynch is the Summit’s top sponsor; its Destin and Tampa offices, in particular, are heavily involved.

“We’re delighted to host the Air Force Contracting Summit year after year in Northwest Florida,” said Defense Leadership Forum chairman William Loiry.

“This major defense business event is growing by 100 to 200 companies per year and is beginning to have a significant economic impact on the region.”

The 2020 Summit will provide the latest information on Air Force 2020 and 2021 budgets; Tyndall Air Force Base reconstruction contracts; Air Force mission and contracting priorities; innovative military acquisition strategies; and financing strategies for government contracting.

The Summit features general session presentations; contracting presentations from senior military contracting officials and contracting experts; a prime contractors panel; a small business resources session; matchmaking sessions; and a variety of opportunities to network with exhibitors.

More than 500 companies registered for the 2019 Air Force Contracting Summit. U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, was the keynote speaker. A panel on Air Force Base reconstruction and resiliency initiatives featured Maj. Steven Fletcher, commander of the 325th Contracting Squadron at Tyndall Air Force Base, and Dave Robau, executive director of the Gulf Coast Energy Network.

The Defense Leadership Forum is a public service organization that brings together Congressional leaders, Pentagon officials, military base commanders, military contracting officials and business representatives in the interests of identifying the best solutions for defending the United States. For more information, visit usdlf.org.

» WANT TO GO?

To register for the 2020 Air Force Contracting Summit, visit usdlf.org. For further information about the event, contact us via email at marketing@defenseleadershipforum.org or reach us by phone at (202) 552-0179.

WILLIAM LOIRY

William Loiry is chairman of the Defense Leadership Forum (DLF), headquartered in Washington, D.C. Loiry, who resides in South Walton County, is renowned for recognizing national and international needs and then bringing key decisionmakers together to identify the best solutions. Since 2010, he and his team have organized major defense business conferences in Washington, D.C., and around the country. In 1998, following the bombings of American embassies in Africa, Loiry organized the first conference on the threat of Osama bin Laden to American companies overseas. In 1999, he organized the first national cybersecurity conference in Washington. After 9/11, Loiry and his team organized the major homeland security forums in Washington, bringing together government and military officials, business leaders and homeland security experts.

Gov. Tom Ridge, the first Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, was a featured keynote speaker. Close to 100,000 Congressional, government, military and industry leaders have attended the conferences organized by William Loiry and his team.

For more information, visit williamloiry.com.

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Fall 2019

850 THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE OF NORTHWEST FLORIDA

Vol. 12, No. 1

PRESIDENT/PUBLISHER BRIAN E. ROWLAND EDITORIAL EDITOR Steve Bornhoft MANAGING EDITOR Jeff Price STAFF WRITER Hannah Burke CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Lazaro Aleman, Rochelle Koff, David Lawrence Jr., Rebecca Padgett, Zandra Wolfgram CREATIVE DIRECTOR OF PRODUCTION AND TECHNOLOGY Daniel Vitter CREATIVE DIRECTOR Jennifer Ekrut ART DIRECTOR Saige Roberts SENIOR PUBLICATION DESIGNER Shruti Shah PUBLICATION DESIGNERS Sarah Burger, Jordan Harrison, Lindsey Masterson GRAPHIC DESIGNER Sierra Thomas CONTRIBUTING DESIGNERS Brian Stromlund CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Michael Booini, Doug Dobos, Desirée Gardner, Scott Holstein, Erick Lima, Marla Carter Photography, Bruce Palmer, Saige Roberts, Chandler Williams SALES, MARKETING & EVENTS VICE PRESIDENT/CORPORATE DEVELOPMENT McKenzie Burleigh SALES MANAGER, EASTERN DIVISION Lori Magee Yeaton SALES MANAGER, WESTERN DIVISION Rhonda Lynn Murray DIRECTOR OF NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, EASTERN DIVISION Daniel Parisi DIRECTOR OF NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, WESTERN DIVISION Dan Parker AD SERVICES COORDINATORS Tracy Mulligan, Lisa Sostre ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES David Doll, Julie Dorr, Darla Harrison, Linda Powell MARKETING MANAGER Kate Pierson SALES AND MARKETING WRITER Rebecca Padgett SALES AND EVENTS MANAGER Mackenzie Little SALES AND EVENTS ASSISTANT Abby Crane SENIOR INTEGRATED MARKETING COORDINATOR Javis Ogden INTEGRATED MARKETING COORDINATOR Taylor Dashiell OPERATIONS ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES DIRECTOR Melissa Spear CUSTOM PUBLISHING MANAGER Sara Goldfarb CLIENT SERVICES REPRESENTATIVE/PRODUCTION SPECIALIST Melinda Lanigan ACCOUNTING ASSISTANT Amber Dennard RECEPTIONISTS Kaitlyn Henderson, Natalie Kazmin

DIGITAL SERVICES DIGITAL EDITOR Janecia Britt 850 BUSINESS MAGAZINE 850businessmagazine.com, facebook.com/850bizmag, twitter.com/850bizmag, linkedin.com/company/850-business-magazine ROWLAND PUBLISHING rowlandpublishing.com SUBSCRIPTIONS A one-year (4 issues) subscription is $20. To purchase, call (850) 878-0554 or go online to 850businessmagazine.com. Single copies are $4.95 and may be purchased at Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million in Tallahassee, Fort Walton Beach, Destin, Pensacola, Panama City and at our Tallahassee office.

850 Magazine is published quarterly by Rowland Publishing, Inc. 1932 Miccosukee Road, Tallahassee, FL 32308.

850/878-0554. 850 Magazine and Rowland Publishing, Inc. are not responsible for unsolicited manuscripts, photography or artwork. Editorial contributions are welcomed and encouraged but will not be returned. 850 Magazine reserves the right to publish any letters to the editor. Copyright September 2019 850 Magazine, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part without written permission is prohibited. Member of three Chambers of Commerce throughout the region.

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From the Publisher

CLASS ACTS

We owe a debt of gratitude to teachers As I write this, school is resuming in my hometown and throughout the 850 region. Teachers are returning to the work of shaping tomorrow’s workforce, leaders and the inheritors of whatever current generations of adults will do right and perhaps not so right. and a retired Miami Herald publisher — wherever he goes. An excerpt from Mr. Lawrence’s book, A Dedicated Life: Journalism, Justice, and a Chance for Every Child, appears on page 24 of this edition of 850.

Most of Lawrence’s formative years were spent on a small farm in upstate New York.

He was one of nine children born to Nancy and David Lawrence — nine children who today combine for 19 college degrees.

Lawrence was 6 when his parents abandoned New York City, where his father was a cigar-smoking newspaper man, in favor of a pastoral existence. A farm, they thought, would be the perfect place to raise a large family. Lawrence, then, grew up poor, but he scarcely knew as much, so consumed was he by the cooperative venture that was the family farm.

He was blessed with invaluable assets in two devoted, highly educated parents who read to their children and impressed upon them the importance of paying attention and staying connected to the world beyond themselves.

Health issues developed by Nancy led the Lawrence family to relocate to Florida, where Dad resumed newspaper work, a career path that Lawrence would follow.

New York’s loss was Florida’s gain.

Today, in his advocacy role, Lawrence urges all of us to heed the words of Fred Rogers, he of the television neighborhood.

Said Rogers, “Our goal as a nation must

be to make sure that no child is denied the chance to grow in knowledge and character from the very first years. … Every child is welcome in the world of learning, not just ones from certain neighborhoods, but every child.”

To that, I will say, “Amen.” Increasingly, we have seen the tragedies that can result when children enter school at such disadvantages that they cannot catch up and grow isolated and frustrated.

So, to our teachers, I say, “Thank you for all that you do. Thank you for the sacrifices you make on behalf of children, including the earnings that you might have made had you chosen a more lucrative profession. I will do my best to remain mindful of the critical importance of your work.”

Be well,

BRIAN ROWLAND browland@rowlandpublishing.com

P.S. Briefly, here’s an update on Rowland Publishing’s experience with the EOS-Traction program, which began one year ago. The entire RPI team has embraced the program. Morale is at an all-time high, people feel empowered, stress levels are reduced and all departments are operating much more efficiently. Ultimately, I foresee the program having a positive effect on the bottom line.

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PHOTO BY SCOTT HOLSTEIN

Parents, teachers, other influencers and the community at large all have roles to play in ensuring that young people are integrated into the lives of our communities and become collegial rather than combative, constructive versus destructive. As the world grows smaller and seemingly spins faster, unprecedented cooperation on a global scale will be required to meet emerging and growing challenges.

How are we doing in Northwest Florida when it comes to preparing the next generation of adults for a rapidly changing world?

There is ample cause for concern.

Among counties in the 850 zone, high school graduation rates range from 66.1 percent to 88.7 percent. Attainment rates — the percentage of students who go on to obtain at least an associate’s degree — range from 15.9 percent to 55.1 percent.

This, according to statistics supplied by the Florida Chamber of Commerce.

If you are like me, you find those numbers alarming.

Improvement will come not at the product of remedial approaches, but proactive ones. The quality of the product exiting our educational systems depends highly on the quality of children’s first years of life.

That is a point of emphasis for David Lawrence Jr. — a leading national advocate for children, the chairman of The Children’s Movement of Florida

Let us help you work ‘ON’ your business.

SMALL BUSINESS EXECUTIVE PROGRAM (SBEP) Participants learn to think differently and become more efficient running their business.

The overall goal of this program is to help particpants work “ON” their business.

There is no cost to participate.

For more information about the program, or the Jim Moran Institute for Global Entrepreneurship, visit jmi.fsu.edu.

CONTACT Mike Campbell (850) 644-4414 mscampbell@JimMoranInstitute.fsu.edu jmi.fsu.edu

Bricks &Brass 850 422 4200

DOWNTOWN TALLAHASSEE’S NEWEST EVENT SPACE 316 West Tennessee Street, Tallahassee FL 32301

www.BricksandBrass850.com 850 Business Magazine

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P RO MOT I O N

850businessmagazine.com

FROM THE MAI LBAG GROWING ORGANICALLY

If you’re ready to soak in the latest leadership trends, feel inspired and propel results to the next level, you belong in downtown Pensacola for EntreCon® on Nov. 13–14. EntreCon® is a business and leadership conference with a communitycentric twist, offering leaders from across all industries an opportunity to grow together. Experience captivating keynotes and actionable breakout sessions on leadership, growth, marketing, mindfulness, social media, innovation — and much more. Whether you’re an aspiring or established leader, EntreCon® is here to help you be the best you that you can be and prepare you for the workforce of the future. Be a part of the movement. Let’s create great places to work together.

Visit 850businessmagazine.com/calendar/entrecon for more information.

ONLINE EXCLUSIVES » Deal Estate Browse residential and

commercial real estate opportunities, recently sold properties and dreamy second homes, sponsored by Beck Properties.

» The Latest News

Stay up to date with local stories and reports about local business events, happenings and gatherings all across Northwest Florida.

» Legal Insights

Stay aware of new industry issues and legal updates with these online exclusives.

» Flip Books

View 850 issues and Business Journals present and past in a digital book format.

LET’S NETWORK! Find 850 Business Magazine on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. You’ll also find Rowland Publishing on LinkedIn, where you can join the 850 Business Group for conversations with fellow readers.

@850BIZMAG

Tag us on Instagram stories at your favorite local businesses for a chance to be featured. Supporting local establishments is crucial to the development and growth of our communities.

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Perry G. Wood Sopchoppy

SETTING IT STRAIGHT @850bizmag 850 - The Business Magazine of Northwest Florida @850BizMag

The Summer 2019 edition of 850 Magazine mistakenly contained references to Beck Properties. The business has been rebranded as Beck Partners. We regret the error.

PHOTO COURTESY OF ENTRECON®

ENTRECON® BUSINESS AND LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE | NOV. 13–14

Dear Mr. Rowland: I read with interest your column, “Fostering Employment,” in the summer edition of 850 — especially given what’s going on in Sopchoppy, where we are undergoing an economic study.

My wife and I travel to “big box stores” to shop, especially to stock up on the many items available in one place. But that place is 16 miles away! Yes, the prices may be better, but factoring in fuel, time and hassle takes away that incentive.

I particularly liked your comment: “Economic developers and civic leaders are often focused on landing the next big whale.” I don’t think landing such a creature and our town’s motto, “Sopchoppy and Easy Living Go Together,” are compatible. I believe “growth for growth’s sake” to be a cancerous philosophy and do not want that here.

You aver, “Organic growth is as important as imported growth.

Communities that grow their own businesses bring about the kind of entities that support Little League teams, churches and nonprofit organizations in ways that many of the big corporations that extract dollars from local communities do not.”

This is particularly true of Sopchoppy and the surrounding area.

Our City Council was recently presented with the third iteration of the study from Competitive Florida mentioned above. It has been most interesting to track the progress of ideas as the study has progressed. I feel strongly that the process has brought about essential involvement and thinking by the citizens.

Though new to town, I have met some of the local business people. They exemplify the “organic growth” you describe, and I hope their interests are considered in discussions of the future of Sopchoppy.

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P R O M OT I O N

FALL CALENDAR BEST BETS ​From festivals and tours to sports and the arts, ​the event and entertainment choices are endless.

For more events in the 850 area, visit 850Tix.com.

SEPTEMBER 13 | TALLAHASSEE

PURPLE WILLIE JAM V This fifth annual evening of great live local music raises funds for the Tallahassee Walk to End Alzheimer’s and The Alzheimer’s Association. Entertainers will include Hot Tamale Tallahassee, Rags & Tinder, the Fried Turkeys and the Jerry Thigpen Trio.

OCTOBER 3 | DESTIN

CONTRACTORS CONNECT OCTOBER MEET UP AT AJ’S DESTIN Make connections with other contractors, subcontractors and specialists in the Emerald Coast construction industry. Each $10 ticket includes a draft beer and light appetizers. All registered guests will be entered to win in multiple giveaways.

OCTOBER 19 | SANDESTIN

2019 BEST OF THE EMERALD COAST Join us at Grand Boulevard as we celebrate winners of “Best of the Emerald Coast” awards for 2019. This 20th annual event will be a night of food, fashion and fun provided by the best restaurants, retailers and other businesses on the Emerald Coast. The community will come together to discover the unique attributes that make this year’s winners stand out in the crowd.

NOVEMBER 2 | MIRAMAR BEACH

The Market Shops is set to host its fifth annual Bloody Mary Festival benefiting Habitat for Humanity-Walton County. The event will feature unlimited tastes of the Emerald Coast’s most creative and innovative Bloody Marys, made with Cathead Vodka and served by the finest restaurants and bars on the Emerald Coast.

LOCAL TICKETS. ONE PLACE. Get tickets to these events now at 850Tix.com.

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF INDIVIDUAL EVENTS

THE MARKET SHOPS FIFTH ANNUAL BLOODY MARY FESTIVAL

Proud partner for the installation of mechanical, medical gas and plumbing systems for the new Studer Family Children's Hospital in Pensacola.

www.csusasoutheast.com

850.484.4999

FL Plumbing License #CFC1428144

FL Mechanical License #CMC057076

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Executive Mindset

Business Arena NEWS AND NUMBERS

ANTICIPATING TOMORROW FLORIDA 2030 PROJECT WELCOMES THE FUTURE Florida 2030, a project spearheaded by the Florida Chamber Foundation, offers a strategic blueprint for achieving the state’s potential by meeting challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. It recognizes that, by 2030, Florida’s population is estimated to be 26 million. That means 1.5 million net new jobs will be needed by then. Sixty-five percent of future jobs will require postsecondary education or training. Up to 85% of all jobs in 2030 may be in industries or occupations that do not exist today. And, nearly one of every four Floridians may be over age 65 by 2030. Baseline data for counties in the 850 region appear below.

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Florida Counties

Estimated Population

Population Range in 2030

Per-Capita Income

3rd Grade Reading Success

High School Graduation

Attainment (AA or above) 32.9%

Bay

183,563

198,200-220,400

$40,926

56%

81.1%

Calhoun

14,483

15,900-17,900

$24,768

62%

86.9%

15.9%

Escambia

313,512

347,600-375,800

$39,582

52%

80.7%

40.2%

Franklin

11,727

13,100-14,700

$35,334

44%

77.3%

25.9%

Gadsden

46,070

50,600-56,100

$31,480

56%

66.1%

23.2%

Gulf

16,160

17,300-19,400

$30,980

46%

82.1%

26.1%

Holmes

19,558

20,900-23,400

$27,421

57%

77.1%

16.4%

Jackson

48,330

51,200-56,300

$30,632

66%

78.1%

20.9% 55.1%

Leon

290,290

332,500-365,900

$40,758

61%

93.0%

Liberty

8,242

10,000-11,200

$26,066

68%

77.0%

16.1%

Okaloosa

202,970

220,400-245,000

$48,836

66%

88.1%

40.8%

Santa Rosa

174,272

214,700-241,200

$40,727

65%

88.7%

40.2%

Walton

68,376

89,500-100,600

$52,662

66%

86.8%

35.1%

Washington

24,567

27,000-30,200

$27,704

66%

80.2%

17.0%

850businessmagazine.com

ILLUSTRATION BY FEODORA CHIOSEA / ISTOCK / GETTYI MAGES

Baseline data for counties in the 850 region appear below.

MAKING BUSINESS TO BUSINESS CONNECTIONS FOR MINORITY, WOMEN & SMALL BUSINESS ENTERPRISES

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FOR MORE INFORMATION:

OCTOBER 22

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OCTOBER

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Construction and Trade Companies

NOVEMBER

OEVforBusiness.org

LOCAL MEETS GLOBAL

The team, values, and service you know.

Now with expanded offerings, trusted worldwide.

Rogers, Gunter, Vaughn Insurance, a HUB International company 1117 Thomasville Road | Tallahassee,FL 32303 | 850-386-1111

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Executive Mindset

The (850) Life RESILIENCY

BOUNCING BACK Mayor Greg Brudnicki is confident about Panama City’s future As a child, Greg Brudnicki lived above his father’s restaurant in downtown Panama City. Now, as the city’s mayor since 2011, he will preside over efforts to reimagine and redevelop downtown and the city at large in the post-Michael era. The Category 5 storm decimated Bay County east of the Hathaway Bridge, displacing thousands of people who may never return.

Still, the mayor is given to an effective mix of realism and irrepressible optimism. In June, 850 editor Steve Bornhoft spoke with Brudnicki and got a progress report.

850: As a resident of Panama City’s hard-hit Cove neighborhood, how did you personally fare in Hurricane Michael?

Brudnicki: My insurance claim on my house is up to about $200,000. I got my roof done, but I need to focus on the other work that needs to happen. I’ve got to replace my deck. I want to get my boat dock back. The boat is in the driveway and all the landings got hammered. I haven’t had any time for fishing, and it kills me to hear that they slaughtered the trout and the pompano this spring.

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850: What has been the impact of the storm on the city’s population?

Do you have a handle on that?

Brudnicki: We were north of 36,000 before the storm, and we think we are down 20 to 25 percent. Housing stock is a big part of that. For example, in the case of our Housing Authority, 200 of their units were destroyed. Some of the people who used to live in those units are couch surfing, some of them are gone. We are hearing that if you don’t keep people within 60 miles of where they lived when the storm hit, the chances are they are going to be gone permanently. Our problem is that we’ve got water to the south of us, the beach is unaffordable to a lot of people, the area to the east of us is

blown up so they can only go north and they’ve got to go a long ways. In most areas, it’s 70 percent homeowners and 30 percent renters. Panama City is exactly the opposite, 70 percent renters and 30 percent homeowners. It is easier, of course, for a less vested person to move when all you’ve got is a lease and the financial obligation is not nearly as strenuous as a mortgage.

It’s scary for us because in April 2020, the census is taken again and that dictates money flow from state sales tax and from federal programs. It’s scary because, without the housing

stock back, I’m afraid we will have had a two-hour event that will dictate funding levels for the next 10 years. We could pay for another census in 2022 at the city’s expense, and it’s expensive, but we may have to do that.

850: How about the value of taxable property in the city?

Brudnicki: As to local tax levies, we substantially live off of property taxes. We think the value is off 15 to 20 percent and, of course, we are going to have to take that into account when we prepare budgets.

PHOTO BY DOUG DOBOS

Q&A WITH GREG BRUDNICKI 

850: In addition to a direct appropriation of disaster aid, are there other types of assistance you are pursuing?

Brudnicki: We have talked to the federal government about a Community Disaster Loan.

Typically, that is limited to $5 million, but the cap can be raised to 25 percent of what your annual budget would be.

(The city’s 2018-2019 fiscal year budget totaled $108.7 million.)

We would love to borrow $20 million or $25 million from that program to offset the loss of revenue due to the decrease in value.

850: Historically, property taxes and income from the city’s merchant fee, which is based on sales, have generated about the same amount of revenue. Is merchant fee income down, too, since the storm?

Brudnicki: You would think that, but there has been a little bit of a silver lining because there have been so many building material purchases for all the construction that is going on. Our merchant fee income, as a result, has pretty much kept up with what we are used

to. And, we hope that when the materials purchases slow down, more businesses will be back up and running.

850: How is the housing crisis being addressed?

Brudnicki: There is $115 million coming from the state for that purpose, and we are not sure how much of that is going to be appropriated to our county, but we think that is going to be a pretty good chunk. There is also supplemental funding of $448 million that is coming from the federal government. The state Department of Economic

Opportunity will have a lot to say about how that money is spent. We had 4,200 rentals in the city and only about 1,500 were available to be used after the storm. The Housing Authority has only $1 million in insurance and a million dollars in reserves for the units they lost at Massalina Commons and Fletcher Black. And, it’s going to take between $25 million and $30 million to rebuild them. We’re hoping that either the state or federal dollars can be used for that purpose.

The approach that the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development has been taking in situations like that is to come back with a portion of the development devoted to Section 8 housing, a portion to housing for seniors and some of it being market rate.

We are still putting families in FEMA trailers, and we will be getting more. Big picture, in order to get the economic engine of the city running, we’ve got to have people here, we’ve got to have workers here. We’re working with D.R. Horton Homes. They’re putting in 1,900-home subdivision in north Panama City, and we will be participating in extending a road to that development.

St. Joe would love to develop apartments downtown. They know that anything good that happens downtown will benefit them.

850: What are some of the problems affecting the private owners of individual homes?

Brudnicki: A big problem is what I would call multigenerational homes, and we may have about 1,000 of those in Millville and Glenwood and other areas of the city. Maybe Grandpa or a great grandparent built the house 50 or 100 years ago. Succeeding generations occupied the home, but the title never was passed. If you are living there now and don’t have

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THE (850) LIFE

a title, you can’t go to the bank and get a loan to fix the place up. You can’t get money from FEMA. And, you can’t get insurance. That means that, apart from savings, there is no capital to go in and improve that property. And, you can’t sell the lot for anyone to invest in. We plan to go to the Legislature with a proposal that will make it possible for long-term, taxpaying residents of these properties to go forward and do something with them. And, really, how can I go enforce codes at your property when you are handcuffed?

850: The new City Hall (a former downtown bank building at 501 Harrison Ave.) has enabled you to consolidate all city departments in one location.

Brudnicki: Yes, and if we had not stayed downtown, I’m sure some people would have said, “Well, if you’re not willing to invest in downtown, why should anybody else?” We chose to fix up this

footprint and, the truth is, we could not have gone anywhere else and built 60,000 square feet and had three acres of parking for what we spent. Having everybody here makes a heckuva difference and it makes a statement. We built it to meet our needs for the next 50 or 60 years.

850: Debris removal — how is the city doing in that regard?

Brudnicki: That’s one of the bright spots. We have 35 miles of ditches and have now cleaned about 32. Over 400 people have signed up for personal property debris removal that did not have insurance to cover that expense.

We are working with FEMA to clarify what they consider personal property debris to include. We are going to resume code enforcement in October, and we wanted to give people time to deal with their insurance companies and FEMA and to let things get to the

point where we could reasonably ask people why issues remain unaddressed. We’re sitting with neglected structures that are unsafe because renters were displaced and the property owner lives in another state and hasn’t done anything.

850: What does the approval, at long last, of the federal disaster aid package mean to the city?

Brudnicki: It gives us hope. We know that we are going to be getting some money, and I’m sure our creditors are happy about that, too. We borrowed $75 million for debris removal and the largest borrowing that the city had ever made previously was $34 million for a wastewater treatment plant.

Our debris bill is going to exceed $150 million. We’ve collected about $14 million in aid to address that expense and we have spent about $90 million. So, the appropriation had to happen so that we could turn

that money. I didn’t want to have to go out and borrow more. I don’t get rid of any debris with the interest paid on the loan. By the time we get aid from the appropriation, we will have spent $5 million or $10 million on interest. That’s not refundable by FEMA. We’ve got to be able to pay down the debt and get rid of the rest of our debris.

850: Are you optimistic?

Brudnicki: I see a very, very bright future for Panama City and Bay County. We will rebound like New Orleans and Mississippi and Houston did. People ask me, “What happens if we get another storm?”

Well, for one thing, we won’t have nearly as many big trees flying around. We had so many big ones because we hadn’t had a major storm like Michael in Panama City for 100 years. At the same time, we don’t know how the removal of a million trees from our city is going to affect our ecosystem.

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STUDER COMMUNITY INSTITUTE

Surround yourself with forward-thinking leaders at EntreCon® 2019.

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Featuring Forbes “30 Under 30” and Bestselling Author, Tiffany Pham

If you’re ready to soak in the latest leadership trends, feel inspired, and propel results to the next level, you belong in downtown Pensacola November 13-14.

EntreCon® is a business and leadership conference with a community-centric twist, offering leaders from across all industries an opportunity to grow together.

Experience captivating keynotes and actionable breakout sessions on leadership, growth, marketing, mindfulness, social media, innovation, and so much more.

Whether you’re an aspiring or established leader, EntreCon® is here to help you be the best you, you can be.

Be a part of the movment: Let’s create great places to work together.

Tiffany Pham, Founder & CEO of Mogul, will grace the EntreCon® stage as a “2019 keynote speaker.

Among many other awards, Pham has been named Business Insider “30 Most Important Women Under 30” in Tech, ELLE Magazine “30 Women Under 30 Who Are Changing the World, and “Good Housekeeping “Awesome Women Award” Winner.

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Rachael Gillette, rgillette@studeri.org

The Studer Community Institute is a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

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Executive Mindset

Perspectives A Universal, Moral, Practical Imperative Investing in children is paramount

BY DAVID LAWRENCE JR.

A

real movement for school readiness can only be done on behalf of everyone’s child because all children need the basics: love and nurturing. Child care that engages the mind, not the warehousing that most children receive. All their shots. Real relationships with medical caregivers, not the emergency room as basic medical care.

Excellent nutrition. The fullest opportunity to be safe.

Our mission must embrace what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke of — that is, “all of God’s children.” Too often, well-intended middle-class people in nonprofits target one deeply disadvantaged neighborhood or another, devoting extra resources that are frequently dispersed in non-holistic ways that lead to precious little progress for children. The impression so often left with others is this: “Oh, I see; it is about those children.”

But real readiness is on behalf of everyone’s child — and everyone’s family.

“Readiness” is not about children learning to read by age 3, but rather about the blending of education and health and love and nurturing in the earliest years, with knowledgeable, nurturing parents front and center in their children’s lives.

The imperative is moral and practical.

What could be more “American” than for every child to have a real chance to succeed? The practical is undergirded by the research that tells us that three of every four 17- to 24-year-old Americans cannot enter the military — cannot enter because of academic challenges, or physical challenges, or because of problems related to justice or substance abuse. This then becomes a matter of national security.

The country of my childhood has changed considerably. Today, two-thirds of women with children age 5 and younger work outside the home. Highquality child care has become crucial; the science tells us that a child’s window of learning is wide open during those early years and never so wide again. Eighty-five percent of brain growth occurs by age 3.

Only brain-stimulating quality child care brings positive outcomes. Most child care is warehousing and storage. Think of the opportunity missed.

The wisest path to genuine public education reform and success would be delivering all children to formal school in far better shape. Children need to be “ready” in many ways — not only cognitively and physically, but also socially, emotionally, behaviorally, developmentally and, yes, spiritually.

There is a Higher Being much higher than any of us.

I am not imagining tiny children in tiny desks with a teacher at the front of the classroom. But I do see “teachable moments” for all children in their earliest years: That sort of learning can go on in the shopping cart at the supermarket (shapes, sizes, colors), on a parent’s lap, on the playground, in any early learning/child care center. Anyplace.

A superb first-grade teacher will quickly know who’s really ready to learn and who is not. That teacher knows how vital genuine investment is in real quality in the years before kindergarten. That teacher wouldn’t be surprised to know of the U.S. Department of Education study of kindergarten showing that a quarter of “beginning kindergartners (are) eager to learn no more than sometimes or never, and (a third are) paying attention in class with similar frequency.” That teacher would respect the research by the American Reading Association, telling us that if a hundred children leave first grade not really able to read, 88 of them will remain poor or nonexistent readers after the fourth grade.

That teacher knows first-hand the frequent tragedy of the student who already feels like a failure.

Too many teachers, and too many parents, don’t expect enough from children.

The best teachers try to save these children. Many are not saved. Such failures must be unacceptable in a country that aspires to greatness and goodness.

The wisest prescription for the future is investment that will bring these children in far better shape to formal school.

David Lawrence Jr. retired in 1999 as publisher of The Miami Herald to work in the area of early childhood development and readiness. He chairs The Children’s Movement of Florida, aimed at making children the state’s top priority for investment. The commentary that appears here was excerpted from his book, A Dedicated Life: Journalism, Justice and a Chance for Every Child.

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE CHILDREN’S MOVEMENT OF FLORIDA

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A DV E RT I S E M E N T

As baby boomers move into the age of retirement, employers find themselves looking for ways to improve their work culture. Attracting and retaining top, millennial talent can be tough, especially if an employer doesn’t understand the kind of environment today’s modern worker thrives in. In this article, Kristine Rushing, the COO and Risk Consultant at Beck Partners, shares lessons learned and provides an insight on the Beck culture.

ATTRACTING + RETAINING

THE MODERN

WORKER

WITH UNBEATABLE WORK CULTURE

PROVIDING WHAT MILLENNIALS WANT “Millennials, or modern workers, simply want an environment where they can learn and grow. However, millennials aren’t the exception. This is a common expectation for everyone looking at employment opportunities,” Kristine explained. Millennials look for environments that are fun but also have a focus on relationships, friendships and being part of something worthwhile. Autonomy and the ability to make their own decisions drive environments millennials can thrive within.

“This is the environment we create for our team members at Beck,” Kristine said. Beck’s culture is “fluid”. It’s fluid because each person that an organization hires impacts their culture. This is one of the many reasons the hiring process is important.

» Providing what millennials want » The importance of continual learning and mentorship » Learn more about the Power of the Plus TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

The Beck culture thrives off the continual growth and education of its team members. “We provide mentorship at a relational level,” Kristine said. Instead, the company focuses on depth of knowledge at a personal level that can be shared to sustain the big picture. With ties to other businesses and community partners, Beck provides a culture geared toward self-stimulation.

The knowledge an employee learns will lend itself to their individual talents, elevating the company. “We meet with every team member to develop professional and personal goals. Aligning each individual’s goals with their growth path and the company’s goals is beneficial for everyone,” said Kristine. Beck puts a prime focus on learning both soft and hard skills, aiding team members in not only being great at their job but being great at life. Employers should strive to promote this kind of growth within their company to attract and retain today’s modern worker. Taking steps toward that type of influential work culture can start with something as simple as a phone call.

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Our hiring process is unique in that it consists of a peer panel comprised of individuals who exemplify the vision and mission of the company.

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850.477.7044 I TeamBeck.com

Beck Partners not only provides you with a full scope of services covering Commercial Real Estate, Insurance and Property Management, but we give you the Power of the Plus: a wealth of business expertise. From the little questions to the most important decisions facing your business, Beck can lend you the advice you need to travel along a path of exponential growth.

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| ECON OM I C D EV ELO P M E N T R O UN D UP

ASSET GROWTH Community partnerships are key to Bay EDA’s success

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

B

ecca Hardin was confident but couldn’t guarantee anything.

She had met officials with GKN Aerospace at the 2017 Paris Air Show and, through subsequent conversations, grew increasingly optimistic about the chance that the Bay County Economic Development Alliance might land the parts maker as a tenant at the St. Joe Company’s VentureCrossings Commerce Park near the Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport in West Bay. GKN, meanwhile, was facing a deadline for plant construction imposed by its customer, the federal government. As talks between the EDA and GKN continued, the construction timeline was becoming more and more compressed, and that concerned St. Joe CEO Jorge Gonzalez.

Gonzalez, then, took an extraordinary step.

With his go-ahead, St. Joe began construction of a factory building at VentureCrossings to GKN’s specifications, even though a deal between the EDA and the contractor had not been reached.

“There were some sleepless nights,” recalled Hardin, the EDA’s president. “If we hadn’t been able to do business with GKN, that would have 30

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been a career ender for me. And it wouldn’t have done Jorge any good either.”

Hardin and Gonzalez asked one another what they would do if negotiations went south.

Well, they agreed, there would be a nice, new, customized spec building to market.

“It’s extremely rare to find a partner who will share in a risk like that,” Hardin said. “But with that risk came great reward.”

Indeed. Already, GKN’s presence in Bay County had led to a decision by one of its suppliers, Advanced Composites and Metalforming Technologies (ACMT), to establish an operation in the one-time Honeywell building in Lynn Haven’s industrial park.

“We don’t get GKN without St. Joe, and we don’t get ACMT without GKN,” said Hardin, describing what she called a domino effect.

GKN, at this writing, has entered into a testing phase at its new plant, on its way to gaining approval for full production. Hardin was among local dignitaries who were afforded an opportunity to tour the 135,000-square-foot plant before any highly proprietary manufacturing operations commenced.

At the tour’s conclusion, said Hardin, the delegation was told, “We hope you enjoyed seeing our facilities, because you will never be allowed inside again.”

GKN had hired 70 employees as of May and has committed to creating 172 jobs. Of those hired, 30 percent are retired military personnel who arrived on Day 1 with top-secret security clearances.

Hardin refers to GKN as a “legacy project that has enhanced all of our recruitment efforts.” And, she added, the contractor “really likes our area and, as a result, they have been our greatest salespeople in the aviation world.

We have several active projects as the result of having GKN in our community. We take prospects through the VentureCrossings commerce park, and they see the GKN building and they see that we are building a spec building out there. Soon, they will see a hotel going up. They see the synergy that the GKN project brought to the properties around the airport.”

Hardin had pleaded for years with Gonzalez to develop a spec building, given the scarcity of available existing space in Bay County. When

PHOTOS BY DESIRÉE GARDNER (HARDIN) AND COURTESY OF THE ST. JOE COMPANY

Jorge Gonzalez and the St. Joe Co. yielded to repeated requests from Bay County Economic Development Alliance president Becca Hardin and agreed to construct a spec building at the Venture Crossings commerce park near the Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport.

finally he said yes to the idea, Hardin “screamed and hugged his neck,” she said.

“At St. Joe, we see land and lots and buildings going up pretty quickly,” Gonzalez said at a wall-raising event for the spec building held in May. A scheduled groundbreaking ceremony became a construction celebration, given the pace at which the project has proceeded. “But not everyone sees things that way. Becca satisfied me that this project will greatly enhance her recruitment efforts.”

Hurricane Michael wiped out what little building inventory Bay County had remaining after ACMT snapped up the Honeywell building and Air Temp, an auto parts manufacturer, acquired the one-time Boyd Brothers Printing property.

Hardin has assured Gonzalez that she will fill the new building quickly.In April,she and Garrett

Wright, the EDA’s vice president, attended MRO Americas Atlanta, an international trade fair, which is focused on maintenance, repair and overhaul in the aerospace industry.

Hardin talked up the spec building while there and lined up four businesses — all located in the U.S. outside the Southeast — who will be making trips to check out the project.

“I don’t think this space will be on the market very long,” Gonzalez ventured to say.

The “flex” building has been designed to accommodate one or as many as 10 tenants.

Each of the 10 bays making up the structure will feature front entries, rear dock doors and ceiling heights of approximately 28 feet. White Construction of Panama City, the project’s general contractor, anticipates that the building will be complete in September or October.

The spec building is one of three that St. Joe plans to develop.

The others will be located in the Panama City Beach Commerce Park and at the commerce park in Cedar Grove. In addition, St. Joe has announced plans to develop a 142-room hotel at the entrance to VentureCrossings.

Economic development efforts, then, have gained momentum in Bay County.

Seemingly long ago are the days when the EDA was in “dire straits,” Hardin said, its credibility shot and its relationship with local government in shambles after it convinced the County Commission in 2011 to advance an IT company, Redpine Healthcare Technologies, $350,000 in incentives.

Five months later, Redpine, which had pledged to create 410 jobs averaging $49,155 a year, shut its doors. It had hired a mere five people.

“We have several active projects as the result of having GKN in our community. We take prospects through the VentureCrossings commerce park, and they see the GKN building and they see that we are building a spec building out there. Soon, they will see a hotel going up.

They see the synergy that the GKN project brought to the properties around the airport.”

– Becca Hardin, president of the Bay County Economic Development Alliance

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“At St. Joe, we see land and lots and buildings going up pretty quickly. But not everyone sees things that way. Becca satisfied me that this project will greatly enhance her recruitment efforts.”

Neal Wade, who had done economic development work for St. Joe and had served as commerce secretary for the State of Alabama, was brought in to clean up the mess.

“Neal did an excellent job in creating a foundation so that when he hired me (in October 2014), I was able to come in and hit the ground running,” said Hardin, who moved to Bay County from Columbus, Georgia. “I immediately started reaching out to my contacts — site selection consultants, industry leaders — and my goal was to bring people here for visits, because we feel that if you can get people to Bay County, the county pretty well sells itself. We started turbo marketing Bay County and trying to get it on the international map.”

In that, Hardin has succeeded. To distinguish her product from those of competing communities, she talks up two key Bay County assets: the airport and properties around the airport and Panama City’s international deep-water port.

In recent years, the aerospace industry has been a focus for economic developers throughout Northwest Florida.

In Pensacola, ST Engineering Aerospace is new to the airport. Santa Rosa County has secured Triumph Gulf Coast dollars for development of an aircraft repair facility adjoining the Navy’s Whiting Field. Even Marianna is improving its commerce park in hopes of attracting an aerospace business.

“We do have a friendly competition, but I would say that Northwest Florida as a whole

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competes more so with Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas,” Hardin said. “We don’t really compete with other parts of the state of Florida like Jacksonville, Orlando, Tampa or South Florida because they have their own niche markets and they are going to get their share of business. Our part of Florida is much more like other Southern states and they are extremely competitive.”

It doesn’t help that legislative funding for Enterprise Florida is shaky year after year.

“You deal with site selection consultants and international companies, and they read about Enterprise Florida and they wonder whether leadership at the state level supports economic development,” Hardin said. “That’s a question that we are always having to handle.”

NEEDED: PLACES TO LIVE

Among the problems created by Hurricane Michael was a housing shortage. As Hardin checks in with existing Bay County industries, she finds that employees are commuting to work from as far away as Tallahassee.

For those workers, new housing stock can’t be built fast enough. But, as to incoming businesses, Hardin isn’t as stressed by the immediate housing crisis. With the exception of businesses going into the spec building, newcomers will have no choice but to proceed with “Greenfield projects,” starting with a clean piece of dirt and requiring something like

18 months to complete. By then, Hardin hopes, the housing issue will substantially be resolved.

“You ride around this community and you see the apartments and housing developments already starting to go up, and I’m confident that in a year or so we’ll be in a much different place,” Hardin said.

For the Bay EDA, 2018 headlines included four welcome commitments …

Air Temp de Mexico, a leading supplier of automotive parts, including condensers, radiators and heat exchangers, announced plans to establish their first manufacturing operation in the United States in Panama City. The company is a Tier 1 supplier to Volkswagen, Nissan, Peugeot and Ford. It is occupying the former Boyd Brothers Printing property.

It has committed to creating 50 advanced manufacturing jobs and will be making a capital investment of $6 million.

Advanced Composites and Metalforming Technologies (ACMT), a supplier of components for domestic and international aerospace manufacturers, announced plans to open a new facility in Lynn Haven. ACMT, headquartered in Connecticut, is engaged in Original Equipment Manufacturing (OEM), Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul (MRO) operations, Adhesives and Chemicals lines, and its relatively new Airframe division.

The project represents a $20 million capital investment and will result in 105 advanced manufacturing jobs.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE ST. JOE COMPANY

– Jorge Gonzalez, St. Joe CEO

Revint Solutions, a revenue recovery business serving health care providers throughout the nation, is establishing a regional headquarters and employee service center at a facility in Lynn Haven. The company is based in Pennsylvania and has grown through acquisitions and the merger of several health care revenue integrity solution providers in the U.S. Once fully operational, Revint will add approximately $6 million in annual payroll to Bay County.

Butterfly Training, a developer of e-learning solutions related to airport security, airport safety, airlines and aviation manufacturing, announced plans to establish a U.S. headquarters in Panama City. The company, which has seven locations in Europe, is partnering with Gulf Coast State College in providing internships and apprenticeships to students in the college’s digital design program. It will be creating 10 permanent jobs.

Other activities, too, are adding to Hardin’s energy level.

Eastern Shipbuilding, she noted, is in the process of hiring 1,000 welders to help fulfill new contracts. Port Panama City has developed its east terminal on property purchased from WestRock, operators of the paper mill in Panama City. The EDA will be marketing additional nearby property to industrial operations requiring port access.

A “very, very active prospect,” said by Hardin to be an international company, is looking at the Intermodal Distribution Center north of

Panama City on U.S. 231. Progress toward a deal was delayed by the hurricane, but the prospect has now made several trips to Bay County.

Another international company, of Japanese ownership and with its U.S. headquarters in California, has made seven trips to Bay County as part of a site search.

“Every time they come, they comment on how much things have improved and they want to be part of the recovery,” Hardin said. “They see how resilient the community is and how committed it is to rebuilding. Those are the kind of companies you want in your community — people who are committed to the same things that you are committed to.”

ACMT sent a team of seven people to Panama City from its home office in Connecticut shortly after the storm.

“They stayed in Destin,” Hardin said. “They rode around for a few days and helped people cut trees down and clean up debris, and they handed out food and candy at a Halloween festival in Lynn Haven.”

LEAN, MEAN PROMOTING MACHINE

The Bay EDA team comprises just three people: Hardin, vice president Garrett Wright and Polly Jackson, the director of finance and administration.

“But we’re just the paid staff,” Hardin was quick to point out. “We have so many people in the community who help us with prospect

visits and dinners and hosting people. We have a fantastic group of allies. In Georgia, we had a good partnership with the community but nothing like here.

“People always answer my phone call, and they will drop everything to meet with a prospect.”

In particular, Hardin mentioned the relationship that the EDA has with Gulf Coast State College and Florida State University Panama City.

“We wouldn’t be in business if we didn’t have our educational partners,” Hardin said.

“I say all the time that I can’t get a prospect to the table to work on an incentives deal if I can’t convince them that we have a workforce available to meet their needs.

“Every single prospect we bring to town meets with president John Holdnak at Gulf Coast and dean Randy Hanna at FSU.” Holdnak was instrumental in finding the EDA office space on the GCSC campus.

When Wade was hired to rescue the EDA, he operated from a renovated house on Jenks Avenue.

“No way was I gonna stay there,” Hardin said. “I never would have brought a prospect there. Moving to the Gulf Coast campus is the greatest move we ever could have made.

“This is where we need to be. With the college, the university and the port right here and the workforce office just down the hall, this really is the economic center of town.”

The decision by GKN Aerospace to establish a manufacturing plant in Bay County has been seen as an important “first domino” by Bay County economic development officials. Businesses with a connection to GKN are coming to town.

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| HO U S I N G CRI S I S

PINCH POINT

Affordable housing is at a premium in the hurricane zone

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

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“Everyone will be entitled to due process,” Majka said. “That’s important for tenants and property owners — and their neighbors. We expect that when some property owners make an appearance before a magistrate, they will be assigned a firm deadline for getting their situations resolved. The assignment of that date lets neighbors know what to expect. They may wish that things could move along more quickly, but at least they know that the county is monitoring things.”

Majka said that in cases involving properties where no progress toward restoration is being made, the county will take steps to make sure that problems with rodents or squatters are not allowed to fester and that unsafe conditions are eliminated.

“We don’t want properties that have been abandoned or neglected to become a burden on neighborhoods,” Majka said.

The scope of the county’s housing crisis is considerable.

Of 8,400 apartments in the county, some 4,600 were damaged, Majka said. Of those, approximately 1,200 were rendered unlivable. In addition, two public housing developments, Massalina Commons and Fletcher Black, both located in Panama City, were destroyed.

“We don’t want properties that have been abandoned or neglected to become a burden on neighborhoods.”

– Bob Majka, Bay County Manager

Majka explained that 70 percent of Bay County residences are rentals, but FEMA’s individual housing assistance programs are geared primarily to homeowners.

“FEMA might provide temporary housing in the form of an RV placed in the driveway or yard of a home,” Majka explained. “The hurricane survivor then lives in that vehicle while his house is being repaired or rebuilt.

“But if you have a heavily damaged apartment complex, you can’t go in there and park 150 RVs on the property.”

As a consequence, displaced people have had to compete for available rental units, move in with friends or family, or get out of Dodge.

“We had an affordable housing problem before the storm,” said Michael Johnson,

PHOTOS BY MICHAEL BOOINI

I

n the months since Hurricane Michael reconfigured a wide swath of Northwest Florida, Bay County Manager Bob Majka has asked staff to exercise “compassion, flexibility and common sense” in dealing with residents.

In October, when traditional code enforcement activity resumed in the county, doing so became more subjective and complicated.

Of late, code enforcement personnel have coordinated with the Property Appraiser’s Office to understand where residents are in their recovery efforts.

“We understand that a lot of residents are struggling to come up with permanent replacement housing, dealing with insurance companies and struggling to find contractors,” Majka said.

“We want to make sure we have our fingers on the pulse of that activity. The property appraiser informed us where damaged properties are located, and code enforcement officers have worked their respective zones and interacted with tenants and property owners and documented their circumstances.”

As of October, Majka anticipates, code enforcement officers will approach magistrates recommending leniency in some cases and a “clean-and-lien” approach in others.

Work on the Arbor Trace (facing page) and Enclave apartments, when complete, was expected to contribute to relieving the housing shortage created by Hurricane Michael in Bay County west of the Hathaway Bridge.

the City of Panama City’s community development director. “And the storm made it that much worse.”

Rents in some locations have quadrupled since the storm and house prices have jumped in response to what Johnson called an “artificial seller’s market.” He placed the average price of a new, medium-size home at $334,000.

Remedies to the affordable housing shortage, Johnson said, may include:

» 3D PRINTED HOMES. The printer

churns out layers of cement, which, as they build up, form the walls of the home. Nonprinted fixtures like doors and windows are installed later. Houses can be erected in a matter of days.

» TINY HOUSES. Johnson said a tiny

sionals who are finding it difficult to locate affordable housing.”

“We need to get our workers back,” Johnson said. He anticipates that housing inventory will be restored in waves occurring one, three and five years after the storm.

Majka wants the housing marketplace to know that he is willing to consider all possibilities.

“Now that the president has signed the supplemental disaster aid bill, we are waiting for eligibility criteria to be written in Washington so we can get a rough idea as to how much federal money will be coming our way,” Majka said. “In the interim, we are making sure that our housing plan in updated, and that we are in position to use those dollars across as many options as possible, when they arrive. We want to have our toe on the starting line.”

Majka anticipates that Bay County will be better able to withstand a future hurricane, should one occur.

“Damaged properties, when they come back online, will have been made consistent with today’s building codes,” he said. “And, there have been changes in standards for public housing. Those developments won’t come back the same way. More attention will be paid to quality-of-life issues and recreational components.”

Plus, Majka noted, the county is home today to far fewer trees posing a threat to structures than it was prior to the storm.

“It is a shame that we lost so much of our tree canopy,” he said. “But that may be a silver lining. Those trees won’t be around to cause damage again.”

house development in Callaway will feature three floor plans.

» CONTAINER HOUSES. While

historically “not very aesthetic,” Johnson said, they are getting better. Today, some units feature vinyl siding or brick fascia.

» RENTAL HOUSING. In sight, Johnson

said, is a 2.5-acre development that will be home to 900-square-foot apartments.

Needed, too, Johnson said, will be senior housing and permanent support housing for people living with disabilities.

Despite rising houses prices, transactions are occurring as a function of demand.

“One developer closed on 100 units in January and again in February,” Majka said.

“But the pinch point is workforce housing for firefighters, public safety employees and teachers. We’re seeing people who are entrylevel engineers and other beginning profes-

The need for apartments is especially acute in Panama City, where the majority of people rent their residences. Above: Eagle’s Landing apartments.

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A DV E RT I S E M E N T

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A DV E RT I S E M E N T

America is made up of many communities.

Together we are a Community of One

People banking with people

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| BAY ME DI CAL CE N T E R

HEALTH CARE Bay Medical Sacred Heart’s leader brings hometown perspective to his job

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scension’s Sacred Heart Health System, part of Ascension Florida, announced in March that Heath Evans had been named president of Bay Medical Sacred Heart in Panama City. His administrative experience in health care began in 2006 with a physical therapy practice in Lynn Haven. Prior to arriving at Bay Medical Sacred Heart, Evans served most recently as chief operating officer of South Georgia Medical Center in Valdosta, Georgia. His promotion to president came shortly after Ascension reached a final agreement to fully acquire Bay Medical. In June, Evans engaged in a Q & A session with 850 Magazine editor Steve Bornhoft.

850: NOW EIGHT MONTHS AFTER HURRICANE MICHAEL, WHAT IS THE CONDITION OF THE PHYSICAL PLANT? Evans: We’re doing good. Construction is underway. We are in recovery mode like most folks in Panama City are, but core services are open at the hospital. Our trauma center is, unfortunately, very active.

Our cardiac cath labs are hitting numbers very much like they did prior to the storm.

Our cardiac surgery program is actually busier than before the storm arrived.

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850: HAVE ANY SERVICES BEEN DISCONTINUED? Evans: The only service at the hospital that was discontinued due to the storm was our labor and delivery OB program. As to ancillary services, the Baldwin Plaza location was heavily damaged. Our services are available; it’s just that locations are more limited.

850: HOW WERE EMPLOYMENT LEVELS AFFECTED? Evans: Currently, we employ about 900 fulltime employees. Prior to the storm, we were around 1,200. We have been successful in reemploying about 70 employees who have come back to us, and we are looking for more every day. We are in a hiring mode and, eventually, we hope to add about another 300 positions.

850: WHAT WAS YOUR EXPERIENCE AT THE HOSPITAL DURING THE STORM? Evans: We took patients into the interior part of our building away from windows, mainly around our operating room and postanesthesia care unit areas, and it was just amazing how calm our staff stayed as they cared for the patients, and it was amazing how calm our patients were as they were moved out of their rooms. We didn’t experience a single injury or a single bad outcome at the hospital from the storm. The evacuation of patients to our partner hospitals

in Destin, Pensacola and Jacksonville went very smoothly; we are very proud of how everything went.

850: IT SOUNDS LIKE YOU WERE AS PREPARED AS YOU COULD HAVE BEEN FOR WHAT HAPPENED. Evans: We had our disaster plan in place long before the storm arrived. About 48 hours before it hit, our incident command center was set up and we started calling in our teams in “A” and “B” shifts. We made sure we had water and backup systems. Fuel tanks for generators were topped off and everything went as planned — except that we had a Category 5 hurricane. Looking around the community, while we had damage, I think we did relatively well. We responded to the storm well. We actually fed not only our patients, but our employees, first responders and contractors three hot meals a day.

850: HOW HAS YOU PARENT COMPANY, ASCENSION, RESPONDED TO THE STORM? Evans: Ascension has pledged $47 million to rebuild the hospital and clean up the campus, and that money includes $11 million to purchase new equipment. We’re going to have a lot of nice, new, cutting-edge equipment with which to carry our mission forward. Already, as the storm was approaching, we were installing

PHOTO COURTESY OF BAY MEDICAL SACRED HEART

850: HOW ABOUT A LITTLE PERSONAL HISTORY FOR STARTERS? Evans: My parents moved to Bay County in 1985 and started Color Press Printing across from the Sheriff ’s Office in Lynn Haven. I graduated from Mosley High School and went to Gulf Coast State College for firefighter/paramedic training.

I worked as a first responder in Orlando for six years and then returned to Bay County and worked for a year and a half for Chief Mark Bowen. My family and I traveled around some as I built my career in hospital administration. On Jan. 2 of last year, I became chief operating officer at Bay Medical/Sacred Heart. I worked in that role for about four months and then was given the wonderful opportunity to become president of the hospital.

a state-of-the-art da Vinci robot for robotic surgery and a new 64-slice CT scanner. We plan to add 144 beds as part of the rebuild, and all of our beds will be private. That’s part of the modern way of delivering health care. We have a 12-month timeline for accomplishing all that we plan to accomplish with the $47 million.

PHOTO: DAVID MCCLISTER

850: AS PRESIDENT, WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS? Evans: One is to get the hospital back to the capacity that is needed for this community.

Two is to look at how we deliver health care across the region wherever the care is needed, and not necessarily at the hospital. We want to be convenient and for people to get quality, affordable, personalized care close to home.

We want to bring Bay County forward to where health care is going, and that’s away from hospitals and toward high-quality, accessible community centers. At the same time, we are working closely with hospital staff to provide them with what they need for cases requiring hospitalization. Generally, we want to provide to Bay County the kind of quality that Sacred Heart is known for.

been absolutely amazing stories about lives 850: THE BMC/SACRED HEART SERVICE 6–9BEYOND Friday, Oct 11saved. being FOOTPRINT EXTENDS WELL BAY COUNTY, Court OF COURSE. of De Luna Event Space 850: HOW WOULD YOU RATE Evans: Yes. We are the cardiac, neuro and Downtown Pensacola EMPLOYEE MORALE? trauma center for the region. People travel Evans: Morale is very good. We are doing a a good distance to get to us.

Our service Meet celebrity chef Kevin Belton! lot of special things to make sure that we are footprint extends to Alabama with our Enjoy live food from local topcare chefs, taking of the mental health of our employtrauma system andmusic, some of our higher-level ees.

We have care in cardiology.

We’ve had patients come and an impressive sampling of wine, resources available for them as the recovers from Hurricane Michael. to us from as far away as Montgomery for the community bourbon and beer under string lights!

The integration of our staff with other hospiorthopedic care and ortho trauma care. $50Gulf tals really boosts morale and makes people feel We reach over toTickets: Calhoun County, like they are part of something bigger. Housing County wsre.org/Wine&Food and Franklin County. We are now has been an issue. Traveling nurses are having a a full partner with Ascension hospitals in hard time finding places to live. But, one of the Gulf County and the Emerald Coast, and benefits of being part of a large corporation is provide care for patients from those hosthat we can work on our own temporary houspitals when what is required exceeds what ing for the employees and travelers that we they can do. need to staff the hospital. Ascension provided thousands of days of housing for employees 850: WHAT ACCOUNTS FOR THE HEAVY who were displaced. It feels great to be part of TRAFFIC TO THE TRAUMA CENTERS? an organization that does so much.

Evans: Things that you hear about in the news. Crimes of violence, the Thunder 850: FINAL THOUGHT? Beach motorcycle rallies are always a busy Evans: The patient census is up, and we are time for us, auto accidents. You name it, we’re here answering the call and there have excited about the future.

#CountryMusicPBS pbs.org/countrymusic 52324-0619 850 Fall fp ad-W&F_Country Music.indd 1

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| HI G H E R ED U CATI ON Randy Hanna, dean, Florida State University in Panama City

GROWING BY DEGREES New programs net FSU-PC students from across country

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ifty freshmen started classes at Florida State University in Panama City as the 2018-19 school year got underway.

They came, said Dean Randy Hanna, from around the state and around the country.

A year later, FSU-PC was looking at the prospect of a smaller freshman class. While the quality of applications has been trending in a good way, the number of applications was diminished. For that, Hanna assigned blame to Hurricane Michael.

“One of the consequences of the storm,” Hanna said, “is that there are few places for students coming to town to live. The housing stock east of the Hathaway Bridge was battered by the storm and everything to the west is full.”

Gone are the days when FSU-PC thought about struggling condominium projects on the beach as a possible avenue for student housing. Rather, FSU-PC is taking steps to

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arrive at on-campus dormitories. The school issued an “Intent to Negotiate” notice that attracted responses from five developers.

At this writing, school officials were discussing terms in pursuit of a deal with the Zimmer Development Co. of Wilmington, North Carolina. Zimmer, a national commercial and multi-family developer, lists projects on its resumé, including the Stadium Enclave student community near Doak Campbell Stadium in Tallahassee and graduate and undergraduate student housing at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro.

Student Housing Business magazine identified Zimmer as one of the 25 most active developers of student housing in the industry.

Hanna anticipates that the campus housing project will accommodate 300-400 students upon completion. It is his hope that the development will be ready for occupancy in August 2021.

The number of student activities has grown steadily at FSU-PC through recent years, and Hanna said the arrival of campus housing will further enhance that trend.

“When you have students on campus all

The number of student activities has grown steadily at FSU-PC through recent years, and Hanna said the arrival of campus housing will further enhance that trend.

PHOTOS BY BRUCE PALMER (CISCOR) AND COURTESY OF FSU-PC

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

Florida State University Panama City has tapped into resources at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering in Tallahassee by adding a mechanical engineering program to the campus’s offerings.

the time, that will make a huge difference,” Hanna said. “We are very excited about this.”

Already, Hanna pointed out, the SeminoleCommodore Alliance (SCA), a collaboration between FSU Panama City and Gulf Coast State College, has established a Student Activities Board Alliance (SABA) that provides activities for FSU-PC students and students at Gulf Coast State College, located across Collegiate Drive from the university campus.

Hanna said that via the SABA framework, GCSC College students are free to join clubs located at FSU-PC and vice versa.

BOUNCING BACK

As of June 1, FSU-PC’s physical plant had substantially been returned to pre-Michael condition.

Repairs to the Holley Academic Center, the most prominent building on campus and one that has come to function as a community center, were nearing completion. The first floor of the Barron Building was occupied, but its second and third floors were not. Work was set to commence on the Bland Conference Center and to the Bayside Building, which had been home to elementary education classrooms and nurse anesthesia classrooms and faculty offices.

Hanna, upon arriving on campus a day after the storm, said it initially appeared “eerily as if everything was OK.” But closer inspection revealed otherwise.

“Once you got inside the buildings, you saw water damage and broken windows, and you could look up and see where the roofs had been compromised,” Hanna said.

Storm-related damage totaled $10 million,

Hanna said, “which is a lot, but still it is a lot less than it could have been. Fortunately, we were able to move people around and not miss a beat as far as being able to hold classes.”

The campus lost 18 students in the immediate wake of the storm, and spring 2019 enrollment was down just a little over 1 percent from the previous spring.

“We were very pleased that the decline was so slight,” Hanna said.

The bachelor’s program in mechanical engineering that was introduced to the campus in the fall of 2018 is off to a “wildly successful start,” Hanna said. It is managed by the FAMUFSU College of Engineering in Tallahassee.

The mechanical engineering program’s arrival closely coincided with the arrival of GKN Aerospace at the VentureCrossings Enterprise Center adjoining the Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport in West Bay. GKN produces airplane components for the federal government.

Both GKN and Naval Support Activity Panama City employ numbers of mechanical engineers.

“FSU has an important role to play in the development of our economy, and that’s one of the reasons that we started mechanical engineering here,” Hanna said. “I am very confident that the aerospace sector will continue to grow. Given our relationship with the FSU/FAMU College of Engineering and the engineering programs we have here, I believe we will be well-positioned to help that industry thrive here.”

Hanna regularly participates in site visits made by prospects pursued by the Bay County Economic Development Alliance.

“I am amazed at the number of new

companies that have an interest in Bay County and have come and visited since the hurricane,” Hanna said. “I have met with more prospects since the storm than I did in the year before the storm.”

In addition to the mechanical engineering program, FSU PC offers a master’s degree in systems engineering.

Hanna said two additional master’s level programs, one in nurse anesthesia and the other in applied behavioral analysis, are drawing students from far beyond Northwest Florida.

The behavioral analysis program, Hanna said, is intended for psychology students working with children with autism. It culminates in an exam leading to national board certification.

“Our program has the No. 1 pass rate for board certification in the world,” Hanna said.

“The nurse anesthesia program is newer, but it is quickly growing its reputation.”

Hanna looks toward the future with optimism.

“This is a great time to be at FSU in Panama City,” he said. “It’s at times like this that you realize you do more than just provide classes and help students earn degrees. I am so proud of our colleagues all across FSU. Folks from our campus and the Tallahassee campus have worked throughout our community to address the storm.

“The Social Work department has provided counseling services, our College of Social Sciences has helped with visioning and long-range planning for the community, our engineering department has helped with resiliency issues. Student-athletes came from Tallahassee for a day of clean up, and I could go on and on. We need to play a role in the recovery, and we are.”

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| AER OS PACE

PUTTING DOWN SOUTHERN ROOTS Aerospace manufacturer lands in Lynn Haven

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anny Polo nodded toward a table on wheels in the middle of a vast empty space inside the former Honeywell plant in Lynn Haven. Atop the table were a few modest chairs.

“I’m going to make that my mobile war room,” Polo said, one that can be moved among centers of activity as the Connecticut-based Advanced Composites & Metalforming Technologies (ACMT) creates its second home.

Redevelopment of the building comprising 150,000 square feet in total will occur in phases with the first phase encompassing 43,000 square feet. At this writing, garage doors and “man doors” were being replaced as part of securing the building, a measure that must be accomplished before equipment is installed.

ACMT, Polo said, is owned by his brother, Michael, and his father, Paul. Danny is its general manager. The 33-year-old company specialized in its early days as a maker of adhesives and chemicals for aerospace applications such as bonding rubber to sheet metal parts.

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As of 2004, ACMT moved into areas including fabrication work and, said Polo, “We just kept going from there.”

Today, the company relies heavily on emerging technologies.

“We are always looking for new, automated equipment,” Polo said, “and faster, better ways of doing things. Customers are always wanting to reduce costs.”

ACMT employs robotics, lasers, waterjet cutters and computer numerical control (CNC) machining equipment, the latter involving computer software that dictates the movements of tools.

“We produce items that may be an inch in size or 20 feet long,” Polo said. “Most of it is sheet metal fabrication, but we are getting further into composites and machining. We do a lot of repair work for the government, and we are going to start overhauling commercial engines also. Customers send us engine components, we assess what’s wrong with them and then make repairs.”

Immediately, “ACMT South” will have a close working relationship with GKN Aerospace in Tallassee, Alabama.

“And, once we get more established, we’ll start working with GKN at VentureCrossings; we’ve already started conversations with them.

We’re also interested in doing work for Tyndall Air Force Base. There are a lot of good aerospace companies within a few hours of here, so it’s a good place for us to be.”

ACMT does both military and commercial jobs for Pratt & Whitney, a key customer; does some work for Rolls Royce; and anticipates doing an increasing amount of work for GE. For starters, the 43,000-square-foot, phaseone space will be devoted mainly to two large projects that came to ACMT via GKN. They involve developing and producing 20-foot-long protectors for Sikorsky helicopter blades.

“Those projects are in development right now,” Polo said. “We will be manufacturing the parts sometime next year.”

Before that manufacturing can begin, ACMT will need to achieve AS9100 industry certification. Auditors will assess the building and ACMT equipment and operations, issue a report and specify needed corrective actions before certification will be granted. Then,

PHOTOS BY MICHAEL BOOINI

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

“We will have jobs for engineers, quality control and production personnel, welders, machinists and fabricators. Most employees will come from the local area.”

– Danny Polo, general manager, Advanced Composites & Metalforming Technologies

ACMT general manager Danny Polo has been pleased by the reception the aerospace manufacturer has received in Lynn Haven and Bay County. ACMT chose Bay County over other sites in Texas, Georgia, North Carolina and Florida.

original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) will do their own audits before authorizing ACMT to make their parts.

“It’s a process,” Polo said.

He said ACMT will hire 35 employees in conjunction with phase one.

“We will have jobs for engineers, quality control and production personnel, welders, machinists and fabricators,” Polo said. “Most employees will come from the local area. Only five are moving down from Connecticut.”

The lead time on some of the specialized equipment that will be used for phase one projects is 26 weeks.

Already, ACMT is working with Gulf Coast State College on an apprenticeship program, an initiative that has proved successful in Connecticut. The company has found that growing its own employees has advantages.

“When you begin working with people as students, they don’t have bad habits,” Polo said. “’We can teach them our habits.”

ACMT also figures to snap up students emerging from the welding program at Tom P. Haney Technical Center and the mechanical

engineering program at Florida State University Panama City. Too, it will tap into the large pool of retired military personnel in the area. Polo has been impressed by the database of 8,500 such individuals that has been compiled by CareerSource Gulf Coast.

GKN is not the only reason ACMT is in Bay County. In fact, the company had been shopping for a site for a couple of years and had considered options in Texas, Georgia, North Carolina and Florida.

“We got to the point where we didn’t want a single point of failure for any of our processes,” Polo said. “We wanted to be somewhere in the country that would not be affected by a largescale event in New England. Economic development officials from a number of locations furnished us with proposals. But right from the start, Becca Hardin and her team at the Bay County Economic Development Alliance were fantastic. They were very responsive, they understood what we wanted, and they did a really good job in getting us some incentives to get us down here.”

For its part, ACMT pledged to create

105 jobs within five years. Its Bay County capital investment will be about $22 million, according to Polo.

ACMT acquired the Honeywell building on Sept. 26 of last year, just two weeks before Hurricane Michael ravaged communities including Lynn Haven.

“Timing is everything,” Polo said with a resigned look on his face.

Some 130 downed trees littered the property. The storm necessitated a $2 million roof replacement job. Much of that cost was covered by insurance, but the need for extensive repairs — 75 feet of block wall was lost — dramatically altered ACMT’s building redevelopment timeline. It had hoped to move in by the first quarter of this year.

Nonetheless, Polo is enthusiastic.

“We’ve been very happy with everything we have encountered in the Bay County area,” said Polo, who purchased a home in Bayou George in March. “The people are great, everyone has been very accommodating and we’re excited. We are looking forward to becoming a part of the community.”

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“When I saw the facilities, it looked like they had gone into my head and designed exactly what I would have built if I had unlimited money.”

– J.D. Wood, general manager, Panama City Beach Sports Complex

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| S P O RTS C O M P L EX

The development of a new multi-field sports complex off Back Beach Road will enable Panama City Beach to host largefield tournaments that few communities can accommodate.

READY FOR PLAY

Complex adds to Panama City Beach’s capacity as tournament host

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

PHOTOS BY MICHAEL BOOINI

J

.D. Wood, married with two small daughters and living in the city of his cherished alma mater, was well rooted.

“The way I love College Station and being close to family, it was going to take a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to move me,” Wood said.

But last August, Wood left Texas behind.

He had been offered a job as the general manager of the Panama City Beach Sports Complex, a 157-acre, $37 million collection of 13 athletic fields that resulted from a partnership between the St. Joe Company and the Panama City Beach Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Wood is an employee of Clearwater-based Sports Facilities Management, which is under contract to the CVB to maintain and operate the complex, located north of Back Beach Road on Chip Seal Parkway and a couple miles west of the Hathaway Bridge.

The complex’s first event, a United States

Fastpitch Association softball tournament, was held in early July.

For five years prior to leaving home, Wood, who holds a master’s degree in sports management from Texas A&M University, worked for the City of College Station in its tourism department, managing a soccer facility said to be one of the 10 best in the country, and working closely with the university regarding access to its athletic facilities.

In that role, he was accustomed to seeing members of the sports team from Visit Panama City Beach, the promotional arm of the CVB, at conventions of sporting event rights holders.

In June 2018, two members of the team, Richard Sanders and Chris O’Brien, had been talking to organizations including USA Football about scheduling events at the PCB complex then under construction.

Rights holders were curious to know who would be managing the facility, but at

the time, that hire had not been made. USA Football, headquartered in Indianapolis, recommended Wood, who then heard from Sports Facilities Management vice president John McDonald.

“He gave me two days to apply for the job,” recalled Wood, who consulted a friend who suggested that he at least check out the opportunity. And, with his wife’s blessings, he flew to Panama City Beach for an interview.

“I’m from East Texas where it’s all trees, and I had never been anywhere in the Florida Panhandle,” Wood said, “but when I flew into Panama City Beach (Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport) and saw the beach and the water, I told myself, ‘This could be perfect.’ ” That suspicion on Wood’s part was confirmed when he got a look at the complex and gained an appreciation for what it would look like upon completion.

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they had gone into my head and designed exactly what I would have built if I had unlimited money,” Wood said.

He would learn that Sanders, Visit Panama City Beach’s vice president of sports marketing and special events, was the sport complex’s chief visionary.

“He was the godfather,” Woods said. “It’s Richard who showed people how great the impact could be if Panama City Beach were made a sports destination.”

Sanders knew that 12 is something of a magic number as it relates to any sports complex’s capacity to host large tournaments on its fields.

The PCB Sports Complex boasts 13 rectangular fields — nine with a synthetic turf surface and four natural grass fields. Those same fields can be configured as 10 softball fields with 220-foot fences and five collegiate size baseball fields (387 feet to dead center).

The result is that big tournaments that used to schedule play on fields on both sides of the Hathaway Bridge may now be confined to Panama City Beach.

Panama City Beach’s capacity for events gets even larger when one considers the fields available at the established Frank Brown Park (located off Back Beach Road just east

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The PCB Sports Complex boasts 13 rectangular fields — nine with a synthetic turf surface and four natural grass fields. of its intersection with State 79), a facility managed by the City of Panama City’s Parks and Recreation Department.

“I’m working in close coordination with Jim Ponek at the city,” Wood said. He noted that play in the USFA tournament was scheduled for both Frank Brown and the PCB Sports Complex.

The new complex includes LED lighting, two operations buildings, three concession stands, an umpire’s lounge and a championship field with seating for 1,500.

“The goal was to make this the top facility not only in the Southeast, but also in the United States,” said Wood of the complex paid for with bed tax proceeds and developed on land donated by St. Joe. “The property for starters was 4 to 5 feet above sea level,” Wood said. “Now, it’s 15 feet.

We used the best fill dirt for the grass fields to make them drain properly. We’ll confine practice activity to synthetic fields to limit the wear on the grass.”

Wood said some scholastic activity will be accommodated by the complex and noted that he had been speaking, in particular, with Arnold High School athletic director Ricci Green.

“But we understand that the main objective is to bring teams to town and put heads in beds,” Wood said. “Teams may play one game a day and spend the rest of the day in our community with their families, dining in restaurants, shopping and contributing to our local economy.”

Wood, in June, was glad that his family came back to town after seven months spent in Texas. The home Wood was renting in Lynn Haven was hard hit by Hurricane Michael. He evacuated to College Station well before the storm made landfall and returned not long after it passed, living in two rooms.

But his wife and daughters remained in Texas while repairs to the residence were made.

“We were fortunate,” Wood said. “We didn’t lose any personal possessions. I’ve still got my diplomas from A&M and my football helmet signed by Kevin Sumlin.”

PHOTO BY MICHAEL BOOINI

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| CASA LAX M I I N TE R N AT I O N A L B OA R D I N G S C H O O L

EQ, NOT IQ Planned school will focus on emotional intelligence

I

n pre-application documents filed as a first step in pursuit of $20 million in Triumph Gulf Coast (BP reparations) funds, the Casa Laxmi Foundation described plans to bring about a “unique educational institution that embodies a concept unparalleled by any other in the world.”

That approach, at a planned pre-K through grade 12 institute, will emphasize EQ, that is, a student’s emotional quotient, versus IQ. “If you intend for your child to go to one of the finest universities in the United States, we’re not the school for you,” said Sonal Thomas, a Canadian-born attorney whose grandparents founded the Casa Laxmi Foundation. “We don’t want to develop academic scholars. We want to develop great human beings.”

Thomas, a member of the foundation’s governing council, finds that there has been a marked shift in focus among educators in the last few years, away from IQ as a marker of future success and toward the concept of EQ. “Emotional intelligence is really your ability to understand, regulate and express your own emotions and to understand others’ emotions so that you can react appropriately in any given situation,” Thomas said. “Once you have a high enough EQ, you are able to empathize and that’s really the end goal for us — we want to create these children that have very, very high empathy.”

In February, the Bay Economic Development Alliance and the Bay County Commission jointly announced plans by Casa Laxmi, headquartered in Toronto, to develop at a total cost of $117 million a boarding school with a

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capacity of 300 students. The school will be sited on 260 acres on Fanning Bayou and North Bay in northern Bay County.

The Bay EDA was instrumental in identifying the acreage. The seller, D.R. Horton, had planned to develop homes on the property.

“We started our search for land in the Bahamas, but after a couple of years, we were just spinning our wheels,” Thomas said. “A member of our advisory board suggested that we look for a site in the United States because parents throughout the world want to send their children to school in America.”

The foundation was set on finding a waterfront location and looked at possibilities in South Carolina and throughout much of Florida.

“Finally, it was (Bay EDA vice president) Garrett Wright and (president) Becca Hardin who made the difference,” Thomas said. “We felt welcomed.”

While, at this writing, the application for Triumph funding remains pending, Casa Laxmi has speedily moved forward.

Working with Florida Architects of Panama City, it had as of mid-June, completed a project master plan that includes athletic fields, residences, education spaces and accommodations for visiting parents and families. It had established collaborative relationships with more than 30 universities.

And, it had narrowed to two the candidates to become the planned school’s educational partner. Both candidates are mightily experienced boarding schools in the United Kingdom.

“One has been around for 500 years and the

other has been around for 600 years,” Thomas said. “They are obviously doing something right. The educational partner will come in and help us set up the school. It will be in charge of school operations and will be responsible for hiring and training staff, designing curriculum and equipping the school.”

The new school will operate with the mother school’s name.

Thomas is in hopes that Casa Laxmi will obtain a development order by year’s end and break ground on its project early in 2020. According to its timetable, the school will open with students in grades 6-8 in September 2021.

“That’s ambitious,” Thomas conceded, “but this entire project is ambitious, so we’re used to it.”

A little over half of the enrollment in every grade will comprise students paying full tuition up to $150,000 per year, Thomas said, while the balance will be made up of vulnerable orphaned or abandoned children from throughout the world.

Non-paying students, whose expenses will be covered by the foundation, will be enrolled between ages 2 and 6. Casa Laxmi, for starters, wasn’t sure how to determine whether a given 4-year-old might succeed at the school.

“You can give an IQ test to a 4-year-old, but you are not going to get any meaningful results,” Thomas said. “So, we teamed up with a couple of universities and children’s hospitals. What we’ve learned is that if you observe a child, even between the ages of 2 and 3, there is a whole host of information that you can get.

“By also examining sleep patterns and diet

RENDERINGS COURTESY OF FLORIDA ARCHITECTS, INC.

BY STEVE BORNHOFT

and interacting with the child, you can tell what kind of behavioral issues the child will have, assess his impulse control, and determine how he will retain and process information.”

Casa Laxmi, in conjunction with experts, will put together tests for screening prospective students.

“We will disseminate them to psychologists around the world in places where we want to find students. They will run the test, gather the data and the data will come back to our experts. They can then determine whether enrollment in our school would be in the best interests of a child.”

Casa Laxmi is collaborating with schools including Yale University, which is home to a center for emotional intelligence. There, children, including even 2-year-olds, are helped to improve their EQ. “Emotional intelligence can rise exponentially given a person’s willingness to learn and grow, so children really become the perfect candidates,” Thomas said.

At the new school, EQ training will involve not just students and teachers.

“We are going to train every single person with whom a student might have contact, including cafeteria workers and groundskeepers, and work all the way up so that we have consistency across the board,” Thomas

said. “As a residential school, we can control that. We know every person that a child may come into contact with, and we can get the desired outcome.”

The foundation is committed to ensuring that its school is integrated into the community.

Casa Laxmi projects that its school will result in 300 high-paying, sustainable long-term jobs.

Most of the total $117 million project cost will remain in Bay County. And, the nature of the school ensures that wealthy families from around the globe will be spending time in Bay County.

Plans also call for:

» A 600-seat, on-campus auditorium whose capacity will allow the school to invite students from the larger community to join boarding school students when dignitaries, guest lecturers and visiting professors make presentations.

» Summer camps, which will include

students from outside the school. “Summer learning loss is such a real thing,” Thomas said. “Parents are working and children are not getting the stimulation they need.

Quite frankly, a lot of parents simply don’t have the resources to send their kids to summer camp and that’s where we want

to come in so that kids can attend our camps and continue their learning without interruption.”

» A Community Alliance Advisory Board

will be made up of well-connected people who are tapped into issues and challenges facing the Bay County community. The advisory panel will serve as a sounding board for ideas generated by the school and make suggestions of its own. Bay County Superintendent of Schools Bill Husfelt, Gulf Coast State College President John Holdnak and April Wilkes, the executive director of the St. Joe Community Foundation, already have agreed to serve as board members.

Thomas said that one or two student slots per grade level will be reserved for Bay County children.

“Our philosophy is that once you are a great human being, the academics will work themselves out,” Thomas said. “We are trying to cultivate the next generation of world leaders — not just any world leaders, but leaders who have qualities such as empathy and compassion and humility … many qualities that leaders today are missing.”

The Casa Laxmi Foundation described plans to bring about a “unique educational institution that embodies a concept unparalleled by any other in the world.” That approach, at a planned pre-K through grade 12 institute, will emphasize EQ, that is, a student’s emotional quotient, versus IQ.

Rendering depicts a common area planned for a waterfront boarding school envisioned by the Casa Laxmi Foundation. The school is scheduled to open with students in grades 6-8 in September 2021.

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Running to Daylight Members of Northwest Florida’s LGBTQ community permit themselves guarded optimism For generations, Northwest Florida residents who depart from the straight and narrow have tiptoed about their hometowns, hiding themselves from view and struggling to conform to expectations and conventions. Many members of the LGBTQ community continue to skip town, taking with them valuable talents and skills in pursuit of more hospitable and accepting environments. Others, however, are hanging around and stepping into the light as the product of an evolution that has recently brought to Bay County precedents including a gay film festival, a pride festival and the creation of an LGBTQ Center, home to support groups, tolerance and understanding.

PHOTOGRAPHY BY MICHAEL BOOINI

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The Arc of Equality State’s business community embraces new anti-discriminatory protections

by Steve Bornhoft

N

adine Smith is satisfied that public sentiment throughout Florida and especially that of the state’s business community has increasingly come to favor the passage of ordinances that extend protections against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Sixty percent of the state’s population lives in communities where such “human rights ordinances” are in place, she said.

Jacksonville passed one in 2015. Leon County’s HRO was adopted in 2010.

HROs have been passed steadily for the past 20 years, said Smith, the director of Equality Florida since its inception in 1997.

“They have been passed in very different parts of the state, some predominantly Democratic, others Republican, and not all of them metropolitan,” Smith said.

Now, she said, the time is right and the time is ripe for communities including Pensacola and her hometown of Panama City to do likewise.

Equality Florida, a St. Petersburg-based civil rights organization dedicated to securing full equality for Florida’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community, was set to conduct a roundtable discussion with local business leaders in Panama City on July 24. Smith was heartened by the formation in Bay County of an LGBTQ Center that supplies programs and support to young people who may be experiencing discrimination, bullying or worse.

“When ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ was repealed and members of the military were permitted to serve openly, there was a ripple effect in communities that host bases,” Smith found. “Some of the most powerful comments heard in support of the HRO in Jacksonville came from Navy personnel who said that, as soon as they left their base, they had fewer protections against discrimination. That’s still true in the Panhandle.”

Smith is a big promoter of uniformity in protections.

The federal Equality Act, which was passed in the House of Representatives in May with bipartisan support, would 54

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Panama City television news anchor Ron Marasco, in sunglasses, photo at left, described his personal journey toward selfacceptance, then handed the microphone to Mayor Greg Brudnicki, who proclaimed June 8, 2019, “Bay Pride Day” in Panama City. Above, drag performer Ambrosia Starling provided entertainment.

PHOTO COURTESY OF EQUALITY FLORIDA (SMITH)

mitigate today’s patchwork quilt whereby protections present in one state may be absent in a neighboring state.

Within Florida, Smith said, “a business should not have to worry that an employee transferred from South Florida to the Panhandle may be unable to rent an apartment. You shouldn’t have to check your GPS to know what protections are in place.”

The Florida Inclusive Workforce Act, sponsored by 57 House members and 17 senators, has the votes to pass, Smith said, provided that legislative leadership permits the measure to go forward.

In any event, local HROs will remain important, Smith stressed, and no matter what happens at the state and federal levels, she does not anticipate that anyone will agitate for their repeal.

“We have federal, state and local civil rights legislation,” she noted. “Municipal and county ordinances mean that there is a local place to begin a process if you have experienced

Ordinances won’t end discrimination, but they are a way for a community to say, ‘We are not OK with it.’ ” — Nadine Smith, director, Equality Florida

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discrimination. They can provide remedies that do not involve going to court.”

Many businesses adopt anti-discrimination policies without regard for whether they are operating in a city with a non-discrimination ordinance on the books.

They do so, Smith said, as a way of making a values statement and reinforcing a community standard.

“Is it possible to be discriminated against in a city with a non-discrimination law? Certainly,” Smith said. “We have a history of marking a black applicant’s resumé by turning down a corner of the page. Ordinances won’t end discrimination, but they are a way for a community to say, ‘We are not OK with it.’ That’s a long ways from winking and making it known that you don’t really care.”

In May, Equality Florida, along with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Florida Chamber of Commerce and

the Orlando Chamber brought about a meeting of 200 business people. The consensus: Absence of statewide anti-discrimination protections has consequences for the economy, economic development efforts and the ability of businesses to attract and retain talent.

Smith spent a week in Panama City in May in which she had conversations with business interests concerned about how to attract residents and visitors in the post-Michael era. She was not without advice.

“Communities need to send the message that, if you come to our beaches or our town, you are going to be respected and not harassed,” Smith said. “Pass an HRO. Join the Open to All movement. Let people know that they can expect to be treated fairly and with respect without regard for their race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation or gender identity.”

From the Leon County Human Rights Ordinance

Adopted May 11, 2010 The general purpose of this chapter is to secure for all individuals within Leon County freedom from discrimination because of age, race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, disability, marital status, familial status, sex, gender, gender identity or expression, or sexual orientation, and thereby to protect their interest in personal dignity, to make Leon County secure against domestic strife and unrest, to preserve the public safety, health, and general welfare, and to promote the interests, rights, and privileges of individuals within Leon County, and, in an effort to accomplish this purpose, to create a private cause of action available to all individuals in Leon County against such discriminatory practices.

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Parental Pursuit Quest for fatherhood took gay couple across the country

by Steve Bornhoft

F Stormy weather threatened to force postponement of the first-ever Pride Festival in Panama City, but perseverance prevailed over precipitation.

William Shurbutt, one of the event’s chief organizers, recorded the day’s activities.

The Open to All campaign, according to its website, is supported by more than 200 civil rights and racial justice organizations; lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBTQ) organizations and community centers; health advocates, disability advocates and faith organizations; and other groups. Together, they are working to advance the principle that when a business opens its doors to the public, it should be open to everyone.

Equality Florida has launched a parallel initiative, called Open Doors. For a nominal fee, businesses are added to a searchable database of non-discriminatory businesses and receive signage they can display to announce their Opens Doors membership. The fee is waived for businesses that are members of chambers of commerce that are aligned with Equality Florida.

“Florida is a massive state, and we have a lot of work left to accomplish,” Smith said.

“When you are in Pensacola, you are about the same distance from Chicago as you are from Key West.

“But wherever local leadership emerges that we can support, we will do whatever we can.”

rustrated, Cathy Rifenburg put pen to paper.

She wrote then governor Charlie Crist to encourage him to take action to make it possible for members of the LGBT community, including her son, to achieve life goals accessible by countless others.

“I told him that Florida was losing its young people and their energy, their brainpower and our future,” Rifenburg said.

“What are you going to do about this?” she wanted to know.

“Don’t you think we should be addressing this now?”

In reply, she received … nothing.

Rifenburg had been deeply saddened when her son, a classically trained musician, and his partner, then a journalist, announced to her in 2008 that they had made plans to leave Florida.

Nathan Rifenburg wanted to have the experience of being a father, but Florida law at the time barred gay couples from adopting children. Two years later, the state ban on gay and lesbian adoption would be ruled unconstitutional. And, in 2015, Gov. Rick Scott signed repeal of the ban into law.

Meanwhile, Nathan and his partner, Lucas Grindley, had moved to Los Angeles.

There, after completing a lengthy application and training process, they would become foster parents to two 5½-monthold twin girls, who had been born to a woman addicted to methamphetamine. Both children entered the world with meth in their systems.

“These two little girls descended upon the boys’ household and, like most first-timers, they didn’t understand all of the ramifications of parenthood,” Rifenburg smiled and said.

“Annabelle and Audrey took over their lives.”

The mother had five children in addition to the twins, whom she turned to her own mother to help raise. Nathan and his partner petitioned for termination of parental rights. The court gave the mother five tries to get clean. Outpatient programs.

Inpatient treatment. None of them was successful.

“It is such an ethical dilemma,” Rifenburg said. “We did not wish to cause the young woman pain, but you just knew that the girls were going to be better served by the dads.”

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attended an appointment that her son had scheduled with a pediatrician and a psychologist. As a social worker, herself, Rifenburg was curious to discover how maternal drug use in utero manifests itself in children as they develop.

She would learn that “meth babies” often exhibit symptoms of attention deficit disorder. Their limbs may be unusually rigid or flaccid. In that latter regard, Annabelle was the greater concern. Nathan and his mom were made “physical therapy interns” and were introduced to dexterity exercises used as assessment tools.

Now age 7, the girls are healthy and have developed normally. The dads and the girls currently live in Philadelphia. Nathan Rifenburg is program manager for Musicopia, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to provide opportunities for children to experience, learn, perform and appreciate music. Grindley is the executive director of Next City, also a nonprofit, which is devoted to inspiring social, economic and environmental change through journalism and events.

“It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes people will challenge me and ask me why my son and his husband should be allowed to be dads,” said Rifenburg, who founded the Panama City chapter of PFLAG for parents and friends of gays and lesbians in 2006.

“They do that, and I pull out statistics. Don’t tell me that the straight people in this country care about children when there are a half-million children in our foster care system. Don’t tell me my son shouldn’t have had the opportunity to become a parent to girls who otherwise would have gone into the system.

That argument stops people in their tracks, and then I encourage them to become foster parents.”

Rifenburg, while heartened by progress that has included the Supreme Court’s landmark decision on same-sex marriage, is at the same time uneasy.

Nathan Rifenburg and his husband Lucas Grindley succeeded in California in adopting two girls whose biological mother battles drug addiction. Nathan’s mother, Cathy, beamed at the development.

We live, she said, in a world in which many people have the “unfounded fear that if we open the door to equality, dramatic, permanent change will result and they will somehow lose the ability to successfully navigate the world.”

Rifenburg and her husband Jerry, a retired Air Force fighter pilot, have two sons, one straight, one gay.

“Why should one son be captive in his own country?” she asked. “Why can’t he live in the 32405 zip code and realize what he wants to realize without being subjected to extreme bias and discrimination on a regular basis? That’s not right. He’s an American just like my other son is.”

Thinkspot Inc., a Florida-based research and policy development consultancy, conducted a study that calculated the positive impact on Florida’s economy and labor force that would result from passage of an anti-discrimination law, the Florida Inclusive Workforce Act, which would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the Florida Civil Rights Act. Findings included the following …

$3.46 BILLION

Reduction in the bottom line of Florida businesses due to lost productivity and turnover. American workers choose to move to states with public policies that enhance personal freedom.

$5.46 billion Growth in economic output over 10 years projected to result from passage of the Florida Inclusive Workforce Act. Passage is also projected to result in the creation of 35,759 jobs in 10 years by boosting the state’s attractiveness to skilled and innovative workers by expanding personal freedom.

Source: “Florida’s Competitiveness for Talent Supply: Projecting the Economic Impact of Tolerance,” a study published by Thinkspot Inc., 2017.

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PHOTO COURTESY OF CATHY RIFENBURG

36th

Florida’s ranking among states in personal freedom. The state ranks sixth in economic freedom. Both are indicators linked to attracting talent and stimulating economic growth.

W

In Transition Bay County couple seeks an accepting place to live

by Steve Bornhoft

I arrived at the Lynn Haven residence of Taryn Wilson and Jessica Black and noted with interest the historical marker in the front yard that informs passers-by that the home dates to 1912. There was a pickup truck with its hood raised in the garage and a scary looking crotch-rocket in the driveway where two employees of a drywall contractor were mixing mud with long attachments affixed to electric drills. One of the men looked toward me and asked, “You looking for the owner?” I told him that, yes, I was and that I was expected. “He or she or whatever it is is probably either in the garage or upstairs,” the worker told me. It was May 23. A day later, the Trump administration would formally propose the elimination of an Obama-era policy that, in conjunction with adoption of the Affordable Care Act, had redefined discrimination on the “basis of sex” to include gender identity. On May 22, the Department of Housing and Urban Development had proposed a new rule to weaken Obama-era protections for homeless transgender people, allowing federally funded shelters to deny people admission on religious grounds or force transgender women to share bathrooms and sleeping quarters with men. The moves immediately were seen by transgender rights groups as part of a larger effort to more generally undermine protections for LGBT people. — S.B.

hile a command master chief at Naval Support Activity Panama City, Tim Wilson frequently had the chiefs from his command and their families over to his house for cookouts.

Prior to their arrival, he would take care to hide from view any items of a feminine nature.

“You know, so there would be no questions,” Wilson said.

Well, save for one that was invariably asked.

“Always by the end of the night, the wives would be drunk and they would ask me why I wasn‘t married,” Wilson recalled.

He impressed them, after all, as highly eligible. He owned two cars and two houses, had little debt and, for two decades, had served with distinction and earned promotions as an engineman in the U.S. Navy.

He deflected the question as best he could, time and again.

“I had to put a lot of work into a simple barbecue,” Wilson reflected. “Who knows how far I could have gone in my career if I hadn’t had to devote so much energy to hiding?”

Wilson retired from the Navy of his own volition, effective Oct. 31, 2018, after 23 years, the last three-and-a-half at the Navy base located on Thomas Drive in the beaches area of Bay County.

There, he was the senior enlisted person, and worked directly for base commander Cmdr. Jay Sego and executive officer Lt. Cmdr. Adam Walski.

Due to accumulated leave time, Wilson’s retirement ceremony and last day on base occurred in August of last year.

While aboard ships, Wilson, a “diesel mechanic by trade,” worked on everything from laundry and galley equipment to main engines, reduction gears, steering systems and windlass mechanisms.

“Basically, any piece of equipment that no other group wanted, my group would get,” he said.

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I liked my living and, for many years before the ban was lifted, being discovered as transgender would have meant being kicked out of the Navy.” — Taryn Wilson At NSA Panama City, Wilson joined the fairly exclusive ranks of Navy E-9 master chief petty officers afforded an opportunity to work in an executive level leadership position.

“It was a great experience,” Wilson said, one that involved frequent interaction with the Military Affairs Committee of the Bay County Chamber of Commerce, dealings with contractors and with tenant commands including the Naval Surface Warfare Center, and the working out of memoranda of understanding with local first-responder departments and agencies.

And, in the midst of performing those various duties, Wilson began transitioning from male to female.

President Barack Obama had lifted the ban on transsexuals in the military, and Wilson came out in 2016.

He’d had conversations with Sego and Walski about the relaxed policy. As a result, they were not surprised

by Wilson’s plans to become a woman — and they were supportive.

“Before I came out to everybody, I also went to every senior enlisted leader on the base, all the tenant commands, and we sat down and had a talk,” Wilson said. “To my surprise, they were all very supportive.

The regional commander in Jacksonville was also supportive.

“For the most part, I didn’t have any problems with the sailors or the civilian employees on base. There’s always gonna be a few in the crowd, but those who did have a problem with it kinda kept it to themselves.”

Today, Tim Wilson is Taryn Wilson.

Her experience outside the fence has not been as supportive as the base environment was.

“There are good days and bad days,” Wilson said.

“And, early in my transition, there were a lot more bad than good. I figured out that a lot of that had to do with how I was dressing. I had been a man for 40 years. I had to learn to do makeup and how to dress and fit in.”

Today, Wilson said, the treatment she receives varies primarily as a function of the particular setting she finds herself in.

“If I go to a hardware store like Home Depot or Lowe’s, I generally get more stares and hear more comments being made when I walk by,” Wilson said.

“But I don’t let them bother me as much anymore.

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women who are not confident, and they get messed with relentlessly and it has a lot to do with how they carry themselves.”

It can help, too, to consider the point of view of others.

“It is important not to get hung up on people not getting the right gender right off the bat,” Wilson said. “I know I don’t sound very feminine, so if I am on the phone and I get misgendered, I don’t let it bother me because the person on the other end of the phone doesn’t know. You can choose what to allow yourself to get upset over. You’ve got to serve as your own counselor.”

In March, a professional wedding officiant, Doug Dunks, married Taryn Wilson and Jessica Black at the Center for the Arts in downtown Panama City. Wilson’s parents and sister flew in from California to attend the ceremony. Her brother, who does not support her decision to transition, stayed home.

Black was a Bay School District employee for years and holds a master’s degree in educational leadership. Despite multiple attempts, however, she never has succeeded in landing a job as a classroom teacher.

Wilson is convinced she knows why.

Wilson is about “three classes” away from a bachelor’s degree in psychology and plans to go on to graduate school. She volunteers at the Panama City chapter of Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), and met Black there. She does advocacy work on behalf of transgender military service members and works with Equality Florida to update its transgender resource guide every quarter.

For a time prior to the storm, Wilson and Black thought about filing a discrimination case against Bay District Schools but abandoned that consideration when they recognized that they would not want to remain in Bay County even if they prevailed.

They have made plans to move to Baltimore. Departing with them will be their experience, skills, education and passion for helping others.

Here, employment is a problem. Access to sympathetic health care is an issue. The only Bay County physician known for working with transgender patients, Dr. Michael Ingram, died in April.

And, Wilson summed things up, “This area is just way too red.”

For Wilson, now 42, military service was a way out of tiny June Lake, California, a ski resort town of just a

few hundred permanent residents. Her father worked as a lineman; her mother was a stay-at-home mom.

There was a time when Wilson ran a lot of foot races — 5Ks and half-marathons. She completed a marathon once. She raced cars and did her own mechanical work but now prefers woodworking. About once a month, she will build a shadow box for a military retiree, the kind that you put a flag and medals and ribbons in.

Wilson, by the way, was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal and the Military Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal upon her retirement.

A Process Leading to a Process Once resolved to transition, Wilson obtained a diagnosis of gender dysphoria. Next, a transgender care team in Portsmouth, Virginia, working with information supplied by a Navy psychologist, primary care physician and others, wrote a transition plan that involved hormone replacement treatment and gender reassignment surgery.

Such plans are forwarded to the commanding officer who decides whether and when they are employed.

“If I was on a ship and we were deploying that would be a nogo,” Wilson explained. “But, being on shore duty, I was able to go ahead and start right up.”

At NSA Panama City, Wilson was aware of one other transgender service member, an E-5 who reported to her.

“When he and I left, people on base washed their hands of the trans issue, satisfied that it would not recur,” Wilson said. “But there are others. The reality is that we hide very well.”

Now that the ban on transsexuals in the military has been restored, hiding is as necessary as it was throughout the majority of Wilson’s Navy career.

“I liked my living and, for many years before the ban was lifted, being discovered Jessica Black, left, as transgender would have meant being and Taryn Wilson kicked out of the Navy,” Wilson said. were married in At this writing, Wilson has undergone Panama City in March. They have hair removal procedures and hormone resince moved to placement treatment.

Baltimore, affected by issues including “I gave Dr. Ingram documentation on a the availability of treatment that I was interested in and he doctors comfortable with treating actually took the time to read it, which transgender patients. was amazing,” Wilson said. “We gave it a try and it worked out great. He was very open, but doctors generally are a challenge. I have a primary care physician who is OK as long as we don’t talk about the transgender stuff.”

Wilson wants to be more “financially stable” before undergoing reassignment surgery, which she said will run between $20,000 and $40,000 and is not covered by her Tricare insurance.

Her focus this spring and summer was on fixing up her stormbattered home, whose remodeling she had nearly completed when Michael returned her to step one.

Wilson is convinced that she — and the entire LGBTQ community — will experience more setbacks.

“Gains will be lost,” Wilson said. “That is absolutely going to happen. Marriage equality is in trouble. The federal HUD director removed transgender protection at homeless shelters that receive federal funds. The military ban on transsexuals is back. Look at what is happening on the reproductive rights front. Given the makeup of the Supreme Court, I would not be surprised to see Roe v. Wade set aside.”

“It’s never just about a cake,” Wilson said, referring to the Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission case in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of a baker who refused to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding ceremony because of a religious objection. “It’s about eroding human rights, just a little bit at a time.”

The “rollbacks,” Wilson fears, “will be upheld here in the Panhandle first.

“Once we get past this house project, I think we’re just going to pull chocks and go.”

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Stemming an Outgoing Talent Tide Paul Hsu is working to groom and retain talent in Northwest Florida STORY BY ZANDRA WOLFGRAM // PHOTOS BY ERICK LIMA

T

hirty-eight years after arriving in the United States from Taiwan, the invariably entrepreneurial Paul Hsu launched the Hsu Education Foundation in 2014, an organization devoted to promoting excellence in education and classroom innovation.

For Hsu of Fort Walton Beach, the motivation for the foundation was supplied by his three children, all of whom started their careers in technical fields far from Okaloosa County after graduating from Ivy League schools.

Via his foundation, Hsu hopes to help create opportunities for young people to discover rewarding science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) employment in Northwest Florida.

The availability of talent is pivotal to economic development efforts and, by stimulating interest in STEM among students, Hsu believes he can make Okaloosa and nearby counties increasingly attractive to high-tech employers and the aerospace industry, in particular.

“Less than 20 percent of students born in the U.S. express an interest in STEM,” Hsu pointed out. “After middle school, interest drops off like an autumn leaf and, for girls, it’s even worse.”

At its outset, the foundation established TEAMS (Teaching Excellence Awards in Math and Science) as a way to reward Paul Hsu, who has teachers who model the kind of educalong capitalized on his talent for spotting tional approaches that Hsu wants to enbusiness opportunities, courage. In its first five years, the foundahas established a tion has awarded more than $100,000 in foundation aimed at stimulating interest cash directly to teachers. in STEM curriculum “I thought if we help the teachers, we among Okaloosa County students. reach the students,” Hsu said. “We are

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uniquely qualified to link schools and industry. I can let schools know what industry is looking for in the next five to 15 years.”

Today, the foundation hosts year-round STEM programs and outreach initiatives for students in grades K-12. It has attracted businesses, including Boeing, Mag Aerospace, Beast Code and the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) as sponsors, and calls upon subject-matter experts that Hsu has come to know in his own fourdecade professional career.

Game Changers Squad is a monthly series of business-to-student STEM-themed events that brings families together around interactive educational experiences. The Air Force Association Cyber Patriot is a weeklong camp centered on cyber security.

The Drone Team Challenge is an Olympicsstyle unmanned aerial vehicle competition.

These and other hands-on programs are provided at no cost to students.

In addition to making large endowments to Northwest Florida State College and the University of West Florida, Hsu has established a $5,000 annual scholarship in his wife’s honor and another $5,000 scholarship in the name of Gen. Bill Kirk, a good

Hsu Foundation program participants traveled to Panama City to compete in a Drone Team Challenge competition. The event required team members to code a Lego Mindstorms EV3 robot, above.

friend. Executive director Amanda Negron estimates the foundation has had an impact on thousands of youths pursuing interests in STEM. “To me, technical training gives you the advantage and skills required to be able to spot the clues to come up with a solution,” Hsu said. “STEM is so important. All we have to do is allow young people to learn while having fun.”

Hsu visited the Oval Office after President Donald Trump made him chairman of the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.

Hsu said knowledge leads to confidence, and applying what you learn results in a sense of accomplishment.

Hsu’s accomplishments have been many.

In 1976, Hsu, then 26, came to America as an industrial management and systems engineering student at the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg. He had 500 bucks in his pocket.

After earning a master’s degree, Hsu worked as an industrial engineer for ChesebroughPonds, then joined defense contractor Harris Corporation in Fort Walton Beach as a production engineer. Confronted with relocation to New York, he remained on the Emerald Coast and, after consulting for a while, started his own company, Manufacturing Technology Incorporated (MTI), in 1984.

As chairman and chief executive, Hsu grew MTI into a 450-employee military electronics company with annual revenues of $60 million. In addition, he founded Total Parts Plus, an internet-based data content provider; ActiGraph, a medical device manufacturer; and Crestview Technology Air Park, which provides infrastructure for aerospace and technology-driven solutions in Northwest Florida.

“I really enjoy spotting opportunities and creating businesses. If I were 40, I’d probably start another one,” Hsu said.

In 1992, Hsu received his doctorate in engineering management from LaSalle University and, in 1995, he completed a three-year executive educational program at Harvard Business School. Since 2014, Hsu has held a senior fellow position at the Harvard University Asia Center.

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“INNOVATION IS SO IMPORTANT, SO FUNDAMENTAL TO THE AMERICAN SPIRIT, THAT IT MAY STAND ALONE AS OUR CORE PRINCIPLE FOR GREATNESS.” — PAUL HSU President George W. Bush appointed him to the President’s Export Council (PEC). He served on the Small Business Association’s (SBA) National Advisory Board and the SBA’s Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Board. Recently, President Donald Trump made him chairman of the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.

Locally, he has dedicated himself to community building by serving in leadership roles with Sustainable Emerald Coast, Enterprise Florida, the Okaloosa County Military Affairs Committee, the Economic Development Council of Okaloosa County, the Emerald Coast Science Center and the Eglin Chapter of the Air Force Association Education Foundation. In February 2006, Hsu was selected by Gen. T. Michael

Moseley to join the U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Civic Leaders Advisory Group to help forge and strengthen the bonds between the Air Force and the communities it serves.

What does the future hold?

“Aerospace is the future of this area,” Hsu said. “We have the facilities and the abilities to play a key role.”

Hsu believes that the Hsu Innovation Institute, located in Fort Walton Beach’s industrial park, the Bob Sikes Airport privatepublic partnership and the 400-acre Hsu STEM range, can combine to provide a “blank page” for tomorrow’s technical dreamers.

To those who share his vision, he says, “Don’t stand on the sidelines and watch me.

Jump in, and you’ll benefit, too.”

Through the foundation’s programs and partnerships, Hsu hopes to provide the motivating spark for young imaginations to fly.

“We just want to lead them to the water and build the pipeline for K through 12, because education is the transformational solution for them.”

Hsu Foundation students completed a flight simulation exercise as part of a Drone Team Challenge competition.

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Embracing Innovation Entrepreneur and business executive Paul Hsu offers advice to businesses that value innovation.

1

Never say no before you say maybe. When you say no,

it closes the door. It turns off the opportunity. I can think of a dozen times in my life when I could have said no, but paused and said instead, “Let me think about it. Let me investigate it.”

2

Stay curious. I was blessed

with a curious mind. I really want to know how things work. I’m a tinkerer at heart. Albert Einstein talked about a “holy curiosity.” I like that image. Curiosity is what took us into space. I believe that we are all on earth to engage in a process of lifetime learning.

3

Be bold. After my son John

graduated from college, he was determined to get into the gaming business, which was his passion.

One day he told me, “There’s a company in New York City that produces my favorite game. If I could work for that company, I’d be so happy.” I urged him to take a bold chance.

He had a contact, so I suggested “Put yourself there, and give him an opening.”

He did it, and he got the job. All it took was initiative and willingness to be bold.

4

Strive to understand what makes people tick.

Those of us in technical and technological fields can sometimes forget that what we do is really about serving people. If you keep that principle at the forefront of your mind, you will be innovation-oriented.

5

Build relationships. For

me, the relationships I build are even more important than the products I create. Time and again, supportive hands have reached out to me, and I’ve done the same for others. You lose nothing by opening yourself to others and developing trust.

6

Build wisely. Innovation is a process, not a destination. I’ve always built my companies slowly and was never in a rush to get big. Often when I talk to students or young engineers, they have stars in their eyes.

But I had a firm principle of never moving beyond what I knew we could produce. It’s tempting when people wave money in front of your eyes, but it’s not a good strategy for long-term growth.

7

Welcome new ideas, even from unlikely sources.

Ideas are the engine of innovation. You can’t be an innovator if you’re a know-it-all. Listen — really listen — to what others have to say. Hold open meetings with your employees and kick around ideas.

8

Adhere to strong values.

When we talk about the “culture” of a company, we are really talking about its values.

Your values are everything; they’re the heart of your business. A values-driven company doesn’t cut corners. It behaves in a trustworthy manner with customers, competitors and employees; it is a responsible partner in the community; and it has a human core — it’s not just about money.

From “Guardians of the Dream: Enduring the Legacy of America’s Immigrants” (2014).

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A DV E RT I S M E N T

IMPROVE REVENUE WITH VIDEO You’ve heard it again and again, “You need to be doing video!”

What does that really mean?

LET US ADDRESS WHY YOU’RE HEARING SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE AND COMPANIES SHOUTING IT FROM THE ROOFTOPS. •

According to the latest 2019 Video Marketing Report from Wyzowl, 83% of marketers report a positive ROI on video marketing efforts. Video campaigns can be designed around the ever-accessible video camera in your pocket or with the help of professionals. No matter the size of your marketing budget, you can use video to grow your business.

•

Building trust is imperative in today’s marketplace.

Video gives your potential clients a behind-thescenes look at your business and dynamically delivers valuable information for their decision-making process. People feel more comfortable if they feel a sense of familiarity in a space or connection with a new face.

•

Video offers exceptional educational value. YouTube has become one of the most comprehensive educational resources online, and potential leads are already there searching for answers to their questions. Providing valuable, original content doesn’t take away potential customers, it positions you/company as an authority in your industry, by offering cost-saving solutions a person can benefit from while keeping you top of mind when bigger solutions are needed.

WHAT NOW? JUST START.

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•

Diving into content creation doesn’t need to be an overwhelming process. It is recommended that 80% of the video content you upload should be documentary style. Think authentic, real content: live video on social media, off the cuff commentary and how-tos from experts in your business, and exciting moments from events.

•

Hire a video consultant (Hi!) to help save valuable time spent researching and troubleshooting.

A consultant guides your team on what ideas, campaigns and schedules will be most effective for your marketing goals, taking a lot of the trial and error out of getting started with video.

•

Start a conversation with a professional video company (Hi again!) to share goals and challenges you’re experiencing as you learn how video communications can help overcome friction points and improve your bottom line.

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418 W. GARDEN STREET, SUITE 310, PENSACOLA

(850) 332-3022 | VIVIDBRIDGE.COM

PHOTO BY YANLEV / SHUTTERSTOCK.COM

PROFESSIONAL PROFILES

There are many aspects you seek when selecting a professional for matters as varied as health care services, banking, insurance, real estate purchases and even vacationing. Attributes such as courteous, experienced, trusted, reliable, passionate and reputable, likely claim top spots on your checklist. In this special advertising section of 850 Business Magazine, we share with you Northwest Florida professionals that embody these traits and aspire to exceed your expectations.

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PROFESSIONAL PROFILES

AMERICAN COMMERCE BANK JOHNNY JONES, MARKET PRESIDENT

Local banks succeed as their customers succeed. Johnny Jones, Tallahassee market president for American Commerce Bank, has come to appreciate this business adage as much as any banker.

“We specialize in banking family-owned businesses,” says Jones. “Enterprises that probably started as ‘mom-and-pop’ shops, built a successful reputation through hard work and are now looking to expand in the Tallahassee market and beyond.

“We’ve been successful in attracting entrepreneurs as customers, because we offer the financial tools that they need.

Commercial banking is a rewarding career because you get to see so many of your customers prosper.

Tallahassee is a great town for commerce. Our

Johnny Jones, Tallahassee Market President for American Commerce Bank

bank works hard to stay connected to the business community because the networking opportunities are outstanding.”

An Alabama native and lifelong baseball fan, Jones joined American Commerce Bank in 2016. His family quickly oriented themselves

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with community sports, and Johnny now coaches the Tallahassee Tomahawks travel baseball team for 12-year-olds along with fellow banker Willie Correa from First Commerce CU and Tracy Davis who runs the City of Tallahassee Youth Center. “We’ve

done phenomenally well this season — so much so that we’re headed up to Cooperstown, New York, at the end of June for the Cooperstown Dream Park Championship. I honestly believe we’re going to come out on top. Coaching the Tomahawks has been

“We specialize in banking family-owned businesses. Enterprises that probably started as ‘mom-and-pop’ shops, built a successful reputation through hard work and are now looking to expand in the Tallahassee market and beyond.”

hugely fulfilling and a whole lot of fun, and I can’t even begin to describe what it’s meant to be coaching my son through this experience.”

Jones and Correa have paired up on a second baseball project that serves an even higher goal: a

nonprofit that will provide equipment and uniforms for travel teams in need.

“It tugs at your heart to see kids on competing teams playing in blue jeans with ragtag equipment,” Jones said.

“We want to help them enjoy the sport and improve

with first-rate gear.”

Johnny’s heart for youth sports carries over into his enthusiasm for community banking. Now in his 23rd year as a lender-turned executive, Johnny has worked in just about every customer-facing position in banking. “You learn

over time to treat people the way you want to be treated. Customers who need ongoing advice and personal attention realize that it’s not the lowest price that’s most important.

It’s reliable service, good products and access to workable solutions that make for successful banking relationships. A bank loan isn’t a one-time transaction. You have to service what you sell.”

American Commerce Bank specializes in high-touch service for commercial and consumer banking customers. The bank offers market-leading deposit rates as well as convenient online banking and treasury management services. By structuring terms to the specific needs of business borrowers, American Commerce Bank provides industry-leading solutions for customer success. Says Jones, “We bring big banking down to the community bank level.”

536 N. Monroe St., Tallahassee (850) 681-7761 AmericanCommerceBank.com

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CHRIS COBB BECK PARTNERS As a property manager, there are several ways to increase your ROI on multifamily investments. However, there are four, in our eyes, that can truly make a difference if you learn to practice them daily.

1. You Should Properly Vet Potential Residents and Tenants. Property managers can take advantage of third-party services, such as Yardi, to do this vetting successfully.

Late fees and turnover simply lead to more tasks and less time. The more time you can devote to the property, the less debt and collection loss you will have. This means you can sell the property at a higher price than you bought it at, which increases your ROI. 2. You Should Consistently Make Competitive Bids. There are several aspects to a multifamily property that can benefit from a property manager making competitive bids. Simply by comparing average costs to your current costs, you can work a deal to lower your premiums to the market average. Another example is landscaping. How well-manicured a place is can mean a lot to tenants and residents.

Property managers can increase the ROI by leveraging their relationships with local vendors to get better deals. Being able to leverage these relationships and find good competitive bids is also a great way to stand out as a property manager and get hired by investors from other states.

understand what should be offered and what kind of residents to expect.

3. You Should Do Your Market Research and Use It. A good property manager understands what other multifamily properties are offering. Keeping the owner and investors informed with what’s happening in the market will help update the property and, therefore, increase the ROI. It’s also important to understand the local demographic. Knowing the people that will rent out spots in a multifamily property will help the investor or owner

4. You Should Provide Monthly Reporting.

Budget reporting and analyzing that budget throughout the year can help you keep a handle on the overall budget, as well as see where expenses are too high. It’s a great snapshot of what the property is worth today. Giving month-to-month feedback to the owner or investor can help increase ROI by keeping track of where money is being put into the property.

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“We aren’t looking to put band-aids on things. Issues in property management are inevitable; it’s how a property manager responds that will make or break them.”

Power of the Plus Beck Partners has four experienced property managers, two fulltime CPAs, and covers both commercial and multifamily properties. The Beck value is sourced from its people. We aren’t looking to put band-aids on things. Issues in property management are inevitable; it’s how a property manager responds that will make or break them.

151 W. Main St., Suite 200, Pensacola (850) 477-7044 ccobb@teambeck.com

WYNDHAM VACATION RENTALS – GROUPS & MEETINGS JOYCE SERINA – DIRECTOR OF GROUP SALES When you think about the perfect getaway, it likely includes adventure, maybe even toes in the sand, splashing waves and soaking up the sunshine, but did you know that traveling for business can be just as rewarding? Accommodations offered by Wyndham Vacation Rentals are not only for the vacationer but also for meetings and groups, too. Plus, we have group accommodations for you along the Gulf Coast of Alabama, Northwest Florida and Orlando!

Whether you’re planning a family reunion, sporting event, business meeting or looking for the perfect wedding venue, our group sales team will be by your side every step of the way. Our experienced, caring and dedicated team is the matchmaker for your group, connecting you with the ideal vacation rentals to suit your needs.

Leading the pack with more than 20 years of experience, Joyce Serina and her team play an essential role in providing expert advice to make sure that the goals of all of her meeting and event planners are met. Her enthusiasm and knowledge have been essential in collaborating for inspired meetings and events in Northwest Florida.

“I develop close relationships with my customers and treat them like family,” said Serina. “I place emphasis on providing flawless customer service and run the business as if it were my own.”

With great rates for groups of all sizes and accommodations, from studio suites to 10-bedroom beachfront homes, guests can go from the meeting room to meeting friends and family with ease.

We can also arrange outdoor catered events at our many venues, including

“I develop close relationships with my customers and treat them like family. I place emphasis on providing flawless customer service and run the business as if it were my own.” the beach, poolside or one of our beautiful lawns.

Traveling to the Orlando area with a large group? We’ve got you covered. Stay with us at one of our spacious homes or one of our full-service resorts — Bahama Bay Resort & Spa or Caribe Cove Resort.

Or try one of our newest offerings for groups — the cottages at Margaritaville Resort Orlando. Any of these gorgeous Orlando resorts are perfect for groups and are located just minutes from the

Orlando theme park action. So, when the meetings are over, the thrills begin.

Whether it’s a family reunion, business meeting or a bride wishing for the perfect venue, the caring and dedicated group sales team, led by director Joyce Serina, seeks to perfectly pair you with a location that fits your needs and budget.

(844) 207-8207 NWFLGroups@wynvr.com

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PROFESSIONAL PROFILES

CAPITAL CITY BANK

Ryan Davis, Capital City Bank President for Bay County

– Ryan Davis

What sets your business apart?

Creating exceptional client experiences is our top priority at Capital City Bank, and we believe it is only through building personal relationships with our clients that we are able to understand the best ways to address their financial needs.

Through individualized attention and customized advice, our bankers partner with our clients to help them find the solutions to help meet their financial goals.

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What do you hope to accomplish?

My primary goal is to introduce Capital City Bank to my hometown and show this community what makes us unique. I want the citizens of Bay County to know that our bankers are invested in the communities we serve and stand shoulder to shoulder with our neighbors in good times and in bad.

What is the best part of working for your company? Without a doubt, the best part of working at Capital City Bank is the company culture and how it translates into rewarding careers with astounding longevity. Our philosophy is to employ talented people, motivate them to do their best work and recognize them for their efforts.

Why did you decide to pursue this career? I did not immediately choose a career in banking after graduating from Florida State University. I owned a small business for a few years first, but ultimately pursued a career

in banking because I love helping people accomplish their dreams. As a former business owner, I understand the needs of my clientele because, in some cases, I have been in their shoes. My experiences set me apart as a well-rounded banker and trusted advisor to my clients. I enjoy building strong relationships with each client I serve and get tremendous gratification from watching them succeed.

What does your future hold?

Right now, my primary focus is to bring the first full-service Capital City Bank office in Bay County online in early 2020. I am working hard every day to tell our story and strengthen relationships with people in our community.

Capital City Bank Loan Production Office 120 Richard Jackson Blvd., Suite 225 Panama City Beach (850) 814-1634 CCBG.com/business

PHOTO COURTESY OF CAPITAL CITY BANK

“Through individualized attention and customized advice, our bankers partner with our clients to help them find the solutions to help meet their financial goals.”

SHANNON OGLETREE SANTA ROSA ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT There are many jobs that impact communities.

Shannon Ogletree’s position as the Director of Economic Development for Santa Rosa County fully encompasses impacting and affecting his community.

What sets your company apart?

I believe it’s the customer service we provide to the client and helping them succeed. We care about their business — not just winning their business.

What services does your company provide? We are a full-service department for companies looking to relocate, expand or start up in Santa Rosa County.

How did you get into this business?

I began by working at the University of West Florida. My career path was significantly influenced by two mentors at UWF’s Haas Center for Business Research and Economic Development — Phyllis Pooley and Dr. Rick Harper.

What impact do you hope to make on the community? To bring companies that can provide well-meaning, wellpaying jobs that help support their families and their lifestyles.

“I believe it’s the customer service we provide to the client and helping them succeed. We care about their business — not just winning their business.”

What do you enjoy most about your job? Meeting new people and learning what their likes and dislikes are. Getting to meet new people helps me become a more rounded person.

react that defines us and makes us who we are.

What defines your work ethic?

I am self-motivated to grow and learn new ideas and meet new people. I like to stay flexible; plans will always change, but it’s how we

What is a goal of yours? A professional goal is to continue to make Santa Rosa County an economic powerhouse in the state of Florida. A personal goal is to continue to learn about new cultures.

What is your company’s mission?

To increase the economic vitality of the county through the creation of jobs, more capital investments and higher average wages.

6491 Caroline St., Suite 4, Milton (850) 623-0174 | SantaRosaEDO.com

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COLDWELL BANKER HARTUNG AND NOBLIN INC. What services do you specialize in?

The leasing and sales of commercial properties and investment sales. I also specialize in office and warehouse properties.

What sets your company apart?

The Coldwell Banker commercial brand is the biggest factor that differentiates us in the commercial industry. It is over 100 years old and is well known for its commercial experience and expertise.

How did you get into this business?

I began in real estate as a result of managing apartments when I was in college. Upon graduating from Florida State University, I received my real estate license and started by selling residential homes for the first five to 10 years. I eventually transitioned into commercial real estate and starting this company.

What’s the secret to your success?

After 40 years in the business, I would say it’s consistency and attention to detail. We are consistent in all we do day in and day out. It is also of great importance to treat each customer right and make sure they are satisfied with every transaction.

What impact do you hope to make in the community? To maintain a strong reputation as one of the leading real estate companies in the market.

What have been some of your proudest career moments? Earning commercial special designations because they took a lot of hard work. The designations I’ve received include a Certified Commercial Investment Member (CCIM) and Society of Industrial and Office Realtors (SIOR).

What do you hope clients gain from working with you? Honest and ethical advice from an experienced

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Chip Hartung, Broker & Owner

“Whenever people visit cities, they are usually most impacted by downtown areas. I think we are finally creating that vibrant downtown that people enjoy and are proud of.”

professional that builds a lasting relationship based on Trust.

What does the future hold? I’m most excited about the expansion of our downtown with the CollegeTown experience, the new development at Cascades Park and the reenergizing of Midtown. Within the framework of our commercial real estate market, those areas

have expanded our downtown and created more energy for Tallahassee to become a vibrant, talked-about downtown. Whenever people visit cities, they are usually most impacted by downtown areas. I think we are finally creating that vibrant downtown that people enjoy and are proud of.

3303 Thomasville Road, Tallahassee (850) 386-6160 ColdwellBankerTallahassee.com

TRUSTMARK JOHN SUMRALL, REGIONAL PRESIDENT - FLORIDA MARKET

PHOTO BY IMAGES FOR BUSINESS

What services do you provide?

Trustmark is a financial services company with over 200 locations in Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Tennessee and Texas. We provide retail and business checking, savings, certificates of deposit, credit cards, consumer loans and business loans. We also offer residential and commercial construction loans. We are one of the Emerald Coast’s leading mortgage providers. Our cash management offerings are best in class and can be custom fit to the needs of small businesses or the largest publicly traded company. We offer investment management and provide a broad array of wealth management strategies, including financial planning, portfolio management, trust and custodial services through our Tailored Wealth division. We also are one of the leading commercial insurance providers in the Panhandle through our wholly owned subsidiary, Fisher Brown Bottrell Insurance.* What impact do you hope to make on the community? We are committed to the economic success of the Emerald Coast, whether it’s providing a small business capital through an equipment loan to expand, arranging a mortgage for a family to buy their first home, implementing an investment plan that helps someone live their retirement dreams, or simply a safe place to keep their hard-earned money. We take that responsibility seriously and know if we do our jobs well, the community is strengthened and continues to be the kind of place people want to move to, retire to, raise their kids in and go to operate a business.

What awards/recognition have you received? Trustmark recognizes our individual markets and branches annually. For 2018, I was fortunate to

“We are committed to our clients’ success.” have Okaloosa/Walton County and Bay County finish No. 1 and No. 6 overall within our company, respectively.

Six of our branches were recognized in the top 25%, with four of those finishing in the top 10%. The most satisfying achievements are team awards. When you are younger, you may think differently. Perhaps we all have a tendency to focus on ourselves until we get comfortable with who we are and our values. The various measurements that determined those rankings mean that a lot of the people

in our community chose to do business with Trustmark.

What sets your company apart?

We are committed to our clients’ success. We genuinely believe in helping our customers win financially.

We are dedicated to a communitybanking model that allows us to be highly attuned to local needs, and therefore, we customize our approach to best fit each market.

(800) 243-2524 Trustmark.com

*Tailored Wealth and Risk Services products are: Not FDIC Insured | Not Bank Guaranteed | Subject to Loss in Value | Not Bank Deposits | Not Insured by any Federal Government Agency

S P EC IA L A D V ER TISING SECTION

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PROFESSIONAL PROFILES

ELIZABETH EKK BROKER/OWNER OF EKK REALTY GROUP Elizabeth Ekk has threaded her time and talents throughout the Tallahassee community by making meaningful connections.

As a realtor and the owner of Ekk Realty Group, she has the capacity to engage uniquely with a variety of people.

“I love that I can give back to my community by connecting with others,” said Ekk. “I have a heart for people that relocate to Tallahassee, and I want to make them feel welcome.” Ekk herself is a transplant, moving from Canada to Tallahassee 15 year ago. In that time, she has fully immersed herself within the community, especially in real estate. The mission in starting her own company was to help other realtors grow their own business.

She has a heart for helping others find flexibility and balance through a career in Real Estate.

“This career has allowed me to live a more integrated and balanced life,” said Ekk. “I’m able to be here emotionally and physically for my kids, to nurture my marriage of 17 years and to connect with others though my career.”

Ekk Realty Group is a Top 1 percent producer, selling homes 53 percent faster than the average. The company sets itself apart with an excellent concierge service available to all clients.

“I always want others to know that we are not their realtors for one transaction — but for life,” said Ekk. 4004 Norton Lane, Suite 204, Tallahassee (850) 895-1355 | EKKRealty.com

PORT OF PENSACOLA The Port of Pensacola has been part of the city’s culture and community since the first commercial dock was built in 1784. But the need for deep-water access is now blending traditional port functions with 21st-century “blue economy” activities.

For example, the port is home to a former 630-foot cargo vessel now owned by Jeff Bezos’ space exploration company Blue Origin.

The ship will complete a major conversion that will equip the ship to serve as a landing platform beginning in late 2021.

The port’s new strategy maintains the port’s core assets for cargo and trade activity while allowing space for blue economy sectors, such as aquaculture, marine technology and biology, and ocean industry career training. It also allocates a portion of the port’s outside the gate holdings for civic uses — such as harbor cruises, water taxis, maritime history centers and entertainment venues.

The port’s commitment to blending traditional and new ideas received two boosts last

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year. Pensacola Bay Oyster Company opened an oyster nursery, becoming the port’s first aquaculture customer. A short time later, the New York Yacht Club selected Pensacola as the winter training base for its American Magic sailing team, which will challenge for the 36th America’s Cup in Auckland, New Zealand in 2021.

Further development of these new niches, combined with the strategic implementation of the new vision plan, should insure that the Port of Pensacola is as important to Northwest Florida’s future as it was to its past.

700 S. Barracks St., Pensacola (850) 436-5070 PortOfPensacola.com

DOUG CROLEY INSURANCE SERVICES Doug Croley Insurance Services has been providing insurance and financial services to the Tallahassee community for nearly 40 years.

As a family-owned and operated business, they have almost 70 years of combined experience spanning two generations.

Will Croley joined the family business after serving two combat tours in Iraq as a Marine. As someone who is independently driven, salesoriented and community-minded, insurance became the ideal fit.

“I live, work, play and raise my kids in this community, therefore I enjoy meeting new clients and watching their families or business grow,” said Will. “I get to guide them and protect their assets. I enjoy helping

them meet their needs and watching them succeed. My idea of success is helping someone so they can be better off.”

As a seventh generation North Floridian, Will is deeply rooted in Tallahassee and its people. Through that meaningful connection, the company strives to excel in customer service and always provides open communication. “The company turns 40 this year, and it’s our goal to continue for another 40 or more years,” said Croley. “Our future is bright. We are always seeking talent and clients to grow with us over the coming years.”

2814 Remington Green Circle, Tallahassee (850) 386-1922 | DougCroleyIns.com

Will Croley, Insurance Agent

BUILDING A HOSPITAL FOR THE YOUNGEST PATIENTS REQUIRES ATTENTION TO THE SMALLEST DETAILS.

We focus on technical specifics—from infection control and safety procedures to the patient experience. For over 20 years we’ve been making quality healthcare construction in Florida our priority.

hoar.com

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TRACTION STRONG

SPONSORED REPORT

Progressing with a Plan for Purpose

A

s a business owner, employer or anyone in a leadership position, it is normal to experience doubts or express concerns about your business. These could be simple questions. How can we create a company culture? How can we build a better marketing strategy? Or it could lead to more complicated questions. Is the right person in the right position?

What is the purpose of our company? What is our 10-year goal?

Ryan Giles, a certified Entrepreneurial Operating System® (EOS®) implementer, helps businesses answer these questions.

EOS® is a system, a framework, for helping business leaders get what they want from their businesses. For this reason, EOS® can help you achieve your business goals, regardless of what they are. Giles offers a free, 90-minute workshop that explains EOS® and allows leaders to find out if it’s right for them.

THE BEGINNING In the last issue of 850 Business Magazine, Giles introduced readers to a Pensacola-based engineering firm getting started on EOS®. The company’s owner sought Giles after expressing concern that his employees weren’t working well together.

During the initial 90-minute workshop, several members of the leadership team were worried about morale and people issues and a lack of scalable processes.

The owner, John, agreed with this assessment and added that he would like to see more profit as well.

John also admitted that he felt like the weight of the whole company was on his shoulders, and he’d even considered selling the business just to get out from under this stress. After learning how EOS® could help the company solve these issues, the leaders agreed to begin the process.

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FOCUS DAY A few weeks after the 90-minute workshop, Giles met the team — including John, Ray, Roberto, and Sarah — to begin the process. This first full day is called Focus Day, and it began with a discussion on “hitting the ceiling.” After discussing why companies “hit the ceiling,” the team learned five tools to help them “break through” the ceiling every time.

Next, a lively debate erupted when the team began creating their first accountability chart, which laid out the structure of the company over the next six months. John insisted that he should be responsible for new business growth, but the team pushed back since John had quite a few other responsibilities. John finally agreed that Ray would “own” the sales manager seat since this position was so critical to the health of the company. Roberto and Sarah agreed to “own” the operations and finance seats. Giles also introduced the concept of the “Integrator” to the team. An Integrator is the person who harmoniously integrates each major department in the company to make sure the business is running like a well-oiled machine. The discussion came to an end as the team admitted that they had no one in the company with the skillset to “own” that seat, so they agreed that they would begin searching for this person within the next six months.

After lunch, the team set short-term goals and assigned someone in the room to be responsible for each goal. These goals included implementing a new time-keeping software system in operations (owned by Roberto), rewriting the company’s HR handbook (owned by Sarah) and bringing on three new, large clients (owned by Ray).

Next on the agenda, the team created a scorecard to help them keep their finger on the pulse of the company. The scorecard was built with weekly metrics from each department, and each metric was assigned to one of the leaders in the room.

The day ended with the team committing to weekly management meetings to help them communicate better, increase accountability and ultimately gain traction within the business. Giles coached them on the best meeting agenda and wrapped up the day with feedback from each leader. While everyone on the team was proud of their progress, John got a little emotional as he expressed how he was feeling. He said for the first time in years, he felt like he truly had help. The weight of the company had been lifted from his shoulders and evenly divided across his very-capable leadership team. While the team would begin to use their newly learned tools immediately, Giles scheduled the next meeting to occur in about 30 days (Vision Building Day).

Ryan@TractionStrong.com

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Gadsden, Jefferson + Leon Counties

Breaking Down Silos

Associates build case for tax-funded Leon County Children’s Services Council

By Rochelle Koff

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hild advocates know the alarming statistics about Leon County children all too well.

Consider:

Forty-two percent of Leon County children under 5 live below the poverty line.

One out of every 10 persons arrested is a juvenile, above the state average.

Teen moms are two times more likely to live in poverty before giving birth to their first child.

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Then there are discrepancies in reading skills, health care, quality child care and mental health services.

“Tallahassee needs to recognize that to succeed as a community, we need to succeed as a whole,” said Mark O’Bryant, president and CEO of Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare.

“Right now, a lot of the community lives in silos. Siloed communities become more insular. We want to break down those silos.”

O’Bryant has a chance to help eliminate those silos as one of the 23 members of the Community Services Council Planning

Committee, which has been tasked with looking into the needs of children, mostly their unmet needs, in Leon County.

The committee has been touted for its high-caliber members, who also include Jonathan Sjostrom, chief judge of the Second Judicial Circuit; Sheriff Walt McNeil; Schools Superintendent Rocky Hanna; School Board member Alva Striplin; Tallahassee Mayor John Dailey; Dr. Alma Littles, Florida State University’s senior associate dean for Medical Education and Academic Affairs; business leader Kim Williams; former Public Defender

“WE WANT TO BE SURE WE’RE NOT CREATING ANOTHER LAYER OF GOVERNMENT BUREAUCRACY. WE WANT TO BE IN THE BUSINESS OF HELPING KIDS...” DOMINIC CALABRO

PHOTO COURTESY OF FLORIDATAXWATCH.ORG (CALABRO)

Members of the Community Services Planning Council Committee met July 12 to solicit ideas from organizations on how best to address unmet needs of children in Leon County.

Nancy Daniels; State Attorney Jack Campbell; plus members with an expertise in mental health, early education and nonprofit services.

The planning committee is laying the groundwork ahead of a referendum to formally establish a local Children’s Services Council, which is an independent special district established by Florida Statutes, Chapter 125.901. Councils fund services for children from birth to age 19.

Leon County commissioners voted unanimously in June 2018 to place creation of a Children’s Services Council on the ballot in November 2020. If approved by voters, the council will have the authority to levy a property tax up to 50 cents for every $1,000 of value to fund services. It should cost the

average taxpayer less than $50 per year and raise about $8 million per year in revenue.

Twelve of Florida’s 67 counties have established councils, but “they are serving half the children in Florida because they’re in such large, urban areas,” said Matthew Guse, CEO of the Florida Children’s Council.

“These 12 councils are investing about $500 million statewide in children’s programs.”

Dailey said, “The CSC has proven to be very successful in other communities. I think a council in Leon County would be a huge benefit for our community.”

Dailey was on the county commission when there was a move to put the measure on the ballot in 2019.

The commission decided to delay the vote after some opposition, including concerns raised by the Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce.

The chamber’s statement at that time: “A Children’s Services Council may be a potential solution to long-standing problems, but before a new independent government body should be established, our community deserves a deliberate evaluation of the issues, opportunities and objectives.”

The commission then decided on a planning committee to evaluate the issues, make recommendations and compile a report.

Sue Dick, president of the Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce, said the council measure “came up quickly” when it was proposed in 2018. “We weren’t pro or against.”

“The good news is there is now a committee that’s been put together, which is all we were really asking,” said Dick.

In fact, a presentation on the Children’s Services Council was scheduled for a breakout session at the annual chamber conference in August.

“I expect the chamber will support the recommendations that come out of this group of individuals selected to come up with a plan,” Dick said before the conference.

Florida TaxWatch President Dominic Calabro said the council “could be really wonderful. It could be a great tool or a lost opportunity. We want to be sure we’re not creating another layer of government bureaucracy. We want to be in the business of helping kids, not helping institutions that serve children.”

Calabro said a well-run council could save taxpayers money in the long run if it ensures providers fulfill their contracts and are held accountable.

“The council could be the tip of the spear to lead and better manage the variety of children’s services currently provided in Leon County,” said Calabro.

Still, the measure will have to overcome challenges to gain voter support for a new tax.

At a June meeting of the planning council, which includes comments from the public, one critic of the tax said the council could bring “more duplication” and “double dipping.” She also said there were agencies without waiting lists.

“It’s good to address these issues now,” Daniels said after the meeting. “I have worked a lot on serving teens in the community, and I can tell you there are vast needs for recreation, mental health services, substance abuse services and job programs.”

Sjostrom, chairman of the committee and a nonvoting member, said, “At the end of the day, the community will make a decision whether this is what they want to do or not. What is really important to me is that everybody has had a chance for input and that nobody says you didn’t listen to us.”

When listening to Sjostrom and other committee members, there’s a common thread.

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“I would challenge any human being to sit with me in court and see the families I work with and not conclude that there are unmet needs for the children in this community,” said Sjostrom. “I see unmet needs every day of my life. I see lots and lots of kids in really difficult circumstances.”

Campbell sees the eventual consequences of those circumstances.

“I’m actually at my desk reviewing a warrant for two teens that killed another young man,” he said in a phone conversation, referring to the fatal Sharer Road shooting in June. “We’re seeing greater levels of violence in younger people. We have some young people who don’t expect to see 30, they don’t expect to survive and they totally expect to go to prison. We have to start making interventions earlier in that cycle.

“The council takes a bigger problem and a more comprehensive approach than the current system,” said Campbell. “If you really want to stop crime, you have to stop these young people from turning into criminals.”

Courtney Atkins isn’t on the committee, but she sees the gaps in services as executive director of the nonprofit group, Whole Child Leon. She is among advocates who have pushed for the creation of the Children’s Services Council even though it may mean her own organization could sunset.

“The CSC would be like Whole Child on steroids,” said Atkins. “Do we need to be around if there’s a Children’s Council? On a very small budget, we’ve tried to bridge gaps and bring people together and we’ve started initiatives. We’d love it if the council would take on these initiatives.

“We have a lot of great agencies doing great work that are funded

Business Moves With Us

for a year or two at a time,” Atkins said. “We’re all stretched and understaffed and overworked. It doesn’t feel like there’s an umbrella organization. Instead of scrambling every year or two, let’s get some long-term vision and real accountability.”

In her work as director of the FSU Center for Prevention and Early Intervention Policy, Mimi Graham, who’s on the planning committee, focuses on babies and toddlers during the first 1,000 days of life.

“Ninety percent of a child’s brain develops by age 5,” she said, so it’s a crucial time to reach kids and families.

“There are kids who are hungry, there are mental health needs, we’re seeing more kids who are Baker Acted and we need more quality child care for infants and toddlers,” said Graham. “We don’t have enough infant care, and what we have is expensive.”

Focusing on babies and young children has become one of the planning committee’s goals as it prepares its final report.

“I think we all recognize that the health of a baby often starts at conception,” said O’Bryant, also chairman of the Tallahassee chamber’s board of directors.

Over the summer, the committee narrowed its priorities to six primary issues:  I nvesting in early childhood education programs to ensure that children enter kindergarten ready to succeed.  I nvesting in summer and afterschool programs designed to help at-risk youth.

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PROPERTY I CASUALTY I SURETY I RISK MANAGEMENT I SECTOR EXPERTISE

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roviding health education and support for parents and P children to reduce infant and maternal mortality, increase infant health, improve oral health and improve early identification of health problems.

Providing mental health support for parents and children.

Investing in youth development programs to provide occupational opportunities that can build job skills and support families facing poverty.

Reducing the consequences of food insecurity by ensuring that children in Leon County have adequate year-round access to healthy food.

Committee consultant Aliza Ghazvini said that priorities may change before the committee turns in its report, due in January.

The report is considered a “template” for a future CSC, but the final decision will be up to the board once it’s established, she said.

Many of the current committee members will likely be on that 10-member board since it must include the superintendent of schools; a local school board member; the district of the Department of Children and Families administrator (or designee); one member of the county governing body; and the judge assigned to juvenile cases. The governor will pick the other five members of the board.

The County Commission would decide whether the council has to be reauthorized. Guse said the councils don’t provide services themselves but contract with agencies, utilizing evidence-based practices with measurable results.

The roots of the children’s council date back to Pinellas County, which established the still-current Independent Juvenile Welfare Board in 1946. In the 1980s, Palm Beach County became the second area to develop a taxing district focused on children. The latest CSC was passed in Alachua County in 2018.

Ten of Florida’s 12 councils are considered independent taxing districts, and two in Jacksonville and Manatee County are dependent, said Guse. Jacksonville’s council is funded through the county budget. Manatee County’s council is a blend of both systems.

“The councils are truly doing amazing things in their communities,” said planning committee Vice Chair Monesia Brown, Walmart’s director of public affairs and government relations. ”I’ve worked with them in the past, and I’ve seen the great things they can do.”

St. Lucie County’s CSC, for instance, funds a program sending a registered nurse to the home of every baby within a week of returning home, said Sean Boyle, the council’s executive director.

“They check on the health of the baby and the mother and answer questions. It’s literally saved mothers’ and babies’ lives.”

The Children’s Trust of Miami-Dade County played a part in reducing the number of teens arrested from 20,000 to 2,000 over 10 years, said president and CEO James Haj. Both the St. Lucie and Miami-Dade councils were reauthorized in their counties by a vote of more than 85 percent.

“The council has also been a plus for the business community when recruiting employees,” said Boyle.

“There’s a sense of pride of people living here, and people relocating, that we are a child-friendly community. We’ve made children a priority.”

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Coastal Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa + Walton Counties

A Growing Family of Students Ohana Institute rounds out ‘good people’

O

nce an accidental homeschooler whose planned medical career was derailed by a daughter, Lettye Burgtorf today presides as executive director over the Ohana Institute, a private, nonprofit academy with an enrollment of 160.

Students at the academy, located in Inlet Beach, range from grades 2 to 12, but all are integrated into a Social Emotional Learning (SEL) system.

“Social Emotional Learning considers the whole child,” Burgtorf explained. “If a kid is struggling with his work one day, we want to be able to pinpoint every emotion, address the physical and mental, and find the root of the issue. Because we only have eight to 12 kids per class, our staff is able to nurture relationships and provide students

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By Hannah Burke

with valuable problem-solving skills they’ll have for life.”

SEL, Burgtorf summarized, incorporates key components of effective parenting. For 10 minutes a day, students take a break from schoolwork for “Quiet Time.” Burgtorf doesn’t care if they “sleep, meditate, pray or read,” so long as they disconnect from all electronics and reconnect with mindfulness.

Additionally, students devote 10 minutes each afternoon to “Ohana Housekeeping,” in which they see to cleaning and maintaining their workspace.

Burgtorf acknowledged that the Ohana Institute, while not a faith-based school, infuses its curriculum with 10 core values: family, responsibility, respect, ethics, community, global awareness, gratitude, creativity, caring and excellence.

“Ohana” is a Hawaiian word for family.

“Family time is every Wednesday and extremely important to us,” Burgtorf stressed.

“We’ll all gather and listen to a speaker, play games or find fun activities that bring us together.”

The ultimate unifier, she said, is Ohana’s musical component. Every student is required to learn to play an instrument and join a band. A rock ’n’ roll performance, complete with spotlights and fog machines, concludes each semester. Students are responsible for writing their own song and performing either their work or a cover track on stage.

“It’s incredible because about 80 percent of our students have never picked up an instrument or stepped forward to become a vocalist,” Burgtorf said. “But what this does is encourage their brain to think differently.

Music subliminally shows you how to find a creative solution to a challenge in your life and, more importantly, how to work together.”

Four years ago, Ohana created “Rock on the Road,” a program in which students learn the ropes of the music business. Students practice at venues such as the Avatar Rehearsal Studio in Atlanta and ultimately record a studio album.

PHOTOS BY CHANDLER WILLIAMS AND MARLA CARTER PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF OHANA INSTITUTE

EMERALD COAST CORRIDOR

The Ohana Institute emphasizes social-emotional learning, an approach that considers all factors that may affect a student’s academic performance. As part of a music program, Ohana students combine each year to record a studio album.

Student “general managers” are responsible for creating logos, scouting locations and booking lodging for an annual, weeklong performance tour. Burgtorf, along with Ohana music instructor Jonathan Mitchell, transport the ensemble to other schools and Boys & Girls Clubs before a series finale at the Rock by the Sea music festival in St. George Island in Franklin County.

When Burgtorf witnesses her students playing with a confidence that inspires their peers, she takes a moment to appreciate her life.

“My degree isn’t in education,” she said.

“It’s in art, biology and Spanish. I was going to be a doctor.”

But life had other plans. Burgtorf’s oldest daughter, Hunter, expressed an interest in being homeschooled. A friend of Hunter’s soon joined the lessons and, not long thereafter, Burgtorf was teaching eight children.

Once siblings began to follow suit and Burgtorf was juggling 17 children, she rented an apartment space above Restaurant Paradis in Rosemary Beach and employed Florida Virtual School curriculum.

Two years later, parents encouraged her to pursue accreditation. That process was complete in 2011.

“I feel like this is my destiny,” Burgtorf said, “because I love children and I love to see them succeed.”

And success overflows at Ohana, where the academy’s focus on the individual student lends itself to a tailored approach to education. Apart from numerous collaborative projects, classes aim to foster a student’s sense of independence.

Flipped learning models involve tasking a student with listening to a lecture or researching topics at home before coming to class the

next day ready to learn and ask questions.

Cross-curricular lessons that may combine language arts and social studies, for example, encourage critical thinking and a reinforced sense of achievement.

College preparation begins in 9th grade.

Students select three universities and majors in which they have an interest and customize a curriculum which will equip them for success. If a subject is not offered by the Ohana Institute, distance learning and virtual lessons are optional.

Additionally, every high school student completes a 72-hour, semester-long internship to either cement their focus or prompt them to discover a new one. It’s Burgtorf’s aim to “see that a student’s success comes from doing what they love, not what they think they have to do.”

The Ohana Institute takes students on international trips so that students can “experience the different” and discover new avenues for achievement and fulfillment.

“I want students to see beyond this bubble,” Burgtorf said. “I want them to want to help and to change the world. And the only way to do that is for them to know who they are and what they have to offer.

“I want them to always carry that knowledge of themselves, so they’re good husbands, wives and parents. The goal is to create good people.”

“I FEEL LIKE THIS IS MY DESTINY, BECAUSE I LOVE CHILDREN AND I LOVE TO SEE THEM SUCCEED.” LETTYE BURGTORF 850 Business Magazine

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I-10 CORRIDOR

Gadsden, Leon Counties Northern Escambia, Santa Rosa,Jefferson, Okaloosa +&Walton Counties and Holmes, Washington, Calhoun, Jackson + Liberty Counties

Aerospace has become a growing part of Northwest Florida’s economy, and Marianna’s airport is competing for a piece of the action.

Raising its Game

Marianna hopes to land aerospace contractors at its Airport Commerce Park

By Lazaro Aleman

W

ith the expected completion of a runway extension by year’s end, Marianna city officials and economic development proponents hope to have in place another key element to attract the aerospace industry to the Marianna Airport Commerce Park (MACP).

“We have a runway that’s 4,900 feet, which limits the size and type of aircrafts that can land here,” said Marianna City Manager Jim Dean. “If we go to 6,000 feet, it expands our ability to take larger aircrafts.

And yes, the aerospace industry is our primary target.”

Indeed, that industry is a target across

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Northwest Florida, given its several military installations and ready workforce of retiring military personnel that make the region a lure to aviation companies.

Roy Baker of Opportunity Florida, which covers a region including Jackson County, amplifies the point.

“The 1,100-foot extension allows the side of the park that touches the runway to target companies that do maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) of the larger planes,” he said. “And, the area off the airport apron could be for other industries, such as small manufacturing, light industry or value-added manufacturing.”

Bill Stanton, Jackson County Development

Council executive director, believes the runway extension, combined with the site’s shovel-ready designation, will boost Marianna’s competitiveness.

“It will allow us to compete with Tallahassee, Panama City and Pensacola,” he said. “We still have the issue that our population and workforce are smaller, but if a project is under 1,000 employees, we can compete.”

The runway extension is the latest of many improvements undertaken in recent years to enhance the MACP’s competitiveness, especially the 237 acres adjacent to the airport that were certified a Florida First Site in 2015 as part of a Gulf Power initiative.

To meet certification, the site underwent

PHOTOS COURTESY OF DONOFRO ARCHITECTS

a rigorous screening process to ensure its shovel-readiness and minimization of businesses’ start-up risks, said Jennifer Conoley, senior economic development project manager at Gulf Power.

“Certification is one competitive factor that communities use to set themselves apart from the competition,” Conoley explained.

“And, certainly, runway extensions and anything that make properties more attractive to targeted industries is key.”

Other improvements that have benefited the MACP include upgrading the airport’s terminal and infrastructure and contracting a fixed-based operator to run the facility.

“There are a number of things happening,” Dean said. “It’s not any one thing that you can put your finger on that’s going to flip the switch. It’s a combination of things that will hopefully impact our ability to grow the park.”

So far, the certified acreage remains vacant — but then, only two of nine regional sites certified in 2015 have attracted activity.

“It’s not unusual,” Baker said. “In this line of work, if you can land two or three out of 100 prospects, you’re doing excellent.”

The certified acreage aside, other parts of the park have enjoyed success, most recently the addition of a fabric company.

All told, the park holds 12 businesses, not counting the Sunland Center and federal prison, government facilities that together employ about 1,100 people.

A former 1940s U.S. airfield that Marianna and Jackson County have been repurposing since 1962, the park lies near two state roads and I-10, a designated Jacksonville-toPensacola manufacturing/logistics corridor.

Kim Wilmes is president/CEO of Florida’s Great Northwest, which markets a 12-county region. She pointed out that Marianna already enjoys a reputation as a manufacturing and distribution center, and the runway puts it in the running for aviation companies. The challenge, she said, will be providing the talent.

“You need a pipeline of skilled employees for companies to succeed,” Wilmes said.

“You need schools offering certifications in skills that are aligned with aviation.”

That challenge is one Marianna can meet, Baker said.

“Chipola College is set up to add programs quickly,” he noted. “It can adopt a program to meet the needs of an MRO employer that did planes.”

Stanton agrees.

“Chipola trained workers for Catalyst Fabric Solutions under a state program,” he said. “So, yes, we have the capability to mount such a program.”

As for the availability of a regional workforce, Baker underscored his argument regarding the need to think beyond county lines when pursuing projects.

“Many citizens in Jackson County work in other counties and vice versa,” Baker said. “We

need to erase county lines and think regionally, because the real competition is Georgia and Alabama.”

Nimbleness is another of Marianna’s assets.

“Rural communities can move quickly,” Wilmes said. “The fact that everyone knows each other and pulls together on projects is significant, because time is money to companies.”

Stanton all but boasts about the rapidity.

“If a company wanted to locate on the park’s certified site, we could come to an agreement, call a meeting within 24 hours, get them approved and the next day they could start construction,” he said. “I don’t know of another entity in Florida that can move that quick.”

“IT WILL ALLOW US TO COMPETE WITH TALLAHASSEE, PANAMA CITY AND PENSACOLA. ... IF A PROJECT IS UNDER 1,000 EMPLOYEES, WE CAN COMPETE.” BILL STANTON 850 Business Magazine

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BUSINESS NEWS

SOUNDBYTES

CAPITAL APPOINTMENTS

» Gov. Ron DeSantis has announced the reappointment of Eugene Lamb Jr. to Tallahassee Community College’s District Board of Trustees. Lamb has served on the TCC District Board of Trustees since 2007. He served as board chair in 2010-11 and again in 2013-14.

He was also on the Presidential Search Committee that selected Jim Murdaugh as TCC’s sixth president.

Lamb was a teacher in the Leon County School District for 30 years.

LOCAL HAPPENINGS

» Aegis Business Technologies

has announced a new partnership with Microsoft. Aegis has been named a Silver Partner with the technology giant, allowing it to continue to bring solutions to the Florida market as a value added reseller (VAR) as well as a certified partner.

» The Legal Aid

Foundation of Tallahassee (LAF) has announced the hiring of Tiffani N. Brown as its new promise zone BROWN staff attorney. Prior to joining LAF, Brown worked as an attorney for both Gary A. Roberts & Associates, LLC, and The Baker Law Firm, P.A.

» Lewis, Longman & Walker, P.A. has announced that Kasey Lewis has joined the firm’s Tallahassee office as a legislative coordinator.

Kasey previously served as a legislative assistant to Florida State Sen. Lori Berman and to Florida State Rep. Matt Willhite.

» TC Federal Bank announced

» Doug Bruce has reestablished his governmental consulting firm, Doug Bruce and Associates, LLC. » Tom Deison has joined Hancock Whitney as Tallahassee’s new market president. Most recently, he was a financial advisor with the Tallahassee-based Barnes Capital Group. » Aloft Tallahassee Downtown

recently appointed Brandon Miller as its new general manager and operations manager. He was promoted from his position as assistant general manager.

LOCAL HONORS

» The Tallahassee Network

for Young Professionals hosted the annual Golden A.C.E. Awards, which acknowledges emerging young leaders in their respective industries. Recognized as the Capital City’s top “20 under 40” young professionals were Britney Smith, Leon County Government; Maxim Nasab, Apexx Architecture; Dorsey Spencer Jr., Florida State University; Dan Watkins, GloFX; Samantha Loebig, Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce; Thomas Vergo, Tallahassee International Airport; Sean Rady, Keller Williams Town & Country; Eduardo Gonzalez Loumiet, Ruvos; Elissa Long, Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare; Taylor Harmon, Thomas Howell Ferguson, P.A., CPAs; Alicia Turner, WCTV; Jamie Van Pelt, ESPMedia; Paul Aloise Jr., Office of the State Attorney, 2nd Circuit; Audra Fournier, Partners for a

that Linda Palmer is joining the bank as chief financial officer and senior vice president. Palmer joins TC Federal Bank with more than 37 years of financial management experience in banking.

» Heather Mitchell, executive

director of the TCC Foundation, announced that John and Maria Lentz donated $25,000 to support TCC’s Wakulla Environmental Institute (WEI) Phase II Project. John Lentz has supported the college in a variety of volunteer roles over the last decade. He served as a member of the TCC Foundation Board of Directors and was on the WEI Campaign Team.

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Solution; Emily Lee, Southern Scholarship Organization; Wilnick Saint Charles, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation; Jennie Kroeger, FSU College of Education; Russ Browning, Rogers Gunter Vaughn Insurance Inc./HUB Florida; Rodney Funderburk Jr., C.A.R.S. and Chicago Chicken & Grill; and Catherine Leonard, Tallahassee Hidden Histories.

» Tallahassee

Community College (TCC) President Jim Murdaugh announced that Madeline PUMARIEGA Pumariega, the former chancellor of the Florida College System (FCS), has been named executive vice president and provost. Pumariega was the first woman and first Hispanic educator to lead the FCS. She worked for Miami Dade College for nearly two decades, serving in a number of leadership roles, including president of the Wolfson Campus.

» Elizabeth Ricci,

a Tallahasseebased immigration attorney, received the Tallahassee Women Lawyers RICCI Diversity & Inclusion Leadership Award.

The award, which was created in 2016, recognizes individuals, businesses, government entities and professional associations who display leadership in fostering diversity in their workplaces or industries and the surrounding community.

» Tallahassee City Manager Reese Goad announced the appointment of David Pollard as director of the City of Tallahassee’s Aviation Department. Pollard previously served as interim director and brings more than 26 years of experience in aviation to the permanent position, which provides administrative oversight of the Tallahassee International Airport (TLH). In addition to his aviation operation experience, Pollard served his country through 22 years of honorable active duty and reserve military service in the United States Marine Corps. » Spectra Venue Management’s

Brandon Shaffer, box office manager at the Donald L. Tucker Civic Center on the campus of Florida State University, is one of the International Association of Venue Managers Foundation’s 30|UNDER|30 class of 2019.

The 30|UNDER|30 program recognizes the best and brightest young professionals in the venue management industry.

» Domi Station in April won

the Pitch Distilled 2019, a multicity competition sponsored

by Gentleman Jack Mellowed Tennessee Whiskey and WIRED Brand Lab. Its winning team presented “Hucksters Mobile Market,” focusing on alleviating local food insecurity issues. They collected a $10,000 grand prize.

» The Capital Chapter of

the Florida Public Relations Association held its annual Image Awards program, recognizing the hard-working PR professionals representing nonprofits, and public and private organizations in the Big Bend Region. Entries were judged by panels of APRcertified PR professionals and evaluated on criteria, including goals, objectives, implementation and overall effectiveness. Winners in various categories included: Sachs Media Group, Florida Department of Environmental Protection, Agency for Persons with Disabilities, BowStern Marketing Communications, Veterans Florida, Leon County Government, SalterMitchellPR, City of Tallahassee, The Workmans and the Never Forgotten Coast Team, City of Tallahassee Communications Department, Jennifer Vasbinder and Alison Leavitt.

NEW & NOTABLE

» The Kraft Brothers

Dealership Group broke ground on construction on their newest facility, Infiniti of Tallahassee, located on Mahan Drive. Attendees included the Kraft brothers, Chris and Peter, Tallahassee Mayor John E. Dailey, and Tallahassee dealership managers Bill Johnson, general manager; Janice Gibson, general sales manager; David Lanier, service and parts director; and Ray Jimenez, vice president of Infiniti USA.

KRAFT BROTHERS GROUNDBREAKING

EMERALD COAST LOCAL HAPPENINGS

» UpBeat Music has opened a

new music store in the Wright Plaza shopping center in Fort Walton Beach. The store offers sales, rentals, repairs and music lessons on a variety of instruments, including pianos, guitars, drums and sound equipment. Owner Dick Reinlie opened the original location in Crestview in 2012.

THE BLAKE AT MIRAMAR BEACH

Ground has been broken on Walton County’s newest resort-style senior living community, The Blake at Miramar Beach. The Blake will feature 124 apartments and a full range of assisted living and memory care services. member for the Center for Children and Families when she lived in Shreveport, Louisiana.

» Dunlap & Shipman, P.A., is pleased to welcome John P. Townsend and Michael P. Dickey to the firm as partners.

Both attorneys will be based out of the firm’s South Walton office.

TOWNSEND

LOCAL HONORS

2018 HCA Awards of Distinction.

The Frist Humanitarian Awards recognize one physician, one employee and one volunteer who each demonstrate extraordinary concern for the welfare and happiness of patients and their community. Thomas Fox, MD, received the Physician Frist Humanitarian Award, Sharon Wise, RN, received the Employee Frist Humanitarian Award and Carolyn Van Pelt received the Volunteer Frist Humanitarian Award.

» Scenic Corridor UPBEAT MUSIC FORT WALTON BEACH

PHOTOS PROVIDED BY PROFILED INDIVIDUALS

» Renée Pellegrino

recently joined the Emerald Coast Children’s Advocacy Center (ECCAC) board. Her community PELLEGRINO involvement has revolved around area school/ athletic fundraising and she was an active and then sustaining member of Junior League in three states for 16 years. Also, she was a past board

DICKEY Foundation has named McCaskill & Company in Miramar Beach as the winner of its Design Excellence Award for this quarter. Owners Bill and Elizabeth Campbell and Carolyn Campbell Brigman received the award at a ceremony on April 12. Scenic Corridor Foundation established this award in 2017 to recognize businesses and developers who build or renovate projects that best exemplify Scenic Corridor guidelines.

» Twin Cities Hospital recently announced the recipients of its

BAY LOCAL HAPENINGS

» Ameris Bank Market President

Robert Vice announced that Stan Janicki has been named city president for the bank’s Panama City market area. Former market leader Jimmy Barr announced his retirement, effective June 28. Barr had served more than 30 years in the financial industry and an additional 13 years as a practicing attorney. Janicki will be responsible for the oversight of core banking activities in the market and building and strengthening the bank’s initiatives and programs.

I-10 FOX

WISE

NEW & NOTABLE

VAN PELT

» Alys Beach has announced that The Camden and The Whitby condominium residences are available for purchase. Designed

by Hart Howerton of San Francisco and New York City, The Camden and The Whitby condominium residences overlook Alys Beach’s growing Town Center.

LOCAL HAPENINGS

» Marianna Mayor John Roberts has passed the gavel on to new Mayor Rico Williams. » Jackson County Fire Chief Charlie Brunner promoted Steve Hall to fire marshall. Hall began his employment with JCFR in 2012 as an EMT/Firefighter. He attended the EMT and Firefighter School at Chipola College.

— COMPILED BY REBECCA PADGETT

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The Last Word

SPREADING THE WORD Recovery effort requires statewide attention

Not long after Hurricane Michael left behind its swath of destruction and chaos, Allan Bense called Ron Sachs, widely regarded as one of the best crisis managers in the country.

» Just 57% of Floridians are aware that extensive damage remains in those areas hardest hit by Hurricane Michael. » Nearly half of Floridians would do nothing to help meet the continuing post-Michael needs in Northwest Florida. » Only 64% of Floridians can name the hurricane that struck Northwest Florida in 2018. » Fewer than half of Floridians know that Hurricane Michael was a Category 5 storm.

And, those findings exist despite the best efforts of Sachs and an organization called Rebuild 850, which commissioned the NHSI study.

Bense had asked Sachs to develop a vehicle to help keep focus on the devastation zone and raise the visibility of its needs.

Sachs and his shop responded by establishing Rebuild 850, which is chaired by Bense; his son-in-law and fellow former House speaker, Will Weatherford; and former Congresswoman Gwen Graham.

“We created a logo and a website and we brought in organizational partners including the Florida Chamber of Commerce, the Florida Chamber Foundation, the Florida Press Association, the Red Cross and the United Way of the Big Bend, who already were involved in delivering supplies and volunteers to the impact area,” Sachs said.

“That meant we had an engaged coalition — and we were able to use their messaging platforms to boost awareness of needs on a continuing basis.”

Rebuild 850 also represented a new fundraising apparatus, one associated with people who are known throughout Florida. The donations received — about $600,000 worth of as July 1, Sachs said — are funneled to Volunteer Florida’s disaster recovery fund.

Sachs explained that Rebuild 850 has four objectives: attracting donations; encouraging volunteerism; promot-

ing visitation to the region; and causing people to think about investing in the storm-affected counties.

In the latter regard, Rebuild 850, along with the Florida Chamber and its foundation, escorted business executives from around the state to Bay County.

“They saw firsthand the damage sustained by Tyndall Air Force Base, Mexico Beach and Panama City,” Sachs said.

“They heard from John Holdnak, the president of Gulf Coast State College, and Bryan Taylor, the director of the United Way of Northwest Florida, and they learned about the homelessness and mental illness problems created by the storm.”

The very welcome result of the field trip was that the business leaders involved went back to their home communities and spread the word about what they saw and heard and what businesses can do to help.

Be well,

STEVE BORNHOFT, EDITOR, 850 MAGAZINE sbornhoft@rowlandpublishing.com

RECOVERY AS OPPORTUNITY The Seaside Institute will gather experts in fields including governance, engineering, leadership and community planning for a three-day symposium that will address Northwest Florida’s continuing hurricane recovery efforts. “Transforming Communities After a Natural Disaster Through New Urbanism” will be held Sept. 14-16 at the Institute, located at 168 Smolian Circle in Santa Rosa Beach. Speakers will include former mayors Joe Riley of Charleston, South Carolina, and John Robert Smith of Meridian, Mississippi, and Quint Studer of the Studer Community Institute in Pensacola. “All have had experience with post-disaster rebuilding efforts that helped strengthen communities rather than just restore them to their pre-disaster state,” said Seaside founder Robert Davis.

For more information about the symposium, contact Beth Ann Carr at the Seaside Institute: b.carr@seasideinstitute.org; (850) 231-2421.

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PHOTO BY SAIGE ROBERTS

This crisis was unlike those Sachs usually deals with. Threatened was not the reputation of an individual or a business, but the viability of a region.

Bense, cognizant certainly of the devastation zone’s lack of large population centers and its relatively limited headlinegenerating capacity, feared that the storm would soon be forgotten by all who were not directly affected by it.

A Bay County resident and former speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, he articulated that fear to Sachs, the founder and CEO of the Sachs Media Group in Tallahassee.

It would prove justified.

From June 7-11, the National Hurricane Survival Initiative (NHSI) conducted a statewide survey of 1,000 Florida voters regarding Hurricane Michael.

Key findings included …

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