- April 24, 2024
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Updated 1:35 p.m.
A Facebook photo of a bear on Palm Coast Parkway went viral in Palm Coast on July 14.
Kristina K Cardone posted the image to Swip~Swap~Palm Coast, saying the photo was taken at St. Joe Plaza.
The Sheriff's Office said this morning that reports had come in overnight about a bear in the R-section, and spokesman Jim Troiano said it's not unusual, especially at this time of year, for bears to roam through the city. Their typical range can be 20 or 30 miles wide. The most important advice for residents is to never feed the bears because they could then become a nuisance. "Then, they'll have to be removed, and that takes a trapper, and it can become a dangerous situation," he said.
In general, there is no need to call the Sheriff's Office to report a sighting — only if the bear is doing something out of the ordinary and "being a naughty bear."
"If they come to your home time and time again, or if there's a bear on your doorstep and you're afraid to go in, call us," Troiano said.
Many comments on Facebook speculated that development disrupts bears' habitat, and that's why they could be moving through residential areas like Palm Coast. Troiano said there is some truth to that.
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At the Palm Coast City Council Workshop July 12, a resident named Robert MacDonald expressed concern about another ramification of developing wooded lots: the impact on the homeless.
"If we keep clearing out these wooded areas, I’m just afraid that the tent cities are going to disappear," he said. "What are we going to do with the homeless situation? I don’t know if the city knows how many tent cities there are, but they have rights, too."
City Councilman Bill McGuire said he had gone on some tours of areas where the homeless live, and it's not an easy problem to fix.
"They’re not breaking any laws," he said. "You can’t make them go away. The people in the neigtbrosod often come out and feed them. You can’t compel them to go somewhere. You can sgugeset shelter, but the bottom line is you can’t make them go if they don't want to go. It’s a dilemma for a goverment of any kind. Because they have services that they could avail themselves of if they choose to do so, but if they don’t … you can’t do anything about them."
Sheriff's Office spokesman Jim Troiano said later that, just as residents are not supposed to feed bears, it's best to not give money to the homeless.
"We don't want people to faciliate their panhandling," he said, adding that soliciting is legal in certain areas, as long as traffic is not impeded.
"As soon as people stop and give them money, that becomes an issue," he said, "or if they're going to walk out in the middle of traffic."
