- May 10, 2024
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The Flagler County Commission at its regular meeting Oct. 5 approved an agreement with the Flagler Beach City Commission in the city's legal challenge over the expansion of Sea Ray's parking lot.
Flagler County Administrator Craig Coffey called the agreement — which requires Flagler County to apply its industrial performance standards to Sea Ray, and requires Sea Ray to provide the city and the county with any applications for increased emissions capacity — "imperfect," but better than continuing litigation.
"From a business standpoint, we could go to trial, and it would be another $20,000 to our taxpayers on our end, $20,000 on their end," he said. The commission approved that agreement unanimously.
Approving its legislative priorities for the year, the commission approved requests to the state for $2.5 million in funding for the Malacompra Basin Water Quality Enhancement Program and the $2 million for the Agricultural Museum, and approved policy priorities such as opposing fracking and natural gas exploration in Florida, maintaining the current county-wide EMS regulatory system and revising the county-state cost-sharing agreement for juvenile detention.
The commission also approved $2,500 in Tourist Development Council funding for Cycle Flagler, a 40-mile bicycling event to be held April 30-May 1 along a route from Flagler Beach to Cody's Corner in Bunnell, over the objections of Commissioner Charlie Ericksen, an avid cyclist who warned that part of the route, which passes along State Route 11, is dangerous.
"This is one dangerous road, in spite of bike lanes, to put any group of people on for a 25-mile scenic route," Ericksen said, noting that there have been fatal car crashes in the area in the past year and a half. "I just don’t want to see another death by a bicyclist in Flagler County."
Commissioner Nate McLAughlin, who is on the Tourist Development Council, said the cyclists would be in a large group accompaied by security and safety personnel.
"It will be a well guarded event," McLaughlin said.
"I hear that; it doesn’t change my mind," Ericksen replied. "This is a dangerous road to drive in a car." The motion to approve the funding passed 4-1, with Ericksen dissenting.
