Santa Rosa County District 2 Commissioner Kerry Smith likes to say that if he found a cure for cancer, his critics would blame him for the number of lab rats that died in development.
As seems par for the course for sitting Santa Rosa County commissioners, he has no shortage of critics. This election cycle, there is also no shortage of opponents looking to prevent him from serving what he flatly states will be a final four-year term in office.
Smith’s tendency to speak his mind has turned some of even his former political supporters against him. They say he has failed to live up to the campaign promises he made while running for office the first time. He says people have gotten mad because he doesn’t do what they tell him to do.
Jeff Ates, Reni “Renee” Johnmeyer, Erin Nisewonger, Jeff Snow and RC Pittman have all entered the race as Republicans. Write-in candidate John Williams also joined the fray, with his presence serving to prevent Democrats and independents from being allowed to cast ballots in the Aug. 18 primary. Williams has raised no money and has not responded to candidate inquiries.
Early voting opened over the weekend of Aug. 7.
Ates, who ran against Smith four years ago, said he decided to run again at the urging of supporters because he has not seen the condition of the county improve.
“We’ve got the same problems we had four years ago,” he said.
Erin Nisewonger has positioned herself as a fresh face running against career politicians and as a people’s candidate for residents who “need their voices heard and not bounced off the brick wall that is the Board of County Commissioners.”
She calls for slowing down development and abiding by a responsible development plan, fixing county infrastructure and boosting the economy. She said she wants to see the beauty and uniqueness of Santa Rosa County preserved and contends she is the only candidate in the field who has stood toe to toe with area developers and told them, “I’m not going to vote in everything you want.”
Nisewonger added she was further motivated to run because she doesn’t like the way Smith deals with the public.
“I don’t like how he talks to the public, how he looks down on the public. He should hold himself to a higher standard,” she said. “The lack of trust he has created needs to be restored.”
RC Pittman also rails against “unchecked overbuilding of housing projects.” He wants to see all local option sales tax funds raised by the county dedicated strictly to infrastructure projects.
Jeff Snow is leaning heavily in his campaign for the District 2 seat on his eight years’ experience as a Milton City Councilman. He states that with his leadership, the city was able to boost reserve funds from $8 million to $43 million, obtain millions in grants for infrastructure projects and improve Milton’s overall fiscal health.
He said when he left municipal office after being beaten in the 2024 Milton City Council race, he didn’t want to have anything else to do with politics.
“God gave me a different path,” he said of his decision to pursue the District 2 seat.
He said he’s running on his experience and wants to work with others the way he did in Milton to achieve great results.
Pittman said he is running for office “to restore the balance of power back to the citizens of Santa Rosa county through transparency, integrity and honesty.”
Johnmeyer, who did not return a phone call for this article or complete a candidate Q&A, touts in campaign literature her work as vice chair of the county’s Republican Liberty Caucus and her “work alongside fellow conservatives to advance the principles of limited government, individual liberty, and constitutional accountability.”
Development, roads and infrastructure: What’s to be done in East Milton?
While Smith comes under fire for what his opponents see as unbridled growth and a failure to provide the road and stormwater infrastructure to handle it, he contends that in his four years in office, the Santa Rosa County Commission has reined in what before his time had been a free-for-all for subdivision developers.
“There’s not one house being built right now that has been approved by a board I’ve been on as far as rezoning,” Smith said. “There’s only been one large-scale development.”
Many of those who have heard Smith make that comment or something similar at candidate forums dispute it and call it a lie, with one supporter of a Smith opponent going so far as to provide dates since 2022 that plat approvals were approved for a handful of subdivisions.
But as Smith and county officials point out, plat approvals do not equate to actual construction. Due to state legislation, plat approvals no longer pass through county commissions in Florida.
Only one of the new subdivisions the Smith opponent pointed to, a small-scale development called Oakland Place, was rezoned after 2022, county records show.
Smith said the one large-scale development approved by the commission while he has been on the board is Baxley Place off Baxley Road in East Milton. Zoning for the proposed 607-home subdivision was approved after applicants offered to install a self-contained sewage system to control waste created without utilizing septic tanks. Smith said builders, including D.R. Horton, have passed on the plans because the self-contained “package plant” would not be economically feasible.
Smith said the current commission’s insistence that developers find ways other than septic to deal with waste in the subdivisions they conceptualize has provided the board a means to control unhinged development.
Smith has also helped spearhead a county plan to build a wastewater treatment plant in East Milton to end years of reliance on the city of Milton to construct one of its own. Many of the grants that Snow boasts of helping the city obtain, $36.5 million worth, were lost or set aside because of delays in implementing them. That was due, in large part, to political infighting during his council tenure.
The East Milton wastewater plant will be up and running long before the Milton city plant and. once online, will able to handle the wastewater treatment needs of East Milton homes and the several State Road 87 distribution facilities constructed or to be constructed in county industrial parks adjacent to Interstate 10.
Cries continue that Smith has sold out to developers.
In addressing that allegation, he points to his leading the charge to impose impact fees “so growth helps pay for growth.” The fees of about $1,600 per single-family home were projected to raise $26 million over 10 years.
There was some pushback when commissioners discussed the impact fees, but it is Smith’s contention that while developers aren’t working very hard to keep him in office, they’re not throwing big money at his opponents either.
“The HBA (Home Builders Association of West Florida) is not a big fan, but they still like me best over the rest of this gang (of opponents),” he said. “They know I understand.”
Smith has raised $45,190 to lead the five-member Republican field in candidate contributions, and roughly $7,500 of that could be attributed to development interests. Two years ago, District 1 candidate Sam Parker raised more than $7,500 in one night of fundraising with local homebuilders and took in over 100 direct donations from development interests.
A second candidate in 2024, District 3 incumbent James Calkins, received 50 direct development interest donations, and a PAC run by his grandmother pulled in another $55,000 in developer donations for his campaign.
Both Calkins and Parker lost their races.
Property tax cuts an issue for all candidates
District 2 candidates who responded to a recent Pensacola News Journal campaign questionnaire were leery of what could happen if Amendment 3, a proposal to drastically reduce county property taxes, were to pass. Their caution was due to the fact that it would cut Santa Rosa County tax revenues by $22 million in the first year of steep increases in homestead exemptions and by $36 million the following year.
Snow said he ultimately favors passage.
“We need to and should have already been planning for this legislation passing,” he said. If elected, “I would push immediately for stop spending on all projects or items that are not critical until we know the fallout of the election results.”
“No matter how the referendum vote goes, I will push to strengthen the county’s ability to find funding that is most important, that serves our residents’ needs,” Snow said.
Ates told voters in responding to the News Journal questionnaire that “as a homeowner I am for” Amendment 3. He added a statement that the county “is proposing to double our current property taxes.”
Both Brad Baker, the county administrator, and Sabrina White, its financial director and assistant county administrator, said no discussion has been had about doubling the county’s property taxes, even after significant reductions due to increased homestead exemptions.
“This year, even if we’re not doing a rollback rate, we have to have four county commissioners vote to approve that,” White said. “The rules have been changed this year, so the state is making it more cumbersome to increase the millage.”
The county’s credit rating is very good, White said, but borrowing to pay for hundreds of millions of dollars in road and stormwater improvement projects already in the pipeline could be tough.
“The question will be how to do it without the revenue to pay back a loan,” White said.
Smith said he views the Amendment 3 issue “as another example of why experienced local leadership matters.”
In anticipation of the possible cuts, Santa Rosa’s County Commission has directed department heads to curtail spending where they can this year and, in putting together their fiscal year 2027 budgets, to plan for 10% to 20% reductions to their operating costs.
Smith said if the referendum passes, the county needs to clearly identify which services and projects are essential, which are optional, and where spending can be reduced or delayed without compromising public safety, roads, drainage and emergency response.
He has called for future conversations with the public about trade-offs, and looking to “more closely tie growth to its impacts.”
U.S. Highway 90 and neighborhood flooding
The candidates running against Smith point to deteriorating roads, failing stormwater and drainage systems and gridlock, primarily on the county’s major thoroughfares.
“I plan on ensuring that money is spent keeping our residents’ homes from being flooded during storms, updating and cleaning out our drainage systems properly,” Nisewonger said. “We need to fix U.S. 90 and U.S. 98, our drainage systems, and update the Navarre Bridge.”
Smith has prioritized roads, particularly those in his district, during his four years on the commission. He, alongside Milton Mayor Heather Lindsay, maneuvered to get the widening of U.S. Highway 90 through downtown Milton moved from priority No. 7 to No. 4 on the Florida-Alabama Transportation Planning Organization priority list.
While the move to No. 4 doesn’t ensure immediate funding, it is important. It could ultimately convince the Florida Department of Transportation that Santa Rosa is serious about making the long-considered project a reality.
“It’s a good first step,” FDOT spokesman Ian Satter said following the TPO move. “Now that this has been moved up, we’ll reevaluate the changing priorities as we’re reviewing our work program.”
Smith and the County Commission also let FDOT know that the county would be willing to donate land from the several parcels it owns along U.S. 90 to put “skin in the game” to help facilitate the widening.
The county has, in the last couple of years, also taken some serious steps toward addressing neighborhood flooding and stormwater system upkeep.
Since last year, the county has established a system wherein local residents can opt in to pay for a higher level of service around subdivision retention ponds.
Routine maintenance not only makes the ponds look better, but it allows the ponds to better do the job of reducing neighborhood flooding.
“It has been a widely successful program,” county Deputy Administrator Jared Lowe said.
Tom McLaughlin covers Santa Rosa County, environmental stories, development and investigative reporting.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Competitors line up to challenge Santa Rosa Commissioner Kerry Smith
Reporting by Tom McLaughlin, Pensacola News Journal / Pensacola News Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Tom McLaughlin, Pensacola News Journal | USA TODAY Network
