From beach restoration and traffic issues to regulating rental homes and pursuing fee simple title for property owners, Pensacola Beach Advocates President Rhonda Dorfman would like to see many issues addressed that impact people who live and work on Santa Rosa Island.
However, she believes the governing bodies that oversee Pensacola Beach, like Escambia County and the Santa Rosa Island Authority, often neglect beach residents and don’t prioritize what’s best for the beach.
With the help of PBA, the community organization that represents residents, leaseholders and business owners on Pensacola, Dorfman said they are beginning the process of exploring incorporating Pensacola Beach and becoming a self-governing body like a city.
Dorfman has lived on the beach for more than 20 years. She says she and other residents feel more could be done to boost business at the beach, improve quality of life for residents, and prioritize spending decisions that accomplish both.
Why some say representation for Pensacola Beach isn’t working
As examples, she points to the lack of beautification at the core of Pensacola Beach that both residents and beach businesses have requested, repairs to bike paths, more money for beach renourishment, zoning problems like a lack of regulation of rental homes that house more than 40 people at a time in residential neighborhoods, and pursuing fee simple title so property owners have greater rights for the use and possession of their land.
She also questions how the SRIA prioritizes spending the residents’ “$5 million worth of lease fees,” like using $250,000 of it on the Blue Angels Beach Air Show.
Dorfman believes the money for the show should come out of the Tourist Development Council’s budget and have the Pensacola Beach Chamber of Commerce and Visit Pensacola handle it “because if anything puts heads in beds, it’s the Blue Angels Beach Air Show.”
However, Dorfman said when residents take their concerns and questions to the SRIA board they get no answers.
Dorfman said PBA is in the process of gauging residents’ response to the idea and educating them about the process.
She said they’re also working with Congressman Jimmy Petronis to get fee simple title.
“In SRIA legislatively, they could be doing so much more and that’s what I wanted them to do, is to flex their muscles, utilize their ability to govern, to lead, but they’re not doing it,” Dorfman said. “The bottom line is we’re not seeing anything that SRIA is doing, so we want to look again at incorporation. We just think the time has come where we think SRIA needs to either put up or shut up.”
Learning what it would take to incorporate Pensacola Beach
PBA member and CPA Arthur Leary is digging into the paperwork and information that was generated from the last time folks on Pensacola Beach considered incorporation in 1998, along with gathering updated data.
Leary says he has experience with similar studies and offered to help research the issue and help prepare for the organization’s annual meeting in November when members will be discussing the issue in earnest.
The annual meeting is scheduled for Nov. 5 at 5:30 p.m. at The Beach Church, 920 Panferio Drive. The guest speaker is Chris Holley II, with the Florida League of Cities, who will be presenting “The Path to Incorporation.”
Dorfman said the presentations will focus on what residents can expect from incorporation, what would be needed to make it happen, and how much it would cost residents to do it, among other questions.
“We just want a better response from our government,” Dorfman said. “County government is not city government. They’re two different types of government. They have a limited scope. I find it interesting that Perdido wanted to incorporate, Navarre wanted to incorporate, and we would like to incorporate. Why? What is the commonality? Well, for Perdido and Pensacola Beach, it’s Escambia County’s lack of proactive management out here or lack of giving back and doing for the residents out here.”
Efforts to incorporate Navarre Beach and Perdido Key were not successful, but Dorfman is not discouraged.
She said Escambia County Commissioner Ashlee Hofberger, who represents Pensacola Beach, will attend the annual meeting to answer questions as well as other public officials and county employees.
Hofberger said she is still gathering information about the proposal and does not have a comment as of now, but Dorfman said Hofberger has supported their efforts to explore the possibility.
SRIA Executive Director Mike Burns also declined to comment.
Leary says he and his wife are planning to move to Pensacola Beach, and like Dorfman, he said residents he has spoken to are open to the idea depending on the cost.
He is gathering tax comparisons and cost information to help residents make an informed decision and address some basic questions.
“What kind of tax revenues would there be for a possible future city of Pensacola Beach? What could they generate in terms of today’s dollars?” Leary said of his study. “And then what would the cost be to the people that live there and own property there? What would the cost be to them versus what they’re paying now?”
Leary said he’ll also be looking into what kind of revenue an incorporated Pensacola Beach community could get versus how it’s working now with the Santa Rosa Island Authority and Escambia County.
Dorfman said the process to incorporate would take at least two years because the proposal would need to be approved by 50% plus one of registered voters on Pensacola Beach.
The next election isn’t until 2026 if the measure is even on the ballot by then.
You can learn more about PBA’s annual meeting on its website.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Should Pensacola Beach be its own city? Why some are talking about it.
Reporting by Mollye Barrows, Pensacola News Journal / Pensacola News Journal
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