Reagan said, Hey, guys, but guess what?

We've got a chance.

He was my fraternity circle of about 200 people.

Hospice communities of healthy environments.

Trust me, she lived in Traficant for four years.

I really felt for a lot of reasons I felt, but I didn't have the guts to stand.

coming up.

We'll look back on some of the news stories, newsmakers and personalities that made 2023 an interesting year.

We'll also glance ahead and prognosticate a little bit on what 2024 may bring.

Our guests are journalists and media personalities who cover and report on the pulse of Northwest Florida.

Rick Allison is a print journalist and a broadcaster he owns and publishes and weekly and host Real News with Rick Allison and CNN Madison.

Weekday mornings on WCCO, a10 4.9 FM and 1370 AM.

Lisa Alison Savage is a long time journalist and is currently the executive editor of the Pensacola News Journal and penned JD.com.

Andrew McKay is an award winning longtime broadcaster.

He is the host of Pensacola Morning News on Newsradio 92.3 FM and AM 1620.

Thank you all for joining us.

Good to be here.

Great to be here.

Always look forward to this every year at the end of the year.

This time around, we're on a brand new set.

Yeah.

Nice digs.

Yeah, a little different.

It's good for us radio and newspaper people to get out in front of a camera to prove that we're really here.

That's right.

That's right.

Let me begin.

Rick, I'll begin with you.

What, in your judgment, what was kind of the biggest, most influential story locally of 2023?

Yeah, I was been thinking about that because you tend to focus on just the last couple of weeks.

But looking at the year as a whole, I think the one that we're going to be talking about in years to come is American magic and the Port of Pensacola.

I think that if everything goes like it is and the governor, we've got state funding, I think that could really change Pensacola.

And I think the secondary story to that is just the development of D.C. as the strong mayor has been.

You get one, Rick.

Come on, now.

You stole mine.

That was my one.

You let me start.

Okay, Lisa, it's yours.

And I was going to say just that, just watching, you know, Mayor Reeves in his first year and everything that has happened so far, I mean, he hit the ground running, tackling things that, you know, needed to be fixed or just, you know, we hadn't really looked at in a while.

He brought in all of that grant funding already for something like $72 million.

It's it's just really, you know, tells you forecast what's going to happen in the next several years under his administration.

Yeah, I agree.

I mean, obviously his growth as a politician with his background has been, you know, very impressive American magic.

You know, all the things that go around that I would say Baptist Hospital was a huge story this year, not the kind of thing that's going to make probably ongoing news coverage.

Exactly.

But in terms of impact on our city and also the ongoing issue of what we do with the old property, who pays for it, what happens there.

That's a pretty big story as well.

Yeah, you know, I think it really does, you know, building it where it was, where the Baptist Hospital was built, it really kind of changes the lay of the land, doesn't it?

I mean, it starts to just to kind of bring things together.

I mean, you only almost kind of think about it is like a midtown developing.

If you go to, you know, larger cities, you know, you have your downtown midtown and that kind of thing.

I mean, it's and you're going to see a lot of development around that.

And I think you already are.

So, yeah, I think that's going to be a big a big play.

Yeah, I think it will be an ongoing story.

I mean, how often once in a lifetime gift that a community might have with that type of land and just the work that they brought in.

I think you were all at the mayor's meetings he had where he brought in people.

Talk about just the financial aspects of that and then what's possible.

He brought in an expert, I believe, from New Orleans right.

Who who talked about the affordable housing they'd done there.

You can you can build a second downtown or, you know, a second neighborhood with that much land.

It could be an incredible story.

I think there are two other layers to it.

One is, is is that neighborhood, West Marina, where that hospital had been there over 60 years, Baptist had no plans to demolish the old hospital, no money for it, despite promises to everyone, even on televised council meetings, that they were going to provide medical services there.

They're not you know, I think DC is taking it, you know, doing its best.

It's a heavy lift to get the money from the state.

I think the other issue is, is, you know, Baptist is is going on and taking on a huge debt service and how can is there enough revenue in town?

Where's their revenue stream going to come from?

Is it going to hurt the other hospitals?

Do we we put other hospitals at risk.

The facilities, gorgeous.

It's beautiful, but I think there's some other layers to it.

Two thirds of $1,000,000,000.

Right.

Right.

Does this fall out of the sky?

Right.

That's talking to Répondre.

He just had the day about this.

And, you know, he's confident that as long as the city is willing to take ownership, that he can get the money between this year and next year to, you know, make that possible.

So it's nice that we have such effective legislators in Tallahassee, you know, represented.

SALZMAN Representative Drori, obviously in his last term, Senator Braxton able to pull some of this stuff together, which has shown over the years to be, you know, pretty nice.

We haven't always had that from the panhandle, but we do have it right now.

At least we'll have a Doug Broxton.

We have one more year of his Senate.

But, you know, appropriations, which is one of the most powerful positions in the Senate and then introduce on the infrastructure tourism area.

So both those working together can be sure they're both in the room where it happens with the budgets finalized.

So that gives us an advantage.

And then even though and even though Doug's leaving, you know, and Right is going to be one of the lieutenants for the next speaker of the House in the next term.

So as long as he wins reelection, obviously.

Right.

So, you know, we've got more to come in terms of the ability to get get things accomplished.

You know, you were talking about as far as Baptist pulling away maybe from some other hospitals and whatnot.

What do you think the possibilities are?

It seems to me that it becomes a whole lot more attractive for out of town people to come to our medical facility, whether it be, you know, coming over from, say, Walton County or even maybe Baldwin County in south Alabama.

Do you think there's going to be some attraction?

I think that location helps because being on the interstate will help that.

You know, and I think that's already happening.

You're seeing the specialized care that they have sacred with its children's hospital.

I'm on the Ronald McDonald House board, so I see the stats that come in and gosh, it's something like 90%.

It comes from neighboring counties.

Very little people staying there are from Escambia and Santa Rosa County themselves.

And that facility will expand.

You know, they've got other plans for more to come in the future.

Sure.

I think it's kind of interesting what we're doing as far as medicine is concerned in this area.

And I know the University of West Florida is being pretty robust with some of their programs as far as nursing and things of that nature of concern.

So that's that's kind of exciting.

And what we can we can build out here, I think, from from that perspective.

But let's go back to the Old Baptist.

We were talking about just a couple of moments ago and what will end up happening to that.

What what what do you visualize?

What do you what do you think ultimately over the next if we were to look ahead ten years, how does all that start to weave in the downtown and any any thoughts on that?

Well, we we seem to be pretty good at coming up with neat ideas for things to do.

Not so good.

I was at manifesting the reality of it, whether it's Community Maritime Park or the Tech Park or LFA, which is seems to be getting closer to maybe being something, but still is.

There's nothing on that field.

Right.

And so for Old Baptist, I mean, we can dream about the New Orleans scenario development, which is amazing.

I mean, it really is the one that you guys brought there that he brought the speaker in to talk about this mixed income, you know, townhomes out facing in blocks that have center parks and parking.

I mean, and crime is down like 90% in that area of New Orleans.

So it's a really cool idea.

Can Pensacola get off the dime and really find somebody who's able to make that happen here?

It's great to see it work somewhere else.

Will it happen here?

Well, I think you've got a different city council now than.

Oh, absolutely.

Past.

I mean, they're definitely in line with the strong mayor.

They seem to be working together on things that could change going down the road.

But when you have two entities working together, there's a lot more you can get accomplished.

Well, but you do make a good point, ensuring that that community, the black community, has had their their rooms full of the studies that have been done to help that community.

And they've participated.

They they participated when Baptist did their private survey of what people wanted in that neighborhood, 85% wanted medical services there, which art housing was was like three or four on the list.

The you know, we've worn out without execution.

We're wearing out our community.

And what I what I do like I think having the strong mayor in this position and a mayor like DC that is pretty much doesn't get concerned about criticism as much.

He does his homework.

He can stand by what he does because he's got the facts to prove it.

I think whatever he launches, I think will be with it won't be just pipe dreams.

I think he'll have a way to work.

So but finding the funding in the air will be a challenge.

But but I'm optimist that that we've got the system in place the council and it's also in Commissioner Lumen Mays District District three.

So I think you'll see him get involved too.

So I think it's a positive.

Nobody is going to complain that DC isn't trying to do enough, right?

No, buddy, you know, he's trying to tackle everything there is that he can find to do.

You know, we'll see whether how much of it he can pull off.

But so far, I mean, a lot, frankly, on the great part of the city owning that land, assuming that that goes through, is that they can control it.

Because, you know, in the legislature this year, there were some changes.

So you can't stop a developer from building affordable housing even if it doesn't fit in with your neighborhood at all.

But the city will own it so therefore they can control.

And this the timing was was perfect on that.

And that's why they really need to get that over the finish line.

And that's been the big hiccup with our elevators commissioners who were ready to do something all of a sudden realize, oh, with this change in the affordable housing bill that any anything basically can be turned into housing at any moment.

We can't sell it.

We have to hold on to it because otherwise we can't control it.

And you can say job creation, but it's just going to be tract housing as soon as we sell it.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

That developer can do what they want.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, you mentioned kind of about DC not being afraid to kind of take a stand and stand up and, you know, I think about, you know, kind of what ended up happening with the curbside recycling, right?

You know, And that was that was a tough decision, you know, that I think he had to make.

What are your thoughts on that?

Well, he got tremendous pushback against it because people had fought so hard for curbside recycling.

I mean, people stood up for it, got easy way to do it.

And it's only been here about ten years.

But but the reality is, is like DC said, the mayor said it's it's hopeful recycling that everything that was going in that key and wasn't going to be recycling gold and a large amount of it you know half the loads were contaminated.

So there was it wasn't a big issue on one side because prior administrations could say just ignore it because there wasn't any price increase.

But when the price increase came in that, you know, and I don't think DC would have ignored it anyway, but, but it's been I think that the reality is it wasn't working.

Yeah, the recycling in town has been such a weird story, right?

Like Easy Way spends all this money to build the materials recycling facility.

Great shiny thing has a fire shuts down.

For this reason, embezzlement by a former employee.

I mean all that.

And then the market craters.

And then on top of that, we find out that people in this game in Santa Rosa just aren't that good at recycling.

So we send contaminated loads up all the time.

And in the city, they're sending recycling.

You know, we find out a month later it's, you know, under Mayor Hayward, I remember even, you know, it's go into the dump instead because there was a problem at this facility that they had an outside service.

Yeah, anything.

And it all got rained out and it's you know, it's for people who recycle, it's such a visceral issue because we all feel like I'm doing I'm doing my part, you know, I'm contributing to the public good.

I'm, I don't know that people really say I'm saving the planet, but there's something about doing it that when you get used to it, you feel like it's an expression of civic goodness or something.

And then when you suddenly get told, we're just not recycling anymore, we're like, But I'm trying to be good, you know, and then I can't be good anymore.

And you can see, but you can be there's you can, but it's hard right this way.

It you should be able to drive to a recycling center.

I mean, I would love to have curbside recycling.

It would be incredible.

But to your point, Rick, he he did his homework again when he announced that he had, you know, percentages.

It wasn't unclear of what's being recycled, what's not, and how much it's costing us.

And you couldn't you can't argue with that.

Yeah, I think the two things that probably cut him the most flack and just in talking to him, one was that the other one was having to shut down Bay Bluffs.

And so that that was, that was very controversial with people love those bluffs.

And again, it was it was unsafe and he could have tried to patch it in maybe, you know, in a piece people.

But, you know, it was a dangerous situation.

And he took the heat for that, too.

I think to me, that's been the most impressive thing about the last year with him as mayor is that he's really like a business owner would looking at all the assets, looking at all the costs, really doing an honest assessment of what's our risk associated with this and what's it going to take to maintain these things Because everybody loves to ribbon cut new facility.

Nobody loves to budget for the cost of that facility every year and the replacement cost for when that facility, whatever it is, goes bad.

And I you know, it's a rough position to be in to have to, you know, sell off a gym may be demolished, a gym maybe, you know, tear down babyliss, maybe you know what's going to happen.

But he's doing it, I think, in the way that a good adult business owner would do.

And so that's been impressive.

And you you hear him say with every new project, Yeah, what's the maintenance plan?

You know, we're not going to build it if we can't maintain it.

And that hasn't been something that every decision should.

We had done.

I remember they took over the Veterans Park Memorial and it was okay, but what's our plan if we're going to do this?

Do we have it in our budget and in our staffing time?

We will take care of it.

And I think the other piece, too, is, is that he is you know, he does his homework, but as a journalist and, you know, the tendency that I have having and I think some of us have I know I do, but I can't speak for the others.

Is that when stuff that you hear something about this, you always try to figure out who's going to make money off.

Yeah.

And and there's no thread of that in the decisions that I've been seeing with this is making.

But that and that was some of the bubble that was out there with Facebook was, well, the Bayfront is going to be closed because they're going to put condo right.

Somebody somebody somebody is buying this.

But you know Pensacola loves the crazy respiratorio speculation, right?

Yeah, we really do.

But there's a history of having deals there is behind it and we're not saying that.

Yeah, that's good that feels good.

I agree with you wholeheartedly, because you're right.

The our world has changed right over.

And we were talking about this prior to going on the air northwest Florida, Pensacola.

It's a different world than it was even ten years ago.

Right.

You know, with the attitude and the people that are involved and just the amazing amount of building and development that is going on.

And in a again, I agree with you, you know, I mean, the Deeks credit on the on the on the recycling thing, if I'm not mistaken, he brought in a professor from the University of West Florida to crunch the numbers.

Numbers.

Right.

It wasn't just some sort of political decision.

Right.

Or whatnot.

So, yeah, I agree.

Talk about downtown Pensacola.

Wow.

I mean, talk about the growth that's going on there and then the talk of, you know, hotels being built and, you know, possibly new world branding going away, that being a big hotel, Where does that what does that look like in the next few years?

It seems like they can't build hotels fast, right?

I mean, I didn't realize so many people were.

I know.

And meanwhile, we've got this massive hotel sitting there vacant and speculation surrounding what's going to happen with the Grand Hotel.

And, you know, I've heard all kinds of people offer ideas, but it's just been sitting there in disuse.

Right?

For what?

Since Sally?

Correct.

I mean, I think so.

I think you're right.

It's amazing.

I think in the mayor's state of the city, he talked about the increase in downtown.

People just visiting downtown was just incredibly much higher in the last year than it's been.

And he didn't take credit for that.

He said, you know, that is that is a lot of years of work that went into that.

But one of the biggest issues is going to be with so many of us wanting to go down there, the parking situation, you know, has to be has to be fixed.

And that was the other controversial thing he wasn't afraid to bring up.

And that that's going to be one of the biggest stories, I think, of 2020 for the new app comes out January one, Right?

It's like cameras barking and red light cameras.

Yes, that's going to be yes, although it's hard to argue, oh, I got my camera.

What are you, the gray?

You know, I want to be able to run that.

Please give us more, Rex.

But the parking one is going to be a fight.

For sure.

It will be.

Well, the private developers, you know, the red, red parking spots, you know, the robber barons that have parking lots, you know, the you know that they're going to.

You mean the capitalists?

Yeah, that's what you know, I'm with you.

I don't mean to hurt your feelings, but I know.

But you.

But I think, you know, the problem is it's been the confusion.

Yeah.

And hopefully the new app, which is the most popular, one of the most popular in the country and definitely in the Florida will make a big difference part Mobile.

And then I think the next move is what can we do with these other parking spots because that some of that money goes to the property owner, but the majority of it goes to New Orleans.

Any fines go to New Orleans.

So they're very aggressive on fines.

And that's the biggest grumble that that, you know, you hear from people is, you know, D.C. you say the same.

He gets letters all the time or text about it.

He has to say, well, what color is it right now?

And it's not is not ours.

So and long, long term.

I mean, I really think DC he's got a good strategy here.

He hired a guy who used to work at the Red Light Company.

Right.

Who is going to come in and help you know, renovate what they're doing.

And I think his basic strategy is let's get our house in order, let's get an app people can understand.

Let's try to cut down on the problems on the blue.

Lots.

But then let's find a way to turn the red light to blue.

Right?

Let's get all the red lights in the city in inventory and operating under the app.

And I think the business owners know how bad it is for the image of Pensacola to get booted when you go downtown.

They'd be favorable for it.

They don't need to necessarily even make as much money as they were making.

But if it's good for the city, there's a lot of goodwill attached to that.

And I think if you can get some of them converted, you can probably get a lot more of them, which is probably what the what is the company, the red light premium.

That's why they've been fighting so hard, you know.

And would they take a lawsuit against them for hire in the guy?

Right.

I mean, it's crazy.

So they know that they're being threatened in their revenue stream by this by this decision.

But it's got a lot of potential.

And the other piece is what are we going to do about the two hour lot spaces downtown?

Those will probably eventually go away.

And it's it you know, people in council will do that.

Yeah, I know.

I know.

DC wants it.

You think council will go along?

I don't know.

You know, they they're more sensitive to public pressure.

I don't know.

There's some pushback from it.

You know, some of the business owners like having those spaces in front of their their retail spot.

Study after study shows the shorter the time, the more you're going to flip it.

You're going to get more people in your retail, you're going to get more people in your restaurant.

I think the arguments there, you know, rarely do you have it.

I mean, pay parking is a part of our life now.

And the downtown is booming.

Yes, it is.

And it's something you going to deal with in any large city.

Right?

Exactly.

I mean, it's just I hate it.

The facts.

I am adamantly against the pay for parking.

I love the free parking.

I don't mind walking the move to make the beach paid.

I will fight against that every single moment.

And so D.C. and I have had the biggest arguments about this one issue because I believe in the free parking.

I think a lot of people hate going downtown because they don't deal with the app or the kiosk or the new app or the new kiosk.

And I can't.

And they're older.

They don't want to deal with it.

So that's that's that's the area of pushback downtown is having a problem getting people to come down.

No, no, no.

But you.

That's right.

They're pulling enough people.

But are they pulling everybody or are they pulling only a certain demographic that's able to afford it and doesn't mind?

Are the other folks being left behind or being marginalized by that?

And I think there is a fair bit of that, too.

Just a challenge a little bit, because you say able to afford it.

It is $0.50.

Oh, I know.

But he wants to raise it to a dollar and he wants to push it past midnight or to midnight.

But if you're going to eat at one of our very, no doubt basements downtown or shop in any of our wonderful retailers, I suspect that a dollar isn't going to stop you if you're going to.

You know, Angelina is you're going to fish.

And I was no problem.

But what if you're just trying to go down to Plaza Luna?

What if you're coming downtown for a parade?

What if you're coming downtown for any number of other things where you're not spending money going to church?

You know, I mean, granted on Sunday.

But the point is that other people go downtown besides the ones who can afford it.

And that's my concern for those folks.

Well, you know, I think the bigger issue, quite frankly, just anecdotally speaking from folks I told her, I think is the older generation who are not in necessarily is tech savvy.

And I think it's frustrating and I think it's aggravating to them.

You know, some of the machines don't always work.

Exactly.

And you can't get it to register.

You know, and I think that's probably, quite frankly, a bigger challenge.

I don't know if I go with my daughter.

She's technologically savvy.

It's all done.

You know, go with somebody else older in the family.

It's you know, they're complaining about it.

I get that, you know, And I'm probably somewhere in between it.

You know, I think I saw something the other day on Facebook.

Somebody posted one of the old, you know, think she stuck a quarter in It's her.

Give me one of these back.

So let's move on and talk about the airport.

I mean, what amazing amount of growth going on there?

I mean, it's you know, I fly out of town a fair amount.

And, you know, one of my biggest concerns, I'm going to be in find a place to park, Right?

No problem.

No, I mean, I mean, it's it's really and they're expanding again.

You know, they keep their network.

They've got a grass field where Exchange Park used to be, right where the baseball fields used to be.

You know, it's that's a huge challenge.

We've outgrown the plan.

Like, you know, we're I think a decade or a decade and about a decade ahead of where we thought we would be.

And so it's all they're working to get the funding to build another gate Gateway is important.

Parking's a huge issue.

It's a nice problem to have.

I mean, because we got people wanting to come here and we've got enough flights for people to get just about anywhere they want to go.

Yeah, yeah, I know.

I know a lot of cities in America that would love to have the problem of an undersized airport and clogged streets because of traffic, of too much construction and having to build new schools.

Right.

These are these are big problems, but these are the problems plenty.

And so they're the right kind of problem to have.

The question is, can we adapt to the future before it hits us in the face more effectively, which we have not done a great job of that recently.

The airport's an example, but obviously, you know, roads and congestion is another example, schools and other examples.

So, oh, the airport situation, it just amazes me.

I mean, I recently came back from somewhere and I think, you know, just on Tuesday night or something like that, a late flight in, you know, out of Atlanta and the planes packed.

Right.

All right.

Yeah.

11:00 flight, you know, and I can recall, it used to be I would rarely ever get on a plane and not recognize somebody that I knew now.

Right.

Are you all experiencing the same.

Well, you used to be able to get off the plane and you'd walk through the terminal and just be dark and everything's boarded up and it's, you know, your few people on your flight and now, like, it's it's really no different than these other airports that you're going through.

It is spectacular change.

I saw on one of the Facebook groups yesterday someone asking, listen, I have to leave for some flight.

Do I really need to get there 2 hours early for this small little airport and people just unloaded?

Yes.

Yes, you do now, Right.

You get to carry a bicycle with you to get to the airport.

What they said over the holidays, they sent out news press releases saying if you can find a way to get dropped off at the airport, please do that.

There won't there won't be enough parking.

I mean, they're trying to work on the PSC lot right in front of studios here is going to be one of their like extra slots and the employees are going to have to, you know, aren't going to be able to park conveniently.

I mean, these are that's the reality.

Yeah.

And the other factor that's going on with the airport is, of course, SD engineering.

You know, now we're maximizing that space where we've got two hangars right now that are doing maintenance, repair and overhaul of UPS flight.

I think they've got a contract.

I've heard rumors of a contract with United that if we build once they build on the other side, closer to 12th Avenue, those come in that they will be servicing those.

And, you know, Pinnacle State College is going to have an academy there.

You know, aviation, mechanics, you know, campus be part of their campus, have a building there.

So it's not only is our traffic going, but we've taken an asset that was solely based on commercial flying in that market and now created a whole nother market for ourselves that are which is probably the best use of the trial grants we could ever have seen for our area that Navy, federal.

Yeah, those moneys help them, too.

Well, if you know anything about the aviation business, those are going to be great careers for young people in Pensacola State, you know, putting those those programs together.

And that's a great way they can make it a very viable living, you know, and great job And it's been cool is is that that project started with Ashton when he was mayor.

Grover picked it up, had worked on getting it.

The extra funding had to easily work Yeah right away had to get I mean 25 million.

It was a huge amount of money.

He had to get right away when he got in office.

Yeah, but you're looking at the ability for us as a city that projects don't get dropped when the political leadership changes, which was one of the worrisome things about having elected mayor.

And so they've taken these projects and stayed with them through the process.

So that's, that's to see.

You know, you mentioned American magic are off the top.

Let's talk a little bit about how that could transform things around here.

What's your what are your thoughts on that?

Well, I mean, the the the best case scenario, right, is they they win the race.

And we actually get to have the race in Pensacola, which is hard to imagine.

But, you know, it's such a desirable field to play.

Right.

The the bay, the length, the calmness of it.

I mean, I'm not a sailor, but I you know, I understand what people tell me.

And the opportunity for peripheral careers, you know, to be here.

I mean, we've already got American magic in there.

People always the possibility you could have a second team.

But just attention on Pensacola and the value of that water space.

It's amazing.

Then again, I don't know personally, I always worry about Olympic villages.

You know, I always worry about big investments in a one time athletic event.

And if that's what we wind up dealing with, good problem.

But let's make sure that we're doing stuff that can be used again and again and again for other purposes after that.

Well, I mean, that's the benefit of having American magic here permanent, right?

So, yeah, we get the World Cup.

Wouldn't that be just amazing?

But they're here all the time and it just it does it raises the profile of Pensacola in an entirely new, different way, which could bring in new Newton, new residents, new businesses.

Just the tourism alone would be incredible.

And then the technology component, you know, of this is, you know, they're constantly tinkering and working on that on the boats that they've got the different size boats, they've got that technology and plugging that into item, See what they're doing on human performance in their second building.

Yeah, it is sucking building, which is almost oh, I mean we'll have it this spring but you look at it takes that port which we've always talked about diversity and now we're seeing some diversity here with somebody with staying power and with, you know, American magic, you know, is, you know, they're they're here.

They're going to be here.

They're here to help design the building and everything.

So it is exciting.

It's exciting.

I H.M.S., I mean, wow, what a phenomenal organization, right?

I mean, and I'm not sure that everybody in the community just really understands what they're doing.

I mean, I don't understand what they're doing.

It's so incredible what they're doing.

I think they're just one of those organizations that people they don't even realize they're here.

You're right that this type of magic is being happening in what's happening right here in downtown Pensacola.

I know they're doing a lot of outreach now.

They're bringing people into to see their buildings, but they're they're under the radar a lot.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's amazing because when we came forward, started it and everybody around 2000, 1999, it was associated with UW and the whole name human and machine cognition.

Remember, you know, personal computers weren't really around that much.

You know, it just everybody was thinking, what does this mean?

What it he was such a visioning free to see this and and to see where it is, you know, gosh, you know, it's just it really is amazing.

In the last 25 years, what's happened.

You know, they got a lot of attention with like the Atlas robot and the DARPA competition.

But then, I mean, they have people that are working on cold weather gloves so that you don't have to take your gloves off to, you know, disassemble your gun if you're in the military, because that's a problem.

They get frostbite because they have to take their gloves off.

So they're building, you know, just as an example, they're doing all these different projects from, you know, underwater drone work to obviously, you know, the robots, but everything from human performance to amazing technological stuff.

And as you say, it's you know, there's probably 50 different projects going on at the agency.

And which ones do we even hear about?

Very few.

And people don't even know, like you say, that the average person doesn't know, just like they don't know about Korea Station.

You know, they they don't know.

We're like this massive hub of cyber activity and training in Pensacola.

And to some degree, it's okay to not saying a lot about it, but people don't even realize they know about the Blue Angels.

But the other stuff that goes on through the military here is, I mean, unbelievable.

Yeah.

And the wealth of the families that they bring in, employees, the professors, they bring in the wealth of talent and knowledge they bring and what they add to the overall level of conversation in the communities.

Because agency for a long time is before silicon, they were leading a lot of the discussions.

You know, they weren't doing as consistently or as large were that y'all are doing it.

But but that was one of the first times like, you know, Richard Florida came to town and some of these ideas started with, you know, with they were doing that.

So it's having that you know, meeting these these scientists around town is amazing.

One of the other ones we haven't talked about yet, but it's a worth not forgetting.

Is the bases open again?

Yeah, that's a big I mean from the terrorist attack, the base was closed and you know, I've only lived here for nine years, but I felt like a part of me had been taken away and it was getting to where the community, my perception is it was getting to where the community was starting to resent it because we feel like we're entitled to it.

And, you know, with the museum and the Lighthouse and the Blue Angels practices and we love the military, but it was starting to grate a little bit that we couldn't go do this stuff that we were used to doing.

And now it's back open and it's like it was never closed.

Right.

But that's good for tourism activities, goodwill interactions between the military and the community, and that's it.

Thank God, with all of the different things that top ten we tried and failed and tried and failed to bring this solution and none of it worked.

And in the end, the answer is what can we not just do it the way we used to do it?

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

Okay, let's.

Let's do that.

Yeah, I agree.

I agree.

Let's move on to politics real quick.

When I write anything going on, I What governmental body do you want to focus on?

Well, what are we what do we first talk about?

Our congressman, who's had kind of an interesting year and essentially led the charge to get rid of the speaker of the House of Representatives.

If in January you don't succeed, try again in August.

Yeah, well, you know, the Republican majority is so tight.

Kevin McCarthy had to negotiate, negotiate, negotiate, gave away a lot of power where one congressman could call for a vote of confidence.

The and then you saw the Republican Party struggle for weeks to find a speaker, Matt, on one side seems to be in a very powerful position as far as the particularly in the House speaker position.

The other thing but we don't see out of Matt is we don't see bills coming back to help our area.

Yeah, in fact, the word I kit from from lobbyist sources in DC is that you really don't want Matt's name on a bill that there's such a vengeful attitude towards him that it's hard for anything with his name on it to get very far.

Now, on the other hand, he's a, he's a leader and run for governor in two more years.

That's the that's who they think that could be the Republican nominee.

So it's interesting you talk about Matt attaching his name to things.

I mean, there's concern at our military bases with the attacks that he's gone after the secretary of the Navy, that, you know, after his last blow up, we suddenly saw a huge appropriation disappear.

It just fell out of the budget.

So there is definitely some concern, I think, from the military ranks that his name attached to something has the potential to backfire.

Well, I mean, you know, look at the Hurlburt thing, right?

You know, we thought maybe we would be losing.

You know, we did lose some.

And that's not like right in the close area, but that certainly very much affects our people.

I mean, how many people never work at.

HURLBURT Right, Right.

That is home district, right?

And that's for him.

It is certainly.

And so is that, you know, Democrat led politics at the national level.

Is that blowback from the comments he's made and the challenges he's made?

I mean, you'd be foolish to think there's no consequence.

Right?

So and he's frustrating Republicans as much as he is.

Democrats know you have this big Ethics Committee investigation right now and it's going on that, you know, there's a lot of talk that this might be what those his enemies used, you know, after after Santos was expelled, Bill, without having any criminal, he had the charges, but he didn't have a conviction.

They couldn't do the same thing, theoretically, with Matt Gaetz, you you mentioned about the governor thing, but there was a survey that came out recently.

Think maybe Florida Atlantic or somebody did.

And statewide, Matt had a pretty negative.

I have never understood the idea.

I always assumed even Matt knows he can't win statewide.

That's what I always assume.

But then again, with the red wave under DeSantis last time around, maybe he thinks the map is different and it seems like everybody everybody's accepted this is the outcome.

Matt is going to be the nominee.

Matt's going to win the governorship or something close to that.

And I've always had the same thought.

He's so loved by the people who love him, so hated by the people who and who don't.

And outside of Northwest Florida, what's his reputation?

Yeah, I think it's mostly negative even among Republicans, you know, down state.

I could be wrong, but that's my perception.

Of course, with his dad going back into the Senate, you'll get Trump's endorsement, right?

For sure.

And, you know, typically congressmen have not done well running for statewide office.

We've seen that happen over and over again.

DeSantis was, you know, was the outlier.

And but he won because of Trump's endorsement.

And I'm not saying that, Matt, when I'm not saying he will even win the nomination.

But but there is a thread out there, a buzz is legitimate that he might seek it.

Yeah.

And he's consistently said he's not consistent.

Right.

Right.

But yeah, you know, you think stay you think as long term you think he stays in Congress or do you think that.

Well he's always favored term limits, right.

So at some point the advocacy for term limits has to come up and say, okay, I've always said this, I have, even though it's not enforced, I have to live by it.

Right.

So I'm not sure that he can stay and keep saying that he's the guy who favors term limits.

So what does he want to do outside of Congress?

He loves Congress has been on TV.

You know, does he love running a state if he thinks he can accomplish it?

I don't know.

Be interesting to see was Dad's back in politics, Right.

So, I mean, you were you were again, on the cutting edge of that story, Rick.

Yeah, I think it was We were hearing that rumor for a while that there was a poll done that we got wind of.

And so I called on and he said that he didn't have anything to do with the poll, but it came out very favorable.

Yes.

So so, you know, we put that out there a little bit.

And then I he called me back and said, you know, I've thought about it.

The family, you know, we're going I'm going to run.

And the interesting thing is, like with the behind the scene politics of it, because we had Frank White out there with Frank White, it raised a lot of money, right?

Oh, I think almost $1,000,000 or so.

He'd had the endorsement of Senate leadership.

He's a former state rep and had really kind of shooed off Michelle Salzman or Andreotti or anybody else who Grover Robinson or anyone else getting in that race.

And once word got Gates out, I think it was you know, he stepped aside and, you know, Don was a very, very good senator and it was very good for our area, did a lot for our area.

And so I think that that if you separate him from his son and you look at his his time in the Senate, it was very, very productive.

So I think him coming in and he might be strong enough to challenge some of the leadership in the Senate to where maybe we'll get an adult in the room on some of this stuff.

And that's my hope into Don's credit.

I mean, you know, the bridge opened up, you know, in full swing this year, you know, and he was responsible for he kept us from getting a toll bridge.

You know, he really was big and triumph in making sure that money stayed up here.

He and Lewis Beyer.

Yeah, he'll fight for that, you know, And he was you know, he was a you know Senate president, so he dug in.

He doesn't expect to go back at that level.

You won't do that right away.

But on the outside looking in, I think it's a real positive for the district.

Yeah, It's a weird story though, right?

I mean people didn't run for the Senate because they knew Frank was in.

Mm.

And then Frank was running and then Don said he's going to get into Frank drops out.

Yeah.

And you know who makes these decisions, who consults whom?

You know, Representative Solomon clearly has ambitions above.

I don't know whether Alex has ambitions above, but, you know, lots of people would like to move up.

And it was an odd development because you have a young, powerful potentially in Frank White.

And then now you have I mean, Don, who is, you know, substantially older, he's not the next wave of Republican leadership by any stretch.

Great.

Though he was in great name recognition, obviously.

Obviously very powerful, you know, for sure.

But, you know, what impact does that have on the party and the other people who are trying to, you know, sort of advance within the party and go to higher office?

Yeah, but there's only so much donor money to go around.

And I think we all know behind the scenes there's a lot of talk over who's, you know, putting their money elsewhere and that's where a lot of those decisions get.

Me and Escambia County is not the decider in this.

This is Santa Rosa County in Okaloosa and a little bit of Walton.

And, you know, Escambia County candidates haven't done well over there.

Right.

And Don, being from there, it could be a plus or a minus.

They know it.

So they may not like it, you know, but but I think they do.

And I think that had a huge factor because Frank was not well known over there.

Right.

Other than his father in law.

So any sense.

And so, yeah, I think, you know, you look at how much, but you can't have too many losses, you know, And Frank already lost running for attorney general, which was a jump too far.

Yeah.

I mean, clearly after one term in the house.

Right, Right.

Yeah.

Because I think he would have had a phenomenal legislative career.

Agreed.

You know, and yeah.

So talk a little bit about our governor.

Obviously running for president.

What what are your what are your thoughts on that?

Does he have a chance in at all?

I'm very curious to see what Iowa we all are, what Iowa and New Hampshire, South Carolina happens because when you actually have numbers occurring, I think he made a good argument in the debate recently where he said everybody said there was this red wave coming and it didn't happen anywhere.

But in Florida, meaning the polls only tell you so much.

And we know that they have been on reliable barometers the same time the polls are over whelming.

I mean, it's hard to make the case that these polls are that wrong across the country in all of these swing states and that Trump really doesn't have the commanding lead that everybody perceives him to have.

So it's hard to imagine anything that would derail Trump at this point.

But I'm curious to see what happens when we actually start casting votes in primaries and caucuses.

Nobody can pull ahead of Trump right now, but there is that possibility out there that Trump isn't able to be on the ballot when it comes down to it.

And if that means very unlikable.

So that's when you start looking at one, who does it come down to?

You know, is it Nikki Haley who is rising in the polls quickly every day?

And that, you know, with DeSantis right behind her, depending on which poll you look at.

So that's that's the real chance.

You're seeing a lot of polling just on issues.

And I don't think the culture wars aggressive stance that that Florida has taken that Governor DeSantis has taken is necessarily landing where he thought it would land nationwide.

I read a poll today that looked at let's put Biden up against.

And they did.

Trump They did Haley, they did DeSantis.

And you see a dropping in Trump.

Haley actually had the best, actually.

HALEY And then you had Trump close like a 3% difference.

But there was a big drop then, and it had DeSantis neck in neck with Joe Biden.

So that's also interesting.

No doubt Nikki Haley would destroy Biden in the general election, No doubt.

No question.

But she's got to win the primary first.

This is the problem.

Well, I think I think all this is showing is what I think it's showing that DeSantis has been in a bubble, that that the reason his policies pass here is is because he narrowly won the first time he ran against 30,000 votes.

I mean, he ran he ran against a horrible candidate in Charlie Crist, who the Democrats didn't back.

Right.

And you had a Democratic Party that was falling apart.

So then he goes into a legislature that he has super majority in the House, in the Senate, and they choose not to challenge him on anything.

So all of his ideas are golden when he's in that bubble, he gets out of that bubble and you find out that he's often he doesn't meet people.

Well, his campaign is run unprofessionally crooked, continually stepping foot in his mouth, problems happening with it continue.

Change of leadership.

And you seeing that, like Lisa said, those policies aren't being accepted everywhere now and and it it's like it's hard to get I used to say this when Greg Evers and Mike Hill is running against Greg Evers, it was hard to ever get to the right of Greg Evers.

Well, you're not going to get any further right than Trump.

You can you can say, I'm just a younger version of Trump.

But but Trump's magnitude and charisma with the hardcore Republican voters is just it's hard spot to get into Sanders is just now starting to challenge him some but it may be way too little too late.

And and the perception of Florida and of Governor Santos nationwide very negative Based on COVID coverage.

We were the catastrophe state, even though we all knew that wasn't actually what was happening here.

That was the narrative you watch anymore.

I'm not so sure it wasn't a catastrophe.

All right.

Well, we will disagree about that.

I mean, when people thought dying, the Republican the Republican view of DeSantis is that he was extremely successful at preserving freedom and keeping business open in a time when everybody was yelling lockdown.

And we thought that would translate nationally.

But I mean, almost like it's almost like COVID ended too soon for that to be a wave for him to build on.

And the national perception of Florida during COVID was that it was a catastrophe.

So, I mean, and I'm with Rick on this, I do think in many ways it was a catastrophe here.

But you you have to challenge a little bit.

He he was closing Florida before California was in the very beginning, for sure.

Roadblocks at the I-10.

Yeah, in the beginning, right?

Yeah.

I mean, it it wasn't the fairy tale that and then he had day when when as he had a they had a three stage plan to come out of this.

They started fudging the numbers so that they could get people out of out of the quarantine, you know, and then they stop and then they start pouring all together, you know, So changing, changing what got reported, changing the definitions.

I mean, it's it's frightening to to to realize that we you know, people could make good decisions because we didn't know the data.

And so it's going to be an interesting year, that's for sure.

I still think an awful lot could happen.

Let's talk look back.

We were again talking a little bit off air about this.

We had some folks who were very influential in this community who passed away in 2023.

And the first one I'll bring up was Judge Roger Vinson, who was just a if you had a chance to know him, was just a true gentleman and, you know, I think really represented us well.

And of course, he dealt with the, you know, you know, made rulings on the Affordable Care Act and then also involved with the 1984 abortion bombings.

And I believe the Paul Hill case would give me give me a little thought on Judge Vinson.

I mean, he was loved.

He you know, I've only been here ten years, but in my ten years and the majority of those big decisions came earlier, he wasn't afraid to tackle those issues.

He was a gentleman.

He could be aggressive, but a gentleman at the same time.

I mean, it was blow.

I think, to the community when he passed, you know, the Earl jurist.

I mean, and, you know, the local bar association named their ends a court in his honor.

The he handled some huge cases, but it was in talking to the attorneys that worked with him, they felt like he was a fair judge, that he kept control of his courtroom, which is important.

But, yeah, he was I mean, he was there on the Affordable Care Act.

I remember sitting in the courthouse listening to it.

You know, he handled it was it was interesting to watch him from the bench.

Yeah, it really was.

He was on the FISA court.

I remember that.

Right.

Who was?

A lot of people probably didn't know I had the opportunity actually to be with him out of the country on a trip that when the Supreme Court ruling came down against what he had ruled per the Affordable Care Act.

And it was fascinating just to kind of hear his thoughts on why he made the ruling that he made and about the Commerce Clause and stuff like that.

Just a wonderful human being and a class act from from northwest Florida.

And then, of course, the other was Bear passed away.

Your thoughts on.

I miss Lewis.

I think he was passionate about this community.

He didn't hesitate to tell you how he felt positive or negative.

You know, he is single handedly, I think, really the one that lobbied the hardest for the trial.

I mean, with he was over there consistently trying to get funds to be sure that we got to rebuild the panhandle.

And he did it on his own dime and aggressively did it.

I think that what his children have done, the Family Foundation, you see their name over it, Baptist Hospital, you see how much money they've given around the community.

The why has their name on it.

He is he was ornery.

He was opinionated.

He but he could be one of the funniest people I've ever been around.

You know, we fought many a time, but he was he'll yeah, you know, his family did put the Political Museum of Art that was his parents in a group of friends that took that old jail and worked on weekends to make that into an art center that eventually became.

It's just that family's history and the community is different.

It's he's not what you think necessarily on the outside.

Yeah.

And it's continued.

Yes.

I mean you look at the philanthropy of the family and the things that they're involved in.

I think Drew, Cindy in the work that she's done with Rally has just been incredible and that hasn't slowed down at all.

Right?

Right.

Yeah.

Influence on politics, obviously.

I mean, incredible influence and not just locally, right?

Statewide, but also, as you say, philanthropy.

What the kids are continuing.

You know, I remember going every year out to the, uh, you know, the distributorship and watching them give away the big, huge checks, all these local organizations and the idea that, you know, it's one thing to make a bunch of money, which obviously their company does, but to share that with the community and to build things in the community that are going to, you know, help serve people in obviously, whether it's economic development, you know, what from, you know, Florida West, would we even have or what before that would we have if the Bears hadn't been so influential in that side of things?

So, yeah, got massive change the community right right.

Couple other people that passed away and now we were we're talking about that we're influential in the community.

You mentioned Georgia Blackmon.

I mean what a blow to to the community.

She just did so much, pulled people together.

I think of all of the work that she did leading the Ella Jordan house Museum and just she was able to get to stop, you know, I think it was former Mayor Hayward.

She was able to, you know, put the brakes on demolishing that she just so loved in everything that she did.

Yeah.

Her bookstore was just sort of a center of conversation in the black community.

We also lost Mary Williams, who was huge.

And the other one that jumped out to me is Norm Vickers.

Oh, yes.

You know who was really Mr. Jazz?

I mean, he was we have a Pensacola Jazz Festival because of him, a jazz society.

Because of him.

We have a jazz collection in the downtown library just really added that extra bit of texture to our community.

And, uh, and I, you know, I would get notes from him often, and, you know, that's another person that had a nice, quiet influence over the community.

Yeah, yeah, I agree of about 3 minutes left.

Let me just get you to look forward in 2024.

What's going to be the big deal in 2024?

Andrew Um, well, there is a commissioner who engaged in communications on his cell phone with a private individual, and I think the person to my left might have more stories coming out of that.

We've already seen two The state attorney's offices opened an investigation into text messages, possible violations of the Sunshine law and other matters.

And I don't think that story's going away.

So I don't know where it's going to go.

I have no idea.

But, uh, you know, that's going to be I think that's going to be a big story.

You also have the ongoing lawsuits between like Remi Adler, the former medical director in the county, Pam Childers, the clerk of the court and the county.

You know, you've got this defamation lawsuit with D.A.

Laski, the medical examiner who has had funeral directors say outrageous things about her in coordination with one of our other county commissioners.

And that story doesn't seem to be going away.

So there's a lot of those kinds of things brewing in Escambia County.

Lisa, your thought on affordable housing, That is, it's everybody right now is suffering.

The new the Quality of Life survey that you did, the insurance, affordable housing, anything to do with that homelessness like how are we going to solve this issue?

When is the will burial shelter going to be built.

It's it's it's ongoing in 2023, but certainly not going away in 2024.

Rick, I think is going to a children's trust and what happens with them next?

You know, they've they're trying to get a do over.

They're going to say that they're going to come up with a new standardized metrics.

We'll see how that gets initiated and done.

And what are we going to do about the school system?

You know, Lincoln Park is there are only three school elementary schools out of 1800 schools in the state that performed worse than I did.

My players in the top ten, the global is in the top 25.

I mean, we've got for, you know, at least 3 to 4 schools that are the worst in the state.

And what are we going to do about it?

I'll wrap up here, but I just want to tell all three of you how important in my view, it is what you do.

And I think sometimes that people forget how important it is to have local journalists and reporters who are covering what's going on, because otherwise it allows the fox to get in the hen house.

Right.

And in in an era where big media comes in and oftentimes you're seeing, you know, small newspapers and radio stations, whatnot, have challenges.

I think it's important to have a strong local media.

I salute all three of you on that.

And in weekly WCHA Radio, Pensacola News Journal, PNG, JD.COM Newsradio, that's where we can find it, right?

Plus, our guys are flying all over social media on top of it.

Right.

Thank you so much for joining us.

I appreciate it.

And I think Rick and Andrew have been with me for many, many years on this program and Lisa has come in numerous times.

So thank you again.

I wish you all the best in 2024.

Thank you so much.

Thank you very much.

By the way, you can see this and many more of our conversations on the PBS video app as well as at WAC.

Sorry Dawgs conversations.

I'm Jeff Weeks.

I wish you all the very best in the brand new year.

Thank you so much for watching us.

Take wonderful care of yourself.