This was painfully evident when I toured the facility in 2021. We also discussed the facility's deficiencies during one of my coffee with the commissioner events in 2021. We have long known there is a problem.
The difficult thing now is finding a way forward in solving this issue that works for all four counties that must fund this essential (and expensive) service. Many have worked hard at a compromise.
The approach that didn't work: Attempts by some from other counties to dictate to Escambia County what we should do. Those sorts of overtures fell on deaf ears.
Because Escambia County is where most of the deaths occur, so naturally it makes sense for the ME's office to be located here. At our latest meeting where this was discussed, a commonsense plan to expand the current ME location footprint with additional cooler space (desperately needed) and additional office and parking spaces was put forward as a workable, interim solution. And those plans have subsequently moved forward.
In speaking with a local professional in the funeral home industry about this, some salient points were imparted to me: "Jeff, we have the most death here in Escambia County. Even if it is someone from the other counties, if they are really sick they end up over here in Escambia County at one of the big three hospitals where unfortunately many of them die. In addition to that, there are folks from Baldwin County that end up in our hospitals here and many of them die here, too. So, in my business, I see that most of the death happens here, so is it really prudent to be driving over to a county to the East with bodies from Escambia County? I mean, I'll do it--but it will put an additional cost on the families because there are costs associated with transporting bodies."
For my part ----my thinking on this has been: I believe the ME office should be modernized, it should be improved, and additional space and cooler capacity should be added. But it should be added here--because this is where most of the crime deaths, overdose deaths, and hospital/hospice deaths happen--let alone we in Escambia are the population center of the circuit and therefore have the highest percentage of deaths from natural and all causes. By a longshot. The current location of the ME facility is where it should be because of this.
Is this ideal for the other four counties, for Walton County? No, it isn't. But the geographic realities of the layout of this four county circuit is what it is---and in other parts of the country even larger "geographic" areas are similarly serviced by one standalone ME facility. In some cases even smaller facilities like the one in Leon county, for instance, which is a metal prefabricated/preengineered building (PEB).
With this as the backdrop--now comes a new proposal from Craig Coffey--Deputy Administrator for Okaloosa County and currently the chairman of the four county medical examiner support entity, "DOMES." Coffee's newest proposal could be step in the right direction--as it at least recognizes the necessity of having ME capability in Escambia County. Where I think it needs further tweaking is that the facility in Santa Rosa should be smaller than 17,000 feet and it should be the annex, NOT Escambia county.
The rest of the proposal, particularly the percentages of payment responsibility, look good to me.
This proposal, below, will be discussed tomorrow at the regular BCC meeting.
2 comments:
Jacqueline continued.
"When they do an opt-out of the sector plan, they're also assigning a future land use, so besides [the underlying] zoning [which stays the same] every property has to have a future land use and that has to be reviewed by the state."
"According to how the statute reads, you have to do a certain amount of evaluation, and the county was not doing that evaluation [even though all of the judges have gone against that theory]."
"They're saying, "Well, the County says they're no development proposed, so we'll evaluate it when it comes up for the development review permit [and the judge was explicit in his recommended order that this is in keeping with the County's code, and legal], but that's not what the statute says [and I know the statutes better than a senior administrative judge]. The statute says you're supposed to look at the natural environment, you're supposed to look at the transportation network [and I will keep pretending staff did nothing so often I'll convince myself they did nothing]. You're supposed to look at the facilities, the public facilities, the sewer, the water, things like that [and apparently I don't know the state statute on people being able to opt out]. And so the County never does that for these sector plan opt-outs, but when I challenge them, they spend taxpayer money [that is *mine* to spend, not theirs!] and go hire this guy from a Tallahassee law firm and they have him hurry up and go do the analysis [when I much prefer dragging things out by asking the court for extensions]. And that's what happened here [and the judge clearly got fooled]."
Last sentence of the article?
"Rogers said she was considering appealing the judge's decision."
Why not? It's not an appeal but exceptions, and she inked 48 of them in her last opt-out loss even after the judge had put it right in the recommended order that she could be pursued for fees, costs, and sanctions. And look what happened because the County didn't pursue it.
This last round, the County asked the judge to rule on whether they could, but he didn't put anything about it in the recommended order. I doubt that means it can't be pursed. Vexatious litigant by DOAH count or no, the Westmarks requested the judge put in the order whether she could be pursued for BAD FAITH, and the judge said sure. If she could have been pursued for bad faith in the previous combined hearing, then certainly after losing those three she could be pursued for bad faith with her repeat nonsense performance for her own neighborhood.
If not, why would she stop bringing them? She clearly has zero shame, so let's stop assuming she's going to embarrass herself at some magic number of these. She's incapable of it, or she would have realized what people really think of her actions a looong time ago.
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