Stormwater Public Education & Training Committee Takes Field Trip to MacDill Air Force Base
The Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council partnered with the Florida Department of Transportation to coordinate a Stormwater Public Education and Training committee. The committee recently decided to forgo the routine meeting in favor of a field trip to MacDill Air Force Base to learn about how their stormwater program is implemented and see a tide-gate that can be closed to stop water flow from the Base to Tampa Bay in the event of a spill.
The stormwater group also visited a habitat enhancement and restoration site adjacent to Tampa Bay, which was implemented to slow shoreline erosion impacting historic live oaks on the Base’s golf course.
WFRPC Hosted Regional Infrastructure Priorities Meeting
The West Florida Regional Planning Council, Apalachee Regional Planning Council, University of West Florida, Northwest Florida Forward, Northwest Florida League of Cities, and Florida’s Great Northwest invited elected officials and community stakeholders from Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa, Walton, Bay, Holmes, Washington, Calhoun, Franklin, Gadsden, Gulf, Jackson, Jefferson, Liberty, Leon, and Wakulla counties to an informational update and interactive planning workshop pertaining to regional priority identification and collaboration efforts. Sparked by questions about the Deepwater Horizon (BP) oil spill funds, or Triumph, WFRPC hosted a previous meeting with the City of Destin, who subsequently offered the use of their community center to facilitate a similar discussion on a reg
ional scale.
More than 100 attendees filled the Destin Community Center on May 17 as State Representative Mel Ponder opened the evening with special remarks. WFRPC Executive Director, Austin Mount and WFRPC RESTORE Coordinator, Bill Williams then provided an update on RESTORE and Triumph funds, and facilitated a discussion to identify infrastructure priorities throughout northwest Florida. Attendees engaged in discussion regarding a variety of regional infrastructure needs, identifying, via vote, their top three areas of focus: Transportation (254 votes), specifically major arterial routes (36 votes); Environment (192 votes), specifically stormwater (which ranked higher than any subcategory at 64 votes); and Quality of Place (116 votes), specifically underground utilities (34 votes) and wastewater (32 votes).
The partners will continue to host meetings to provide updates and identify trends and common goals, allowing a unified regional voice to foster leverage in future endeavors and potential funding opportunities. Please visit this webpage for updates.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Regional Planning Councils Assist with Statewide Hurricane Exercise
Staff from the North Central Florida RPC and Apalachee RPC assisted the Florida Division of Emergency Management with planning and evaluating the 2017 Statewide Hurricane Exercise which took place May 1 – 4, 2017 at the State Emergency Operations Center (SEOC). RPC staff developed the Master Scenario Events List and facilitated coordination between the SEOC and the agencies involved in response and recovery.
Local Update of Census Addresses (LUCA) Meetings Schedule
Click here to register for a LUCA Meeting
