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| Apalachicola Mayor Van W. Johnson, Sr. |
October 6, 2015
(As written -- There may
have been some slight deviations in its delivery)
Eight years ago
I stood here
and asked that
you join me
on a journey to
transform Apalachicola into
the most livable
city in the entire State of
Florida.
You accepted that challenge,
but from the
onset of that journey
we faced obstacles brought on
by the Global
Financial Crisis of 2008,
which not only
tested our nation
and our state, but
also our city,
causing three local
banks to collapse,
real estate prices to plummet and record foreclosures.
But despite it all,
we overcame those
obstacles and were
able to achieve more
for our city
with less, and
progressed more than most
other cities throughout
Florida of similar
shape and size.
As a result,
the City of
Apalachicola is now
nationally known as a
distinctive destination, attracting
thousands of visitors and
luring hundreds of
new residents into
the community each year.
Four years later,
I again stood
here and asked
could we begin anew,
to work in
a spirit of
true harmony and
cooperation. Where together
we could dream,
hope and plan
for a brighter future.
You did, and
by working together
we were able
to accomplish so much,
we now have
a dedicated Senior
Citizen Center where our
elderly can gather
and socialize. We
have a state recognized afterschool
and summer enrichment
program where the youth
of our community
can congregate in
a safe environment.
We supported our
local seafood workers
by acting as
their payroll agent during
the shelling program,
and we secured grant
funding to add
amenities in the
downtown district to support our growing tourism industry.
We took BP
to task over
the 2010 Oil
spill, which resulted
in a million dollar
settlement, and we
were able to
enhance the quality of
life for all of our
residents with summer
music in the park,
a spectacular Annual
Independence Day fireworks display through
a collaborative effort
with our friends
at Historic Apalachicola Main
Street and we
partnered with members of
the community to
establish a History,
Culture and Art Center.
Once again, I
stand before you
tonight, thankful, humble
and excited to begin
my third term
as Mayor of
this wonderful city and
I ask of
you this time,
that we again
work together to position Apalachicola
for generations to
come as an
undeniable envy of small town America.
To my colleagues
on the Apalachicola
Board of City Commissioners, our
City Administrator, Clerk,
Police Chief, staff and
fellow residents of
Apalachicola, I thank
each you for trusting me to continue to serve as Mayor
of this great city.
The oath of
office I just
took, reaffirms that
trust and placed before
my administration the
task of continuing
the progress made over
the last eight
years, to build
on that progress,
and to protect what
we all so
dearly love about
Apalachicola for future
generations.
To build on
that progress, as
a community we
must have both the
courage and foresight
to think about
the future and
to plan accordingly for the city
our children will eventually inherit.
I believe the path
forward on the
journey we started
eight years ago is
through a visioning
process that will
develop a plan for
our city that
will not only
protect and preserve
what we have, but to use what
we have to
create jobs and economic opportunities.
That is why
I’m supportive of
the proposal received
from Mrs. Bonnie Davis
to form a
Citizen’s Task Force
to work with
the City Commission, members
of the community
and other appointed boards to
develop a vision for our city’s future.
Two key components
to creating economic
opportunities are education and
job training. That
is why my
administration strongly
believes and supports
the long held
vision of Dr. Frederick
Humphries to establish
a Florida A&M
University branch campus in
Apalachicola. Now poised
to become a reality,
a branch college
campus would not
only provide a post
high school education,
but it would
also bring about
a transformative change to
our city, a
change that will
not only spur local
industries, but also
provide a trained
workforce and a more engaged
community.
With that, the
goal of my
administration over the
next four years will
be dedicated to
creating economic opportunities
for all through public-private collaborations, and
the use of our
local renewable resources
like our river
and bay that
will neither adversely affect
the historic flavor
of our community nor those resources.
We have already
begun the process
by capitalizing on the
momentum from the
past eight years
with the launch
of a pilot job
training program for
youth adults, complete
with leadership skills and
academic programming. All
through a public-private partnership
between the City
of Apalachicola, the Conservation
Corps of the
Forgotten Coast, the Conservation Corps
Network, Community Training
Works and the Franklin’s
Promise Coalition. The
focus of the
program is to conserve, protect
and improve our environment.
In addition, over
the past eleven
months my administration has been
in communication with
a foreign business
interest and a municipal
government in the
region of Tuscany,
Italy to create sustainable
local jobs by
establishing a plant
in Apalachicola that will
process from our
local fishery various finished products
and ready to eat Tuscan
meals for sale
on the U.S. market.
Furthermore, we have
established a dialogue
with our neighbors and
stakeholders along the
Apalachicola River Basin, concerning the
city's interest to begin working
together, to return the
river system, a
natural economic resource,
once again into a
functional waterway, for
commercial and full season
recreational boating activities,
to which will
usher into the region more tourism
dollars.
Growing our local
economy to create
jobs and economic opportunities doesn’t
mean we have
to give up anything;
neither does it
means sacrificing the
historic integrity of the
community nor desecrating
the city’s plan.
It simply means having the foresight and the wiliness
to do so.
Lastly, I firmly
believe the greatest
measure of any
community is in how
it treats its
most vulnerable. Because
of this belief,
I wholeheartedly support the citizen led
initiative by Creighton and
Holly Brown to
begin renovating and
restoring run down and
abandon properties within
the city to
create affordable and mixed income housing.
No one person
or group of
people has all
the answers or the
solutions, but based
upon our past
successes, by working together we
can definitely position
our city as
an undeniable envy of small town
America.
Thank you and
May God bless
each of you
and May God continue
to bless the
Historic City of
Apalachicola, Florida.
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