Childers Offers to Settle First Tee Lawsuit for $50

Rick Outzen

3 hours ago

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Childers Offers First Tee and WEAC $50 Each to Settle Lawsuit Over Funds She Refused to Pay

Just days after Escambia County commissioners voted to join the lawsuit against her, Clerk of Courts Pam Childers has served both First Tee Gulf Coast and the Warrington Emergency Aid Center with formal settlement offers for less than the cost of a round of golf.

Escambia County Clerk of Courts Pam Childers has made her move in the lawsuit over the community impact grants she refused to pay, and it’s not the move anyone watching this case expected.

On June 22, Childers’ attorneys served Greater Pensacola Junior Golf Association, Inc. (First Tee Gulf Coast) with a formal Offer of Judgment for Settlement in the amount of $50. First Tee had sued to collect $4,500 in commission-approved funding that Childers refused to release. Read 2026 06 22 Offer of Judgment First Tee. The Warrington Emergency Aid Center received a similar offer over its separate $2,500 claim.

“This offer is made to avoid the continued utilization of government resources in litigating this cause of action. It is not, and shall not be construed as, an admission of liability, fault, wrongdoing, or abuse of discretion by Defendant.”

What’s Actually on the Table

Amounts offered: $50 to First Tee Gulf Coast (against a $4,500 claim) and $50 to WEAC (against a $2,500 claim)
Recipients: Greater Pensacola Junior Golf Association, Inc. (First Tee Gulf Coast) and Warrington Emergency Aid Center — both named co-plaintiffs in the suit
Deadline to accept: 30 days after service, but no later than July 22, 2026
Scope if accepted: Resolves all claims, damages, and remedies the accepting plaintiff asserted or could have asserted against Childers — including attorney’s fees, interest, and costs
Counsel for Childers: Codey L. Leigh (in-house, Clerk of Courts) and Edward P. Fleming and Aaron T. McCurdy of McDonald Fleming, LLP

Why this is a legal chess move, not a peace offering: Florida’s offer-of-judgment statute (§768.79) exists to shift the financial risk of litigation. If a plaintiff rejects a formal offer and ultimately recovers less than the offer at trial, the defendant can seek to recover their own attorney’s fees and costs incurred from the date of the offer forward. Token $50 offers against claims of $4,500 and $2,500 aren’t really attempts to settle for $50. They’re a low bar designed to be easy to “beat” in the technical sense that triggers fee-shifting exposure for First Tee and WEAC if the case doesn’t go their way. Expect Childers to allow legal bills to mount, pressuring these small nonprofits to give up.

The Bigger Fight Hasn’t Moved

This offer lands just four days after the Escambia County Commission voted 3-1 to join First Tee and WEAC as co-plaintiffs in their suit against Childers, with Commissioner Ashlee Hofberger as the lone no vote. That vote came with a condition pushed by Commissioner Steve Stroberger: the county would not support any outcome that made Childers personally liable for repaying the funds, even if the court sided with the nonprofits.

Childers’ position hasn’t shifted. She has maintained that her ministerial duty as comptroller obligates her to evaluate whether each individual payment—not just the commission’s overall appropriation authority—serves a lawful public purpose. “Should I not agree that the mission of County government will be served through the expenditure, the payment will be denied,” she wrote in her April 2025 memo to the commission, a line that’s now Exhibit F in the case.

Attorney Alex Andrade, representing First Tee and WEAC, has argued the opposite: that the clerk’s role is ministerial, not discretionary, and that Florida Statute §129.09 only allows her to refuse a warrant when a payment is illegal, exceeds authorized spending, or isn’t authorized by law or ordinance — conditions he says don’t apply to commission-approved community impact grants under the county’s 1985 ordinance.

What’s Still Unresolved

First Tee’s board unanimously declined the settlement. We don’t know if WEAC will accept, reject, or let the $50 offer lapse by July 22.
The underlying declaratory judgment question both sides say they actually want answered: who decides “public purpose”—the commission or the clerk?

The bottom line: Two $50 offers on claims worth $4,500 and $2,500 aren’t a negotiating position. They’re a procedural setup to pressure the small nonprofits.