Pensacola Mayor D.C. Reeves held his weekly press conference Tuesday morning, covering a range of city updates from a major shift in recycling drop-off operations to progress on the New Palafox streetscape project.
Recycling Drop-Off Moving from Summit to Leonard Street
The city’s assisted recycling drop-off location at Summit Boulevard is closing May 4, and the program is moving to the sanitation services office at 100 West Leonard Street—a move that will slash annual operating costs by roughly 90%.
The Summit location currently costs the city $258,984 per year to operate, requiring a five-person crew running up to six days a week during the holidays, for a total of 218 cleanups annually. Despite that level of service, contamination rates at the Summit site are estimated at 85% to 90%, meaning nearly everything dropped off there ends up in the landfill anyway.
The new Leonard Street site will be more secure, managed by a single employee using existing equipment and infrastructure already on-site at the city’s sanitation building. Annual operating cost: $30,000.
Reeves noted that the curbside recycling program continues to grow, now reaching 4,469 households, with a 93% clean rate and only 7% contamination — a stark contrast to the Summit drop-off numbers.
Signage announcing the transition will go up at the Summit location this week.
Airport Holding Steady Amid National TSA Delays
With TSA wait times making national headlines, Reeves offered some reassurance about Pensacola International Airport. The airport has not appeared on the TSA “hotspot list” — defined as a location with waits of 30 minutes or more — for over a year.
- On the busiest day of 2026 so far — this past Sunday — the airport processed 12,000 passengers and 6,000 screenings while keeping wait times under 30 minutes. Reeves noted that roughly a dozen airports nationally are currently on the hotspot list, up from the typical one or two, and urged travelers to check with their carriers for potential delay impacts from larger connecting airports.
Port Road and Rail Rehabilitation Underway
Work began last week on a road and rail rehabilitation project at the Port of Pensacola, addressing infrastructure damage dating back to Hurricane Sally. The base bid for the project comes in at approximately $11.5 million. The city is seeking council approval of an additional $2.3 million to fund alternate bid items and complete the full scope of work. Reeves clarified that the base project can proceed now using already-allocated Hurricane Sally CDBG funds, with the alternate bids contingent on council approval.
- When asked whether an inland port remains on the city’s radar, Reeves said yes — but noted that the right catalytic private partner, such as a company like Birdon potentially moving jobs to the site, would do more to accelerate the project than speculative grant pursuits alone.
New Palafox Streetscape at the Halfway Mark
Construction on the New Palafox Project is approaching the halfway point on its incentivized completion date of May 24th. Current progress:
- Storm infrastructure: 80% complete, projected to be done April 3
- Curb and gutter: 80% complete, projected to be done April 24
- Irrigation: 90% complete, projected to be done April 10
- Pavers: ~50% complete, projected to be done 100% by May 8
So far, workers have installed 11,755 square feet of sidewalk pavers and 2,200 square feet of pavers in parking bays. Several cabbage palms on the north and south ends have also been planted.
I asked the mayor: Have you discovered the tunnels yet, Mayor?
Mayor Reeves: Not yet. I was waiting for your reporting on that. If you’ll let me know, if you get out there on a weekend or something and see one, please notify us.
Rick Outzen: Well, we’re hearing you just didn’t dig deep enough.
Mayor Reeves: Well, yeah, maybe that was intentional. That’s—
Rick Outzen: That’s the theory.
Mayor Reeves: We want to be intentional about what we don’t find.
Rick Outzen: We know your dad hid the records.
Mayor Reeves: They might be under there.
Rick Outzen: Could be.
Library Director Selection: Mayor Takes a Pass
When asked about Escambia County Administrator Wes Moreno’s decision to override the Library Board of Governance’s unanimous recommendation for library director—selecting the board’s third-ranked candidate instead—Reeves declined to weigh in.
“I haven’t spent a lot of time worrying about one that isn’t necessarily in our purview,” he said, adding that he has not spoken directly with Moreno about the decision and wouldn’t second-guess it publicly. Reeves said that from his vantage point, the library system has been operating without complaints hitting his desk, which he views as a reasonable measure of day-to-day success.
