Visit Pensacola and its bylaws gain approval, final vote may be Thursday…or not

By Jesse Farthing

Yesterday’s Committee of the Whole meeting of the Escambia County Commission focused heavily on Visit Pensacola, Inc. and its proposed governance and bylaws.

Ron Ellington opened by immediately asking that the commission move the proposed voting date from Dec. 5 to Nov. 21, two days from now, because right now, he said, they are stalled with the Chamber until the county makes a decision to accept or not accept the proposed plan and budget.

Commissioner Wilson Robertson gave his full support to Visit Pensacola’s proposed bylaws and organizational chart and said that it makes sense for the hoteliers to have a large say in deciding how bed tax money is spent because they are the only people who collect it.

Commissioner Grover Robinson also agreed with the makeup and organization that Visit Pensacola put forth.

Chairman Gene Valentino, who had put forth his own recommendation for the structure and bylaws of Visit Pensacola, was less willing to accept everything without consideration of his own plan. Valentino appeared frustrated that a motion was put on the floor to accept Visit Pensacola’s proposal without any discussion of his ideas.

“This was an 11th hour issue that came up to us before we had the chance to really vet it,” Valentino said. “The organizational structure was created without us even knowing about it.”

Valentino said that he wanted time to scrub the structure of the deal and expressed his concern with Visit Pensacola’s apparent lack of transparency. He said that he was worried about possible violations of the Sunshine Law.

“When you create a situation that makes us feel like we’re on the outside looking in it certainly raises my curiosity, without being paranoid, as to why it’s being handled that way,” Valentino said to Ellington regarding the lack of commission involvement in Visit Pensacola’s meetings.

“I mean, would you expect to exclude the five commissioners of county government in a deliberative process during the creation of this entity when we are the source of your $6 million a year?”

He said that he would have liked more of the commissioners to be involved in the process from the beginning.

Another point of contention was the perceived lack of minority representation in the proposed board makeup of Visit Pensacola. Ellington said that the bylaws in place would guarantee minority representation, but it would not be based on a percentage of the demographics.

Commissioner Lumon May expressed reluctance to move forward without more specifics on inclusion.

“I would like to think that people are good-willed and good intentioned,” May said. “But history has produced a lack of inclusion in this county. I want some type of guarantee that there is minority inclusion.”

Ellington assured the board that minorities would be represented, and there would always be at least one minority voice on Visit Pensacola’s board.

Ultimately, the vote passed unanimously to accept Visit Pensacola’s bylaws and structure. Ellington then requested, again, that it be brought to Thursday’s meeting for ratification, but Commissioner May encouraged it be left for Dec. 5, much to Commissioner Robertson’s dismay.

“I’ll bring it forth as an add-on to the agenda if I have to,” Robertson said. “Do we want to go over it all over again? I think it should go to the next board meeting after the Committee of the Whole.”

The next meeting of the Board of County Commissioners will be held Thursday, Nov. 21 at 5 p.m.