News Archive

Before every performance, Pamela Strecker made one final walk.
She moved through the backstage area from one side to the other, checking on every actor, calling out final cues, making sure nothing had been missed. Then, just before heading up to the booth, she would turn around, look out at the cast and raise a hand in the air.
“Be brilliant.”
It caught on. Cast members started saying it to each other.
Strecker,61, who served as stage manager and eight-year president of Stage Crafters Community Theater in Fort Walton Beach, died earlier this month after a battle with cancer. She had been part of the organization for more than two decades, arriving as a shy backstage helper in 1999 and becoming the heartbeat of one of Northwest Florida’s most beloved volunteer arts organizations.

Local base commanders and Rep. Jimmy Patronis (R-FL1) made the case on May 27 that the area’s congested roadways are not just a quality-of-life problem, it is also a threat to national security.

The old hospital on Stewart Steet could become a 300-unit apartment community with a public library and technology hub. A three-acre lot off James Street could become a new home for senior housing. A 10-acre plat in the city’s northern end could become a planned community of manufactured homes where people can actually afford a home.

A 59-year-old Pace man is behind bars after a May 24 incident where deputies say he shoved a Pace Fire Rescue firefighter who was responding to a trash fire at his home, according to an arrest report from the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office.

State Sen. Don Gaetz has asked the agriculture commissioner to open a formal investigation into aerial herbicide spraying by a Florida Power & Light contractor that farmers and beekeepers in north Santa Rosa County say drifted onto their property and killed livestock and bees.

The Legislature will convene on Monday, June 1, in a special session called by Gov. Ron DeSantis to consider the governor’s proposal to cut or even eliminate property tax bills.

A small family farm in East Milton is calling for an investigation after the owners say more than 50 chickens died following the alleged spraying of an herbicide over Florida Power & Light right-of-way across the street from their property.

A 40-year-old Milton man has been arrested on six counts of lewd molestation of a child under 12 and one count of lewd exhibition of his stepdaughter, according to an arrest report from the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office.

Mike Philley, the band director at Avalon Middle School, has accepted the Santa Rosa County District Schools Instrumental Music Coordinator position.

While heavy rain may have forced event organizers to change the venue to the Gracey Community Center on Memorial Day, the City of Milton still showed up to honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice.