About 300 people filled the first service on Aug. 9 at Crosspoint Church’s newest campus in Pace, capping nearly a year of preparation and launching a teaching series aimed at helping parents pass on their faith at home.

Congressman Jimmy Patronis made his first appearance before a local board of county commissioners on Aug. 11, providing a legislative update to Santa Rosa County officials and announcing the opening of a new district office in the area.

The Milton Police Department announced Aug. 12 a second arrest in a November 2025 shooting death of a man at Lucille Johnson Park, saying forensic testing on two recovered firearms linked a suspect to the killing.

U.S. Rep. Jimmy Patronis has asked the Department of Veterans Affairs to study establishing a national veterans cemetery in Okaloosa County and announced a steering committee to build a case for a roughly 200-acre site in Northwest Florida.

The Milton City Council is set to meet Aug. 11, when it will finalize the fall event schedule, look to increase flood defenses and improve the Milton Police Department with new equipment.

Here are three things you need to know ahead of the meeting.

Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Deputy Shane Forsman starts his day with coffee and a walk of the fence line.

He checks the gates. He looks for anyone who shouldn’t be there. Then the buses pull in at Bennett C. Russell Elementary School, the doors open, and for the next several minutes he is handing out high-fives and good mornings to a share of the school’s roughly 900 students.

“They trust me with their lives day in and day out, so I take that very seriously,” he said.

Santa Rosa County School Board member Linda Sanborn says her case for a third term comes down to one rule: Pay teachers and staff as much as the district can afford, and cut elsewhere when money falls short.

A citywide, year-round curfew for anyone under 17 will go before the Pensacola City Council, with Mayor D.C. Reeves pushing back on the assumption that the proposal is a response to a recent downtown shooting.

The Santa Rosa County School Board voted unanimously July 28 to eliminate the public committee that decided whether challenged library books stayed on school shelves, handing that decision to the superintendent.

The Santa Rosa County Board of County Commissioners is set to meet twice next week as it discusses possible loans to a local fire district, sets the upcoming mosquito control budget and approves a contract to resurface a county road in rural Santa Rosa.

Here are three things you need to know ahead of the meetings.