With temperatures dipping into the lower 50s, Tom Turman is preparing the cold weather shelter at Ferris Hill Baptist Church.

“I monitor a couple of sites – weather.com and weather.gov – to keep track of conditions. If the forecast is below 40, or even if it’s below 50 or so but windy and rainy, we’ll open the shelter,” Turman told the Press Gazette earlier this month. “We’re usually open 35-40 nights in a normal year.”

Florida Sen. Doug Broxson and Reps. Alex Andrade and Joel Rudman met with Santa Rosa County residents Tuesday at St. Sylvester Catholic Church in Navarre to preview key bills and hear public concerns before the 2024 legislative session.

The Rev. David Lewis, pastor at Woodbine Baptist Church in Pace, and his wife Susie were with a tour group in eastern Israel when Hamas militants began firing rockets into the central and southern parts of the country.

“Our first inkling that something was going wrong was when we were about to stop for lunch in Jericho, which is under Muslim control,” Lewis told the Press Gazette last week. “Our guide leaned forward to the driver and told him to keep going straight.”

Volunteers portrayed prominent Bagdad residents from the past and shared the stories from the historic village’s past during the Bagdad Historic Cemetery Association’s Legends and Lore Tour on Saturday.

Milton City Councilman Jason Vance has announced that he expects to move outside the city’s limits by Oct. 30, which would disqualify him from serving on the city council.

Milton Councilwoman Roxanne Meiss is asking the council to consider – again – revising the city’s Unified Development Code to allow property owners to apply for a “local historic resource” designation. The council’s agenda workshop meeting begins at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 19.

Meet prominent residents from Bagdad’s past and learn their stories during the Bagdad Cemetery Association’s free Legends and Lore Tour. The event was suspended because of COVID, but volunteers have revived the educational two-hour presentation, which takes place between 10 a.m. and noon Saturday at the cemetery, 6800 Pooley Street in Bagdad.

The Milton City Council voted last week to install benches in the city’s parks dedicated to sexual assault survivors, including a plaque with contact information for support resources.

Butterflies in Motion, Inc., unveiled its “Wow! World of Water” presentation Friday, Oct. 6, at an end-of-season party at Beardless Brewhaus in Milton.

The Santa Rosa County Budget Office has scheduled a budget workshop beginning at 1 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 26, to discuss how the county’s budget is funded and additional ways in which the county could increase revenues.