Palm Coast’s City Council met on Tuesday, August 13th, at 9 am. Following public comment, Nancy Crouch and Jay Sherr presented on the Flagler County Cultural Council; a local organization working to broaden the Cultural Arts in Flagler County. Their presentation focused on the scholarships they plan to award regularly. Currently, the FC3 provides grants to local graduating high schoolers who are planning a career in the Arts. Among their strategic plans, are tools like calendars, books on the unique turtles that make up the local turtle trail, and adding the turtle trail to local Schools’ art education. The main topic of their presentation is the Re-Imagined Grant Program, which helps support mural artists, artist workshops, music festivals, historical initiatives, etc. The grant would require a 3-year commitment to the grant program from the City and would require a minimum of $100,000 per year to support these initiatives. The grant would be labeled as the City of Palm Coast Cultural Arts Grant, as well as providing the grantee’s information to the city and celebrating the grantee at a City Meeting.
City Staff invited FC3 to step up and present how their organization could take on handling the Cultural Arts grants that City Staff currently handle every year. FC3 agreed to bring a presentation forward on how this potential partnership could benefit the Cultural Arts in Flagler County. FC3 stressed that if they handled the grants, payments, and applications, the entire process would remain 100% visible to the public, as it would be taxpayer monies. The consensus was to move forward, however, there would be multiple adjustments, funding, etc., that would require adjustments and further discussion.
The Palm Coast Historical Society gave a presentation on what they do and their request for an increase in funding from $3,000 to $10,000. Mayor Alfin stated his desire to see the organization grow its membership base, possibly raise its membership fees and consider other avenues as well for better sustainability.
The City Council debated the concept of a fourth Tuesday workshop meeting. Council Person Pontieri initially brought up the need for a permanent fourth meeting every month; allowing the city to have two permanently scheduled workshops, and two business meetings a month. This is due to the length of the workshop agendas. The consensus was to move forward with plans for a permanent workshop meeting on the 4th Tuesday of the month.
