“Seeing how corrupt and uncaring the City Council is about the citizens of Palm Coast is what prompted me to run. People would bring their problems to City Council and some of the Council members would be playing on their phones and not doing anything,” Stancel told us when we sat down to discuss his bid for City Council’s District 3 seat.
The Stancel’s moved to Palm Coast in April of 2021, and Stancel has been involved in the Citizens Advisory Committee as well as the Code Enforcement board since moving here. Stancel retired from the army where he spent time in the Army’s postal department. He spent his career in administrative and support roles in the military.
We asked Stancel what he felt the biggest issue Palm Coast is facing? “Infrastructure isn’t good enough for the expansion taking place. Traffic lights, there is just too much traffic. SR100 is just packed all the time, and it might need to get widened down the road. These are all really important things.”
One of the biggest issues floating around Palm Coast is the flooding issues, which in part appears to be due to new construction and the swale system. We asked Stancel where he stood on the issue of the new build issues, and the stormwater system. “I would recommend to change the heights. They have a minimum height requirement for new builds, but no maximum. Set one. The minimum is 12 inches, set the maximum to 24 inches, and that would stop the issue.”
The pace of new development in Palm Coast is another topic of larger concern for many residents. We asked Stancel to explain where he stood on this issue. “The pace is not sustainable. Palm Coast was originally designed to house 300,000 people, but not immediately. That is why our taxes have gone up so high, because we have to pay or that infrastructure that those houses and developments have to have. We are paying for that, the developers aren’t paying for that. We get stuck with that bill. Palm Coast is going to grow, but it needs to grow in a good way.”
Stancel continued on talking about the developing pace, and brought up the influx of apartment complexes coming to Palm Coast. “They build an apartment complex and that money is rolling in, and it goes towards another apartment complex, and it is a way to keep money rolling in. The problem is that Palm Coast has an 80% occupancy rate on their apartments; there are new apartments going in on Roberts Rd., there are the new proposed apartments going in in front of Toscana and Hidden Lakes, and then more apartments going in at town center. Where are we going to get the people to fill these? We need to stop rezoning things and balance out the homes we have with good paying jobs.”
Stancel talked with us about the business with the rehearing for Seminole Woods. He stated, “it is sneaky. Pontieri pointed out that the legal aspect of the fact that the mistake was on the applicant, not city council or staff, so there should not have been a rehearing. They are doing crooked and corrupt stuff to get what they want.”
On the issue of trust and transparency, Stancel said, “Show the people. If you say you’re going to do something, then by God, do it! What I would like to do, maybe quarterly, notify everyone in my district and meet somewhere to go over issues and problems so we can deal with them. If you are going to be elected to represent people you need to get to know them. I am just a retired person living in Palm Coast who wants to keep it nice.”
To find more information about Stancel and his platform, you can visit his website here.
