FLCapitalTea

01/01/2026

✨We are better together and that means we need more options for the local elections.

✨If you have considered running for city, county, or school board seat now is the time.

✨City seats available
-seat 5 (incumbent: Dianne Williams-Cox)
-seat 4 (Mayor’s seat)
-seat 3 (Matlow’s former seat)

✨County seats available
-At large (incumbent: Nick Maddox)
-District 1 (incumbent: Bill Proctor)
-District 3 (incumbent: Rick Minor)
-District 5 (incumbent: David O’Keefe)

✨School Board
-District 1 (incumbent: Alva Swafford Striplin)
-District 3 (incumbent: Darryl Jones)
-District 5 (incumbent: Marcus Nicolas)

✨Link below to the supervisor of elections for information on filing and qualifying.

🫶We are better together, we all can play a role in changing the trajectory of our local community. If you don’t want to run, find a candidate that you believe in and join their campaign.

✨We are sending out candidate questions in a couple weeks, if there is a question you have for all the candidates, drop it in the comments.

12/31/2025

✨Here’s a quick recap that doesn’t nearly cover everything that happened with our City government this year.

✨As we step into 2026, keep the conversation going.

🫶We are better together

12/31/2025

✨Here’s a look back at a post from July of this year.

✨The local Chamber of Commerce always holds an annual retreat at Amelia island, but do other local chambers also hold theirs out of town?

🫶Keep the conversation going, we are better together

🏝️After conversations with our neighbors about the Chamber boasting their annual conference at the Ritz Carlton on Amelia Island, we looked up a few other chambers and the locations of their retreats.

🏝️Here are four different Chambers and their location of their annual conference

-Tampa bay at Tampa convention center

-Gainesville at UF Hilton conference center

-Pensacola at sanders beach-Corinne jones resource center (in Pensacola)

-St. Petersburg at Duke energy center for the arts (in St. Petersburg)

🏝️Many small local businesses would love to attend these workshops and have a seat at the table. Yet, they are priced out of attending.

🫶We all deserve a seat at the table and a voice in the conversation

✨Keep this conversation going

12/30/2025

✨Are you looking for ways to be involved in our community this upcoming year?

✨From community advocacy and providing nutrition to our neighbors to entering our local government races. There’s a place for all our neighbors to get involved.

✨Find a place to volunteer, donate to, adopt a food pantry.

✨There are still seats open for the local elections this year (we will post more about this in another post).

🫶We are better together and we stand in a position that allows us to change the future of Tallahasse into one we want.

12/30/2025

✨A look back at this post from June.

✨We notice a pattern with the language the city uses. They’ve shifted from partners with the county to adversarial: severing interlocal agreements simply because they asked to see the financial records which their agreement allows.

🫶 keep the conversation going. We are Better Together

✨We noticed at the last city budget meeting the language has shifted from “Interlocal Agreement” to “contract”

✨This shift in language is important to note. While this is legally a contract between the two parties it is mutually beneficial.

✨Just like a marriage is legally considered a contract, it isn’t really an acceptable term to say I have a contract with my significant other and the significant other also may not like the marriage being called a contract.

✨Calling the interlocal agreement a contract, while technically correct, removes the obligation the city has to the county in this agreement.

✨This agreement is to share resources between the city and the county. The county provides Emergency Medical Services (ambulances) to the city and the city provides fire services.

✨This is why the county said the city was in breech of the interlocal agreement when they got the fire fees reassessed without consulting them. It was a part of their agreement (which may or may not be enforceable-the biggest difference between contract and agreement)

✨We will attach the link below to the agreement

🫶We are better together

12/29/2025

✨As we approach the New Year we are grateful to the city for filling our requests, just today they filled our request for the annual trainings completed by the city managers and other executives.

✨Reese Goad
-Anti harassment: 8/26/25
-Ethics: 7/15/25
-Workplace inclusion: 8/20/19 👀

✨Jumonville
-Anti harassment: 8/26/25
-Ethics: 7/3/25
-It’s all about respect, DEI refresher: 12/19/24

✨Doolin
-Anti harassment: 8/26/25
-Ethics: 6/26/25
-workplace inclusion: 1/24/24

✨Ojetyo
-Anti harassment: 8/26/25
-Ethics: 7/23/25
-Workplace inclusion: 10/19/22

✨Tedder
-anti harassment: 8/26/25
-Ethics: 6/30/25
-workplace inclusion: 12/12/24

✨Farris
-anti harassment:8/26/25
-Ethics: 7/22/25
-it’s all about respect,DEI refresher: 12/19/24

✨McGarrah
-anti harassment: 8/26/25
-Ethics: 6/27/25
-it’s all about respect, DEI refresher: 8/1/25

✨Whitley
-Anti harassment: 8/25/25
-Ethics: 7/22/25
-it’s all about respect, DEI refresher: 7/5/24

✨A good leader leads by example. This we know. Goad requires all city staff to complete these annual trainings, the consequence of not completing: No pay raise. Yet, he hasn’t taken his workplace inclusion since 2019.

✨We need leadership that is willing to do the work they require others to do. We need leadership that serves our neighbors, not themself.

🫶Keep the conversation going, we are better together

12/29/2025

✨Replay: here’s a look back at October when our neighbors appeared at the commission meeting with questions about the sale of TMH to FSU.

✨The majority of these questions and concerns have still gone unanswered.

🫶We deserve answers to our questions, keep the conversation going

12/28/2025

✨Here’s a look back at a post we did earlier this year around the history of blueprint.

✨It’s fitting that as we step into a new year with new beginnings that we take the time to retell the story of our past.

🫶Keep the conversation going and remain engaged in our community

✨A neighbor inquired about Blueprint: what it is, how it got here, and why it has its own board.

✨We started with the question about how it got here.

✨According to an opinion piece written by Scott Matteo in 1999, the penny sales tax was created in 1989 to help fund road improvements and a county jail.

✨However, even in 1999 there was scrutiny over how the funds were being used and concern that this was more of a “slush fund” than a benefit to taxpayers.

✨Matteo stated that few of the projects proposed had actually come to fruition and suggested limiting the projects to just four. One of those four: Fund the firefighter and police pensions.

✨In 1999 our neighbors were discussing infrastructure and the spending of the penny sales tax.

✨So much so that an Economic and Environmental consensus committee (EECC) was formed. Their mission was to identify ways the community could continue to grow, remain economically healthy, and maintain and improve our environmental conditions.

✨In 2000 the penny sales tax was re-authorized and the Blueprint 2000 intergovernmental agency was formed.

✨In 2002 they hired staff, in march 2003 they sold Bonds, and in April 2003 their first project began.

🫶We will end part 1 here and pick back up with more historical context. Keep the conversation going, we are better together.

12/28/2025

Keep the conversation going 🫶

https://www.tallahassee.com/story/opinion/2025/12/28/a-moral-moment-for-healthcare-in-tallahassee-opinion/87899247007/?utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwZnRzaAO-GQtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEee9K500rjIfQsuUlmSfD2y6R6u7loyrVMntxetrYBfb1Isnjg8ZLDeIOCA2Y_aem_OLCoEmQcT10OQ90sMqbMug

The conversation unfolding around the future of healthcare in our region is not merely administrative or economic. It is moral. It is deeply human.

12/27/2025

Repost:

✨This is from the November meeting which Commissioner Porter is retaliated against for questioning all things.

✨We should question all things. We should scrutinize all things.

🫶Keep the conversation going. We are better together

12/27/2025

✨A partnership with FSU doesn’t have to be giving them all of Tallahassee.

-$20million to FSU stadium
-airport gateway (initially FSU was to assist Blueprint with funding and design and then ghosted the board)
-the civic center (we’ve heard conversations about FSU not upholding their word)
-now our local hospital for only $109 million and with payments. Our government money isn’t a bank, and we shouldn’t allow our city to be used as such (even a bank would charge interest)

✨A partnership only works when both parties are giving equally. When only the city is giving, it’s not a partnership.

🫶Keep the conversation going, we are better together.

12/26/2025

✨District attorney recommended positions be created for what is needed, not for specific people.

✨ School board member Dr Nicolas agreed and reiterated.

✨A hired consultant, hired by the district stated the role titles and descriptions needed to also match the job.

✨The Commissioner of education highlighted the amount of administrative positions our district has and the amount those positions have received in raises compared to other districts.

✨When our board members state that they don’t know how many positions there are or how much executives are making and then add they don’t care, it leaves us feeling a lack of confidence in our School Board and hurts our public education.

✨We want a county that is leading Florida in teacher pay, student success, and transparency and accountability. We deserve better.

🫶Keep the conversation going, we are better together.