Destin's History highlights from 1984

In 1984, Destin became a city, Destin Water Users ran into sewer problems, work began on Emerald Coast Parkway and the Destin Charter Boat Association considered relocating to Okaloosa Island.

Since March, The Destin Log has been recapping the high points of the year of incorporation online, week by week. Here’s a synopsis of the big events and trends of 1984 in Destin.
Incorporation

Only two years after Destin residents voted against incorporation in a 1251-796 thumping, the group Citizens for Incorporation, headed by Bill McIlroy, launched a new push to turn Destin into a city. Some incorporation opponents complained that there should be a restriction against trying again so soon.

Landowners Mattie Kelly and Burney Henderson both objected to their land west of the Okaloosa/Walton County line being included;Kelly said that because the state classed the “Moreno Point” area as a barrier island zone that couldn’t be built on, it wasn’t fair to have to pay city taxes.

CFI’s solution was to exempt that area from taxes until it could be developed, but the state Senate struck that from the incorporation bill, saying it didn’t comply with Florida’s Constitution. When the incorporation bill passed the Legislature on the last day of the session, the Moreno Point land was outside the boundaries; Rep. Jim Ward said he’d had to write the boundaries into the bill, and had done it from memory.

After the bill passed, a Destin group organized to oppose incorporation, without success. Destin voted for incorporation in a 1,135-1,027 squeaker in November, 1984, after which 37 people filed to run for office in the first City Council election.

Destin charter boats consider moving west
About 95 percent of Destin’s charter fleet was “at the mercy of landowners in two or three places,” Capt. Tommy Green of the Destin Charter Boat Association said. “We have no guarantee we’ll even be here tomorrow.”

That prompted the DCBA to start looking for a docking site it could call its own. Over the course of 1984, it considered mooring under the bridge, tying up at the northeast corner of the bridge or anchoring on Okaloosa Island, just east of the Marler Bridge.

The Okaloosa Island approach drew the most interest, despite the fact that Eglin Air Force Base claimed the land was federal, not county-owned, and the Department of Environmental Regulation was concerned about the environmental impact. The DCBA decided to begin the state permit process, but nothing had been resolved by the end of the year.

The fleet also looked at relocating to the Ramada Inn area on Okaloosa Island.

Destin Water Users
Destin Water Users found itself caught between the city’s rapid growth and a growing pollution problem.

In May, 1984, DWU, which disposed of wastewater in percolation ponds, announced that it had maxed out its wastewater-treatment capacity, so it couldn’t approve new sewer tap-ons. That translated into a moratorium on new development until the utility could find a way to handle added sewage.

Consulting engineer Steve Holcomb told a state committee the utility had been blindsided by the surge of tap-ons requested by major projects: “No one could project how fast taps would go … You get projects requesting anywhere from 200 to 500 taps, and it doesn’t take many of those to eat up your capacity.”

As if that wasn’t bad enough, Kell-Aire Gardens homeowners blamed runoff from the perc ponds for an algae bloom in Lake Kell-Aire.

Then the permit for DWU’s sewage-treatment plant expired Aug. 1, leaving the plant operating under a consent order while DWU tried to satisfy DER’s concerns about pollution from the perc ponds.

One idea was floated during this period that turned out to be a success in later years: Disposing of wastewater by treating it and then using it for irrigation.

Road projects: Some started, some didn’t
At the beginning of 1984, the Florida Department of Transportation’s proposal to seven-lane U.S. 98 — three lanes either side, with a turn lane replacing the median — ran into heavy opposition from Destin residents who thought the road would become even more dangerous.

The DOT told naysayers that the plan would provide more sidewalks and synchronized traffic signals along the highway, but the opposition didn’t soften and the agency backed off the idea.

Further east, a lawsuit over the winning bid for “the new 98” — now known as Emerald Coast Parkway — threatened to delay the start of the project until 1985. The suit was settled, however, and by the end of the year, the contractor had an on-site asphalt maker set up to help lay the road.

Fire District versus Community Center
The Destin Fire District’s lease on its Stahlman Avenue station came up for renewal and for several months it looked as if the Destin Community Center, which owned the land, would demand a higher lease than the district would accept. Eventually the two sides worked out a deal they could both live with.

Taxing questions
After Okaloosa County’s cities filed a lawsuit charging that their county taxes shouldn’t be spent on roads, parks and police services in the unincorporated areas, the County Commission voted to create a Municipal Services Taxing Unit to levy taxes in the unincorporated areas to pay for those services.

Although county officials said this would add less than a dollar in taxes to a $250,000 homesteaded property, pro-incorporation CFI said that the 2-mill property-tax cap in Destin’s charter would be safer for residents than an MSTU that could go up to 10 mills.
Trouble and death

Destin faced its share of calamities in 1984: The 38-foot boat Bobbi M sank 55 miles southeast of Destin; 22-year-old John Hanna drowned when his 16-foot catamaran capsized near East Pass; diver Dennis Culpepper drowned, probably because of a problem with his diving weights; an April storm flooded a half-dozen homes in the Quail Lake subdivision; former California resident Daniel McGaugh was arrested based on a post-office wanted poster; Mary Ann Adler was arrested for shooting her husband, Deputy Walter Joel Adler; and charter Capt. Craig Griffith was charged with shooting Capt. Neil Finkel.
Growth

A 1984 condo report said sales in 1983 had risen to $145 million from $89 million in 1982.

Old Pass Lagoon
Pollution in Old Pass Lagoon, now known as Destin harbor, was a growing concern, with the Florida Department of Natural Resources suggesting the county impose a dock-building moratorium until the water quality improved. Instead, DNR decided to allow docks if the owners contributed a “net environmental benefit,” meaning they found some way to improve the environment more than they hurt it.

A local, private group began working to improve water quality by installing aerators to keep the water circulating in parts of the harbor. By the end of the year, it appeared the aerators had substantially improved water quality.

Odds and ends
In May, the Air Force made an infrared analysis of the Marler Bridge to see how heat-seeking missiles could be used to target bridges in a combat zone.

•Skip Fite caught the biggest blue marlin ever recorded in Florida, 736 pounds — up from 672 pounds —  but because Fite had help reeling the marlin in, it didn’t qualify for the record books.

•Fishing aboard Capt. David Rojas’ Shooting Star, Mike Gelston landed an 867.5 pound mako shark after a battle of more than two hours. When the shark was weighed on the dock, the block and tackle gave way.

•A state panel debated whether a Niceville-Destin bridge over Choctaw Bay was a practical option.

 •The FBI investigated after the Destin Area Chamber of Commerce received a letter sent from Los Angeles to the non-existent “Destin Mayor’s Office” that made a misspelled threat against President Reagan: “The White House will explain to you that Reagan came to be second to a dishwasher .... I will give him who practise here what they practised in Dallas against JFK.”

•10th anniversary of The Destin Log

In January, 1984, The Log listed how much had changed in Destin since 1974: Destin’s first bank opened in 1976; the Coast Guard Station opened in 1977; the first traffic light started operating in 1979; and the first major shopping center opened in 1982.