Incumbents are mum as familiar faces emerge in 2010 City Council race

So far, Destin has three candidates saying they’ll run for the three open seats on the Destin City Council in the 2010 election.

Councilors Kelly Windes, Jim Bagby and Sam Seevers were all elected in 2006 for a four year term, so all three seats come open. Seevers can’t run again because she’s served two terms, but she has filed to run for the mayor, the only candidate so far for that office.

Bagby told The Log he’d decide on whether to run again after talking about it with his family over Thanksgiving.

Windes said he’d “take the fifth” on his plans for now.

Here are the three candidates who have said they’ll run.

•Larry Hines, retired Air Force officer and businessman, making his first run for a council seat.

“I think the city should be focusing a little bit more on our economy,” Hines told The Log. “Part of it is national issues, part of it is local decisions being made — for example, the fishing fleet being hit with the red snapper ban and the amberjack ban.”

He said he’d like to start an aggressive campaign to build more artificial reefs close to shore.

Hines said he was also concerned about the “public benefits” required of major Destin developments, which the city is now considering requiring for slightly smaller projects as well.

“I think the public benefits the city thinks they’re getting are costing the developers more money, and don’t really provide anything to the city,” Hines said.

Currently, Hines is heading up the “unified team” of Holiday Isle owners working to find a solution to the current beach-restoration debate.

Hines is the only council candidate who’s prefiled so far.

•Cyron Marler, an electrician and maintenance technician for Legendary Inc., whose first two council terms ended in 2008.

Marler, recently widowed, told The Log that he’d promised his wife, Heidi, that “if she was still with me, I would probably not run — I wanted to spend time with her.”

Marler, who put the issue of “affordable workforce housing” on the city’s agenda a few years ago, said he felt that was “unfinished business” he’d like to take up again. “And I feel that I still have a lot to offer the city. I’m still in the blue-collar business and I still think there needs to be a blue collar presence.

•Larry Williges, retired from the Air Force and the postal service, whose first two terms ended, like Marler’s, in 2008.

“I want to continue serving the people of Destin,” Williges said. “It sounds corny as hell but that’s my price, to me, for the pleasure of living here. I still think there are things that need to be done that haven’t been done or aren’t being done.”

Williges said that the council has ceded too much authority to the staff, particularly on development decisions. “I don’t mean to nitpick and micromanage ... I want the council to get back in and do what they’re supposed to instead of relinquishing authority to staff.”

The election is set for March 9. The qualifying period is from noon Dec. 28 through noon, Dec. 31.