Charter Review Committee’s 5 Slots Draw 27 Applicants With Variety of Backgrounds Except in Age

After

a slow start

, the call for applicants to Palm Coast government’s

Charter Review Committee

drew 27 candidates by the time the window closed at 5 p.m. this evening, 11 of them over the weekend. The applicants bring a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. The council wanted choices. It now has them and then some but for its pronounced boomer skew.

If there is a dearth of variety in one category, it’s age. Almost 30 percent of Palm Coast’s population is 65 and older, and getting older. That’s reflected in the applicants, whose average age is 63, and whose collective age of over 1,700 would stretch back to the dying days of the Roman Empire. In contrast, the

average age of the drafters

of the U.S. Constitution was 42. The oldest applicant for the charter committee is

David Lybarger

, a retired landscape contractor who, at 81, is the age Benjamin Franklin was in Philadelphia. Only one applicant is in his 20s, none in the 30s, one is in his 40s, which may limit the charter’s potential for a generational refresher.

Just three applicants are from District 1, the district represented by Council member Ty Miller.  More than half the applicants–14–are from District 2, represented by Theresa Pontieri, five are from District 3 (Dave Sullivan) and five from District 4 (Charles Gambaro). But there’s not that much relevance to the breakdown. Each council member and the mayor will make one appointment. It does not have to be from the council member’s district.

Sixteen applicants are registered Republican, seven Democratic and four have no party affiliation. (With a 50 percent majority, registered Republicans in Flagler County outnumber Democrats and independents combined). Palm Coast government and its charter are ostensibly non-partisan, as are most policy matters. All five council members are Republicans. While four of them would not abide his conduct in that regard, Mayor Mike Norris at the last meeting of the local Republican Party railed against Democrats allegedly still wielding influence in the city administration, signaling his intention to underscore his partisan priorities.

With one or two exceptions, the pool appears largely free of the shriller, more zealous loudmouths who, with Norris’s gavel on their side, have frequently turned public-comment segments into verbal muggings of select council members or staffers and bacchanals of conspiracy theories about the city. But this remains an era of surprises in those regards, in Palm Coast more than elsewhere in the county.

The pool of applicants includes four who have been Palm Coast residents before Palm Coast was incorporated in 1999, and one applicant,

Lupe Amith

, who claims she has been a Palm Coast resident for just one week. She moved here from Indio, a city 125 miles a little less populous than Palm Coast, where she was a five-time mayor and a member of the council.  She was also a district manager in the state legislature.

The applicants include former two-term County Commissioner Donald O’Brien, current Mosquito Control District Commissioner Michael Martin, Drainage Committee member Donna Stancel, former Planning Board member Jake Scully, former Bunnel Waste Management and Utilities Director Perry Mitrano, who is also the current chair of the Flagler County Republican Party, Karen Sousa, a 10-year employee of the Flagler County Supervisor of Elections office, and Adrian Calderin, a community development coordinator for Bunnell government and at 25, the youngest applicant by far.

The panel may discuss possibly making future elections district-specific, rather than at-large, as they all are now. Other potential discussions include expanding the council to seven members, and–a certain point of discussion–lifting borrowing limits currently imposed by the charter.

The Palm Coast City Council will appoint the committee on July 15. The city charter calls for a review of the document at least every 10 years. The council decided to move that up by a couple of years. The last review was


in 2017


. The charter is the city’s constitution, setting out governing principles in broad outlines. The review committee will hold public workshops and conclude its work with recommended amendments to the charter. The council will accept, reject or alter the proposed amendments.

The council may introduce its own amendments as well. It did so ahead of last November’s election, to eliminate a provision in the charter–unusual for most cities–that forbids Palm Coast government from borrowing more than $15 million or entering into long-term leases without a referendum. (The restriction does not apply to funds autonomous from the general fund, like the Utility Department, the garbage and stormwater funds.)

The referendum failed decisively as the city was blamed for writing it deceptively. The referendum did not explicitly state that it was repealing the public’s right to a referendum on large-scale borrowing initiatives. The proposal is very likely to be back on the ballot in one form or another.

The council is also interested in clarifying the language controlling council vacancies. The current language is poor and has demonstrably left the city vulnerable to litigation: its own mayor,


Mike Norris


, filed suit against his city, challenging the legitimacy of the appointment of Council member Charles Gambaro past last November’s election. The city considers Norris’s lawsuit “


frivolous


.”

The proposed amendments, if any, would be on the November 2026 ballot. The full pool of applicants is below. Their names are linked to their applications.

Palm Coast Charter Review 2025

Applicant	District	Occupation	Highest degree	Years in Palm Coast	Age	Party
Lupe Amith	3	Retired mayor, consultant	High School	1 week	62	Republican
Greg Blose	1	Self-employed consultant	M.B.A.	5	45	Republican
Robert Boggess	4	Retired from Volusia County government	M.B.A.	18	72	Democratic
Adrian Calderin	1	Bunnell community development coordinator	A.A.	18	25	Republican
Rich Cooper	2	Insurance executive	A.A.	33	51	Republican
Andrew Dodzik	4	Retired civil engineer	B.S.C.E.	10	77	Republican
Jeani Duarte	2	Retired nutritionist	Certificates	7	58	NPA
Ramon Giaccone	3	Contractor	High School	22	55	Republican
Denise Henry	3	Retired office manager	A.S.	11	71	NPA
Steven Ludwig	1	Speaker, retired from government services	High School	2	59	Republican
David Lybarger	2	Retired landscape contractor	High School	3	81	Democratic
Ramón Marrero	4	President of Hispanic Society	B.A.	18	65	Republican
Michael Martin	2	Retired printer	B.S.	9	75	Republican
Donna McGevna	3	Retired, self-employed training director	Certificates	8	72	Democratic
Georgianne Miller	4	Retired, Operations planner, FDOT	M.A.	10 months	64	Republican
Patrick Miller	2	Retired (government and private sector)	M.A.	18	73	NPA
Perry Mitrano	2	Auctioneer, Flagler GOP Chairman	High School	20	67	Republican
Sheri Montgomery	2	Program director/professor	Doctorate	12	67	Republican
Donald O’Brien	2	Insurance agent	M.B.A., M.P.A.	35	65	Republican
Anthony Pearson	2	Insurance executive	High School	29	65	Democratic
Chantal Preuninger	4	Hallmark salesperson	B.S.	3	67	Republican
Alberto Ritondo	2	Retired, media productions	M.A.	3	70	Democratic
Melissa Roller	2	Account manager	B.S.	18	56	Republican
Jake Scully	2	Senior data architect	High School	34	62	Democratic
Donna Stancel	3	Retired program analyst	B.S., B.A.	4	74	Democratic
Karen Sousa	2	Elections office candidate supervisor	B.A. and B.S.	24	54	Republican
Brad West	2	Data analyst/project manager	B.S.	21	53	NPA