"On Behalf of our elected City Council, those 10 masterful men who manage our magnificent municipality; and on behalf of the chairman of our county commision and his four commissioners who constantly deal with the changing, challenging conditions of our county; and on behalf of our wonderful people who populate the Northwest Florida area, it is my privilege and pleasure as mayor to welcome you to Pensacola, the western gate to the Sunshine State, where thousands live the way millions wish they could, where the warmth of our community comes not only from God's good sunshine, but from the hearts of the people who live here. Welcome to Pensacola, America's first place city and the place where America began." -Vince Whibbs
If you have lived in Pensacola any time at all, you have heard a portion of this speech before - I'm sure. I have often thought of this speech while anticipating a hurricane to hit our beaches, and lately it has been on my mind because of the oil spill.
I don't need to say it for you to know that Mayor Vince Whibbs summed up in a few short sentences why it is great to live in Pensacola. As we all know, that beauty comes with a price sometimes. I started thinking about all the hurricanes we have recovered from - Erin and Opal in August and October of 1995 and of course, Ivan in 2004 which rocked our world in a way we had not seen. After Ivan, please show me one person that did not have a blue roof or at least have a neighbor who had one. Those are just three major hurricanes, not to mention all the category 1 or tropical storms that have brought rain and wind to our shores.
We have faced financial insecurities - who can forget when the Base Realignment and Closure project was announced? Well, if you didn't live here then or were too young to remember - this was an unsettling time in our community and I know several people that were affected by the outcome.
How about every time we read in the paper about another one of our soldiers dying somewhere overseas, or even in a training flight over the mountains of Georgia, like so recently happened. And I am certain that all of us held our breath back in April of 2007 when word came in that Blue Angel #6 had crashed in South Carolina, hoped the outcome would not be what it was, and shed tears for Lieutenant Commander Kevin Davis and his family when we were told that he had been lost. I remember looking out my window the next day and watching the Blues fly back in, right over my apartment, looking for that plane that wasn't coming - and crying. You know why? Because even if those soldiers don't start out in Pensacola, they become one of us.
Which brings me to my point...
The past few weeks have been difficult for a lot of people. The uncertainty of the oil spill situation has been like tracking a hurricane for 40 days and still not knowing what the outcome is going to be. I don't pretend to know how this will impact our community or for how long this will impact our community, but I do know this:
At the end of the day, we will be there to clean up, to rebuild, to hold hands while we cry, to support each other, and one day...we will be at the beach, watching the Blues fly - thousands living the way millions wish they could.
