On September 1, 2026, the Fernandina Beach City Commission met with Mayor James Antun absent due to illness and Vice Mayor Darron Ayscue presiding. After public comment, Commissioner Tim Poynter moved to reconsider the Commission’s August 19 vote directing staff to terminate the downtown paid-parking contract with One Parking. Commissioner Joyce Tuten seconded. After public comment on that motion and debate among the four commissioners present, the reconsideration failed 2-2. Tuten and Poynter voted yes. Genece Minshew and Ayscue voted no. The August 19 termination stands. Paid parking remains scheduled to end November 18.

On Tuesday night, with Mayor James Antun home sick and Vice Mayor Darron Ayscue in the chair, Commissioner Tim Poynter asked the City Commission to undo his own two-week-old motion to kill downtown paid parking. The motion was poorly received, deadlocked 2-2, and failed.

Vice Mayor Darron Ayscue: Before we move into the consent agenda, I do have a commissioner that wishes to address the Commission. I will turn the floor over to Commissioner Poynter.

Commissioner Tim Poynter: Thank you, Vice Mayor. It is with a heavy heart that I talk about this. At first I want to apologize to the community. I want to apologize to the city staff for all of the hard work they have done on this paid parking, and I also want to apologize to this Commission.

Last week, or a week and a half ago, whenever it was, I was a major part of asking that this be put on the agenda on an emergency basis. I also made the motion to disband paid parking. Those were wrong decisions. They were wrong decisions based off of something that Miss Foster said. I wish I hadn’t done it. I wish I wasn’t part of it.

The one thing I wish I would have done, and I wish I would have listened to, is Commissioner Tuten, who said we need more time. After that vote, the next day, and for the next week and a half, I regretted every moment of that meeting. Why? Because it was irrational. It was a knee-jerk reaction on my part, which I am terribly sorry for.

Because we proved that paid parking works. I think this was the first Commission in the history of this community that actually established a revenue stream that could go on for years without burdening the taxpayers. That’s an amazing thing. People have talked about this for years and years and years. I’ve been on commissions off and on for years. This was something we always talked about: How can we do this? We did it.

Now, since I have sat on this Commission we have righted two wrongs, in my opinion. One was the trolley, which we came back with. We got rid of the trolley. We spent $175,000 on the trolley to nowhere. This was after consideration, after the meeting, and it was brought back. The second thing was on the banking, where we brought it back for reconsideration, and I probably made the city somewhere around $300,000 because we reconsidered.

Tonight, regardless of what was said tonight, I am asking this Commission to reconsider the paid parking motion that I had made, and do exactly what was successful before: that we think about it more. We move forward with this. We tweak it. But we don’t throw away the dollars that are not on the taxpayers. These are the people who are coming here to visit, who are helping. We cannot continue to keep throwing it on the backs of the taxpayers.

So I would like to make a motion for reconsideration. And Vice Mayor, I would need a second.

Ayscue: We have a motion on the floor for reconsideration. Is there a second, before I get clarification?

Commissioner Genece Minshew: I’m not allowed to second, because I was a no.

Ayscue: Anybody can second.

Commissioner Joyce Tuten: What am I seconding?

Poynter: What I am asking for is a reconsideration of the motion that I made. The motion that I made was to instruct city staff to immediately, as time permitted, to kill paid parking. That’s what I’m asking for reconsideration. What reconsideration would mean is, if also a second and a vote, if we have three, because there’s only four of us here. If people affirm that reconsideration, paid parking remains. Can we move forward. That’s what I’m asking.

Ayscue: Okay. Thank you, Commissioner. Before we move forward I want to double-check with the City Attorney. The process here would be: we had a motion that was brought in front of this Commission the second-to-last meeting, seconded and passed. A vote for
reconsideration must be done at the next meeting. Am I correct there?

City Attorney Teresa Prince: You are correct.

Ayscue: The motion has to be made from somebody in the majority?

Prince: In the prevailing side. Seconded by any other person. It is a simple majority to reconsider that motion. That is correct under 7.4 of your rules. The other issue: if it is not advertised and on your agenda, you can, if the motion is successful, place it on the next agenda so that it can be posted. I’m looking at 7.4A. If
reconsideration of Commission action has not been posted on the Commission agenda for the meeting at which the motion for
reconsideration is made, however, actual reconsideration of the item actually must be delayed until the next voting agenda meeting after the posting requirements of the Sunshine. So if it is successful today, since it wasn’t an item on the agenda, we would place it on the next agenda to discuss it.

Ayscue: Thank you. So for everyone at home, we have a motion on the floor to reconsider by Commissioner Poynter.

Tuten: Okay. So let me reiterate that. If I second this, on the next agenda two weeks from now, we would be reconsidering this vote?

Prince: No. You would vote on whether to reconsider it tonight. But the actual act of discussing it again and making a different decision would be posted on the next agenda.

Tuten: This is actually what I wanted in the first place, that we have time to discuss that. Yes, I would love that. I’ll second.

Ayscue: We have a motion on the floor for a reconsideration of a motion from last meeting by Commissioner Poynter, seconded by Commissioner Tuten. All those in favor — or I guess, any discussion? And I’m assuming because it is a vote, we must have input.

Prince: You have public input. We have a motion and a second.

Ayscue: Open the floor for any questions of staff. Is there anybody from the audience that would like to speak on this motion?

Mac Morris, 821 Park View Place East: The real victims of paid parking are not the citizens that live here, the taxpayers. It is the downtown business owners. After last week’s decision by the City Commission to rightfully cancel the contract, I had a business owner who was afraid of losing her business crying on my shoulder. Shame on you for doing that to her and for other city business owners downtown who are afraid of losing their businesses. That’s despicable behavior. You say this is a victimless crime. No, it is not. The 51 downtown shops, they’re victims of your brutality. Shame on you for doing that. Is this a Sunshine Law violation right here, Commissioner? That should be a public comment.

Poynter: I said so much for healing.

Morris: Well that’s because you’re inflicting pain again. Now it is the business owners who will suffer if you inflict this again on them. Also, are you legally allowed to do that without a vote by the city voters? It is a city voted-on approving an ordinance. And you’re slow-walking it, which could be something that the state ethics could violate you for. The city voted, 75 percent approved it, to put the voting right on paid parking in the hands of the voters. This contract has been canceled. If you reinstate that, that’s a new contract. You might want to check on that. I love your arrogance. Thank you, sir.

Roger Martin, 1517 Atlantic Avenue: Several things can be true at the same time. The city has infrastructure needs and waterfront needs funding. We understand that. Paid parking can still be the wrong answer. And 75 percent of the voters made their position pretty clear on August 18. Yet less than two weeks later, here we are again. The next night the Commission voted 4-1 to terminate paid parking. Now at least two of the commissioners who originally voted to start paid parking then voted to terminate it, reversing themselves again. That’s reactionary, and in my opinion, irresponsible government.

Let’s stop pretending that this created a $1.5 million crisis. The latest paid parking projection was $1.1 million. $1.5 was allocated to the waterfront. The city had to fund the difference. Meanwhile Controller Susan Carlisle reported general fund revenues are $1.4 million higher year to date than this time last year. Maybe the question isn’t how we replace paid parking revenue. Maybe where can we reduce spending. I’ll have some suggestions for you on Thursday. And commissioners, Tallahassee is watching. Florida CFO has scrutinized spending here in Nassau County. I couldn’t assume Fernandina Beach is off the radar.

I have a bigger concern. How did at least two commissioners reverse themselves this quickly? Were there conversations, texts, emails, third-party discussions, discussion with staff that made their way to other commissioners? I’m not alleging Sunshine Law violations. I’m saying the circumstances warrant scrutiny, especially when one of them was out of town.

And that brings me directly to the City Attorney. Miss Prince, I would like your legal opinion on the record. The voters approved language saying the city shall not implement paid parking without majority approval, 50 percent plus one, from a public referendum of registered city voters. The Commission then voted 4-1 to terminate paid parking, and November 18 is the final day. So I have three questions. One: once terminated, does reinstatement of paid parking constitute implementing paid parking under the ordinance? Two: if so, does that legally require another referendum? Three: given this rapid reversal, would you recommend preserving and reviewing Commission communications concerning paid parking since August 19 to ensure compliance with Florida Sunshine laws? These are not rhetorical. If your opinion is the Commission can reinstate paid parking without a referendum, explain how that squares with the words that the voters approved. Seventy-five percent of the voters didn’t misunderstand the question. They throttled it. If you believe paid parking should return, make your case. Put it on the ballot and let the people decide.

Marion Phillips: Leaders lead. And when you say something, your word should mean something. As far as I’m concerned, Mr. Poynter, you made a motion. That motion carried. And it should stand, because you stand on your word. When you start going back on your word — you knew what you did that night. Every one of y’all did when you voted. That shows the people don’t have any trust in you when you do stuff like that. You mean what you say and say what you mean, and you didn’t, eventually, because that’s what you’re saying tonight. To me, in my opinion, this is not legal. We have 75 percent say no paid parking. And it said “shall.” I’m a union president. Our contract, every word matters. Shall, will, they all mean something. The citizens have spoken. We don’t want paid parking. And people who don’t live in this city — I’m going to say it one more time tonight. If you don’t live in the city limits you don’t have a say what we do in this city. You need to stay in the county, where you belong. Period. I fight for this city because I love this city. I’m from here. And I will fight to defend it. Thank you.

Sheila Cocchi, 1553 Indigo Street: Miss Phillips and I do not agree on much these days. But I would agree that words matter, and the words that were in the ballot referendum are very clear. And they were devised by a citizen who put forth this initiative. It was not vetted by an attorney, so it was just the words that they wanted, and this is what it said: “The City of Fernandina Beach shall not implement paid parking in any designated area defined as all city without majority approval, 50 plus one vote from a public referendum of registered city voters.” That’s the question that was asked. Yes or no. It does not say, do you want to eliminate paid parking? It did not say should paid parking exist or not? I know people who were so upset they were told by a current commissioner that just go ahead and vote yes, because this doesn’t take away paid parking. You’ll still have paid parking tomorrow. This just means we’ll vote on it in the future. That’s what some people who supported paid parking thought they were voting for. So yes, words do matter when they’re on the ballot. I have been saying for 18 months that the people that live in the city pay taxes here have a different burden than our local neighbors. But that didn’t seem to matter when 56 percent of money y’all raised to sue this city to recall commissioners came from outside the city. So you cannot have it both ways.

Paul Nolan, 4167 South Fletcher Avenue: I really appreciate your apology. I really appreciate you, Commission, trying to get these knuckleheads to take a pause. It is such an emotional issue. I want politicians that don’t make knee-jerk reactions. This, like
Commissioner Poynter said: hey, this is a revenue stream. I know about revenue streams. That can continue forever. I have never been to any other town that would be considered a resort destination that I didn’t have to pay parking. I didn’t think twice about it. It is about 200 to 300 percent higher than what ours is. I appreciate and hope that the commissioners will vote a majority to reconsider it. It doesn’t mean anything is going to change, but just the ability to get it back on, put it through the Sunshine laws, and let’s talk about it a little bit more. Well done, Commissioner Tuten. Thank you.

Veronica Barnes, downtown business owner: Thank you, Commissioner Poynter, for bringing this motion this evening. As a downtown business owner I personally have not seen a drop in business as the result of paid parking. My drop is result of significant other expenses like increases in my insurance. As the result of eliminating paid parking it is going to increase taxes for businesses. As a matter of fact, many of my guests have noted and anticipate paying for parking as a part of travel. I would just request the Commission vote this evening to reconsider. Thank you.

Cameron Moss, 3435 Sea Marsh Road: Words do matter. First I also want to thank Commissioner Poynter, with whom I’ve had no conversation whatsoever with this, for raising this. Because when I saw the video of that, from a continent away, I thought, oh my God, what have they done as a knee-jerk response, which I fully understand. I have been vilified from half of the people of the room because I dare to comment on the welfare of the city where I own property, where I live. I care about the welfare of the city and how it goes. The fact that I’m told, or some in the room who would say I don’t get a voice, I think that’s unfair.

This is not about the merits of paid parking. The motion has not been paid parking. Let’s hold on a second. Let’s look at the facts. Let’s go back and consider, get proper legal opinions, what is decided. How many voters thought they were voting for something different than what they voted for? I know there were many who said I just didn’t want to expand it. So there’s real substance to the concern that the referendum was worded in such a way as people were confused. And I would have to say I lay some of that on Mr. Morris and the citizens against paid parking, because they came out publicly and said it would not be retroactive, and now they say you cheated us, you lied to us. I just think that’s wrong.

Let’s focus on the facts. There are two facts that are real. People will pay for parking, and they do. I have and I will continue to in places that require it. I can choose to walk if I want. Many times I don’t. But paid parking worked. It generated revenue and continued to generate the revenue. The $1.5 is a ramp in the middle of rampant inflation and protest against the program. We’re trying to bring life into the worst of all possible circumstances to value it. So actually doing pretty well given the headwinds it has taken economically.

There’s another factor also very real, which is the city is not doing a good job — has never done a good job that I’ve seen — of making very transparent and very clear, citizen-digestible information: where the money is going, how it is being spent, and what you’re getting. What are the KPIs? Are you getting there? Is it worth the squeeze? That hasn’t happened. So I think there are two pitches. Citizens should just run paid parking and get the revenue coming in and see if it works and make it better. At the same time the city owes the residents a transparent overhaul of what’s going on. Thank you.

Ayscue: Is anyone else wishing to speak on this motion? Seeing and hearing none, we have a motion and a second on the floor. I will open the floor for debate.

Commissioner Joyce Tuten: Thank you. I second this, so obviously I’ve got to vote for it. I think our most important consideration on this vote is that we are giving public notice to this decision. This is a really big decision. I’ve gotten a lot of feedback in all directions. But to me, the most important piece of feedback is precisely what I think all of us — and probably Miss Best the most — values: that our agendas go out a week in advance. Our meetings are noticed a full year in advance. We owe the residents notice on this decision. And I think we should all vote in the affirmative to reconsider this and bring it back in a properly noticed agenda item. That’s it.

Commissioner Genece Minshew: Thank you. So I did not make a knee-jerk reaction last week. I have been wanting this vote. I have been watching the paid parking opponents spend almost $80,000 to sway this community. I fully expected the vote to go the way it did. I was told anecdotally that the paid parking opponents were prepared to take us back to court. I didn’t want to have to do that. I was tired of the debate. And I fully understand that a majority of people are willing to walk away from over $1 million a year in free revenue because they think that we are just a bunch of — I don’t know — dummies sitting up here who just put whatever we want to put in the budget. Trust me, we all have pretty sharp pencils. I have a really sharp pencil. I have gone through this new budget book. It is so transparent, and so easy to understand. You can go through it yourself and figure out what you think.

Everyone stands up here and says, well you just need to cut this and cut that. Okay, go into the budget book and tell me what it is you want to cut. Do you want to cut the $135,000 for a new school bus for the youth program? Is that what you would like me to cut? You can just raise your hands now and tell me. Do you want me to cut $457,000 for the youth programs in the city? Let’s have a raise of hands. Do you want me to cut the $355,000 that we have set aside for maybe buying Igor Alvarez from the FAA? Let’s have a raise of hands who would like me to cut that. Okay, nobody is raising their hands out here.

So don’t tell me that I do not know what I’m doing. That I have not paid attention to the budget, and I do not understand the
implications, because I do. So I am going to vote no on this motion to reconsider. Because I consider this done. And I need to get on with managing this budget, and understanding implications of Amendment 3, and getting prepared to understand what it is we’re going to do next week, what we’re going to do on Thursday, on the 15th, and after November 3. For me, paid parking is a done issue, because the community has voted. So I’m voting no tonight on the reconsideration.

Commissioner Tim Poynter: When I say it is a knee-jerk reaction, it was for me. Because 18 months of putting up with this crap, only to watch it succeed, when this community needs dollars like it has never needed before. Because of the deferred maintenance on just about everything you can point to. And we are literally — you know I hear there’ll be tons of people that come on Thursday at the budget meeting to say lower our taxes and cut, cut, cut. Well, what a great thing to be able to just sit there and say these types of things as we watch our downtown disintegrate. People were talking about the Seaside Park, that we should be spending this money and making it nice for visitors. We’ve got walkovers that are going to need to be replaced, one after one after one, at a quarter of a million dollars apiece. But we don’t want to ask anybody but just the local residents who pay taxes to continue to foot this bill. It is not reasonable.

I mean the people who visit here, they have no issues. I’m down here every day. I watch those people walk up to the sign. Do they have any issues? No. $2 an hour. They actually don’t have issues with this. They understand, just like I understand when I go into another community and I am paying for parking. I don’t begrudge the city. I look at how nice it is. I know that these dollars are going to fixing our community. This is what communities do. My last comment: paid parking does not make a town unfriendly. People in the town make the towns unfriendly.

Tuten: I completely understand that you, Commissioner, are tired of this debate. I think everything that you said is completely fair. But I really just think that as a government entity our biggest commitment is to public debate, to operating in the sunshine, to public trust. Two weeks ago we made a decision, last minute adding something to our agenda and voting on it. And right now we’re making sort of the same, in my opinion, bad decision. We are not affording public comment. The people who happened to come here tonight are about to be allowed to make public comment, but our own mayor is not even here. He’s sick and not allowed to be part of this debate. I don’t see the harm in allowing this to go to a proper discussion in two weeks. It is not necessarily going to change the vote. There won’t necessarily be any difference. One Parking has already been served with the notice that this is ending in 90 days, November 18. I just think that the other 13,000, the 13,850 who are not here tonight or listening tonight would like a voice. I think we should vote in the affirmative and put this on the agenda in two weeks.

Vice Mayor Ayscue: I don’t think that there’s a commissioner up here that doesn’t wish we could rewind the clock and do things differently. I personally wish that this had gone to a vote for or against paid parking. I personally wish this Commission had gotten up and said we’re going to put this out to the vote. I think the vote would have been a lot closer than it was had we developed the system, taken it to the community and said, do you want this?

I have no problems with paid parking. I want to go ahead and put it out there. I use it all the time. I personally don’t like it in the City of Fernandina Beach. That’s just my personal opinion and how I would vote singly. But that doesn’t mean I’m against paid parking. I use it all the time.

Here’s one of my biggest issues why this should be a voter issue. This issue has driven every single election in probably the last four to five cycles. It always comes up. It is always an issue that you have to answer correctly as a candidate. And personally, I have an issue with — if I’m a candidate for office and I go and I ask for your vote, and somebody says, well what do you stand for? I say I’m against paid parking? Okay, you’ve got my vote? Okay, that’s it? That’s the qualification?

I believe this should be in the charter. I said this should be in the charter so this issue will go away. We will never have to deal with it again. Any commission that wishes to get up here and put paid parking in, you can open the discussion. You can have the discussion and then you can put it to the referendum of the voters for them to decide, after you’ve put together a plan. That A, would be voted in, and B, couldn’t be voted out without the citizens saying we want it to go away. That’s been one of my biggest stances the whole time. This should be a vote. It should be in the charter. I’ve held that position consistently.

I wish we could go back and do a lot of this over again. I wish we could have hit the pause button. Unfortunately this thing has snowballed completely and totally out of control. I just cannot support putting this back in front of this community again, as we see the community get tore open over and over again. I didn’t make a rash decision. I think I listened to the voters. I understand what that vote meant. I understand what’s said on the referendum. It did not mean that paid parking would go away. But this Commission is the one that put paid parking in and this Commission is the one that voted to take it out. It is as simple as that.

Poynter: The Robert’s Rules of Order allows you to reconsider things, to roll back that you say. It gives us an opportunity to pause. Now you only get one, one time, one meeting. The next meeting. You can’t do it two meetings from now. And that’s what I’m asking for. A reconsideration. A more robust conversation.

I spoke to an awful lot of people over these last two weeks. They said, you know I voted yes because I was told paid parking stays. And that moving forward, if you were to want to park at the beach or something like this, that it would have to go to the voters. That’s what the vote actually says. Moving forward, and an undesignated area that we are now designating, that has to go to the voters.

A couple of wonderful things about paid parking that people tend to forget. There hasn’t been one discussion about there’s no parking, we need a parking garage. Why? Because 25 percent of the parking seems always to be available, because all of the employees are outside of the parking area. When you say 90 percent of the revenues generated from paid parking people outside of the 32034 — people could say, how could that possibly be? Well, because people would know they only have to walk one more block and it is free for them. So the people who are paying for this is the people who are coming in and saying wow, I can get a spot right in front of this store. They go in. They pay their money. They’re happy. They leave. You get turnover. The traffic in this community has been so softened so much since paid parking.

Now our businesses are down. And probably some of it is because of paid parking only because of all of the boycotting for our businesses. But in actuality the economy is down a little bit. And that’s the fact. The biggest concern for me is when the downtown starts looking ratty. And it is not up to what we want to represent ourselves as Fernandina Beachans. That’s when you need to worry. When curbs are all broken up and potholes are in the streets. And sidewalks all crooked. And plants are dead. Which is what we have right now.

This is the only way to ask other people. For 18 months I’ve asked people, any other ways to get revenues from other people, not just on the backs of this community. No one, and I repeat no one, has come with a different way. Paid parking has generated the revenues not on the backs of the community. That’s it.

So I would ask Commission to reconsider, or Vice Mayor, because I think it is an important conversation to have. It is not over. It is never going to be over. As soon as we walk away from this revenue stream the next arguments will be cut, cut, cut. And we’re going to defer this, defer this and defer this, because we don’t have the dollars to do this. We cannot cut our way into prosperity. Thank you. I won’t say any more.

Ayscue: Are there any other requests to speak from commissioners? We have a motion by Commissioner Poynter, seconded by Commissioner Tuten, to reconsider. That motion fails, 2-2.

Poynter: Vice Mayor, can I interrupt? Can either you or Miss Best read the vote? I’ve had so many people that say to me that can’t see the results. They just hear 2-2.

City Clerk Caroline Best: Commissioner Minshew and Vice Mayor voted no. Commissioner Tuten and Commissioner Poynter voted yes.

This post was prepared with AI assistance for research, fact-checking, and initial drafting. Meeting quotes are cleaned from uncorrected closed captioning and are not an official transcript.