Congressman Ron DeSantis will be in St Augustine tomorrow morning for a coffee meeting with constituents and Historic City News readers are invited to attend at 11:00 a.m. at City Coffee Company located at 1280 Ponce de Leon Boulevard in St Augustine.

Eric Doten, chairman of the Arts, Culture, and Heritage Funding Panel, announced to Historic City News that four more applicants will be recommended for funding from the local option tourist development tax when the Tourist Development Council holds its re-scheduled business meeting on Monday, August 26, 2013.

Paul Williamson announced to Historic City News that the members of the St Augustine City Commission will convene in a workshop this Thursday to review the proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2013-14 in an informal format.

Last week the State Board of Administration released investment performance figures to Historic City News for Fiscal Year 2012-2013 showing that the Florida Retirement System Defined Benefit plan earned a 13.12% return — beating its benchmark by 111 basis points.

The Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen and the Florida AFL-CIO filed a lawsuit yesterday to overturn a Florida Department of Transportation decision to award a bid for work on SunRail, the commuter line in central Florida, to a contractor they believe is unqualified for the project.

Historic City News in St Augustine has received the signed agreement between the City and Tennessee concert promoter, AC Entertainment, Inc., to rent Francis Field, “Event Premises”, and adjacent property, “Supplemental Premises”, for the Gentlemen of the Road Stopover beginning September 13, and concluding September 14, 2013.

Within the next two-week period, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection is required to complete an assessment of state-owned lands in order to identify up to $50 million worth that could be sold to the public to raise money to fund the purchase up to $70 million of “conservation land”, allocated in the 2013-14 budget.

Dissatisfaction with a subjective process, allegedly rife with favoritism, has focused increasing attention on how St Johns County awards grants from the millions of dollars in bed tax money to certain non-profit organizations that provide programming and events of a cultural, artistic, or heritage nature.