The Salt Line, Vol. 24: 800 Acres, Two Cities Pumping the Brakes, and One Slightly Longer Minute
Welcome back to The Salt Line. This week we’re doing something different: numbers. Just the numbers. The Gulf Coast generated a truly impressive spreadsheet of a news week, and I have arranged it for you the way nature intended — as an index, with commentary, so you can experience the whiplash in its purest form. Sharpen a pencil. Class is in session at the beach.
📐 Department of Long-Range Regret
Number of large-scale, long-range growth plans Escambia County has attempted in its entire history: 1
Acres the Planning Board just voted to let opt out of that one plan: 800
The vote margin: 3–2
Official condition of the county’s only long-range plan, per the local press: “on life support”
Commentary: the county made exactly one plan for the future, and the future has now filed paperwork to be excused from it. Eight hundred acres looked at two decades of careful sector planning and said, “actually, we’re good.” I want you to remember that opt-out request. It comes back later. Everything on the Gulf Coast comes back later — usually as an artificial reef.
🏗️ The Bureau of Not So Fast
Number of fast-growing Baldwin County cities that just temporarily halted some high-density housing: 2
Their names: Daphne and Fairhope
What Fairhope did to its existing pause on multifamily applications: extended it
Hear me out: this is civic news narrated best as saga. For years the cranes came, and the cities said build. And lo, in the seventh month, Daphne and Fairhope looked east and west upon the apartments, and they raised one hand each, palm out, in the ancient gesture of the school crossing guard. Not no, the elders clarified. Just whoa. And the multifamily applications sat quietly in the drawer, and the drawer was extended.
🎓 The Search Committee Will See You Now
Date the Baldwin County school board begins interviewing candidates for its next superintendent: July 14
Superintendent being replaced: Eddie Tyler, retired
Between you and me — and this stays between us — there is no job interview on Earth with higher stakes-to-air-conditioning ratio than “superintendent of a Gulf Coast county, interviewed in mid-July.” Whoever walks into that work session on the 14th in a full suit and doesn’t visibly wilt deserves the job on composure alone. That’s the whole evaluation. Hand them the keys.
⏱️ The Most Honest Rebrand in Radio
Length, in minutes, of WUWF’s daily EcoMinute segment: 1
Official description of the companion segment, EcoMinutes: “a slightly more in-depth version” of the EcoMinute
This week’s topic: plastic usage
No joke structure I could build improves on the raw fact: there is a segment called EcoMinute, and its expanded director’s cut is called EcoMinutes, and it is described — with a straight face I deeply admire — as slightly more in-depth. That is the most truthful sequel marketing in American media. Hollywood titles a second movie “MAXIMUM RECKONING.” Public radio titles it “Minutes.” Plural. Do with that extra time what you will; they’re covering plastic, and honestly, somebody should.
That’s the week, by the numbers: one plan on a ventilator, two cities doing the crossing-guard palm, one very sweaty interview room, and at least two full minutes of eco content. As promised, I’ve taken inspiration from those 800 acres and formally requested to opt out of the rest of July’s humidity. The board votes 3–2 on everything around here, so I like my odds.
— Chris
