Dozens of applicants, from Gulf and Franklin counties and beyond, filed through the parking lot all day long, part of a CareerSource Gulf Coast Job Fair designed to recruit qualified candidates for over 50 skilled craft, long-term positions at Eastern Shipbuilding Group’s shipyard

After a decade-long court battle between two Louisiana-based shipbuilders was finally settled a few months ago, Eastern has been the fortunate recipient of a contract to complete the work on two enormous state-of-the-art support vessels for the oil and gas industry.

On Friday afternoon, hundreds of locals gathered at the newly rebuilt facility to celebrate the progress at the marina and the progress of the community as a whole following the storm.

For two years, many drove to Tallahassee or Panama City to receive their kidney dialysis treatment three times a week. Others went more frequently than that. But on Thursday, at the ribbon cutting for the town’s brand new Fresenius Medical Center of North America dialysis facility, local officials and representatives from different healthcare agencies gathered to celebrate what they say is the end to these patients’ dilemma.

Almost two years since Gulf County’s only kidney dialysis provider shuttered their doors, a new kidney dialysis facility will be opening next month.

It has been more than four years since Hurricane Michael flattened the Port St. Joe Marina and almost as long since the community began to anticipate its reopening. The wait is finally over.

In the 30 years since Gulf County began tracking its unemployment rate, it has never posted as low as it did in April. At just 1.9 percent, there were only 104 people listed as unemployed, despite workforce numbers having returned to near pre-Covid normals.

According to Sherrie Walter, the opening of the Wewahitchka Burger King has been, so far, the largest Burger King opening in the region. “So far this has been our largest opening to date in the region,” she said, “even larger than our one in Santa Rosa County, which we just thought no one would ever beat.”

Gulf County’s unemployment rate dropped sharply in April, improving to where fewer than 1 in 50 people in the workforce are without jobs. According to data released last week by the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity, the county’s jobless rate dipped to 1.9 percent as the labor force grew by 26 workers, to a total of 5,358, and the unemployment rate dropped by four-tenths of 1 percentage point.

The seven-story high DATT, which stands for Detachable Airship from a Tethered Technology, has been years in the making. But after the successful inflation test on Tuesday, there is only about a month left until Skyborne can execute the aircraft’s final flight test.

According to Gulf Correctional Institution Warden Scott Payne, there are currently 107 available jobs at Gulf County prison facilities, including 65 jobs at the temporarily closed Gulf Forestry Camp.

UAV Corp. is opening a new division within their Gulf County operations that aims to use their existing airship technology to make space travel more accessible, the company announced on Dec. 21.

Gulf County could soon see the return of a full-service kidney dialysis center, thanks largely to a generous five-year subsidy from the county to cover start-up costs. Whether Franklin County is willing to chip in a portion of that subsidy, and what pot of money it might come out of, remains up in the air.

The Port of Port St. Joe Port Authority is one step closer to securing $15 million from Triumph to help fund a dredging project that would deepen the channel allowing ships to enter the bay.

On Friday, as a crowd of Eastern Shipbuilding shipyard workers gathered at the water’s edge to watch, the tugboat Colonel eased from its mooring at 1:55 p.m. with the Staten Island Ferry SSG Michael H. Ollis in tow, embarking on its approximately 12-day journey around Florida and up the East Coast for delivery to the New York Department of Transportation.

Standing beside a pair of freshly finished, pumpkin-orange ferries, soon to shuttle millions of New Yorkers each year between the boroughs of Manhattan and Staten Island, the ninth smallest county in Florida celebrated its good fortune Thursday morning.

Sunday’s arrival of the foreign flag ship M/V UBC Saiki in St. Joe Bay signaled the opening of the St. Joe Port to the international shipping world for the first time in over 20 years. The port reopening has for many years been the mission of husband-and-wife team Clay and Ashley Crosby, owners of Twin Rivers Company.

The fruits of seeds sowed years ago with a $6 million investment in infrastructure for a shipyard on the old mill site were sampled by Gulf County commissioners and other dignitaries on a tour Monday. Hosted by Eastern Shipbuilding President Joey D�Isernia, commissioners got an up-close and personal view of the new buildings, roadways, fencing, lighting, water lines and electrical service that populate the site, including the heavy-duty bollards necessary for mooring ships.

When thousands of New Yorkers travel to and fro between Manhattan and Staten Island in the years ahead, they won’t be thinking about Port St. Joe.

Gulf County has been awarded close to a half-million dollars in rural infrastructure dollars that will go towards completing infrastructure improvements at Costin Airport.

They broke ground last week on the first expansion of the Gulf Franklin campus in 22 years.

It’s called a DATT SA-70 semi-rigid airship, and it’s tested positive. Three months after Wewahitchka-based Skyborne Technology, Inc.’s investment arm, which owns Costin Airport in Port St. Joe, sailed through its annual inspection for manned and unmanned operations at the airport, the company has passed an essential stress test for getting its airship off the ground, and ultimately by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The rotunda of Port St. Joe’s First United Methodist Church abounded with smiles because a disaster was being healed. At a Tuesday morning ceremony, Dana Gartzke, assistant secretary of the US Department of Commerce Economic Development Administration, was the bearer of good news with his announcement that the Gulf County Board of County Commissioners will be the recipient of EDA disaster grant funds.

Woodchip shipping out of St. Joe may be a tongue twister, but it’s a welcome one. The shipping of woodchips to Honduras took a big step forward this week with the arrival of four barges of woodchips from Pensacola.

By the end of this month, they’ll be shipping wood out of Port St. Joe to Honduras, a first chip in what county leaders hope will be a big block of economic growth.

The blossoming of solar energy in Florida will sprout in Gulf County next year.

Behind the brick walls of the Industrial Park in Wewahitchka something aerial is going down.

The name of the parent company will be changing, but Wewahitchka-based Skyborne Technology, Inc. remains on track to take off this fall. Skyborne Technology Investment Properties, which owns Costin Airport in Port St. Joe, recently passed its annual inspection for manned and unmanned operations at the airport, according to a company press release.

Telecommunication issues notwithstanding, last Thursday’s meeting of the board of Triumph Gulf Coast was quite productive for Gulf Coast State College. The Triumph board finalized a grant agreement with the college for a drone “boot camp” program for exiting military personnel and their spouses in eight Northwest Florida counties.

Depending on point of view last week’s meeting of the board of Triumph Gulf Coast, Inc. was a mixed bag. For Gulf Coast State College, and its Gulf/Franklin Campus, it was a fruitful day with two projects that would be located in Gulf County moved ahead in the pipeline by the Triumph board.

The rebuilding of the Port St. Joe Marina is about to break ground. The St. Joe Company announced last week its plan to construct a dry storage facility at the marina, which the company owns.

There might be a name or logo change in the future. But Tuesday’s announcement that Skyborne Technology had been acquired by another technology company was nothing but good news for Skyborne President and CEO Mike Lawson and his aspirations for his company’s Gulf County operations.

The first step forward on a project to expand drone programs at Gulf Coast State College was taken last week by the board of Triumph Gulf Coast.

Most Florida farm producers are very good at conserving natural resources as they grow food. They know their livelihoods depend upon the land and water they manage. Michael Archibald and his employees at Deseret Cattle & Timber have a mission to preserve a substantial agricultural property for the indefinite future. They produce cattle and timber on more than 300,000 acres in various parcels located west of the Apalachicola River.

Double the graduates double the nurses while expanding opportunities is the focus of a grant recently received by Gulf Coast State College.

The long-sought expansion into Gulf County of Eastern Shipbuilding could happen before the end of the year, according to county officials.

Port St. Joe city commissioners last week approved plans by the St. Joe Company for development of the Port St. Joe Marina.

The Unmanned Safety Institute, which provides flight safety training and certification for unmanned aviation systems, or drones, announced this week it will establish the USI Center of Excellence at Gulf Coast State College’s Gulf/Franklin campus.

Skyborne Technology joined with county officials as they celebrated the company’s acquisition of the airport facility and expansion to the south end of the county of its operations.

Company and local officials are flying high over the recently announced expansion of Skyborne Technology. Skyborne and partner Unmanned Systems, Inc. (USI) will be demonstrating some of the reasons why beginning at 12 p.m. ET today at Costin Airport off Rutherford Road in Port St. Joe.

The Board of County Commissioners on Tuesday lent support to a project to build a $450 million biofuel plant in Gulf County.

Skyborne Technology, Inc. expanded its Gulf County footprint this week. The developer, designer and manufacturer of manned and unmanned aviation systems, which established its first United States facility last fall in Gulf… Mar. 14, 2019

By: Kirsten Mitchell PORT ST. JOE, Fla. - Eastern Shipbuilding continues to expand in the Panhandle bringing jobs along for the ride. This time they are headed to Gulf County to build on a piece of land that's been vacant for nearly 20 years.

Wednesday was a day the Port St. Joe Port Authority has been awaiting for years

A port, a railroad and plenty of infrastructure give Gulf County a boost in its drive to grow the economy

"From here, the Intracoastal is about 20,000 miles and you can go all the way to El Paso or all the way to Chicago. It is all about commerce." ~Capt. Jim Anderson

Gulf County's multi-year plan for spending RESTORE Act dollars has been approved by the U.S. Treasury.

Officials with the Port St. Joe Port Authority came away from a recent meeting with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers optimistic about attempts to address dredging costs.

Shipbuilding Group to add hundreds of jobs after securing largest contract in U.S. Coast Guard history

A second pot of RESTORE Act funds has suddenly become a planning priority for Gulf County officials.

A tipping point for the development of the Port of Port St. Joe appears nigh.

Chris Holley, executive director of the Gulf County Economic Development Center, describes the assets and factors that make Gulf County a unique and attractive environment for economic development.

Chris Holley, member of the Gulf Consortium - Committee of Eight Disproportionately Affected Counties, explains how "Triumph legislation" and the RESTORE Act continue to aid Florida's Gulf counties following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.