PALM CITY — Retired attorney, Pauley Kellum was a Marine First Sergeant during World War II. He spent 15 months in the hospital after being severely wounded during the liberation of Guam and was then discharged with little ceremony.

“I took the GI Bill college aid and became a lawyer,” the 89-year-old Palm City resident said. “I thought that was it.” (more…)

STUART — A Palm City man, who was driving without a license when he was involved in a fatal traffic accident in 2000, was arrested Saturday morning for driving on a suspended license.

Charles E. McComas, 24, was stopped on the west side of the Palm City Bridge about 10 a.m. Saturday, after a Martin County deputy’s radar registered his vehicle travelling at 54 mph in a 35 mph zone. (more…)

STUART — A Stuart woman was killed Thursday night as she was attempting to cross the southbound lanes of U.S. 1 in the 1700 block of Northwest Federal Highway.

Stuart police report Martha Clearwater, 42, was airlifted to Lawnwood Medical Center in Fort Pierce with severe injuries following the 7:15 p.m. accident and was pronounced dead shortly after arriving.
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PALM CITY — A 64-year-old motorcyclist died after a Toyota Tundra collided with his bike Thursday on Martin Downs Boulevard near the Florida’s Turnpike entrance, according to the Florida Highway Patrol.

Thomas M. Niebauer, of Palm City, was driving a 2005 Suzuki east on County Road 714 about 6:15 p.m. as Theresa M. Finnegan, 47, of Port St. Lucie, drove a 2008 Toyota Tundra west. (more…)

A minor league pitcher in the Baltimore Orioles farm system was charged with driving while under the influence Sunday night, according to the Martin County Sheriff’s Office.
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PALM CITY — The Palm Cove Golf Club is offering a reward for information that leads to an arrest for vandalism to its golf course.

The club has been vandalized before but never like this, said Jay Pacholczak, Palm Cove Golf Club greens superintendent, who added a $2,500 reward is being offered. (more…)

STUART — Three people were attacked by a swarm of bees on Monday that came from a hive about the size of a car engine.

“I have never experienced anything like this before in my life,” said Kendall Todd, owner of Affordable Pressure Cleaning in Palm City.

Todd and his brother were pressure cleaning Becky Engebretsen’s driveway in the 1800 block of Northwest River Point Drive, when they first started noticing some bees. After spraying the bees with water, more continued to show up until finally they were forced to take off on foot.
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A Palm City man reported he was stabbed early this morning, and detectives are now investigating the incident.

Coquina Cove resident Paul Embry, 33, told Martin County Sheriff’s detectives that he saw a teen by his vehicle at about 5:30 a.m. He said he confronted the boy and then felt what seemed like a “bee sting” in his abdomen, according to sheriff’s spokeswoman Rhonda Irons.

A relative drove Embry to the hospital for treatment. His injuries do not seem to be life-threatening, Irons said.

Detectives have not yet recovered a weapon.

PALM CITY — Hard financial times have turned tumultuous at a local church, with the pastor using a sheriff’s deputy to keep elders outside the sanctuary doors and the elders, in turn, filing suit to remove the pastor.

In the lawsuit filed Wednesday in Martin County Circuit Court, seven members of Palm City Christian Church charge Pastor Anthony “Pastor Tony” Galbicka with breach of fiduciary duty and seek a ruling “ousting” him and voiding the “improper and/or illegal” actions he took.

The suit also alleges Galbicka slandered one plaintiff, Edward Taudien, when the pastor told other church members Taudien had stolen money from the church. The suit counters that Taudien had donated more than $168,000 to the church and loaned it $200,000 to build the sanctuary at 6450 Martin Highway in western Palm City.

Galbicka could not be reached Thursday at his home in Palm City, at the church, via telephone or by e-mail.

Robert J. Watson, a Stuart attorney representing the plaintiffs, said he expects a hearing on his request for a temporary restraining order against Galbicka to be scheduled late this month or early August.

According to the lawsuit, the 80-member church “began to struggle financially” this year; at a May 28 meeting attended by Galbicka, the elders approved several spending cuts, including reducing the pastor’s salary “by a modest percentage.”

Watson said the cut was to be about 15 percent, adding the church paid Galbicka’s housing and car expenses plus $22,000 a year. Details of how to make the cut had not been worked out, he said. (more…)

When Martin County Commissioner Ed Ciampi ran for office about a year ago he heard one question over and over again: Do you want to build the Indian Street Bridge?

Ciampi, a supporter of the proposed bridge, always said yes, but with a mental shrug.

“I kind of felt, ‘Why are we talking about this? It’s never going to happen,’ ” he said.

That changed this year when a state legislative commission earmarked it for $128 million in federal stimulus dollars and the White House later reviewed the project and said it could move forward with the stimulus money. Now the construction of what some have called Florida’s Bridge to Nowhere seems imminent.

What does this mean for Martin County?

The answer, in classic Martin County fashion, depends on your stance on growth. That’s because the county is a community often polarized by questions of development, and perhaps no other road project has been as divisive as the Indian Street Bridge.

The bridge, which would provide a second span across the South Fork of the St. Lucie River between Palm City and Stuart, has been planned for decades. And it has been argued about for just as long.

Supporters of the project, which include four of five county commissioners, say the second bridge will alleviate traffic congestion in and out of Palm City, provide faster access to Martin Memorial Medical Center in Stuart, and ease economic pain in the region by creating more than 3,500 jobs during its estimated three-year construction.

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