WEST PALM MAYOR TAKES CITY ISSUES TO LEGISLATURE

For a sense of the times we live in, ask West Palm Beach Mayor Jeri Muoio what’s on her holiday wish list.

The mayor is in Tallahassee this week to lobby lawmakers for help with city priorities. West Palm might be a city of modest size, but it’s dealing with issues of national scope, from presidential security to opioid addiction and mass-murder response. The mayor’s requests reflect those concerns.

In the past three years, city spending for the overdose preventative Narcan has skyrocketed 48 percent, to the point where West Palm spends $200,000 a year for first responders to have an adequate supply, the mayor said Tuesday in an interview from the state capital. So she’s urging lawmakers to bolster state grants for Narcan.

Public safety vehicles also are a priority. The city needs a “mass casualty incident truck,” an incident command vehicle and a bigger patrol boat, she said. The three would cost $1.1 million, and the city is lobbying for $525,000 from the Legislature and would cover the remaining $575,000 itself.

The mass casualty truck is what it sounds like: a vehicle with emergency supplies and equipment for triage. “They had one in Las Vegas when they had the shooting. It was extremely helpful,” the mayor said.

The command vehicle is a mobile command post that multiple agencies can work out of during an incident, she said.

The city has a small boat for Intracoastal Waterway patrols, but it’s not big enough for all the gear needed, particularly with more trips expected by President Donald Trump to Mar-a-Lago, she said.

West Palm already has nearly $4 million coming from the feds to help pay for 10 new police officers and 15 new firefighters, and has been reimbursed for police overtime for presidential security. The city also purchased a hazmat vehicle, partly to address its responsibility for screening all mail that goes to Mar-a-Lago, Muoio added.