- November 27, 2024
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As chairwoman for both the County Commission and Economic Opportunity Advisory Council, Barbara Revels is the voice of Flagler County’s economic development efforts.
Barbara Revels
Age: 59
Family: She and her husband, Jerry, together have one son, Lloyd.
Occupation: Flagler County Board of County Commissioners and Economic Opportunity Advisory Council chairwoman; Coquina Real Estate and Construction Inc. owner
Quirky fact: While diving, she once caught a 12-pound lobster, among the largest in state history.
It could be argued that Barbara Revels will have the most thankless job in all of Flagler County in 2012.
Along with the newly formed Economic Opportunity Advisory Council, of which she is chairwoman, she is tasked with not only rebuilding Flagler’s economy, but convincing residents that government-led economic development works, and is occurring, even if they don’t directly see the results.
“Unfortunately, people are going to expect instant gratification. And to spend $400,000 a year and not be able to say, ‘Here’s 400 jobs’ — you’re not going to be well thought of. You’re not going to get kudos for anything,” she said.
Following the September dissolution of Enterprise Flagler, a group she supported and takes blame for not adequately marketing, and the $21,000 summer economic development summits, which she believes shaped future efforts, Revels recognizes past mistakes and feels Flagler has finally found the recipe for economic recovery.
The secret: teamwork, with a heaping side of transparency.
A lifetime Flagler resident, Revels graduated from Bunnell High School in its final year before burning down. Her father was a “pickup-truck builder,” one of the county’s first and only construction workers, and, today, Revels keeps an old metal sign of his hanging on the wall in her own Flagler Beach construction firm, Coquina Real Estate and Construction Inc.
She never finished college, opting instead to jump into real estate after high school. But glancing through her resume, that fact seems more indicative of her personality than of the times.
It’s like her friend of 30 years, Anne Wilson, who is also the president of the A1A Scenic & Historic Coastal Byway, said: “(Barbara) has more energy than 10 people. … She’s always antsy. Got to be doing something. Can’t just sit.”
Revels was named the new Flagler County Board of County Commission chairwoman Nov. 21, after three years of service, and she’ll run again next year when her term expires. She was one of the founding members of the local Association of Realtors, and was the first woman president of the statewide Florida Home Builders Association.
She was also on the first Flagler Beach planning board. She ran for state Legislature in 2004. And she has served on countless other boards, ranging from the Florida Agricultural Museum, to the Flagler County Chamber of Commerce & Affiliates, to positions appointed by the governor.
But none of her accomplishments, she said, seem quite as fulfilling as her work with the George Washington Carver Community Center, which she led toward a renovated re-opening and rebranding.
“When you get elected,” she said, “you think that you’re going to get (a lot of) mundane calls. … But when the Carver Gym came up, it was a great opportunity to work with people and see that there was going to be something good to come from it.”
When it’s complete, she believes it will be something for the citizens of Bunnell to be proud of, a portal through which to “reclaim” the city.
“It’s very, very easy to imagine,” she said, “that (the center) could be landscaped and lighted, and be a really nice gateway to a (better place).”
It’s exactly that attitude that Revels will need to rebrand Flagler’s economic development efforts.
As one of the few who stood behind Enterprise Flagler until its final day, Revels believes the organization’s failure lay not in its performance, but its publicity.
“We did have successes, we did have good stories,” she said. “So that is going to be my job (as EOAC chairwoman), to make sure that (everybody) has the knowledge about what’s going on.”
On the County Commission, Revels will take the same approach by requesting more frequent and detailed updates from staff and commissioners, to keep all projects public and held in a higher state of accountability.
Public engagement is a requirement of the EOAC director, she added. Transparency will help the organization to become a true community presence. In the organization, Revels will help design roles for each team leader assigned at the summit as the five “pillars” of economic development.
She envisions the Palm Coast Business Assistance Center at every EOAC meeting. She sees it representing the pillars of entrepreneurship and new talent development.
She said the chamber will conduct studies, most notably on manufacturers, measuring what resources are currently available in Flagler for prospective companies, locking in the “target industries” pillar.
The BAC, as well as county officials, have also been developing customer-service training programs, she added. And for enhanced regionalism, Revels is involved in the economic development arm to the north, JAXUSA.
“I absolutely want to reach out to the existing team leaders,” she said. “I really want them to stay engaged. I want to be looking to them for advice all along.”
But exactly how each will be involved remains an issue to be worked out with the executive director, on a case-by-case basis.
“If we can’t pull this off, if we can’t show involvement from our cities and our business community … businesses that come here will find that out,” she said. “So we need to work as a team.”
According to Bruce Page, Intracoastal Bank’s president and a 20-year colleague of Revels, one of the chairwoman’s greatest traits is her adaptability. Although she never stopped rallying for Enterprise Flagler, after it folded, she turned right around and volunteered for the EOAC, because it was best for the community.
“She’s always adapting, always evolving,” Page said. “She put (the dissolution) behind her, and she’s going forward.”
From what Revels calls the “wild and woolly” days of Flagler’s beginnings, when all a builder needed was a single permit to do basically whatever she wanted, the county has changed, and she has changed with it.
But total transformation takes time. “The pretty community we work in today was because of long-range planning,” Revels said.
Her theory behind economics is no different.
“Ten years ago, we didn’t look this way,” she said of Flagler. “That’s why people will want to come here, and that’s why a company will move here … It’s going to take a long time.”
