NEW SMYRNA BEACH, Fla. – A 17-second clip of New Smyrna Beach city manager Pam Brangaccio has some residents upset, including the Rev. Jeffrey Dove.
Dove said he met with city officials to ask if he could feed houseless residents at the Babe James Community Center immediately after Hurricane Irma.
"We requested from the city to allow us to use the center again to feed the citizens of New Smyrna who would be without power, especially the homeless," Dove said. "Emails went out to the city manager. I was under the impression that we had the OK to redo what we did last year."
News 6 obtained the emails that showed Dove wanted to use the facility Tuesday, Wednesday and possibly Thursday. The city manager responded saying in part, "Our intent is to have the center available as we did after Matthew, but we cannot have the Rev's Wednesday program at BJC, or the God's Bath House there, as we anticipate having children on site."
Dove said he received a text message Monday night that said he could no longer use the center Tuesday, but he showed up anyway. The city manager greeted him at the door.
In that 17-second interaction Brangaccio said to Dove, "It's not the pastor's center, it's my center."
To which the reverend responded, "It's the people's center, it ain't your center. Your name ain't on this. We pay taxes here."
"Sir, I don't think you pay you taxes," Brangaccio said to Dove.
Dove was offended by that implication and said Brangaccio should "be ashamed."
"The comments that Pam would make in regards to that being her center is hurting because that's everybody's center," Dove said.
The city manager sent out a letter apologizing for her comments and said that the center was occupied at that time, feeding 50 city maintenance workers.
"I was hot because I worked with Pam too much, and for her to say that, it blew my mind," Dove said.
Read the letter here
"We're taking this seemingly bad incident and we are going to create some good out of it," said city spokeswoman Anna Hackett. "There's already been meetings with other folks in the community that serve the homeless population. The city manager has met with them and started a preliminary plan on what we can do in the future."