Palm Beach County commissioners praised the work of a nonprofit that helps the homeless at a Tuesday meeting, just weeks after a commissioner threatened to pull funding for the group.
The Homeless Coalition of Palm Beach County spoke at a workshop meeting, after District 6 Commissioner and Vice Mayor Sara Baxter threatened to pull the group’s funding — a request speculated to do with Baxter’s wish to host the upcoming “Mayors' Ball” fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago, President Donald Trump’s Palm Beach residence and club.
Baxter, who is a Republican and a Trump supporter, is scheduled to become mayor in November. The mayor presides over the commission.
“ One of our board members was approached by the vice mayor, with some pretty specific details surrounding the planning of the Mayors' Ball at Mar-a-Lago,” Melissa McKinlay, the coalition’s board president, told WLRN on Tuesday. “But it is actually up to the coalition to host.”
McKinlay, a former Democratic county commissioner, said they were against it because of the greater cost to hold it at the Palm Beach club. She declined to guess why exactly Baxter sought to cut the group’s funding, but she said it came as a surprise.
“Our board was shared information that the vice mayor had approached, Mar-a-Lago, had a date on hold and an estimate of what the deposit cost would be,” according to McKinlay.
Baxter’s motion to cut $150,000 in the group’s yearly allocated funding at a September 16 budget meeting failed and instead resulted in the September 30 presentation about the coalition.
Baxter did not immediately respond to a request for comment by WLRN. She left the meeting early.
“ I had looked into it more and found out that the Homeless Coalition is not actually serving as many homeless people as we thought,” Baxter said during the September 16 meeting. “It seems like the majority of their budget goes to employees.”
The request was met with a long pause and appeared to catch fellow commissioners by surprise, who had two weeks left to approve a budget before the end of the fiscal year.
READ MORE: Homeless group at center of dispute over holding Mayors’ Ball at Mar-a-Lago
The coalition helps people transitioning out of homelessness with apartment deposits, provides cell phones to homeless individuals, helps them organize their documents and supports nonprofits related to homeless youth, to name a few initiatives.
“I have no qualms on continuing this contract,” District 2 Commissioner Gregg Weiss said during the Tuesday meeting.
District 3 Commissioner Joel Flores concurred, stating the county’s funding is a drop in the bucket in terms of the county’s overall spending.
“It’s a very small investment to what we are getting back in return,” Flores said. “From my standpoint, this is a slam dunk.”
The Palm Beach Post first reported the Mar-a-Lago connection last week.
The Post previously reported that Baxter racked up security costs in 2024 for Palm Beach deputies to provide her private security at events — several of which were at Mar-a-Lago.
