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News Archive Index
02-28-2006
Major league baseball has teamed up with Habitat for Humanity to build homes for people displaced by last year’s hurricanes. The Minnesota Twins did their part for the cause Monday pitching in to frame the walls for a new habitat home that will go up in Lehigh Acres. WGCU’s Valerie Alker reports.
02-28-2006
‘Housing’ figures to be one of the top issues for state lawmakers when they return to Tallahassee next week for the start of the annual legislative session. The state has seen a stunning run-up in real estate prices in the last few years. Southwest Florida saw its home prices increase by almost 50-percent last year alone. The hikes are squeezing the middle class who can’t afford to buy. Worsening the problem, others are getting kicked out of their rental properties that are being sold or converted to condominiums. State Representative Mike Davis says there are an unprecedented 16 bipartisan bills before lawmakers to try to address the myriad of issues. Speaking on W-G-C-U’s Gulf Coast Live, the Naples Republican said he filed one of the measures to try to help public schools, fire districts and local governments.
“[It would] provide them the ability to build affordable housing, or workforce housing more precisely, on property they already own. That would mean that we might see a school site where at on one end there would be some two-story townhouses where teachers would live.”
Collier School Superintendent Ray Baker has already proposed building apartments for teachers over existing parking lots. The state legislative session begins March 7th.
02-28-2006
Florida is synonymous with oranges. The official state beverage is orange juice. The state flower: an orange blossom. And the official fruit is, of course, an orange. The citrus industry is worth an estimated nine-billion dollars to the Florida economy. Faced with new agricultural diseases and rising land values, the state’s signature industry is feeling the squeeze. W-G-C-U’s Russell Lewis has the story.
02-28-2006
A car struck and killed an adult male panther Monday morning on Interstate 75 near M-L-K Boulevard in Fort Myers. It’s the fifth time a panther’s been killed by traffic so far this year. The Florida Panther is one of the United States’ most endangered animals…with an adult breeding population of fewer than 80 cats. Spokesman for the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission - Gary Morse - says it’s unusual for a panther to be in such a highly-populated area…
“You’re probably talking about a panther that’s been forced out of breeding territories, and he’s going to try and look for his own breeding territory. Otherwise they generally try to avoid concentrations of people that would be in that area.”
Morse says adult male panther territories are typically large, between 30 and 100 square miles. About two dozen adult panthers have radio-collars so scientists can monitor them, but this panther didn’t have one. The cat’s body will be sent to the University of Florida for analysis.
02-27-2006
Publix Supermarket customers in Miami, Orlando and Tampa will soon be able to get more than groceries at the store. The Lakeland-based supermarket chain has signed an agreement with the “Little Clinic” to open health-care clinics in some stores. The clinic operators will lease space from Publix. Supermarket spokeswoman Maria Brause says a range of services will be offered.
“It would be staffed with nurse practitioners that would be able to evaluate patients with common colds symptoms, screenings, vaccines and the ability to do physicals – and the nurse practitioners will be able to fill out prescriptions.”
Brause says the partnership is all about customer convenience – allowing shoppers to get their cold symptoms evaluated – for example – at the same time as they pick up their orange juice and tissues. The “Little Clinics” should open around the first of next year – if they’re judged successful Brause says they may eventually come to a Publix near you.
02-27-2006
Water managers joined about a hundred agricultural, environmental and business leaders Friday in Hendry County near Labelle for a groundbreaking on 2 small water storage reservoirs. The project is part of the Everglades Restoration plan – and is designed to help reduce freshwater releases from Lake Okeechobee down the Caloosahatchee River. WGCU’s Mike Kiniry prepared this report.
02-24-2006
Authorities closed Metro Parkway between Colonial and Crystal Drive until just after noon. The shutdown crippled LeeTran, the county’s public bus system, because their depot was in the cordoned-off area. As many as 4-thousand riders were left with no way to get to work. LeeTran spokeswoman Joann Haley says the closure was like a set of dominoes.
“The way that the impact kind of moves out in waves from the center of a situation whether it be an accident or a road closure.”
Investigators blocked off Metro as they searched for evidence in a fatal car shooting. Tens of thousands of motorists got trapped in the resulting parking lot traffic jam as they flooded other roads. The delay also meant a loss of money and productivity. William called into W-G-C-U’s Gulf Coast Live to say three houses didn’t get his tile deliveries.
“The homeowners are now a day behind and the general contractor now has to pay for an extra day for those houses to not be closing.”
The two-mile Metro shutdown is further proof of this region’s overtaxed roads. Planners say they’re doing what they can to make do with too many cars and not enough transportation arteries.
02-24-2006
There are somewhere between 11 and 20-Million undocumented workers in the U-S, and their numbers are steadily growing.
The proposed legislation would build a wall along the entire length of the U-S / Mexican Border – and criminalize the presence of every undocumented person in the country…now a misdemeanor. The bill’s been passed by the House, but not in the Senate.
Wendy Vasquez (BASS-kez) is vice president of the United Latino Immigrants of Florida - a newly formed group advocating for the rights of the state's illegal immigrant work force. She says the proposal would criminalize more than just the illegal aliens.
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“And also they are going to criminalize you if you are in contact with illegal aliens. If you want to help illegal aliens through organizations, through churches…any entity that’s going to help migrant workers that are illegal in this country are going to be criminalized.”
The proposed bill would also give local law enforcement the power to act as immigration officers.
Critics say illegal workers take jobs away from legal ones. But Vasquez says although there’s a shortage of field laborers in Florida – no locals are showing up to fill those jobs.
02-23-2006
The Bonita Fire department now has small, pet oxygen masks in its arsenal of tools. The special masks cover the snout of a dog or a cat. Fire-rescue spokeswoman Debbi Redfield says having the easy-to-use masks can make all the difference in a fire.
“Pets really become part of people’s families and some people even consider them as close as their children. And a lot of times pets become confused. They hide under beds. They hide under sofas. They get very scared when there is a fire instead of running out of the house. So they’re very susceptible to smoke inhalation injuries.”
Six Bonita fire trucks will each get a set of three masks. They’re different sizes for dogs with big snouts and those with flat faces.
02-23-2006
Music is listed as a core academic subject under the federal No Child Left Behind Act – but until now there’s been no unified way to measure student performance statewide.
So the Florida Music Educators’ AND the Florida School Music Associations have designed a test of general music knowledge that will soon begin pilot testing.
University of Florida music professor Timothy Brophy chaired the task force that designed the test. He spoke on WGCU’s Gulf Coast Live.
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“We’re looking at doing a statewide field test to set levels of achievement in spring of 2007 – for the 4th grade phase one test. Approximately a year after we do our initial pilot testing and we develop our final version is when we implement these statewide.”
At first only 4th graders will take the test – but plans call for similar tests for 8th and 10th graders once the kinks are worked out.
Florida joins a small, but growing number of states developing this kind of music assessment test.
02-22-2006
Collier County Elections Supervisor Jennifer Edwards helped launch the 2006 ‘Get Out the Vote’ effort in advance of this fall’s elections. Heated contests include races for governor, U-S Senate, attorney general and other state positions on the ballot. A thousand people move to Florida each day and Collier election educator Cyndi Young says the rules are different in other states. In Florida, for instance, you must register 29 days before election day.
“In some states they may have same-day registration or you can register a week in advance. But that’s just one difference here in Florida with our book closings and requirements.”
Election officials will take their message on the road soon. Every month they’ll try to increase voter registration by going to college campuses, work places, houses of worship, supermarkets and even conducting online voter registration campaigns.
02-21-2006
The walls came down yesterday at Charlotte High School in Punta Gorda – as a demolition crew finished what Hurricane Charley started. WGCU’s Valerie Alker has this report.
02-21-2006
The Florida Legislative session begins next month. One bill lawmakers will debate would create a stem cell research institute at Florida Gulf University.
The bill, filed by Senate Democrat Dave Aronberg, would establish the FGCU Institute for Stem Biology. Research would focus on adult stem cells, skirting religious and ethical issues associated with embryonic stem cells. FGCU’s director of Biotechnology, Dr. Randall Alberte, says the school has state of the art research facilities and faculty that can lead the way in establishing a niche in this emerging field.
“It turns out that when you harvest adult stem cells, they’re from cord blood cells or bone marrow, less than 10 percent is stem cells and some of the opportunity to select and harvest that community is an opportunity that is not been achieved today and we believe we can exploit some new and emerging molecular recognition tools that will allow you to grab those cells out of a mixed population and identify them.”
Alberte says FGCU would also partner with other institutions both in the private and public sectors. Senator Aronberg’s bill earmarks 32 million dollars for the stem cell research institute. It has bi-partisan support. Its House sponsor is Republican Representative Paige Kreegal of Punta Gorda who is also a medical doctor.
02-21-2006
State Senator Burt Saunders of Republican of Naples made it officials today – he’s campaigning to be Florida’s next Attorney General. WGCU’s Valerie Alker reports.
02-20-2006
A roving Florida panther that had taken livestock from a number of residences near Ochopee and Copeland in rural Collier County in the past few weeks has been removed from the wild. WGCU’s Valerie Alker reports.
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