Sarasota & Manatee Counties news thread

[wondermint2]

USF students plan another protest despite serious consequences


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkTqygdeJkk

Three people pushing for a free Palestine have been arrested at the University of South Florida’s Tampa campus and plans for another protest are underway.

[wondermint2]

Invasive South American lizard spotted in Southwest Florida


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJJIcaXmiHQ

FWC says Tegu lizards are an invasive and prohibited species in the state of Florida, on par with Iguanas and Burmese pythons.

[wondermint2]

Gulf Islands Ferry could expand to a third vessel for growing passengers


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGXOd8o4KCA

The service takes 375 passengers daily from the Bradenton Riverwalk Dock to Anna Maria Island. The initiative, a 45 minute ride takes 175 cars off congested roads.

[wondermint2]

Originally Posted by wondermint2

Mote’s Sea Turtle Patrol discovers first nest of the season in Venice (Video)

For full article & video:

https://www.newsbreak.com/venice-fl/...ason-in-venice

Mote Marine Laboratory’s Sea Turtle Patrol documented their first nest of the 2024 season on Sunday.

Sea turtle nesting season begins May 1, but it’s not unusual to see some early arrivals on Sarasota County beaches.

“Even though sea turtle nesting season isn’t officially supposed to start until May 1, we like to be prepared and patrol early to make sure we catch the first signs of nesting on our beaches,” Melissa Macksey, Senior Biologist and Conservation Manager of STCRP, said in a statement. “Our enthusiastic volunteers and interns make patrolling 35 miles of beaches possible. We could not do it without them. They are the reason we were able to catch this early nest.”

The Sea Turtle Conservation and Research Program includes over 300 volunteers who monitor 35 miles of local beaches from April 15 to October 31. They mark the nests with tape and signs indicating that it’s a sea turtle nest, reminding beachgoers that it’s illegal to disturb it.

Mote’s first nest came from a loggerhead sea turtle, which are the most common sea turtles to nest along southwest Florida beaches, followed by endangered green sea turtles and the rare Kemp’s ridleys.

Anyone who spots a sick, injured or stranded sea turtle, dolphin, or whale in Sarasota or Manatee County is asked contact Mote Marine Laboratory’s Stranding Investigations Program at (888)-345-2335. Outside of Sarasota or Manatee counties, please call the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) at (888)-404-FWCC (3922).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75U7wvVjMgk

[wondermint2]

Sarasota County Schools celebrates Educator Signing Day

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/care...7d25963a&ei=38

Sarasota County Schools proudly welcomed nine new teachers – all from the University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee’s College of Education – to its ranks on Monday.

This past semester, Sarasota County Schools hosted 71 college and university students from 11 different educational institutions. The students were placed in 25 public schools throughout the district, with placements ranging from field experiences and observations to final teaching internships. Nine students from the University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee’s College of Education completed final teaching internships – all nine students received acceptance agreements for teaching positions with Sarasota County Schools for the 2024-2025 school year.

Sarasota County Schools – for the first time – was able to pay its teaching interns, and offer a stipend to supervising teachers, courtesy of the generosity of Charles & Margery Barancik Foundation. This builds upon Sarasota County Schools’ existing partnership with Barancik Foundation to enhance efforts relating to teacher recruitment, retention, and recognition.

These nine new teachers will participate in the district’s First Year Teacher Induction program. In addition to an immersive training this summer – covering collaborative learning environments, classroom management, educational technology, and more – the new instructional hires will be matched with a mentor to help them navigate their first year on the job.

[wondermint2]

Manatee County officials discuss Jewfish Key, a new road roundabout and Gulf Islands Ferry

For full article:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/ma...ce8e1e3c&ei=15

Homeowners on Jewfish Key are pushing for de-annexation from the town of Longboat Key to circumvent restrictions on short-term rentals that limit stays to less than 30 days.

Manatee County and Longboat Key officials met Tuesday to discuss the matter, as well as plans for a new traffic roundabout, the potential expansion of the Gulf Islands Ferry Service, a learning center at Whitney Plaza, and funding for increased police presence on Greer Island.

[wondermint2]

After protest, private school in Sarasota County can keep its controversial buildings

For full article & graphic:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/af...ce8e1e3c&ei=19

A recent victory for a citizen action group battling the construction of the private K-12 school The Classical Academy proved to be short-lived, as a setback to the school’s construction was remedied almost as quickly as it was issued.

Almost three months after the Sarasota County Zoning Administrator Donna Thompson found The Classical Academy in violation of its site plan for the modular buildings on its campus, the Sarasota County Commission voted 4-1 at its April 23 meeting to reverse this designation. The commission found buildings to be “minor modifications” and therefore compliant with the intent of the school, though the zoning administration had deemed the buildings “significant modifications” that strayed from the original intent in a Feb. 28 ruling.

Commission approval allows The Classical Academy to permanently install 30 of the 54 modular classrooms it originally had on campus. The current layout includes the modulars — three buildings with 10 classrooms each — in the area of Building 1 on the site map and former Grace Community Church buildings across its 41 acres.

The issue came in the shadow of a looming legal challenge to The Classical Academy’s new campus at 8000 Bee Ridge Road. Sarasota East Enders for Responsible Development’s lawsuit contesting the special exception that allowed the school is still awaiting action in the 12th Judicial Circuit Court.

Residents of nearby neighborhoods Bee Ridge Road — some of whom live 800 feet from the school site — maintain that they weren’t aware the school would use modular buildings until they appeared on campus. Despite neighborhood workshops and county meetings where The Classical Academy was asked to identify each of the structures it planned to have on campus, neighbors say modular buildings weren’t mentioned.

Roger Zacks, a member of SEERD, said The Classical Academy’s placement of the buildings has deliberately left residents in the dark.

“This is not just a difference of opinion but an effort to obfuscate and deceive the residents,” Zacks said. “It’s nothing more than a shell game.”

Zacks and others have continually opposed the construction of the school at large and the inclusion of modular buildings. The inclusion of the buildings, opponents argue, changes the size and orientation of the total volume of buildings on campus, subsequently violating the binding site plan the county approved in July of last year.

[wondermint2]

Hospital care in Sarasota-Manatee area tied for 2nd in state in latest Leapfrog rankings

For full article:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/oth...ce8e1e3c&ei=33

Leapfrog Group ranked the quality of healthcare available in the North Port, Sarasota, Bradenton metro area in a tie for both second in the state and 13th in the country based on the percentage of A-rated hospitals in its spring 2024 hospital rankings.

The metro area ratings, released as part of the Leapfrog grades for the first time on May 1, were based on the grades of four hospitals in Sarasota County and three in Manatee County.

Sarasota Memorial Hospital’s Venice campus made its debut with an “A” grade, joining SMH Sarasota, HCA Florida Sarasota Doctors Hospital and HCA Florida Englewood Hospital as A-rated facilities in the region.

The entire Leapfrog Group assessment is available online at: https://www.hospitalsafetygrade.org.

Leapfrog Group has released grades every fall and spring since 2012. HCA Florida Englewood has received an A grade for 24 straight periods. Sarasota Memorial started participating in 2016 and has received “A” grades ever since, while HCA Florida Sarasota Doctors Hospital continued a streak of four straight “A” grades.

In Manatee County, HCA Florida Blake Hospital and Lakewood Ranch Medical Center earned “B” grades, while Manatee Memorial Hospital earned a “C” grade.

As a result, 57.1% of area hospitals earned “A” grades – tied with Jacksonville and the Harrisburg-Carlisle MSA in Pennsylvania.

[wondermint2]

Report: Sarasota-Manatee metro employs more than 30,000 people in construction industry

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/comp...ce8e1e3c&ei=34

A recent report using U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data ranked the Sarasota-Manatee metro area as having the 14th highest share of workers employed in the building industry in the country.

The yearly report from Construction Coverage highlights the building industry's impact on local economies, as construction employed 5.2% of all workers in the U.S.

In the local metro area, which stretches from North Port to Bradenton, the building industry employed 30,883 people, or about 9.6% of the total workforce, at the end of the third quarter of 2023, according to the most recent data.

That's more than 4 percentage points higher than the national average and an increase of about 7% compared to the number of construction workers in the area in 2023.

The building industry's big share of local workers should not come as a surprise, given that the region is one of the fastest growing areas in the country.

Florida metro areas that ranked ahead of Sarasota in construction industry employment included: Cape Coral-Fort Myers, with 40,332 workers and 13.9% of its workforce; Naples-Marco Island, with 20,196 workers and 12.6% of its workforce; Punta Gorda with 5,555 workers and 10.6% of its workforce and The Villages with 3,973 workers and 10.2% of its workers.

[wondermint2]

Letters to the Editor - Save examples of early African American architecture in Sarasota before it's too late

For the full column:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world...ce8e1e3c&ei=37

Preserve early examples of Black settlement

Old Sarasota is rapidly disappearing. I try to envision what Sarasota must have been like in an earlier time, when my great-grandmother lived on Goodrich Avenue in a house that no longer exists. It’s a parking lot now.

One of the few remaining examples of historical significance from that period is the Colson Hotel for Negroes, at Eighth Street and Central Avenue in the Rosemary District.

I recently went to an open house called “Moderns that Matter.” I was impressed but wondered why Sarasota does so little to honor some of the few remaining examples of Florida architecture before Paul Rudolph’s time.

Why doesn’t Sarasota make the same effort to preserve some of its earlier architecture, including the limited examples of African American life in the city, before the forced relocation to Newtown?

The Colson Hotel for Negroes is one of the few remaining examples of old Sarasota that we can honor and preserve that speaks to a time when a person of color just needed a place to lie down. Those places were few and far between in Florida.

Marilyn M. White, Sarasota