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Nearly 64 years after construction began on what was then described as "Negro housing," the low-income dwellings at Southward Village in Fort Myers' Dunbar neighborhood were demolished this week.On Wednesday morning, the workers began taking down the squat, light tropical-colored buildings. Information from the Housing Authority of the City of Fort Myers described the project as "a major step of progression for the Greater Dunbar Initiative."
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Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officials hope they are seeing decreased incidents of what are described as “erratically spinning fish” and smalltooth sawfish deaths in the Florida Keys. Gil McRae, director of the commission’s Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, told commissioners Wednesday that a decrease in incidents of spinning fish the past two weeks could be a sign “we're on the tail end of this event.”
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The South Florida Water Management District plans to conduct a 200-acre prescribed burn in the Corkscrew Regional Ecosystem Watershed (CREW) Management Area in Lee County today, Wednesday, May 1.
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Florida abortion providers and activists are girding for a law that will take effect Wednesday and prevent abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, severely limiting access to abortion for women in the state and across the Southeast.While providers rushed to see as many patients as possible before Wednesday, abortion-rights supporters also were bolstering efforts to help women travel out-of-state to obtain the procedure.
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A judge released eight of nine pro-Palestinian protesters from jail early Tuesday after their arrest on the University of Florida campus on Monday. A ninth protester, identified as a UF student, remained jailed facing a felony battery charge related to his arrest.Allan Hektor Frasheri, 20, a philosophy major from Dunedin, Florida, was accused of spitting on a campus police officer during the arrests Monday night. He was being held in lieu of a $5,000 bond. Police and state troopers arrested the nine in a move coordinated with the university administration.
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The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration will move to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug, The Associated Press has learned, a historic shift to generations of American drug policy that could have wide ripple effects across the country.The DEA’s proposal, which still must be reviewed by the White House Office of Management and Budget, would recognize the medical uses of cannabis and acknowledge it has less potential for abuse than some of the nation’s most dangerous drugs. However, it would not legalize marijuana outright for recreational use.
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The Curriculum Advisory Committee for Lee County public schools had their final meeting of this school year last evening, to vote on a contentious issue.
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Gov. Ron DeSantis stopped in Naples Tuesday to make a special announcement for the Memorial Day weekend.“ I am pleased to be able to be here today to announce, because we want as many people to be able to enjoy this as possible, that for the entire Memorial Day weekend, we are suspending all entry fees for all Florida state parks," the governor announced.Later, at another press conference, this one in Tampa, DeSantis announced that he would be signing the Freedom Summer Sales Tax Holiday, in the budget for Fiscal Year 2024-25. The Sales Tax Holiday will take place the entire month of July and will make items such as fishing supplies, outdoor recreation equipment, admissions to state parks and, museums sales tax free.
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Targeting issues about sexual orientation and gender identity, Florida joined three other states Monday in filing a federal lawsuit challenging a new Biden administration rule about sex-based discrimination in education programs.The lawsuit, filed by the attorneys general of Florida, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina and four organizations, seeks to block the rule that would help carry out Title IX, a landmark 1972 law that bars discrimination in education programs based on sex.
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