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In the days and weeks after a disaster like Hurricane Ian, it’s often up to local nonprofits and mental health professionals who are volunteering their time to step in and provide support for people who have been impacted. Now, for the first time ever, Florida’s State Emergency Response Team — or SERT — is supporting a program to assemble a group of mental health professionals including therapists, counselors, and massage therapists to work directly with residents and first responders who are still in the midst of recovery work.

Tim Love spent more than four decades in the world of global advertising. Since retiring in 2013, he has focused much of his attention on the way the online world operates today, and how it has been used to polarize us, and has greatly impacted mental health, particularly among young people. Love is author “Discovering Truth: How to Navigate Between Fact & Fiction in an Overwhelming Social Media World” and he’s host of a podcast called Tim Love's Discovering Truth where he interviews major players in the online and corporate world about the nature of truth and the trouble we find ourselves in.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic neurological condition where a person’s immune system attacks the protective covering of nerve fibers in their central nervous system. MS can greatly impact an individual's life, from just mobility issues making daily activities difficult, to relationships and emotional well-being. Treatment generally focuses on managing symptoms and slowing disease progression through medications, physical therapy, lifestyle modifications, and support services. The Multiple Sclerosis Center of Southwest Florida has been providing support services to people with MS since 2000 — all for free. To learn more we talk with the center’s CEO, Kay Jasso.

A natural part of living in Florida is sometimes interacting with wild animals — including Florida black bears. Wildlife officers trapped and tranquilized a black bear on Monday near downtown Fort Myers. Bears are pretty wily and mostly move around at night so most people have probably never even seen one, or even know that we have black bears in this part of Florida, let alone wandering through our neighborhoods. We talk with a bear expert with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission about bears in Florida, how they behave, and what we can do to minimize neighborhood interactions with them.

As internet use became common, communities formed in different ways. Early examples would include internet forums, or message boards. In the early 2000s a message board called 4chan was created that was anonymous by design. And posts made to it, and replies, were inherently temporary. While 4chan had message boards for all sorts of topics its anonymity combined with posts that would eventually disappear led to the emergence of an online culture that would seem strange and even extreme to many people who didn’t spend time there. Our guest grew up immersed in this online culture, and is now a researcher of it, so we thought he’d be a good person to help us understand this world a bit better as it seems to increasingly enter into mainstream culture, from media to public discourse, and the polarization it contains.

On Feb. 14, 2018 — six years ago today — a former student at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida walked into the school and opened fire on students and staff, killing 17 people and injuring 17 others. It was then, and remains today, the deadliest mass shooting at a high school in U.S. history. To mark the anniversary of that horrific day we're airing a one-hour special from Connecticut Public Radio called ‘Life after Parkland: A victim’s dad turns art to activism.’

Protests and marches continue to spread and grow across the country since the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on Memorial Day. They are happening in cities and towns in all 50 states, and in cities around the world.

Carefree Community is a lesbian neighborhood in North Fort Myers that was developed by married couple Gina Razete and Cathy Groene. Resident Sharon Rodgers has lived in the community for over twenty years, and she describes it as a sisterhood. There are still the usual spats between neighbors, but at the end of the day everyone is there for one another, and that’s what she thinks makes Carefree a special place.

Since 1970, the bird populations of North America have experienced a net loss of nearly 3 billion birds, and biologists say we are approaching "tipping points" that could fundamentally alter our ecosystems. More than one-fifth of native North American pollinators are at risk of extinction due to climate change, habitat loss, and pesticide use, including key species like monarch butterflies and various bumble bees that are declining even faster. While these large-scale problems might seem beyond the scope of what an individual can do in their own lives to help, a new campaign from Audubon Western Everglades called “Nature Where We Live” seeks to help people understand that the kinds of plants we use around our homes can make a real difference.

Just as people born under the sign of Cancer are warm, loyal, and sure to tell you where they stand, Syrah is a grape that produces a wine that feels like…