Fort Myers

After two murals of Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelenskyy were vandalized in April at the Alliance for the Arts in Fort Myers, Florida, a larger project was born. Now, an accordion of twenty 4×8 foot murals painted by local artists line the Alliances’ festival grounds. All using vivid colors - most emphasizing the yellow and blue of the Ukrainian flag.

Two murals by local artists in response to the Ukrainian refugee crisis were vandalized last month on the campus of the Alliance for the Arts in Fort Myers. The art center is reacting by commissioning 20 more murals by local artists to show solidarity for the people of Ukraine.

Dozens of people who live at the Fort Myers Yacht Basin showed up to express their concerns and have questions answered by Fort Myers City Council member Liston Bochette and City Manager Marty Lawing. They did so at a recent meeting at the basin. This follows the City of Fort Myers' request for proposal for developers to manage, lease and/or redevelop the basin. The city has had contact from five developers offering changes to the marina that include, but are not limited to, demolishing the current yacht basin and building a new marina with stores, restaurants and other buildings.

$300,000 in grant funding from the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity was approved to aid Lee County residents who were impacted by the tornadoes on January 16th. The funding was approved Wednesday at the Lee County Board of County Commissioners meeting. The funding will go towards vendors who will help repair home damages from the tornadoes.

There always has been a complicated relationship between religion and queerness. Churches like St. John the Apostle are making a concerted effort to bring LGBTQ+ people back into the fold.

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.

Baseball fans and Southwest Florida businesses are more worried than ever about the possible loss of spring training this year. Major League Baseball officially has postponed any spring training games until March 5 at the earliest.

It’s often said that to really know someone, you first have to walk a mile in their shoes. But to get to know artist Ilya Stolyar, all you have to do is view his retrospective this month at DAAS Co-Op Gallery in the Fort Myers River District.

A design by multimedia artist Cecilia Lueza that embodies the concepts of dreams, hope and civil rights will be constructed at the intersection of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Veronica S. Shoemaker Boulevards.

Lee County officials estimate about $1.1 million dollars in damages with more than one hundred mobile homes damaged and some 30 mobile homes destroyed. This was just one of a number of tornadoes that touched down across Southwest Florida on Sunday as a massive cold front moved across the state.