Cast members of Respect: A Musical Journey of Women toss their cowgirl hats in the air at the conclusion of a dress rehearsal last month. Rachel O’Hara is fourth from left. They all wore clear plastic masks to limit the potential of spreading COVID-19. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Rachel O’Hara

Being born in Delray Beach and raised there for almost 13 years was something truly special. Besides living near the beach and enjoying beautiful weather year-round, I was lucky enough to be involved in community theater.
When the acting bug bit me around the age of 7, my mother looked for places where kids like me could get involved in theater. I spent the next six years being in shows at Little Palm Family Theatre in Boca Raton. My weeknights were for rehearsals and my weekends were for performing.
I couldn’t have been happier.
When one of my theater friends mentioned going to classes with other kids at the Delray Beach Playhouse, I asked my mom if I could go, too. Those days were filled with theater games, vocal warm-ups and plenty of improv.
I moved back to the area in 2017 to be the communications associate at Gulf Stream School, after I had been living in Sarasota and working for the Herald-Tribune. Lucky for me, our music teacher, Toni Stamos, remembered me from my days at the playhouse and encouraged me to try out for Annie Get Your Gun that fall.
It had been a decade since I’d been involved with community theater and it felt so good to be performing again.
Here we are in 2022 and I’m in my third production — Respect: A Musical Journey of Women — at the Delray Beach Playhouse and my fourth production since I got back home. We are an ensemble cast and our characters/roles/attitudes change with whatever song/scene we are in. I go from being Betty Boop for one song to a member of the USO to a young woman working in a factory during the war.

ABOVE: Fast forward to this season. Rachel took a selfie of the Musical Journey of Women cast members after they read through the script for the first time at The Black Box. The majority of the cast is here in front of a mirror. Omicron had not arrived yet and they felt safe with everyone vaccinated and boosted. RIGHT: Rachel O’Hara as Piglet in The House at Pooh Corner at Little Palm Family Theatre. Her first big role! Photos provided by Rachel O’Hara

My other passion, photojournalism, stays alive thanks to freelance assignments for The Coastal Star.
When Editor Mary Kate Leming saw my Facebook post about getting back into theater after two long, pandemic-filled years, she asked me to keep a journal of how the rehearsal process was going. Is it the same as it was before the coronavirus? No. Has omicron come in and really stressed us all out? For sure.
But is it possible to get creative and talented people together again to create something beautiful for the stage? Yes, it is.
And you know what? I’m just as excited about returning to the stage as I was when I started at age 7. 
Here are some excerpts from my journal.

Dec. 6: Doing a rehearsal in person and preparing to get back on stage again feels so exciting and I’m a little giddy. It’s great to see some familiar faces, but I’m having a fun time getting to know the people I’ve never met before as well.
The whole show, from director to cast to stagehands and even the band, is made up almost entirely of women. The show tells the history of women through music. That can be pretty raw at times and there is a lot of history worked in throughout the dialogue.
Many of these songs are ones that our parents and grandparents grew up with, so we need to make sure we really get up there and perform them as authentically as we can. 

Dec. 7: Today is the first music rehearsal. Karen Nagy, the musical director, went through an extensive warm-up with us, which felt really good. I can’t remember the last time I warmed up my vocal cords and body in preparation to sing. We did some cool harmony exercises and did Do, Re, Mi in a round. It sounded awesome!
When I tell people I go to rehearsal from 7:30 to 10 at night and don’t get paid, some look at me like I’m insane. But there is a reason we all do it. We love it. 

Dec. 9: We got to work in the Children’s Theatre tonight. There is a lot more room for us to spread out and that always makes me feel a bit safer, especially since we are singing a lot! We recorded ourselves tonight for our director Suzanne Dunn to pass along to Jeannie Krouch, the choreographer, so she can get us ready to start moving and grooving. Better get out my character shoes and start stretching!
Unfortunately, we won’t have rehearsal tomorrow because one of our castmates has tested positive for the coronavirus. She’s fully vaccinated and doing OK, but I feel terrible that she has gotten sick.
I think that’s everyone’s biggest fear with going back to doing live theater. Hopefully, this will be our only case throughout the rehearsal process and the run of the show. This show means too much to all of us already to be derailed by the pandemic.

Dec. 28: I’m back to rehearsal after being away for a week to see my family back in Cleveland. We continue to practice everything while masked.

Jan. 5: Finally! It’s 2022 and we are having our first full cast rehearsal in I don’t know how long and I am so happy to see everyone again. We have all been working hard on our own time on our songs, lines and choreography. But it just isn’t the same as being able to be all together in the same room.

Jan. 15: Today was our big Saturday rehearsal! Five hours of working on blocking, choreography and singing on the stage. Five hours sounds like a lot, but I swear it flew by. We also got to meet the band. Spensyr, Sara and I stayed a bit later to listen to them practice and they sound great.

Jan. 18: Tonight we reviewed trouble spots that we encountered during what Suzanne referred to as our first “stumble-through” on the stage the night before. I cannot believe that in nine days we will be performing for a live audience! I am extremely nervous and excited to be in front of a live audience again.

Jan. 27: WE DID IT! Tonight’s Family & Friends performance was so much better than I could have ever imagined. Having a supportive audience filled with friends and family for everyone in the cast gave us all so much energy and I don't think any of us ever stopped smiling. This cast has been a dream to work with and everyone is so talented, yet humble, and seeing us all come together and give such an amazing performance had me smiling from ear to ear all night long.
There are women in this cast that have only performed once or twice in a show and women who have been in national Broadway tours of iconic shows. Where else can you find a cast like that? Only in the wonderful world of community theater. I cannot wait to perform with this amazing group of women for the next three weeks. I know that when we close the show, I will be sad but also so grateful for the new friendships and the opportunity to have gotten back to being on stage again.
I hope that those who come to the show enjoy not only the performance but the feeling of joy about being able to attend live theater again.

If You Go
What: Respect: A Musical Journey of Women
When: Through Feb. 13
Where: Delray Beach Playhouse, 950 NW Ninth Street
Tickets: $38
Info: 561-272-1281 or https://delraybeachplayhouse.com

The exterior makes the Big Red Bus a rolling billboard to promote blood donations. Photo provided

By Joyce Reingold

In January, a month traditionally earmarked for encouraging blood drives and donations, the messaging took an urgent turn: The U.S. was experiencing a blood supply crisis, the worst shortage in more than a decade.
“In recent weeks, blood centers across the country have reported less than a one-day’s supply of blood of certain critical blood types — a dangerously low level,” the Red Cross said in a statement made with the Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies and America’s Blood Centers. “If the nation’s blood supply does not stabilize soon, lifesaving blood may not be available for some patients when it is needed.”
While maintaining a steady blood supply is always challenging, experts say the coronavirus pandemic has delivered a series of devastating blows to collection efforts, which they are working hard to counteract.
“The pandemic upended the traditional venues for blood drives and there’s no indication when, or if, it’s going to go back to what it used to be,” said Susan Forbes, senior vice president of corporate communications and public relations for OneBlood, the nonprofit organization that collects and distributes blood throughout Florida and in other parts of the Southeast.
“The new normal does not bring donors to the traditional places for blood drives, and that’s an issue when it comes to collecting blood.”
OneBlood’s familiar Big Red Bus fleet is mobilized but, with so many people still working from home, fewer businesses are hosting blood drives. High school and college events, which have accounted for 20% of OneBlood’s collections, have slowed, too. “So, then you have a surge in cases of COVID,” Forbes said. “You put all this stuff together and you can see how that is constantly impacting the blood supply.”

Trying to meet demand
Supply levels fluctuate, but the needs remain. People with sickle cell disease, cancer and leukemia rely on regular blood transfusions. A person injured in a car accident could require up to 100 pints of blood.
“Blood and platelets cannot be manufactured,” the Red Cross says. “They can only come from volunteer donors.”
And that’s the challenge and miracle of the blood supply. In a normal year in the United States, about 6.8 million people volunteer to donate blood.
The Red Cross doesn’t collect blood in Florida, but it does work with local hospitals and organizations like OneBlood to host drives, said Siara Campbell, regional communications director for the South Florida region of the Red Cross.
“During this blood crisis, it’s critical that we come together and roll up a sleeve to help ensure people in our communities receive the care they need,” she said.

A call for change
After the January announcement, the Human Rights Campaign renewed its call for the Food and Drug Administration to remove blanket restrictions on sexually active gay and bisexual men. The FDA is responsible for most of the eligibility rules governing blood donations. One study showed that removing this restriction could increase the annual blood supply up to 4%.
In 1983, during the AIDS epidemic, the FDA implemented a lifetime ban on blood donations from men who’d had sex with other men since 1977. In 2015, the FDA replaced the ban with a one-year period of abstinence and in 2020, to three months. The HRC supports a donation policy that is based on individual risk assessment rather than “membership in a group.” The FDA continues to study the issue.
“The FDA remains committed to considering alternatives to time-based deferral by generating the scientific evidence that is intended to support an individual-risk-assessment-based blood-donor questionnaire,” the FDA has said in a statement to media outlets.
To service the more than 250 hospitals in its footprint, OneBlood needs to collect more than 2,500 units of blood a day. What will it take to shore up the blood supply?
“We need a sustained donor response from the community, from people who are eligible to donate to step forward, do it each time they are eligible, and make it a habit. That will help ensure a ready blood supply,” OneBlood’s Forbes said. “Another thing is to encourage the community to host drives, and to get creative with it because we can roll that Big Red Bus up to just about anywhere.”
OneBlood offers donors incentives like promotional items, tickets and gift cards.
Prospective donors can learn more about types of donations and eligibility, find a collection location, and schedule an appointment by visiting OneBlood.org or calling 888-936-6283. OneBlood has centers in Lantana, Delray Beach and Boca Raton.

Joyce Reingold writes about health and healthy living. Send column ideas to joyce.reingold@yahoo.com.

By Christine Davis

Baptist Health, which owns Boca Raton Regional Hospital and the Bethesda hospitals in Boynton Beach, reported encouraging news on the coronavirus in late January.
As of Jan. 26, Baptist Health said it had 424 patients with COVID-19 hospitalized across its South Florida entities. This represented a 48% decline from that of two weeks earlier.
The hospital adjusts visitor guidelines as necessary. Those guidelines can be found at https://baptisthealth-coronavirus.com/patients-and-visitors/visitor-guidelines.
JFK Medical Center in Atlantis reported:
“At this time, we have the bed capacity, equipment and resources needed to care for our community safely and effectively. We continue to monitor the situation closely and respond accordingly with appropriate resources to support changes in patient care demands.
“The majority of COVID-19 patients being treated in our hospitals are unvaccinated. We strongly encourage people in our area to get the vaccine and booster shot if they’re eligible.”

***

JFK Medical Center Main and North campuses named Dr. Alex Paya as chief medical officer in January. Paya joins JFK Medical Center from Palms West Hospital, where he served as chief medical officer.
He joined HCA Healthcare in 2018 as chief medical officer of the previous University Hospital (now HCA Florida Woodmont Hospital) and Plantation General Hospital.
He earned his bachelor’s degree from Florida International University, cum laude, before pursuing his doctor of osteopathy at Nova Southern University.
Paya did his clinical training at Shands Medical Center and is board certified in internal medicine. He also holds a master’s degree in health care administration from the University of North Carolina.

***

Delray Medical Center offers the new Ensite X EP System for cardiovascular EP procedures. This technology uses HD images to collect data to give accurate and linear visualization for physicians to map out any area of the heart. Electrophysiologist Dr. Yoel Vivas was the first physician in the county to use this new system at the hospital, according to a news release.
Vivas is also the founder of the Arrhythmia Center of South Florida. Learn more at https://vivasmd.com.

***

Florida Atlantic University’s College of Engineering and Computer Sciences with Schmidt College of Medicine received a three-year, $1.3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health for an automated HIV self-testing assay. Another $1.3 million could be awarded after a review of the progress made in phase one.
With this grant, researchers are aiming to further develop an affordable, disposable self-testing HIV-1 chip that can selectively detect HIV from whole blood samples.
The chip can be highly sensitive to detect HIV during the acute infection, treatment and viral rebound and be rapid within 40 minutes. It’s highly stable without requiring refrigeration and provides fully automated sample-in/answer-out analyses. 
Waseem Asghar, Ph.D., principal investigator and an associate professor at the College of Engineering and Computer Sciences, is developing this technology with Massimo Caputi, Ph.D., a professor of biomedical science in FAU’s Schmidt College of Medicine.
Collaborators of the NIH grant include the University of Virginia and University of Pennsylvania.

***

After training with Dr. Richard E. Busch III, author of Surgery Not Included, Dr. Timothy Kehrig, of Kehrig Family Chiropractic, offers Busch’s DRS protocol, a noninvasive treatment to relieve chronic neck and back pain. The program combines treatments that include spinal decompression, exercise and vitamins.
Kehrig Family Chiropractic is at 1815 S. Federal Highway, Boynton Beach.
For more info, visit www.chiropractorboynton.com/drs-protocol or call 561-737-7787.

Rabbi Shmuel Biston and his wife, Sarah Biston, are co-directors of Chabad of East Delray. It holds services at its synagogue at 10 SE First Ave., on the ground floor. Photo provided

By Janis Fontaine

A “rabbi with a gun” sounds like the punchline of a bad joke.
But nobody was laughing after a homeless man took four people hostage at Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville, Texas, just weeks after he arrived in the United States.
“That’s the reason we have TSA-level security,” said Rabbi Shmuel “Shmuli” Biston of Chabad of East Delray. It’s the reason he practices at the gun range and keeps his skills sharp through ongoing training. It’s part of his commitment to keep his congregants and family safe.
Biston wants people bowing their heads in prayer to be as worry-free as possible, and if that means he puts on a gun along with his yarmulke, he’ll do it. Worship is a place for unburdening, and people should — like students in school — feel safe there.
The irony is unrelenting.
So, if not rabbis with guns, what then? The rabbi and congregants involved in Colleyville had all undergone significant counter-violence training. It even has its own name: active shooter training.
“After Shabbat on Saturday, my phone was blowing up,” Biston said, recalling the events of Jan. 15. Members of his flock were calling for reassurance. “They wanted to know if we were ready. People were shocked, frustrated, angry, scared, every emotion you can imagine.”
As Biston prepared his remarks for Shabbat after the situation ended with the hostages freed, he wanted to remind his congregation “to be cautious but proud. Don’t be scared to wear your yarmulke. We must be proud of our heritage and work to break down misinformation. We have to talk about it again and again.”
Biston, the father of two and the son of a rabbi, has made peace with the reality of hate.
“I find a positive spin. Certain people hate us, but much of that is ignorance. And the answer is education.”
He doesn’t dwell on it and he finds respite in sports and depends on his quirky sense of humor to get him through.
The outcome in Texas was largely possible because the people involved were prepared and had discussed what to do.
“Fifteen or 20 people reached out and asked, ‘what are we doing?’” Biston said of his congregants. He reassured them, but he also plans to add emergency first aid to the roster of active-shooter training courses.
In reality, first aid means learning how to prevent someone from bleeding to death from a gunshot or stab wound.
At home, the rabbi has a high-tech alarm system and he keeps his gun locked in a safe but accessible. He’s learned to handle the stress of being on alert 24/7. “I’m used to it,” Biston said. “I’m a public figure. My address is out there.”
Biston says he’s faced hatred and discrimination his whole life (“I was egged,” he says casually) and has “thick skin.”
Biston, who says he is “pro sensible gun control,” has one or two other trusted members quietly armed at Shabbat events. All have training. “I want to be safe. But I say, ‘Don’t cower in fear. Spread goodness. Only light can dispel darkness.’”
That’s an irony as Biston sees it: The man in Colleyville was “obviously homeless and disturbed, not Jewish, but the rabbi brought him in and welcomed him.” The Dallas Morning News reported that Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker, one of the hostages, invited the man in out of the cold and made him a cup of tea before the service began.
Who welcomes an attacker into the synagogue with kindness and compassion?
In East Delray, a rabbi with a gun. Just in case.

Janis Fontaine writes about people of faith, their congregations, causes and community events. Contact her at fontaine423@outlook.com

By Janis Fontaine

After going virtual in 2021 because of the pandemic, First Presbyterian Church’s annual Step-Above Rummage Sale returns as an in-person event from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Feb. 10-13 at the church at 33 Gleason St., Delray Beach.
Linda Prior says the church was overwhelmed after just the first day accepting donations. “People just collected stuff since we didn’t have a sale last year,” she said.
Shoppers will find more bargains than ever before, including artwork and decor, clothes and $3 shoes for men and women, books and toys, crafts and sporting goods, electronics and tools.
Most folks know about the women of Holly House, who host a holiday bazaar each year. The Holly House ladies will have jewelry, purses, accessories, lamps and art at bargain prices for the rummage sale.
The sale contradicts its name because rummage tends to imply messy, unorganized mystery wares, and this sale is super-organized: Clothes are sorted and hung on racks just like at a department store. Shoes are organized by size.
There’s a linen department with bedding, towels, table coverings, and decorative pillows. The housewares department has tableware, cookware, and small appliances. The church even has sales specialists on hand to help.
Cash and checks only. Call 561-276-6338; https://firstdelray.com/upcoming-events.

East Delray rabbi, wife welcome second child
Rabbi Shmuel Biston and his wife, Sarah, welcomed their second child, a son, Mordechai, on Dec. 21. The baby, named for Sarah’s grandfather, likely will be called Motty. The baby, originally due Jan. 3, came early, in time for the 2021 child tax credit, Biston joked.
Mordechai joins big brother Yehudeh, 3, who was named for the rabbi’s father. The Bistons are co-directors of Chabad of East Delray, which has a vibrant Young Professionals group.
Shmuel said that everyone is happy and healthy, but tired. “It’s a good stress,” he said.

Jewish film nights at South Palm Chabad
Chabad of South Palm Beach is hosting a “Hollywood Goes Jewish” festival featuring three more films, shown at 7 p.m. select Wednesdays at the Chabad, 224 S. Ocean Blvd., Manalapan. Each film features an introduction and is followed by a discussion moderated by Abraham Serfaty. The January film was Woman In Gold. Upcoming films are:
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis — Feb. 9.
Varian’s War — Feb. 23.
The Diary of Anne Frank — March 9.

Wedding anniversary Mass scheduled at St. Jude
Catholic couples celebrating 25, 40, 50 or more years of marriage in 2022 are invited to participate in the celebration of the 38th annual anniversary Mass at 10:30 a.m. Feb. 19 at St. Jude Catholic Church in Boca Raton. The Most Rev. Gerald M. Barbarito, bishop of Palm Beach, will preside.
Cake, coffee and punch will be served in the parish hall after Mass. Register by Feb. 7 at the parish office, 21689 Toledo Road, or call 561-392-8172.

St. Vincent cancels festival because of roadwork
The annual St. Vincent Ferrer Catholic Church Festival, held in Delray Beach at the end of February for more than 50 years, has been canceled this year because of road construction on George Bush Boulevard. But a mini festival is planned for later in the year. Check https://stvincentferrer.com for updates.

Christmas party a success in Belle Glade
The First Haitian Baptist Church in Belle Glade held its annual Christmas Party on Dec. 19 with support from the Sovereign Order of St. John of Jerusalem, Knights Hospitaller, Palm Beach Commandery, St. Vincent Ferrer Catholic Church with its Care Ministry, Creative Waves Foundation, and In Jacob’s Shoes Foundation.
The church, at 200 SW Ave. B, hosted local children who received gifts, gift cards, socks and shoes. Festive refreshments were served. 
 
Boca Raton rabbi named to education council
Senior Rabbi David Steinhardt of B’nai Torah Congregation in Boca Raton has been named to the Melton School of Jewish Learning’s Rabbinic Council, the largest pluralistic adult Jewish education network.
Steinhardt has served for more than 20 years and been a leader in the synagogue’s growth. B’nai Torah has the largest conservative membership in Southeast Florida, with more than 1,300 families. Visit https://btcboca.org.

FAU student Chase Donaghy enjoyed an afternoon of surfing at Red Reef Park. Tao Woolfe/The Coastal Star

By Tao Woolfe

Boca Raton’s Red Reef Park is a busy place in the late afternoon as beachgoers scoop up kids, towels and folding chairs for the trek back to the parking lot.
Walkers and bikers take final laps along tree-covered trails, and feral cats seem to loom suddenly in the lengthening shadows.
On this particular crisp, windy Friday, the only people in the ocean are surfers enjoying the unusually active waves.
Among them is Chase Donaghy, looking cold and wet but happy afterward.
“The surfing here is hit or miss, but today it’s good,” he says, resting his turquoise surfboard against a guardrail. “I caught a couple of high tide breakers coming in.”
Donaghy, a business major at Florida Atlantic University, says he comes often to play in the ocean.
Connie Riecks lives a couple of blocks away. She, too, is a regular who has been walking Red Reef Park’s tree-covered trails for 20 years.
“I come in the evening when it’s quiet,” she says. “I enjoy the ocean, the nature, the cats, and private time away from everybody.”
Red Reef is a 39.7-acre beachside sanctuary set aside by voters who did not want ocean access cut off by a wall of high-rises.
Thanks to a series of bond issues from the late 1960s to the mid-’70s, Boca Raton purchased and set aside more than 100 acres of beachfront green space — which, besides Red Reef, includes Spanish River and South Beach parks.
Red Reef is prized by residents and tourists for its snorkeling and fishing. The artificial reef is home to such species as parrotfish and sergeant major, silver porgy, snapper and great barracuda.
Donaghy, an Orlando native who grew up surfing at New Smyrna Beach, says that on some days he finds Red Reef’s fish population disappointing.
“I snorkel here, too, and it’s pretty good, but I think there’s better wildlife further south towards Lauderdale,” he says.
That wasn’t always the case, says Ann Crawford Gregory, a Lynn University marine biology teacher. Back in the days before beach widening changed the landscape, the reef was teeming with fish and invertebrates, she says.
“I used to bring my students to this park and the reef was right here. You could put a mask on, put your face into the water and see angel fish and clown fish everywhere.
“Now the reef is covered up by sand,” says Gregory, who on this evening is watching the sunset with her husband, Dale Gregory.
The city of Boca Raton is working to restore the reef to its former glory.
Last fall the city completed a reef restoration project that added 15 limestone boulders (or “modules”) to the existing six artificial reef modules placed years ago at the south end of the park.
Once colonized, the new reef is expected to attract more fish species, sponges, urchins and crabs, city officials say.

Landlubbers welcome
For people not into ocean activities, the park offers other attractions.
Picnic tables and grills are scattered throughout a 3-acre forest of sea grapes, banyans and palms. The park has a nine-hole golf course, a playground for children and a boardwalk designed to allow people of all mobility levels the grace of an ocean view.
Across State Road A1A is Gumbo Limbo Nature Center, which is considered a part of Red Reef Park. Visitors can see marine life exhibits, including the nature center’s extensive turtle rescue operation.
Boca Raton residents Alan and Sherrie Wade enjoy walking the entire length of the contiguous seaside open space from Spanish River Boulevard to Palmetto Park Road. This afternoon they are scaling a favorite bluff at Red Reef to look at the whitecaps and appreciate the wisdom of conservation.
“Preserving such a huge chunk of land was a visionary move by the city,” Alan Wade says. “We absolutely love it here.”

If You Go
Red Reef Park is at 1400 N. Ocean Blvd., Boca Raton.
Open 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily.
Pets are not permitted.
Cost of parking for a day is $25 for a passenger car, $65 for a larger vehicle. Free for residents with a permit.
Alcoholic beverages are not allowed in the park.
Visitors are not permitted to feed the wildlife.
For more information, call 561-393-7815 or visit www.myboca.us and locate Recreation Services, then Parks.

Willie Howard is taking some time off but will return soon.

Ocean Ridge Garden Club member Barbara Cook’s garden includes a collection of statues. Photo provided

This is the second in a series on five local garden clubs.

By Jan Engoren

The Ocean Ridge Garden Club, founded in 1966 and still going strong, is the only service club located in Ocean Ridge.
The club’s wide-ranging mission is to preserve the natural landscape, educate members in gardening, horticulture, floral design and garden-related art, plus civic outreach and beautification and environmental awareness.
“Garden clubs are a great way to get to know your neighbors,” says President Mary Ann Cody, a former attorney from Albany, New York, who joined the club when she retired and moved to Ocean Ridge five years ago.
“Moving to Ocean Ridge has changed my life,” Cody says. “Garden clubs are not so much about floral decoration anymore, but for us, more about environmentalism, keeping the oceans plastic-free and preserving our dunes.”
In partnership with the town of Ocean Ridge and the city of Boynton Beach, the club will hold its community engagement day on April 2. The Save the Seas event is designed to raise awareness about plastic waste in the oceans and typically includes a beach cleanup, educational sessions and family friendly activities, all of which were postponed last year due to the pandemic.
Another highlight is Roses and Chocolates, an annual fundraiser ahead of Valentine’s Day. It runs online through Feb. 8 this year, with pickup Feb. 13. The club sells roses along with hand-dipped chocolates from Scheurer’s Chocolate, a family-owned business on East Ocean Avenue in Boynton Beach.
Cody, whose mother was also a member of the club, says that “the trend among garden clubs is to become more environmentally conscious and focused.”
As part of its mission, the club maintains a public portion of the dunes along Old Ocean Boulevard and has authored two books. One is about native trees, Ocean Ridge Garden Club Tree Booklet, and the second, A Gardening Guide for Living on the Barrier Island, was printed in English, Spanish and Creole.
Cody, who lives in a condo along State Road A1A and does not have a backyard, says the dune plot is her garden.
Sea grape trees and saw palmetto planted in the dune help minimize erosion.
Barbara Cook, a member since 1999, maintains her garden at 6062 N. Ocean Blvd. Residents and visitors can drive by and get a glimpse of the garden from the road.
“I worked very hard to make the garden attractive and a visual presentation from the road,” says Cook.
“The garden is a true paradise right off A1A,” says Cody. “If you didn’t know it was there, you’d probably drive right by without even noticing it.”
Taking on a Florida hammock with sandy soil and a plethora of pothos vines growing wild, Cook remembers she began cultivating the land and putting in xeriscape plants that thrive in shade without supplemental water from irrigation.
“It shows visitors that there is more to gardening than just planting roses, butterfly plants or bouquet flowers,” Cook says. “It’s a fun spot.”
Her garden’s design has a strong Asian influence, with a Buddha sculpture and fountain, a number of Chinese pagodas and large bird sculptures which are used as hardscapes, to break up the monotony of vegetation.
“It makes for more interest and is more fun for the gardener,” says Cook.
She notes that the Garden Club and its 61 members work closely with the town on events such as decorating the Town Hall’s holiday tree and providing floral decor and refreshments for the annual Light the Lights and Cruisin’ Santa holiday events.
Members are proud of their Blue Star marker on A1A, which they designed, installed and gave to the town to pay tribute to veterans and those who died in service. Cook and other members decorate the marker for Veterans Day and Memorial Day.
To join the Ocean Ridge Garden Club, you must be a resident of Ocean Ridge and join a committee once you become a member.
Committees include those for beautification and conservation, ways and means, membership, civic engagement, scholarship, and hospitality. The last includes planning for the year-end luncheon, holiday tree decoration and the Light the Lights event.
New guests are invited by a member who will then serve as their sponsor. The club is a member of the Florida Federation of Garden Clubs District X. Annual dues are $65.
Meetings are held Monday nights at members’ homes, with light dinners furnished by the members. “It’s an opportunity to see each other’s homes and gardens and experience their hospitality,” says Cody.
“We’re happy to have new members, but remember, we’ll put you to work,” says Cook. “You must join a committee and participate.
“It’s a working club, and we all enjoy it,” she says.

Visit the club on Facebook or at www.oceanridgegardenclub.org, where you can find details of the Valentine’s Day sale.
Save the Seas is from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. April 2 at Town Hall, 6450 N. Ocean Blvd. It is free and open to the public.

By Janis Fontaine

There’s more to being a tutor these days than just being able to teach, Evan Weisberg says.
Weisberg grew up in Boca Raton and graduated from Spanish River High School. He started tutoring as a side business, doing SAT and ACT prep while he was attending Florida Atlantic University, spending about three years learning the business.
Weisberg saw a lot of problems in the system and he lay awake at night thinking of ways to fix them. He earned a bachelor’s in English from FAU in 2008, and a master’s in special education from the University of Phoenix in 2010.
He started Tutors of Highland Beach as a sole proprietor, then opened the corporate Tutors Who Care a few years later. By 2017, he was tutoring seven days a week and turning clients away, so he took a risk and brought on his first employee. Today he has nearly 60 tutors working for him and he’s constantly searching for more.
Weisberg, 36, says he doesn’t have time to tutor any longer, which he misses, but he knows he has more important roles now.
“My job is to solve problems and create opportunities,” he says, and he believes his success hinges on three things: Is the tutor happy? Is the parent happy? Is the student making progress?
“In a nutshell, it’s ‘How well did we meet the clients’ expectations?’”
He adds: “A good fit is the most important facet. I’m a matchmaker, personality-wise. I won’t take a client if I don’t have a good match.”
Liz Hiden of Boca Raton hired Tutors Who Care for her daughter, Taylor, a senior at Olympic Heights High School, to prepare for the SAT.
“The tutor was really able to reach my daughter, which can be hard with teenagers,” Hiden says. “They met in a safe, public place because I work, and the cost was reasonable.
“But the thing that really stood out was that Taylor would come home in a good mood. She enjoyed meeting with her tutor. It’s hard to judge how well it’s going, but judged by my daughter’s mood, I felt good about the whole process. I would definitely hire him again,” she said.
That’s good matchmaking in action. But being a Tutors Who Care tutor is a hard role to fill because Weisberg has high expectations. His tutors are more like life coaches than academic taskmasters.
His tutors work in person, meeting face-to-face, despite the pandemic. That’s what parents want and what the students need, he says.
“Everyone has a different level of comfort with COVID,” Weisberg says. Some tutors were uncomfortable with in-person assignments, so Weisberg scrambled to find replacements.
“COVID not only increased the need for tutors, because virtual learning was in many cases ineffective, it also decreased the number of tutors willing to work,” he says.
Weisberg’s company specializes in kids with learning challenges, and that’s part of the reason in-person tutoring is imperative.
“I tutored kids with ADD, dyslexia and Asperger’s, and I found it more rewarding, more fulfilling in a lasting way. I had one student with Asperger’s who didn’t speak to me until the 20th session,” Weisberg says.
Once the door opened, student and tutor found a lot of common ground.
Kids today need help with “executive functions, especially the boys,” Weisberg says. Executive functions are the mental processes that allow people to focus their attention, remember basic instructions, plan for the future and multitask. They are building-block skills that are fundamental to learning and development.
“Middle school is the toughest group,” Weisberg says.
To be successful, tutors have to be “self-sufficient, enthusiastic and passionate about teaching,” he says. His clients are “affluent and can be demanding, so tutors have to have strong social skills and be ready to handle any situation.”
Weisberg, a former hip-hop performer, started using “educational music” he wrote as a conduit to reach kids he couldn’t reach in other ways. He started by laying down beats and making up lyrics to teach multiplication tables and basic math principles. For a select few students, the rhythms and rhymes were just the ticket they needed to get into the game.
Weisberg says he was bred to be an entrepreneur as the son of a New York City schoolteacher and toy company executive turned financial planner.
“My mother taught in the toughest neighborhoods, including Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant,” Weisberg says.
His father transplanted the family to Boca Raton when he changed careers when Evan was 5 years old. They still live in the city.

Tutors Who Care CEO Evan Weisberg unwinds with his horse Gilles, a Dutch warmblood, after a week supervising nearly 60 tutors. They all work in person with students. Photo provided

Weisberg’s newest passion is horses, and he has two. He tries to surround himself with things that make him feel good, and right now one is a nimble-footed quadruped named Gilles.
Weisberg says he looks at his life like it’s a masterpiece he’s painting. You have to take risks, he says. Try new colors.
And one thing Weisberg knows for sure: “Regret is way worse than failure.”

Graphic provided by the American Veterinary Dental Society

By Arden Moore

Is your cat leaving tiny pieces of kibble scattered on the kitchen floor? Has your dog stopped pestering you to play tug with his favorite toy? Is your pet acting a bit cranky when you try to give him a hug? Have you started to turn your head and hold your breath when your dog tries to kiss you?
The cause may be a dental issue. Far too many pets suffer in silence from pain caused by bleeding gums, broken teeth, thick tartar buildup, gum ulcers and a host of other issues popping up inside their mouths.
The dreaded doggy breath in dogs and cats could also be due to gastrointestinal upset or even diabetes or kidney disease.
With February being heralded as National Pet Dental Health Month, I reached out to Palm Beach County’s top pet dental expert — Dr. Michael Wiegand, DVM, DAVDC. He is the only board-certified veterinary dentist in our entire county.
Florida has just eight such veterinary specialists, according to the American Veterinary Dental College (https://avdc.org).
“One of the best habits to get into is to regularly flip the lip of your pet and check inside and yes, take a sniff,” says Wiegand, who operates the Florida Animal Dentistry and Oral Surgery Center in West Palm Beach and Stuart (https://floridaanimaldentistry.com).
He says to closely inspect your cat’s mouth as cats tend to hide pain more than dogs.
“Lift the lip and look for redness, bleeding, gums growing up the side of the tooth — that means there is a hole in the tooth,” he explains. “If your cat or dog is dropping food a lot, losing weight, having halitosis, drooling excessively or bleeding from the gums, please alert your veterinarian.”
Wiegand is a major cheerleader of daily teeth brushing and says to read the label to make sure the toothpaste is specifically made for cats or dogs, not humans. We can rinse and spit out fluoride, but pets cannot.
“Daily brushing will improve your pet’s oral health,” he says. “Brushing every other day will maintain his oral health, but brushing just once in a while or not at all will do nothing to help your pet’s oral health.”
He follows his own advice by daily brushing the teeth of Mojo, the 12-year-old mixed breed he adopted from a local animal shelter at age 2. Mojo sports a tartar-free smile that would make many Hollywood stars jealous.
“Mojo does have beautiful teeth,” says Wiegand.
As you begin to get your pet used to having you handle his mouth, consider starting by wrapping a gauze around your index finger and rubbing inside the cheek surfaces. Then advance to a finger brush or toothbrush sized for pets. Always finish with a grade-A treat so your pet sees this as a rewarding experience.
I admit I need to step up and brush my pets’ teeth every day. I do smell their breaths and examine their gums and teeth to catch any early signs of trouble. And, I squirt a veterinarian-approved dental additive into their cleaned water bowls daily. Sadly, by age 3, about 80% of dogs and about 70% of cats develop some degree of periodontal disease. Adult dogs sport 42 teeth, but it is harder for a Pomeranian than a long-muzzled Doberman to stave off dental issues.
“The smaller the muzzle, the more prone to periodontal disease,” says Wiegand. “Small toy breeds have 42 teeth jammed in a smaller space than big-dog mouths and food can get stuck in between the teeth.”
Wiegand’s advice:
• Hard toys — bones, hard plastic or nylon chews and ice cubes — are tough on teeth. “Instead, treat them to bendable chew toys like stuffed Kongs,” he says.
Veterinarians suggest you do what is known as the “knee test.” If you hit your dog’s chew against your knee and it hurts, it is not a good idea to give it to your dog to chew on. Chews should be pliable and have some give.
• Do not give human toothpaste to your pet.
• Look for dental products, chews and treats that are approved by veterinary dentists. They will sport the Veterinary Oral Health Council seal of approval. A list of VOHC-approved products is available at http://www.vohc.org.
• Book wellness appointments. Make sure your pet is treated to a thorough veterinary exam at least once a year, ideally every six months so that dental issues can be detected early and treated quickly and for less bite to your wallet.
A five-minute video guide on brushing your pet’s teeth and conditioning him to welcome hygiene sessions is available from the American Veterinary Medical Association at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wB3GIAgrTPE.

Arden Moore, founder of FourLeggedLife.com, is an animal behavior consultant, author, speaker and master certified pet first-aid instructor. She hosts Oh Behave! weekly on PetLifeRadio.com. Learn more at www.ardenmoore.com.

ABOVE: The chef’s kitchen features granite, top-of-the-line stainless appliances, custom cabinets and a butler's pantry. It overlooks the pool and ocean beyond. BELOW: This gated property sits on an incredibly deep lot with 100 feet of ocean frontage and almost 700 feet from State Road A1A to the ocean. Photos provided

This is a rare opportunity to acquire a direct oceanfront compound located in Delray Beach’s famed Estate Section just south of Atlantic Avenue. The home was built in 1994 and has overall features of more than 12,000 total square feet with an elevator, an entry level living area and a stunning combination of volume, cathedral and vaulted ceilings throughout the open and naturally lit residence.
The home has seven bedrooms, an office, theater/game room, formal dining room, large family room and staff quarters.
Each floor has a master suite. The oversized first-floor master suite has his and her baths, a sitting area, walk-in closets and a direct ocean view. The second-floor master suite has a balcony overlooking the water.
Enjoy the home, renovate it to your particular tastes or build your own dream home on the ocean.

Offered at $24,950,000. Contact Nick Malinosky, 561-306-4597 or nicholas.malinosky@elliman.com. Douglas Elliman, 900 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach, FL 33483. 561-278-5570.

ABOVE: The large pool overlooking the ocean is strategically located for relaxation. The outdoor area features tropical plantings, a cabana and kitchen. BELOW: The formal entry is an ideal dramatic setting for a gallery collection. The marble flooring contains a compass design of malachite, onyx and terra cotta tile.

Each month, The Coastal Star features a house for sale in our community. The House of the Month is presented as a service to our advertisers and provides readers with a peek inside one of our homes.

City Council members Yvette Drucker (l-r), Andy Thomson, Monica Mayotte, Andrea O'Rourke, Mayor Scott Singer, Brightline President Patrick Goddard and U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch shovel ceremonial dirt on Jan. 25 at the site of the new train station next to the Downtown Library. Photo by City of Boca Raton

By Mary Hladky

As a Brightline train zipped past, Brightline and Boca Raton officials raised ceremonial shovels and tossed dirt on Jan. 25 to break ground on the long-awaited Boca Raton train station.

The start of station construction comes one month after the upscale rail company began work on a 4.5 story, 455-space parking garage. The station and garage are expected to be completed this fall.

Brightline President Patrick Goddard was joined at the ceremony by U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch, (D-Boca Raton), Discover the Palm Beaches CEO Jorge Pesquera, Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer and the City Council’s four other members, as well as representatives of companies building the station.

“As a premier business and leisure destination, Boca Raton is a perfect fit for Brightline and will be an integral part of our network that will further connect the state of Florida,” Goddard said.

“Brightline will be a game-changer for Boca Raton, and especially our downtown,” Singer said.

Construction is starting about one year later than initially anticipated in part because of the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, which forced Brightline to halt passenger service in March 2020. Service resumed in November.

At 38,000 square feet, the Boca station will be smaller than Brightline’s stations in West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale, which are about 60,000 square feet. A bar and restaurant will be available to premium passengers. A market with items such as beer, wine and snacks will be open to all passengers.

Brightline will pay $20 million of the station cost, and the city will spend $9.9 million on the garage. The project cost was partly defrayed by a $16.3 million U.S. Department of Transportation grant.

By Mary Hladky

The state fire marshal is seeking the public’s help in its investigation of how a Jan. 2 fire started in vacant townhomes on the site of a proposed luxury condominium at the intersection of East Palmetto Park Road and South Ocean Boulevard in Boca Raton.

The fire marshal’s office, which is heading up the investigation, is offering up to $5,000 for information leading to the identification of persons responsible for the fire and has posted a sign on the site saying that arson is suspected. Money for the rewards comes from the Florida Advisory Committee on Arson Prevention.

To report information, call 877-662-7766, 561-513-2547 or 561-620-6051.

The fire broke out at about 4 p.m., engulfing about one-third of the Breakers Townhomes in the Por La Mar neighborhood before Boca Raton Fire Rescue crews were able to extinguish it. No one was injured.

The fire prompted temporary closures of portions of South Ocean Boulevard and Southeast Wavecrest Way.

A fire marshal’s spokesman said on Jan. 7 that the investigation is ongoing and that no additional information was available.

“The residents in Por La Mar have been complaining for months about homeless people, mostly teenagers, going in there at night and partying,” said Katie Barr MacDougall, president of the Riviera Civic Association which includes Por La Mar. “One of the neighbors thought there were kids in there setting off fireworks.”

Homeless people at the site is not a new issue. In 2020, a 26-year-old man was charged with first-degree murder for killing his father in the parking garage of an office building on the property. Both were homeless.

The townhomes and the office building will be demolished soon to make way for One South Ocean, a 70-unit condo on 3.5 acres that is being built by Miami real estate investor Ramon Llorens.

The Riviera Civic Association supports the condo project. MacDougall has said that project architect Jorge Garcia of GarciaStromberg GS4 Studios in West Palm Beach was willing to accommodate their requests for small design changes.

By Joe Capozzi

The thieves rode in on a jet ski. 

Under cover of darkness, they boarded boats tied to docks in Ocean Ridge and Briny Breezes and sped off with tens of thousands of dollars in high-end electronic equipment and fishing gear. 

In all, 18 pleasure boats were entered between 2 a.m. and 2:30 a.m. Dec. 31 by two thieves on a single jet ski, according to images captured by two private surveillance videos, Ocean Ridge Police Chief Richard Jones told The Coastal Star.

Of that total, eight or nine boats were hit in the Briny Breezes Marina, said Michael Gallacher, general manager of Briny Breezes Inc. 

The boats were boarded between the Briny Breezes Marina and the canals behind Waterview Drive, Ixora Drive, Harbour Drive North/South and Ocean Harbour Estates Canal, Jones said.

One video shows a suspect climbing off the jet ski and entering a boat while another holds onto the sea wall so the jet ski does not float away with the current, he said. No evidence indicates there was more than one jet ski involved.

All but two of the 18 boats either had electronics and fishing gear stolen or wires cut from the equipment. The most popular items stolen were Garmin and Simrad GPS devices and depth finders with a rough combined value of about $100,000, Jones said. 

“The target seems to have been newer, high-end electronics,’’ Gallacher said in an email to residents, noting that GPS devices, radios, scuba gear and other equipment were not removed from smaller boats.

The Ocean Ridge Police Department, which also patrols Briny Breezes, is encouraging all boat owners to lock their hatches and also to remove and secure all electronics that are removable from their boats when not in use. 

Anyone who has questions or information about these thefts can contact Detective Choban at 561-732-8331 or achoban@oceanridgeflorida.com. Police also want to hear from residents who may have captured suspicious videos from their home surveillance systems. 

While jet skis are loud at full throttle, they can be relatively quiet when idling which explains why homeowners never heard them. 

“For our jurisdiction, it is extremely unusual,’’ Jones said of thieves arriving using a personal watercraft to commit crimes in Ocean Ridge.

But he said it’s not uncommon in other waterfront municipalities for thieves to arrive on various watercraft, from small boats to kayaks and paddleboards, many of them stolen.

“It is likely that these suspects use any type of watercraft they can steal to commit these crimes,’’ he said.

By Joe Capozzi

A proposed $26 billion nationwide settlement with the pharmaceutical industry over the opioid crisis drew a sharp rebuke from Ocean Ridge Town Commissioner Martin Wiescholek.   

“It’s the settlement culture that we have come to accept as part of our daily lives where corporations can do whatever they want and if they get caught, they pay a little settlement,’’ he said Jan. 3 at a Town Commission meeting.

“It is unconscionable to even consider such a settlement. It's a slap in the face to every American.’’ 

With Wiescholek dissenting, the commission voted 4-1 to join the settlement with Johnson & Johnson and drug distributors Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen and McKesson.

If the deal is finalized, Ocean Ridge stands to get $32,000 to $36,000 over 18 years, Town Attorney Christy Goddeau told commissioners. 

Many municipalities in Palm Beach County have reluctantly agreed to participate, noting the payouts will fall far short of the epidemic’s financial and human costs. 

But Wiescholek, who had the item pulled from the commission’s consent agenda so he could publicly share his feelings, said his concerns were not about whether Ocean Ridge was getting its fair share of money.

“It’s not a cost issue where we can say, ‘Well, you know what? At least they are paying back what it cost us the taxpayers.’ It's simply, ‘We’re getting away with it and we are keeping most of our profits.’ That is not acceptable in my book,’’ he said.

“I'm going to make a very bold statement here: Keep your free money. I don’t want it. This is not what this town should be about. We should be ashamed of taking $32,000 for a settlement of 500,000 people that have been killed.’’ 

Vice Mayor Susan Hurlburt told Wiescholek she agreed with everything he said but added, “I don’t think us not taking part in this is going to make a hill of beans in the big picture.’’

Commissioner Geoff Pugh pointed out the town accepted money years ago from settlements with the tobacco companies.

“I think the town is lucky to get $32,000,’’ he said. “Maybe it's a small slap to those companies but still it's something.’’

According to research Wiescholek said he did before the commission meeting, the $26 billion settlement works out to about 5% of the four companies’ combined profits.  

And if the town gets as much as $36,000, that equates to about $19 for each town resident, he told the commission. Then he said the street cost for one Oxycontin pill is $20. 

“So we are settling this thing for the price of under one pill per resident to get these drug companies off our backs. Not acceptable. It's just not acceptable,’’ he said, adding that the attorneys general who negotiated that settlement “should be ashamed of themselves.’’  

Before the commission voted to participate in the deal, one resident told Wiescholek she was insulted by his comments.

“This is not the place for social issues’’ said Stella Kolb. “What you're doing, Commissioner, is lecturing to us and I resent it.’’

International tourism took off in November after the U.S. reopened borders to fully vaccinated travelers. Leonardo Sanchez sips a mate tea on Delray Beach’s municipal beach while soaking up the sun among a group of family and friends from Argentina. One of them, Alberto Palmetta (left), is a professional boxer. Photos by Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

Best summer on record, early-season surge signal sunny outlook for 2022

By Jan Norris

They’re back — the flocks of tourists that give the state its reputation as a winter habitat for snowbirds.
But this year, they might be known as the early migrators. They showed up at least six months ahead of the traditional schedule.
“We had the strongest summer on record since recorded time,” said Troy McLellan, president and CEO of the Boca Raton Chamber of Commerce.
He was near giddy about the positive numbers coming from all the agencies and industry watchers who count occupied beds, restaurant reservations and train riders. Tickets to events and venues also figure in.
Those numbers translate into much-needed tourism dollars — a large part of the county economy, with more than $7 billion in play annually from visitors in pre-pandemic years, according to the county’s Tourist Development Council.
“Commerce continues to happen. The GM of Town Center mall reports stores are bustling. Restaurants are on waits [for seating]. But the flip side is having workers,” McLellan said. The challenge remains finding the labor to service the tourists, he said.
The problem started early in the pandemic, he said, as hospitality industry workers and hourly laborers started assessing their careers after their bosses closed the doors to the public. Many who were let go decided to go back to school or to switch careers for less demanding hours and the uncertain pay of tip-based earnings.
Cooks, servers and hotel housekeepers are still in big demand. Restaurants have adjusted with shorter hours or fewer tables seated. Pay scales have increased for retail and hotel workers, and often companies have thrown in hiring bonuses.
But, McLellan said, “The business of hotel, restaurants and retail is doing well.”
After shutting down completely in March 2020, Florida became one of the first states to reopen its hotels, restaurants and transportation. Once airlines got back up to speed, and later cruises began sailing, South Florida became the “at last we can travel” resort destination.
“We had the highest bed tax collections in August on record,” McLellan said. “It means people are traveling again.”
Discover The Palm Beaches, the marketing agency that collects data on visitors to the county, provided statistics showing spring and summer had record numbers of leisure travelers in April, May, June and July — surpassing 2019’s boom year.
In November, after a year and a half of restrictions, the U.S. opened its borders again, allowing in international tourists who showed proof of vaccination.
Europeans came back, sometimes to reunite with families; Canadian tourists and snowbirds arrived, and some from South America came north for their annual holiday shopping, with favorable exchange rates in place.
The year ended with the county hosting about 7.8 million visitors, just shy of the pre-pandemic record-breaking 2019 year, according to Discover The Palm Beaches.
Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa, the beachfront resort in Manalapan, is experiencing a strong demand for bookings, both suite and premium rooms, according to Michelle Phillips, marketing director.
“Indicators suggest that we could return to pre-pandemic levels sometime in late 2022 once the corporate group and social/wedding business bounces back entirely,” she said.
Group functions, including large conventions and big weddings, were canceled because of the pandemic. Smaller gatherings, most outdoors, have taken their place.
Phillips noted that Florida’s open spaces and warm weather conducive to outdoor events are drawing customers.

Brazilian tourists Gabriel Da Luz and Mathias Rocha volley a soccer ball at South Beach Park in Boca Raton.

Season started early
The county’s marketing program, touting 39 unique cities and towns plus 47 miles of “unspoiled beachfront,” reaches the Northeast U.S. and spreads throughout eastern Canada. Now that borders have reopened, Canadians are coming down by car and in motor homes, or renting favorite efficiency hotels for lengthy stays.
At the Del-Raton RV Park in Delray Beach, owner Art Parsons says his spots have been booked out for months. “We’re very busy. We have our seasonal regulars, but a lot of newcomers. There are a lot of RVs on the road.”
He’s owned the park for 48 years, and many people who rent space for months at a time reserve the same spot each year. His visitors include those from Ohio, Pennsylvania and Georgia, but none in 2021 from Canada. “Canadians got a late start,” he said. “We were all booked up by the time they hit the road. A lot of them are going to Pompano and Hollywood.”
At Benny’s on the Beach on the Lake Worth pier, the Canadians are back full force, according to chef/partner Jeremy Hanlon. “Oh yeah, as of mid-December, it’s like a ship pulled up to Palm Beach County. All the Quebec tags. We have several regulars and they were really pumped to be back. They’re so happy to be able to travel.”
A lot of new residents are filling seats too, he said. “It’s the mainstay of conversation: ‘I just moved down and I’ve never been here before.’”
But finding help to run the dining room is a challenge, Hanlon said. “We get people who are looking for a job, but who don’t want to work. We’ll interview and welcome them, then they don’t show up. That’s when management steps up” to do extra work.
John Calormis of the Dune Deck Cafe in Lantana says his seasonal Canadian regulars as well as newcomers have been coming in for “a while.”
Diners still appear to prefer outdoor seating as safer, so the Dune Deck, which is entirely al fresco, has a built-in edge on restaurants that don’t have as much outdoors.
The business is a godsend after the beach was closed and the restaurant completely out of service for months in 2020. “It was tough,” Calormis said.
The increased number of visitors so early has been obvious to people trying to get into restaurants and finding out they have to wait.
Jeremy Bearman, chef/owner of Oceano Kitchen on Ocean Avenue in Lantana, says he’s seeing really big numbers. “Season doesn’t usually start for us till January. This year, it began in September and hasn’t stopped.”
Several factors contributed, he said, with “Florida being open” the main one. “Obviously, you see it on the roads. Traffic has never been worse.”
He’s also seeing a lot of new residents — ones who came to visit and decided to stay. “We hear it every day in the restaurant: ‘Yeah, I just bought a house down here.’ I don’t know if it’s their primary residence or a second home. But a lot of people are talking about moving here.”
His small casual eatery is doing so much business, he said, he’s working on expanding to accommodate more diners. “We really need a bar, and more seating. In season, we’re on a 11/2- to 2-hour wait. Our regulars who support us year-round can’t get in. It’s frustrating.”
He is trying to work things out with his landlord and the town, which he said “has been very supportive and helpful.”
“We want to stay on the Avenue.”
Overall, he said, “We’re very thankful to have all good opportunities. Being a small restaurant, we were able to pivot and stay open and do well.”
Many restaurants changed because of COVID, especially adding outdoor seating to assuage diners who did not want to be in confined spaces with strangers. Dozens added patios, and cities loosened restrictions on sidewalk seating and allowed canopies. The Kapow Noodle Bar in Mizner Park was among restaurants that took advantage of this and moved more outdoors.

Transit bouncing back
Another indicator of the comeback is public transportation. Steven Abrams, executive director of the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, which operates Tri-Rail, said ridership on the commuter railway is booming.
“We are second in the nation behind Denver for commuter rails coming back to ridership,” he said. “We’re at approximately 70% of pre-COVID figures.” The rail is transporting about 15,000 riders a day, he said.
In contrast, he said, ridership on commuter trains in New York and New Jersey is at just 20% of pre-COVID numbers.
Tri-Rail connects to all three airports in South Florida, giving tourists inexpensive rides to and from their destinations. Connecting rides via free coaches in Fort Lauderdale and city buses in Miami and West Palm Beach, as well as cars for hire, make it easier to get around the area without a car.
“West Palm is now the highest ridership station in the county,” Abrams said. Boca Raton used to be, but that was when offices there were full of on-site staffers who now work remotely.
Visitors also take Tri-Rail to visit attractions and shop in other cities; with its proximity to the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach and the downtown area, tourists who want to see a performance can take the train back and forth.
Sports venues in Miami are accessible via rail, eliminating long car trips and parking costs, Abrams said.
Tourists and residents alike are finding plenty of attractions open as well, and the Boca Museum of Art has record-breaking figures in the books for November, according to Jim May, deputy director of communications.
He points to the international premiere of the exhibit Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru as one of the biggest draws for the museum. It opened in October and runs through early March.
“A year ago, there were 750 visitors for the month of November. We had 10,000 this year. The year before COVID, we did 2,600 in November,” May said.
The county’s Tourist Development Council is a sponsor of the exhibit, which has drawn visitors from other parts of Florida, particularly Miami-Dade and Broward counties. It was planned to open after hurricane season and on the cusp of the traditional tourist season opening; it exceeded expectations.
“Our membership is breaking records, and while most of that is local, we’re getting a lot of new people from all over. Sales in the museum shop are up significantly as well,” May said.
While there are no guarantees with the coronavirus surging again and the especially contagious omicron variant taking hold, Discover The Palm Beaches is bullish on 2022.
Figures on bookings for the new year have the experts predicting record-breaking numbers in high season — January through March — and overall to be 10% to 11% higher than 2021. That translates to 8.5 million tourists visiting Palm Beach County.

By Joe Capozzi

The Champlain Towers collapse that killed 98 people in Surfside in June weighed heavily over a special magistrate’s hearing last month when South Palm Beach officials voiced concerns about erosion damage to three oceanfront condominiums. 
The Dec. 22 hearing dealt with code violations at one condo, La Pensee, but discussion of that case disclosed concerns about damages at two other condos, Horizon East and Mayfair House East. 
“We don’t want another Surfside here in South Palm Beach,’’ Town Attorney Glen Torcivia said, explaining why the town is demanding immediate repairs to sea wall erosion near a corner of the pool deck behind La Pensee, a 24-unit oceanfront condo at 4000 S. Ocean Blvd.
Special Magistrate Mitty Barnard agreed with the town code officer’s determination that the damage violated the town code as “an unsafe structure.’’ 
She gave La Pensee a Feb. 1 deadline to secure permits for the repairs and a March 1 deadline to complete the repairs. La Pensee had been seeking a March 18 deadline to finish the work, a time line that left town officials uncomfortable. 
Pounding surf during November king tides eroded a 5-foot section of the sea wall near the stairs at the northeast corner of the pool deck, said Kevin Markow, an attorney for the condo. 
But, he said, engineers who have looked at the damage said the six-story condo, built in 1985, and its residents are not in imminent danger, an opinion town officials aren’t ready to fully support.
Markow said the condo was in the process of hiring an engineer to conduct a thorough study and report as part of the repair plans. Those plans were initiated, he said, before the town’s building officials alerted code enforcement about potential safety violations.
“We will certainly share our engineering report with the town when we have it,’’ Markow said. “I don’t know if it should be a condition of the order. We all have the same interests, to make sure everybody is safe and the property is secure. There’s no indication that it is not, at present.’’
Town Manager Robert Kellogg took issue with that answer, sparking a brief debate with Markow.
“I totally disagree,’’ Kellogg said. “You’re not an engineer. We need some kind of a letter from them saying that there is no imminent danger to that facility or that structure. Period.’’ 
Markow responded, “I mean, has the town sent an engineer out to the property?”
“The only people I know that have been out there are inspectors,’’ Kellogg said.
“And they’re not engineers, right?’’ Markow replied. 
“They’re not,’’ Kellogg said, leaning closer to his microphone, “but let me tell you something. We had a situation in Surfside. I’m dealing with a situation very similar to this right across the street from Town Hall where I have an engineering report that there is a potential collapse over there. And I want to ensure that the residents of that condo are protected.’’

Repairs begun at Mayfair
After the meeting, Kellogg explained that his remarks about the “potential collapse” across the street from Town Hall were about erosion problems discovered in June to the pool and pool deck at Horizon East, a seven-story condo built in 1973.
A private engineering report commissioned by The Mayfair House, which is immediately south of Horizon East, warned that the north segment of Mayfair House East was “at risk of imminent collapse’’ after erosion led to the formation of a sinkhole.
Emergency repairs have been initiated since the report was issued June 30. Workers are still in the process of “shoring up the void” with jacks and steel beams and plates, Kellogg said after the Dec. 22 hearing.
During the hearing, Markow assured town officials that La Pensee’s top priority is the safety of its residents. 
“But you have to understand a little bit of the origin of how we wound up here,’’ he said. “We have a disgruntled resident who is in multiple litigation proceedings with the association and reported this violation as a matter of spite.’’
Torvicia said town officials don’t care how the violation was reported. They just want the La Pensee repairs done as soon as possible. 
The special magistrate asked town officials if they consider the damage “a health/safety issue at the moment.’’
“We don’t know,’’ code enforcement officer Manny Palacios said. “We don’t know the depth and problem of the erosion issue. That’s exactly why the building official would like to have a letter from their engineers stating right now there is no immediate danger to the pool or the structure itself.’’
Markow assured the town and the magistrate that the board of La Pensee wants to make the repairs as soon as possible.
“We take it very seriously but by no means do we think this is an issue where residents’ safety is an issue,’’ he said.
“The cause was king tides in four to five days in November. It was not a lack of maintenance. It was something that was completely unforeseeable.’’
If La Pensee fails to meet the magistrate’s February and March deadlines, it can be fined up to $100 a day. 
With condos and towns up and down the coast scrambling to hire engineers and contractors to make sure their buildings are safe, getting the repairs done by March 1 might be a challenge, Markow said. 
“Certainly in a post-Champlain Towers world, what I can continue to offer is to share any engineering records we do have and any reports we do receive with the town immediately. What I can tell you based on engineers that have been out there is, nobody went out there and said, ‘You’ve got a major problem on your hands.’ It seems to be a pretty garden variety sea wall erosion sea wall repair,’’ Markow said.
“We understand the urgency and the board is certainly acting responsibly. … But I don’t want to hit the panic button” when no one else is.
Although Highland Beach and Boca Raton have moved ahead with their own inspection rules, South Palm Beach and other municipalities decided to wait for guidance from Palm Beach County on a countywide program. The county, though, has put that plan on hold and is waiting to see if the state Legislature creates a statewide program.
In light of the problems at Horizon East and Le Pensee, might the town reconsider implementing its own program?
“Certainly we can reconsider it,” Kellogg said in an interview Dec. 23, “but with our building official being part of that task force that was put together by the (county) League of Cities, the council just decided to wait and see if the Legislature is going to do anything. I think there is still a large concern about not only those two buildings, but other structures in town and the potential damage being done.”

Related Story: Opioid settlements, ‘way less’ than cost of crisis, get reluctant support

By Charles Elmore

After a rocky 2020, fewer people died of overdoses in southern Palm Beach County cities during the first three quarters of 2021. Sometimes a lot fewer.
In Delray Beach, overdose deaths decreased 40% to 33 in the first nine months of 2021 compared to the same stretch of the previous year, according to the latest records available from the Palm Beach County Medical Examiner’s Office, which identified an “injury city” where an overdose occurred.
In Boca Raton, such deaths fell 28% to 48. In Boynton Beach, the decline was 24% to 44 deaths.
“We’re cautiously optimistic,” said Ariana Ciancio, service population advocate for the Delray Beach Police Department. “I want to knock on wood and be thankful where we can. But we can never be complacent about this. It ebbs and flows.”
In the last 90 days, upticks in some monthly reports of drug deaths locally and across Palm Beach County mean few are feeling complacent. All deaths take a toll. But many see evidence that efforts by first responders, community groups and others are having an effect.
For example, cases more than doubled in 2021 in which paramedics arrived after someone else had administered naloxone, whose brand names include Narcan, Delray Beach Fire Rescue documents show. That is medicine that can counter the potentially lethal effects of an opioid overdose.
Delray Beach paramedics used Narcan 118 times in 2021 through mid-December, compared to 161 times the full year before, records show. But people other than paramedics, sometimes denoted in records by the catch-all term “bystanders,” administered Narcan by the time paramedics arrived 100 times in 2021, compared to just 41 in 2020.
Delray Beach issues Narcan to police as well as fire-rescue responders. Records show city police used Narcan 70 times in 2021, Ciancio said. She said she did not have 2020 data at hand.
Even so, that would not account for all bystander interventions in 2021. Ciancio said community organizations have mounted a continuing push to educate and train people how to help. 
For instance, about 50 people attended a public meeting at the Delray Beach Public Library on Dec. 1, where an overdose death occurred in the parking lot months earlier, officials said. The event offered naloxone training by members of the West Palm Beach-based group Rebel Recovery, whose website describes programs to offer peer support, reduce harm and assist people struggling with addiction to make “positive changes.”

‘Trial by fire’
At the same time, paramedics have been honing protocols to deal with fast-moving situations, said Sean Gibson, division chief of emergency medical services for Delray Beach Fire Rescue.
Responders have tried to calibrate carefully how much Narcan is needed to keep patients stable and breathing on their own, while assessing how much, if any, may have been administered before paramedics arrived, Gibson said. Too much too soon can leave people startled, upset or resistant to treatment at a hospital, he said.
Facing a pandemic since early 2020 on top of overdose calls, “it was a trial by fire for a lot of new paramedics,” Gibson said. “It’s been a long row to hoe, I’ll say that. But I think we’ve got a good group of people who have weathered it despite all the adversity.”
Overdose deaths recorded by medical examiners can vary from counts by police and fire-rescue departments, which may have on-scene information for certain cases without access to final medical reports for all deaths. By just about any account, though, 2020 was a tough year.
Delray Beach Fire Rescue recorded 64 overdose deaths in 2020, rising from 35 in 2019 and 18 in 2018 before falling to 11 in 2021 through mid-December. Emergency calls for suspected overdoses declined to 161 in a not-quite-finished 2021, down from 244 in 2020, 213 in 2019 and 214 in 2018.

Complicated by coronavirus
The first part of 2020 was especially rugged. Delray Beach police logged a doubling of overdose fatalities, to 42 from 21, in the first seven months of 2020 compared to the same period a year earlier.
The early stages of the pandemic not only threatened lives and jobs, but also temporarily closed in-person meeting spaces for support and recovery groups. Many scrambled to meet through Zoom or other online methods.
In 2021, a common approach was a hybrid of the two, alternating between gathering in person and virtually, said one participant who asked not to be identified in a group that meets in southern Palm Beach County.
“Discussions in meetings are certainly less centered on COVID than they were in 2020,” the participant said. A helpful thing for many has been “more intimate access to support in in-person meetings.”
In Boca Raton, city officials said overdose deaths tracked by responders rose from 15 in 2018 to 28 in 2019 and 32 in 2020 before falling to 13 as of Dec. 10, 2021.
Mayor Scott Singer said factors might be greater awareness of the potential hazards and greater proactivity by doctors and health care professionals to limit abuse.
First responders deserve credit, Singer said: “Because of intervention by our fire-rescue teams and police officers, they are able to actually save a number of lives.”
Deputy City Manager George Brown said the city has not changed its policy on how it responds to opioid cases. He speculated that police and fire-rescue might be getting calls sooner and so are able to administer Narcan or get people to the hospital more quickly.

Where deaths happen
Briny Breezes, Manalapan, Gulf Stream and Ocean Ridge do not appear as “injury” locations in overdose records from medical examiners, though they do fall within ZIP codes listed as death locations where no place of injury was identified. That happened in 11 cases in 2020 and 10 during the first nine months of 2021.
This does not mean residents of those towns were necessarily involved. A death location can be different from an injury location because someone was taken to a hospital, for example, officials noted. And sometimes examiners did not know or at least did not record a place of injury.
In another 21 cases in 2020 and nine through nine months of 2021, records listing only a death location showed ZIP codes in or near Delray Beach, Boca Raton and Boynton Beach. 
The records include what medical examiners classify as overdoses from all drugs and alcohol and, at least in this case, do not specify the specific substances causing death.
But other sources paint a stark picture of which drugs have been causing the deadliest outcomes.

Florida’s deadliest drug
The death toll from opioids rose a staggering 42% in Florida in 2020, a detailed analysis released in November by the state’s Medical Examiners Commission showed. That was 16.7 deaths a day from opioids as an official cause of death — the “highest total ever,” Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg said.
And an average 2.6 of those opioid deaths happened each day in Palm Beach County. That included 1.6 per day in the county dying from the synthetic opioid fentanyl. It was Florida’s deadliest drug, accounting for more than twice as many direct fatalities statewide as any other single contender including cocaine, alcohol or methamphetamines. 
Broward (611 deaths) and Palm Beach (572) counties led the state in deaths directly attributed to fentanyl in 2020. Fentanyl was present but not ruled the cause of death in another 62 cases in Palm Beach County.
Many people think of heroin when they hear the word opioids, but records tell an evolving story: Heroin-caused deaths fell by a third in Palm Beach County during 2020 to 138, the lowest total since 2014.
Opioids can come in many forms, including pills such as oxycodone. It is fentanyl, though, that wreaked unprecedented damage.
“Increasingly fentanyl, which is 100 times more powerful than morphine, is added surreptitiously to other illegally manufactured drugs to enhance their potency,” said John Hulick, senior program manager for the substance use disorders community service department of Palm Beach County. “While some drug users may be seeking out fentanyl, many may not have wanted to take it. Many people are dying without knowing what they are ingesting.”
A breakdown by age of the 572 fentanyl deaths in Palm Beach County in 2020 shows relatively few — 67, or less than 12% — involved people 25 years old or younger. Deaths occurred more frequently among people 26 to 34 years old (180), 35 to 50 (208) or older than 50 (117).

‘One death is too many’
Across Palm Beach County, “you’ll note the overdose deaths in 2021 are below 2020 and on par with the number of deaths experienced in 2019,” Hulick said. “My position is, while we prefer to see reductions and may never get to zero, one death is too many. The devastation of such experienced by families, friends and the community is enough to maintain that position.”
Reports late in 2021 showed the struggle is far from over. In October and November combined, overdose response calls tracked by Delray Beach police fell from 55 to 48 but deaths rose to 18, double the number in the same months a year earlier, Ciancio said.
October brought a 21-month peak for Palm Beach County Fire Rescue’s use of Narcan, according to records supplied by Hulick’s office. Reported fatal overdoses countywide reached a 2021 high of 70 in November, a total exceeded by only one month of 2020, though causes had yet to be confirmed by medical examiners in all cases.
Hulick spoke in Delray Beach at a September event that celebrated hard-won gains but also recognized how precarious progress can feel for people and families affected by addiction.
“Our work is not complete,” he said. “I am reminded of that day in and day out.”

Mary Hladky contributed to this story.

By Mary Hladky and Jane Smith

When a $26 billion deal was reached in July that required the pharmaceutical industry to help pay for the opioid addiction and overdose crisis, a framework was established to get that money to thousands of communities that have borne the brunt of the problem.
Florida and its cities and counties are slated to receive as much as $1.6 billion if the two settlements in the massive nationwide case against Johnson & Johnson and drug distributors Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen and McKesson are finalized.
That’s an eye-popping amount. But as it is divvied up, each city’s and county’s share will fall far short of what the opioid epidemic has cost them.
In southeastern Palm Beach County, Boca Raton stands to get the biggest slice of that pie — a maximum of $1.2 million paid out over 18 years.
Delray Beach, the epicenter of the crisis in the county, could see nearly $900,000. Boynton Beach’s cut could be $783,000, according to allocations listed in the Florida Attorney General Office’s opioid settlements portal.
Gulf Stream could get $27,266; Highland Beach, $83,070; Lantana, $62,619; Manalapan, $55,275; Ocean Ridge, $32,671; and South Palm Beach, $14,990. Briny Breezes’ share is listed as $8,323, but Town Attorney Trey Nazzaro told the council to expect about $800 a year, which would be about $14,400.
Palm Beach County would be entitled to about $13 million.
“I think every single county is under the impression it was way less” than what each spent responding to the crisis, said Chief Assistant County Attorney David Ottey.
If the county had litigated the case on its own, “we would not be satisfied with that amount,” he said.
Various organizations have pegged the epidemic’s cost at many multiples of the settlement amounts. The Society of Actuaries found the costs in the U.S. were $630 billion from 2015 through 2018 alone, the Associated Press has reported.
Delray Beach officials are especially aggrieved that their share is so small when their burden was so large, and that the city trails Boca Raton, which was not as severely affected by opioid overdoses and deaths.
Nevertheless, Delray Beach joined the state of Florida in agreeing to the settlements, as did Boca Raton and Boynton Beach ahead of the Jan. 2 deadline, rather than leave money on the table.
“It’s super-disappointing to me to see actual figures when they came through, knowing that our neighboring town is going to see more of those dollars,” Mayor Shelly Petrolia said at a Dec. 7 meeting of the City Commission. “And I know that they did not have as huge a crisis as we did in Delray Beach.
“There was not an hour in a day (in 2016 and 2017) when we were walking outside that we didn’t hear sirens running,” she said. “Our police and our fire staff were on the front end. They looked like they were in a war, watching young people die in front of them. It was terrible on a daily basis.”
Former Mayor Cary Glickstein, who led the city in 2016 when public safety officers responded to a record-high 690 overdoses and 65 fatalities and in 2018 when it filed a lawsuit that ultimately was rolled into the national litigation, also reacted with dismay.
“I think by any objective measure, the settlement is disappointing,” he said in a Dec. 8 email to The Coastal Star. “Delray’s portion of the settlement amount will do little to offset the addiction and mental health crises these drugs spawned by the defendants’ collective negligence and callous disregard for human life.”
He also faulted the metrics used to determine how much each local government would receive that favored Boca Raton over his city.
But Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer indicated his city had no control over the metrics used, and noted that since population was one factor, his city stood to receive a larger amount.
The city and county metrics are based on population numbers adjusted for their proportionate share of the nationwide impact of the opioid epidemic. Factors include the amount of opioids shipped to the state, the number of opioid-related deaths and the number of people who suffer opioid use disorder.
More than 500,000 have died from overdoses to prescription and illegal street opioids since 1999, according to federal data.
If the settlement agreements are finalized, the four companies would be bound by them. They would be released from all civil liability in the opioid epidemic and thousands of local governments and states would drop lawsuits against the companies.
But the agreements leave thousands of other lawsuits against many other defendants unresolved, including manufacturers, drugstore chains and smaller distributors. Many of those are negotiating their own deals, which could potentially bring more money to states, cities and counties.
After the agreements were reached, they went to states and their municipalities for formal approval. Most were expected to sign off on the proposals.
The Boca Raton City Council, for example, authorized City Manager Leif Ahnell to sign the settlement agreements on Nov. 23. Cities need not have filed a lawsuit to receive a payout, and Boca Raton and Boynton Beach were among those that chose not to do so.
The exact amount local governments get will be determined by how many of them sign on. The more that do, the more each state will receive. The states will then distribute the money to local governments.
Cities and counties will have numerous options on how they can spend the money. The settlements include approved uses for the funds that stretch over many pages, but generally revolve around opioid prevention, treatment and recovery services.

Joe Capozzi contributed to this story.

Although there’s déjà vu associated with the latest fast-spreading coronavirus variant, it feels less paralyzing than when we first learned of the coronavirus pandemic in December 2019. Yes. Two years ago. Hard to believe? Some days yes, some days no.
After we stocked up on home test kits in December 2021, it’s clear we’ve entered a new phase in this global health crisis. The hope is that 2022 will be a better year.
We now have free vaccines for all but the youngest children and booster shots, plus more and better treatment options to help us all get through the omicron outbreak. These are miracles of science we simply can’t take for granted. Imagine the global health crisis if these prevention and treatment options were never invented! Have doubts? Ask an emergency room doctor or nurse.
These are like the intensified security protocols initiated after 9/11 that made travel safer — although often annoying and less convenient. But our fears of a terrorist attack in the air have diminished. We learned that taking precautions works. Just ask a pilot or flight attendant.
Still, as this new year begins, it feels fragile.
After all, 2021 ended up being another heartbreaker for many even though it started with so much promise following the chaos and panic of 2020.
Good people still died from COVID-19 infections, schoolchildren continued struggling to find their way in an upside-down world, and some of us trudged through the last 12 months with an aching void from loved ones who left us when life just became too much. And although overdose numbers in our area dipped this past year as people went back to work and in-person addiction treatment resumed, the numbers of ODs are starting to inch back up.
And we can’t forget that, to date, 800,000 Americans have died from COVID-19.
Surely, they haven’t died in vain. Let’s remember them — and everyone still struggling — as we enter the new year. Before we step into the future, let’s vow to learn from the past.
If we all do our part, 2022 should be a better year, right?
Happy New Year.

— Mary Kate Leming
Editor

Erika Petersen will take over as Manalapan town clerk when her mother, Lisa Petersen, retires this month after 18 years on the job. ‘The town residents are losing a wonderful, caring person,’ Manager Linda Stumpf says. Erika Petersen will be promoted from deputy clerk. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Dan Moffett

The only thing typical about Lisa Petersen’s workdays are the atypical assignments that are sure to land on her desk in Manalapan.
When the county elections supervisor moved up municipal deadlines for candidate qualifying last year, Petersen hastily revamped the town’s schedule. When the coronavirus pandemic struck, she oversaw safety measures in Town Hall. When Police Chief Carmen Mattox had a leaking roof in his office, naturally he called Petersen, the town clerk.
“I don’t know how I got into roofing maintenance,” she said, “but that’s what you do in a small town. My job has changed through the years because I kept taking on more and more.”
When people move to Manalapan, Petersen leads the welcomes and when they move away, she sends farewells. When residents complain, she takes their phone calls, and when they ask questions, she looks for answers. She works with contractors, inspectors and grumpy neighbors.
Since she’s also director of the town’s library, Petersen, 66, runs its lecture series. It was Petersen who came up with the plan for a park and gazebo in the library’s backyard. “I think of the library as the heartbeat of the town,” she said.
For 18 years, Petersen has served Manalapan as concierge, referee, researcher, big sister, ambassador and, yes, municipal clerk.
But all that ends this month when she begins her retirement.
“I feel as though I’ve lost my right hand,” said Town Manager Linda Stumpf.
Petersen, Stumpf and Mattox call themselves “the triumvirate” — “we all bring different things to the table,” Petersen said. They have worked together in Manalapan for nearly two decades. In fact, Stumpf and former Manager Greg Dunham interviewed Petersen for the clerk’s job.
“Chief Mattox, Lisa and I have been through so many adventures in Manalapan,” Stumpf said. “I have had the best work colleague and best friend anyone could ask for. The town residents are losing a wonderful, caring person.”
Mayor Keith Waters said Petersen “epitomizes the elegance, character and gentle grace of this wonderful place we call home.”
“My father always told me, ‘It is not hard to recognize a winner when you see one,’’’ the mayor said, “and I am delighted to say that I recognized Lisa the moment we met.”
It’s not a stretch to say Petersen knows every address in Manalapan. “I have this thing for numbers,” she explained. “I can tell you everyone’s house number. It’s terrible because I use valuable brain cells for information I could easily look up.”
Originally from Augusta, Georgia, Petersen graduated from Florida State University, where she met her husband, Tom. His career in the space industry brought them to South Florida, and eventually to a home in Juno Beach.
Renovating that house is a project for the Petersens’ retirement, and there’s also a piece of property on the St. Johns River near Palatka where they hope to build a vacation home.
Spending time with her 3-year-old grandson, Soren, is on the agenda, too. His mother just happens to be the next town clerk of Manalapan. Petersen’s daughter, Erika, was hired as deputy clerk six months ago, and takes over as town clerk this month.
A graduate of Florida International University, Erika Petersen, 36, earned a master’s degree in architecture from the Savannah College of Art and Design.
“Erika will bring a lot more to the building side than my knowledge,” Lisa Petersen said. “She interned for the town during college. Everybody knows her. I tease her and say I’ve been training her since she was born to take my place.”
Manalapan will show its appreciation for Petersen on Jan. 27 with a party and celebration at the library.
“It’s been a wonderful 18 years,” she said. “I have no complaints. The residents have been so kind.”
Waters put it this way: “She will be sorely missed but never forgotten. Well done, Miss Lisa, well done!”

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