Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in Profiles.
Kevin Mills is almost an institution in Boca Grande and Gasparilla Island. Nearly everybody knows him.They recognize him by the brown uniform he wears and the big brown truck he drives, but mostly they recognize him by his smile and his infectious friendliness. Kevin is our UPS delivery driver. “Our” is appropriate because this is […]
Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in Editorial.
This week is one I have been dreading and looking forward to all at the same time. The youngest of my five children will be graduating from The Island School and moving on to bigger things. This was the first year since 2006 that I haven’t had to fill out a registration form for the […]
Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in News.
This week island resident Gary Martin was out in his boat going around the island, looking for gunk. It’s not an activity that a lot of people partake in, but he is very concerned about the vast amount of floating organic matter in our harbor and backcountry water. Gary had already seen it in the water in front of his island home – patches of what appears to be sludge mixed with collard greens, followed by a disturbing absence of seagrass in the shallow waters right outside of his home. But he wanted to see how far it went and how much there was.
He took Boca Beacon Publisher Dusty Hopkins with him to take photographs. Gary thought they would have to go down to Redfish Pass to see large amounts of the gunk, but they didn’t get that far. They had already seen three huge fields of it before they got anywhere close. They also saw more bald spots in the harbor and Intracoastal where the seagrass was gone.
Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in News, Profiles.
Gary Robinson loves making music. Making it for the people of Boca Grande raises it to a whole new level for him. Gary is the drummer for the new rock band known as “The Green Flash, Boca Grande,” which has taken the island by storm this past spring. The music the band plays and the town have a lot in common.
“It’s what I love about Boca Grande, “ Gary said. “We’ve been coming here for over 30 years, and it’s like stepping back in time. Like when I was younger, much younger. Like the ‘60s and ‘70s. That hasn’t been lost here … courtesy and friendliness. I get very emotional about it.”
Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in News.
This week, Boca Grande was added to the communities in Lee County being asked for input on how well the County has been doing in response to Hurricane Ian. Every city in the county, and several planning areas of unincorporated parts of the county – such as Boca Grande – are being asked by the […]
Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in Profiles.
Being in the family chiropractic business was not the original plan for Francine Finucan (fah-NU-kin). She was supposed to be a college-educated stay-at-home wife and mother. That was her father’s plan for her. Francine – Frankie to her friends – had other plans. Among them was to come to Florida and help people stay healthy and fit in multiple ways.
Frankie was the oldest of three siblings. According to her father, who was a well-known chiropractor in Roseville, Michigan for 50 years, Frankie’s brother Paul was to be the chiropractor. He was to take over dad’s business when the time was right. Their younger brother Andrew was going to be president of the United States. Dad is one out of three so far. (Andrew could still become president if he really tried.)
Written by Boca Beacon Reader on . Posted in Letters to the Editor.
To the Editor: You could call it, “The Miracle of the Lemonade Stand.” Two little girls wanted to help put the old Baptist Church back together again. You see, they knew that Hurricane Ian had left the church much like Humpty Dumpty after he fell off the wall, scattered all over the place. Eleanor and […]
Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in News.
It was easy to see that the Boca Grande Historic Preservation Board didn’t want to make the decision they felt they had to make on Wednesday, May 10 at their monthly meeting. The proposal was from the Boca Grande Health Clinic to demolish the old Annex building and to build a new building approximately four times the size of the old one – weighing in at 13,299 square feet. After a series of pointed questions directed to several Clinic representatives, though, they had to deny the Certificate of Appropriateness based on two criteria within the Boca Grande Historic District Design Guidelines, specifically addressing the mass and scale of the proposed building and its height.
The reasons given officially to the county were submitted as, “Although the Board did not object to the form or materials proposed for the proposed office, it found that the height of the structure is too large for the immediate block of surrounding residences. The proposal is therefore not consistent with Guideline 4.1. The Board finds that the proposed structure exceeds both the mass and scale of the block and therefore is not consistent with Guideline 4.3.”
Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in News, Sports & Outdoors.
If the first tarpon tournament of the 2023 season, held last Saturday night, gives any indication as to what is in store, it might just be a pretty interesting season. Capt. Chad Bombenger and his team aboard “Sabalo” brought home the prize money for first place with five of the 24 fish released in the #17 Classic.
Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in News.
The next time you see our local firefighters out selling their shirts or cooking up barbecue, remember why it is they do what they do. The answer is simple – they do what they do to help their friends and the community in times of need.
The Boca Grande Firefighter’s Association, Inc. is a non-profit organization created in 2009 to help firefighters and their families in times of strife. Even before that, though, our local firefighters were finding ways to give back to the community. Each year they would pool together what money they could between them, then give it to an island family who needed a little extra help for Christmas.