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Coach Kiesling, retiring? No, not really

Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in Community, News.

If you were to find ten young adults who grew up in Boca Grande during the 2000s and ask them who the most influential people in their lives were, you can be guaranteed a good number of them would say the name DJ, or “Coach,” Keisling. DJ has been working at the Boca Grande Community Center’s events and summer camp for a very long time … time he has made good use of. The number of young lives he has positively impacted is countless. Not to mention, it just wouldn’t be a proper egg hunt without him there between hunts, throwing candy to the wind with joyous abandon, surrounded by hundreds of young children who look as though they might eat him for brunch if he didn’t step up the pace.

IN THE SPOTLIGHT: Teacher Susan McKenzie eager to start her first year at TIS

Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in Education, Profiles.

There is a special place in Susan McKenzie’s heart for second-graders. She loves teaching all elementary grades, but second-graders have a “special wonderment” about them. “There is an excitement to learn and the ability to stretch themselves. I love to watch them grow.” This is what second-graders bring to this teacher, and she is happy to be starting her connection with The Island School by teaching second grade. She will have 14 students in her class.

EDITORIAL: Readers, please take note of our obituary policy changes: There’s good news, and there’s not-so-good news

Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in Editorial, Obituaries.

Since the Boca Beacon began in 1980, the Boca Beacon has had the distinct honor of running obituaries free of charge. This policy has been adhered to without question until recently, when we realized that many of our readers send us obituaries that don’t go through funeral homes. This means that they aren’t being recorded […]

A part of our history, about to fade away?

Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in Community History, News.

A wise local once told me something profound. When asked what we could do to help save a historic icon that was about to be sold he said, “What are you trying to save? It’s already been sold out. It could have been sold to someone who cared, but they didn’t buy it. And it’s not my job to subsidize their personal experience. They had their chance to make it what they wanted to, or to keep it the way it is, and they choose not to buy it. Now it’s someone else’s choice.”

As the case of Boots and a Nantucket beachfronter altercation unfolds, the story starts to sound vaguely familiar …

Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in News.

All it takes is one homeowner or, in some cases, a corporation, to try to impose this regulation on beaches, and soon others follow suit. GIS maps can be misleading to potential property owners, as in many cases it shows the property line going out into the water. In Florida the law states that all beaches are public from the mean high-water line down to the water, and that used to be a cut-and-dried rule. But in 2018 former Governor Rick Scott created House Bill 631 (now Florida Statute 163.035), which is known as the “Establishment of Recreational Customary Use.” It seemed like a good idea at the time, but now it has proven to make a touchy situation even touchier in the fact it can be interpreted in many ways … including ways that benefit the property owner, not the public.

IN THE SPOTLIGHT: A new TIS teacher for the ‘littlest’ students has arrived in a big way

Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in Profiles.

“I am an outside-the-box thinker,” Gretchen declared, and she backs it up with evidence. She has received multiple grants to create unusual learning experiences with her students, including creating and performing a musical with her second-grade students not too long ago. The musical is called “Squirm” – which sounds appropriate for second graders. 

ECOWATCH: Sharks are not bad guys … we are

Written by Delores Savas on . Posted in Boca Beacon Back Pages, Columns, Opinion.

Florida has topped the global charts in shark bite numbers for decades. The trend continued in 2021 researchers said. Out of 73 reported unprovoked incidents around the world last year, 28 were in Florida, representing 60 percent of the total cases in the U.S. and 38 percent worldwide. That number was consistent with Florida’s most recent five-year annual average of 25-shark attacks.

This Date in the Boca Beacon

Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in Boca Beacon Back Pages, Community History.

FIVE YEARS AGO A Port Charlotte youth visiting with a church group drowned at the south end of the island. In another scenario, two lives were saved from drowning when beachgoers formed a human chain (with some help from a pool noodle) out into the water. This incident occurred in the same spot where the […]