The residents of Spanish Lakes gathered Oct. 9 to mourn fallen neighbors a year after a devastating tornado swept through Lakewood Park in northern St. Lucie. At least 150 residents of the mobile home community near the Indian River County line witnessed the unveiling of a plaque dedicated to six fellow retirees. They all died when a historic tornado struck the community hours before Hurricane Milton made landfall in Tampa Oct. 9, 2024. The six victims enshrined are Alejandro Alonso, 66; Debbie Kennedy, 66; Mary Viramontez, 70; William Cutlip, 82; Sandra MacDonald, 84; and Roger Ammon, 85. They lived along

Read more

Concerns about parking dominated discussion at last month’s Fort Pierce Redevelopment Agency (FPPA) meeting as conceptual plans for Marina Park were unveiled. The 6 acres of publicly owned property located between Avenue A (Marina Way) and Orange Avenue is home to the popular Downtown Farmers Market and contains 175 parking spots. The project is part of the November 2022 Downtown Master Plan with phase 1 of the plan to transform Marina Square into Marina Park. Proposals for the site include a market plaza, a playground with a splashpad, an events lawn, dog park, waterfront promenade and the controversial loss of

Read more

St. Lucie County is currently teeming with initiatives aimed at creating cleaner rivers and improving water quality, with 10 projects either in the planning stages, underway or recently completed. They are all being carried out with help from the 2018 voter-approved half-cent sales tax and $19 million in federal funding from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARP) of 2021. To take advantage of the funding, money needed to be reserved by the end of 2024 and projects completed by the end of 2026. “Residents are seeing improvements like better drainage, improved roads and new stormwater ponds,” said St. Lucie County

Read more

After deliberations since January 2024, the Port St. Lucie City Council unanimously struck down adding 850 homes to the 464.5-acre Lulfs Groves development Sept. 22. An amendment to change the property into the Astoria gated community would have added up to 1,350 residential units from an initially proposed 500, according to proposals by developers of D.R. Horton and Lucido & Associates. The amendment would have rezoned all 2.4 million square feet of industrial space in Lulfs Groves, 150,000 square feet of city use, and 50,000 square feet of office space to residential use. Other changes included the addition of a

Read more

Ray Balsamo, 71, rode his golf cart through the Spanish Lakes community in Lakewood Park on a humid Friday afternoon Sept. 26.He went to the front door of N. Craig Martin, a 20-year resident who moved to a nearby double-wide mobile home after a life of banking in the hamlet of Waterford, near Albany, N.Y.Martin’s front parlor had fresh, modern furniture that contrasted with vinyl wood-grain paneling. A throw blanket embroidered with a group portrait of his five adult daughters accented his sofa.Martin ribbed Balsamo, his neighbor of three years, on how he owes his high energy to taking the

Read more

James Sebree still remembers screams from his front porch.“I could hear them,” he said on Sept. 24. His eyes welled with tears as he went to his aging Saturn sedan for another commute on an otherwise uneventful afternoon. Sebree, 71, has lived along the northern boundary of the Eastwood Canal, a 2.2-mile stormwater conduit in Lakewood Park near the Indian River County line, for 30 years.An uprooted tree has stood over the canal in his front yard since last Oct. 9. Its roots poked out of pitch-black soil like intestinal villi; its branches grasped for vacant lots of evergreen grass

Read more

The Port St. Lucie City Council unanimously approved a major site plan amendment to Gatlin Plaza at 2250 Gatlin Blvd. late last month, paving the way for a BJ’s Wholesale Club to be added to the mix of already established businesses. The amendment includes the addition of a 106,200-square-foot building as well as 16 fuel pumping stations. It will bring the total of existing and proposed buildings to almost 500,000 square feet, requiring transportation improvements because it exceeds the 400,000-square-foot mark. BJ’s will join name-brand stores such as Home Depot, Floor Décor, Dave & Buster’s, Bass Pro Shops, Wendy’s and

Read more

Florida Coast Medical Center in Port St. Lucie was the place to be earlier this month when hundreds came together to celebrate the grand opening of the county’s first new hospital in over a decade. In addition to staff, the Sept. 9 festivities included many city and county officials as well as administrators from Tenet Healthcare Corporation, the hospital’s Dallas-based parent company. A fun photo station, a variety of games and an appetizing food display were part of the scene that included a large enthusiastic group of staff members ready for business. Since opening day, over 150 patients have been

Read more

Port St. Lucie will go forward with a budget of just over $869.8 million and their lowest millage on record for the next fiscal year, starting Oct. 1. The City Council agreed 5-0 to pass the budget – repeated from the Sept. 8 budget meeting – shortly before their regular meeting Monday. The 2025-26 budget uses approximately $18.8 million (2.21 percent) more than the FY 2024-25 budget of around $851 million, city documents show. The City Council also feted the success of this year’s total millage rate reduction to 4.9750, or nearly $4.98 taxed for every $1,000 of home value.

Read more

Two more judicial seats have opened up in the 19th Circuit, bringing the total vacancies to four this year so far, with the second opening still pending an appointment sometime in the next two weeks. Judge Lawrence Mirman, appointed by former Gov. Jeb Bush in 2005, retired after 20 years on the bench, plus 16 years as an assistant state attorney. Mirman’s docket included a portion of St. Lucie County’s felony criminal cases and Mental Health Court in Fort Pierce, and recently, Martin County jury trials. Mirman made headlines earlier this year for cracking down on no-show jurors in Martin

Read more