INDIAN RIVER COUNTY It s still too soon to talk about bailing out nonprofits suffering financially because of the COVID-19 pandemic, county commissioners said Tuesday.
Getting people vaccinated against the coronavirus and helping them meet their basic needs are priorities, commissioners said. For now, they said, nonprofits need to seek assistance from organizations such as the United Way or hold their own fundraisers. Now is not the time, said Commissioner Peter O Bryan, stressing the county needs to focus on vaccinations, not looking for money fund nonprofits. I think we re up to our eyeballs trying to get these vaccines out.
Commissioner Laura Moss had proposed a small-nonprofit grant program, similar to the $5,000 grants offered to eligible small businesses that suffered financially because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Treasure Coast nonprofits dig into local history to celebrate Black History Month Lamaur Stancil, Treasure Coast Newspapers
Much of the national attention for Black History Month goes to cities in Alabama or Oklahoma, the sites of major events in the civil rights movement.
On the Treasure Coast, residents are looking there too, but also locally as they celebrate Black pioneers who entered the swampland before it was a state, worshipped in Vero Beach and sold paintings along Old Dixie Highway throughout South Florida. I go to the Gomez Pioneer Cemetery in Hobe Sound and look at the years these people were born, said Martin County history enthusiast Lloyd Jones. You see dates from the 1800s, and I try to imagine what life was like for them and I want to investigate why they came to South Florida, well before there was a tourism industry here.
Vero Beach woman reminisces growing up along Jungle Trail in 1930s as she walks where home stood
Jungle Trail has long history in Indian River County | Homegrown
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Except for one thing: the mosquitoes.
The 90-year-old Vero Beach resident, who lived along the Indian River on the island until the age of 4, said mosquitoes were so bad that residents used smudge pots to create a constant level of smoke in hopes of driving the nasty bugs away.
“I remember they were so bad they covered the screens,” said Wolverton, as she stood Friday on Jungle Trail just south of Jones Pier where her home once stood. “You couldn’t even see outside; all you could see and hear were mosquitoes.”
Ballet Vero Beach films a scene on location from Nutcracker on the Indian River
Ballet Vero Beach turned the challenge of the pandemic into an innovative opportunity by taking their Nutcracker on the Indian River to the water s edge to film an original adaptation of Tchaikovsky s Nutcracker which we can see for free from December 22 through January 6.
One holiday tradition the pandemic has almost entirely eliminated is the Nutcracker ballet. But the nonprofit professional dance company Ballet Vero Beach got innovative and took their version out into the rugged Florida wetlands to film it.
And from December 22 through January 6, we can all see it for free on streaming and broadcast services, including PBS South Florida.