The weekend after Race Week in Highlands County is often rather quiet. Not so this Saturday in Avon Park – the second annual “Springapalooza” Festival runs from 8am till 5pm along the Mile Long Mall, raising funds for Heartland Helping Hands … the organization this year is earmarking funds to supporting Viet Nam Veteran Curt Ruggles, a resident at Royal Care in Avon Park. There’s a 3k Mall Run, breakfast at Donaldson Park, vendors, food trucks, music and more till 5pm. They could use more entries for the bed races at the event – log onto heartlandhelpinghands.org.
Our local theatre troupe is bringing home some acccolades on a regional level. Highlands Lakeside Theatre’s Laura Wade won second place in the “Best Play” category at the ten-state Southeastern Regional Theatre Conference up in North Carolina this week. The play also won honors for Best Set, and Larry Moore won Best actor award.
If you saw smoke in the Spring Lake area yesterday, don’t assume the worst – your neighbors didn’t burn their pizza. There was a controlled burn near the corner of Highway 98 and Elliott Road. Planned, and no sausages, cheese or structures were endangered.
It wasn’t an election, but a 20 year member of the Lake Placid Town Council is back. Debra Worley was defeated for re-election in April of ’22, but was the only person who applied for an appointment to fill the unexpired term of Greg Sapp, who resigned his seat at the end of last year over the new requirements for far more detailed public disclosure of officials’ finances. Worley took her seat at last week’s Town Council meeting.
This IS an election, though, with some teeth in it. The annual online competition between the state’s sherrifs’ department K9’s is on. This one’s for the puppies, and Highlands County’s K9 Hank garnered enough support in the preliminary rounds for a first-round “bye.” Keep tabs on the rounds on the Sheriff’s Department Facebook page and vote daily. Serious woofing – err, bragging rights are at stake.