News Update for 4/15/19

Today is April 15th – income tax day. To mark the occaision, members of the Highlands County Tea Party will be holding a flag and sign wave. The group is slated to gather at the intersection of Highway 27 & Sparta Road and stand at the sidewalk there.
Many people do not know that “TEA” actually is an acronym for “Taxed Enough Already.” The event marks the 10th anniversary for the Tax Day Tea parties. The event will run from 10-noon

The Avon Park city council has turned down a grant from the Southwest Florida Water Management District. Staff members told the council that accepting the state money could be cost prohibitive and result in major changes in the mall area, including the elimination of more than half the trees.
Apparently the original application for the project, which would re-rout stormwater, was “filled out in haste,” reportedly to meet a looming deadline. Council decided to absorb the $57,000 already spent under the administration of former city managers.

An Avon Park man was seriously injured when a motorcycle and a car collided in the Avon Estates area on Saturday.
Police say a car driven by 72-year-old Judy Watkins was turning into a driveway on Morningside Drive and pulled into the path of the Kawasaki Vulcan being ridden by 51-year-old Curtis Ludden.
Ludden was airlifted to Tampa General. Watkins was cited for making an improper turn.

A lot of residents were without power west of Sebring in the area of Highlands Hammock during the pre-dawn hours this morning. Duke energy officials say at its peak about 1800 customers were affected in what appears to have been the largest outage in the state today.
It’s unclear how long the electric was out or what caused the power failure.

The suspect in the fatal shootings of a 6-year-old Polk County girl, her mother and aunt has surrendered after a statewide manhunt.
Haines City Police report 38-year-old Ernst Cherizard turned himself in yesterday. He is accused of killing Elizabelle Frenel, her 23-year-old mother, Eli Normil, and 48-year-old aunt Nicole Guillume.
Police say he fled after shooting the three at an apartment complex Friday night and had been the subject search that tracked him 200 miles away near Fort Lauderdale.
Apparently Cherizard had been in a relationship with Normil.
Police said Cherizard apologized on Facebook hours after the shooting, but Chief James Elensky called him “a monster.”