Today is Memorial Day, a time when Americans honor the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of our country.
There will be an observance today at 9am at the Lakeview Memorial Gardens on Memorial Drive between Avon Park and Sebring. It’s the 10th annual event. The guest speaker will be Chief Master Sgt. Dennis Green.
At noon, Amvets Post 21 will have a flag raising ceremony – that will be at the post home on Highway 27.
The Military Sea Services Museum in Sebring will host a special program at 2:00 this afternoon, followed by guided tours of the facility.
At 4:00 this afternoon the American Legion Post 69 in Avon Park will hold their observance.
From 4-5:30 pm the Highlands Tea Party will hold a memorial flag wave on Highway 27 in front of the Fairmunt Cinema Square shopping complex.
If you’re planning to cook out today, local officials are asking for extreme caution. Highlands County – and all of peninsular Florida – is listed as a "Very High" danger of wildfires.
Highlands County crews have not reported any incidents of fires over the weekend, and they’d like to keep it that way.
Anyone cooking or using outdoor fire, is asked to keep suppression methods nearby to extinguish embers or anything else that could spread the flames.
There were graduations over the weekend in Highlands County, and a trio of seniors walked away with more than a diploma. Avon Park’s Jaheem West, Sebring’s McKinley Carver and Raoul Espinoza of Lake Placid each recieved a late model automobile courtesy of the Alan Jay Automotive network.
The cars represent number 92, 93 and 94 in the Alan Jay "Wheels of A’s Program. That’s where seniors who earned "A" grades during their final year in high school have a chance at winning a car.
Highlands County sheriff’s officials say they continue to work on a major cyber attack on their agency. They spotted the incursion early Friday and took the system offline to minimize damage.
Information technology crews have been working to unravel the issue and restore the system while increasing firewalls and other security.
Right now they are asking citizens not to utilize the computer system while efforts are underway for repair and restoration.
The city of Avon Park had a ransome ware attack several years ago, they since have been able to recover from that one.