Domestic Violence Month Koppel’s column on Violence
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Pink Heals to Tradition
Pink fire trucks make their return
A18
The A-list gets longer
Sunrise Theatre adds big names
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ST. LUCIE WEST • TRADITION
YourVoiceWeekly.com VOL. 2/ISSUE 48
YOUR INDEPENDENT LOCAL COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER
Charter school expansion approved by city
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 03, 2014
PSL campaign stop
Brandon Zeris STAFF WRITER
bzeris@YourVoiceWeekly.com
ST. LUCIE WEST — The city’s last council meeting was packed. More than 200 people attended on Sept. 22, and due to fire and safety codes, about 40 had to watch on televisions, outside council chambers. The final budget was set, along with the property tax rate, but that’s not why most of the attendees were there. The council approved Somerset College Preparatory Academy plans to build a new school on a 10-acre site at the northeast corner of Peacock and California boulevards with a 4-1 vote. “It is one step in the right direction. We are not done, yet,” Erica Rains, the academy’s principal, said. The school is currently operating out of a leased Indian River State College building at its St. Lucie West branch, but Rains said more space is needed to add a middle school and eventually, an elementary
See SCHOOL page A13
Mitch Kloorfain/chief photographer Somerset College Preparatory Academy students Arianna James, Alejandra Rodriquez and Jayme De La Vega, earn volunteer hours as they bookend Gov. Rick Scott in town to make a campaign stop at the Republican Party of St. Lucie County Headquarters Tuesday, Sept. 30.
Ballot bias gives some a boost Brandon Zeris STAFF WRITER
bzeris@YourVoiceWeekly.com
ST. LUCIE COUNTY — It’s likely that, if you’re last name begins with a Z, you’re going to have a bad time — if you’re running for a
seat in the St. Lucie West Services District, that is. Since 2000, candidates whose last names came after their opponents’, alphabetically, lost in six of eight races. Thatr doesn’t take unopposed races into account, however. If a race in Florida is a non-par-
tisan one, the candidates are ordered alphabetically. According to numerous studies, that gives the first person on the ballot about a 2 percent advantage over his or her opponents. This is commonly referred to as “the primacy effect.” Two Stanford researchers revealed the advan-
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tage as it applied to elections in 1998. In the study, Stanford scientist Jon Krosnick said voters often feel obligated to select a candidate even though they may know nothing about him or her, so they just
See BIAS page A15