Start your engines
Regatta races start this weekend
A3
Bye Bye Birdie 20 years later County performance comes full circle
B1
ST. LUCIE WEST • TRADITION
Super Sale Up to 30-40% OFF
See page A7
YourVoiceWeekly.com VOL. 4/ISSUE 29
YOUR INDEPENDENT LOCAL COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER
A story and a blessing
FRIDAY, MAY 20, 2016
Area cities join Indian River Lagoon Regional Compact Patrick McCallister STAFF WRITER
pmccallister@YourVoiceWeekly.com
Mitch Kloorfain/chief photographer David Wisnia, an Auschwitz concentration camp survivor reads the torah with Rabbi Bruce Benson at Temple Beth El Israel in St. Lucie West before telling his story of survival to the congregation. See story on page A16.
TREASURE COAST — Drop a dime in the water from the Stuart Causeway and the ripple goes to Volusia County. The Indian River Lagoon reaches more than 150 miles northward from Martin and cuts a swath through five counties with several towns and cities along the way. There’re also common water-quality issues along the way. At its last regular meeting, the Port St. Lucie City Council approved a resolution joining the Indian River Lagoon Regional Compact. Councilman Ron Bowen said he hopes the move helps avoid a repeat of history he witnessed. “I come from Cleveland, Ohio,” he said at the meeting. “I saw a river die.” The Cuyahoga River famously caught fire several times from the late 1800s due to industrial and other pollution. Additionally, there were stretches of the river devoid of aquatic life. A 1969 fire on the river was a seminal moment in the environmental-protection movement. Bowen said he’s seeing — albeit on a smaller scale — similar pattern with the St. Lucie
See COMPACT page A10
Scholarship program celebrates 20 years of success Adam Laten Wilson
FOR YOURVOICE NEWS& VIEWS
info@YourVoiceWeekly.com
ST. LUCIE WEST — “Welcome to the best evening of the year!” That was how guest speaker Michael Minton began his opening remarks at IRSC’s 20th annual Take Stock
in Children Awards, held at their Fort Pierce campus on May 9. “These scholarships have positively changed the lives of these students and their families,” Minton, of Dean Mead Minton and Zwemer law firm and a founding partner with the program, continued, “Many of them are now adults and have become productive members
of society. I can think of no other program we’ve participated in that’s done more good for our community than this program.” At the ceremony, 44 eighth grade students from Indian River, Okeechobee, St. Lucie, and Martin counties were awarded need-based
See SCHOLARSHIP page A13
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