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The stories near you

• WUFT News: Mark your calendar for Remembering Rosewood centennial events. "The Remembering Rosewood Centennial Committee curated a week of events to mark the 100th anniversary of the destruction of Rosewood – what had been a majority Black community in Levy County before a white vigilante mob murdered African American residents and set fire to the town in January of 1923."

• WUFT News: Newberry in talks with Archer and High Springs about new $40M regional wastewater treatment facility. "The new facility is part of an effort by Newberry to overhaul its wastewater infrastructure to accommodate new development and meet new environmental regulations the state legislature passed several years ago; those will take effect when the city’s current wastewater permit expires in mid-2026."

• Ocala Star-Banner ($): Fighting back: Opponents of newly approved development sue Marion County. "Several of them filed a blistering lawsuit last week accusing Marion County government of denying them due process, disrespecting them and violating the county's own written rules and guidelines concerning development."

• WCJB: NCFL rural communities get money for infrastructure funding. "Rural communities in Florida are getting more than $7.1 million in infrastructure funding, including some North Central Florida communities."

• Gainesville Sun ($): LaVern Porter-Mitchell, a pioneer in the dance community in Gainesville, dies at age 72. "Known as a performer with grace and poise who gave it her all on the dance floor and as she taught hundreds, if not thousands of young people to dance, Porter-Mitchell will live long in the hearts of those whom she met and mentored as she touched many lives through dance, service and wisdom in Alachua County."

• WUFT News: Meet some of the professional athletes who call Gainesville home. "Gainesville is home to many professional athletes who stay in town for first-class training facilities and coaching talent."

• Ocala Gazette: Living history lesson. "Participants in the Great Florida Cattle Drive rode their horses into the past as they re-enacted how Cracker pioneers survived—and thrived—in early Florida."

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Around the state

• NPR:She was an ABC News producer. She also was a corporate operative. "Television news producer Kristen Hentschel was doing precisely what journalists should do on a searing hot day in Stuart, Fla., in July 2018: She confronted a politician with unwelcome questions."

• WUSF-Tampa: Three words in a new law threaten Florida's rental boat industry. "The words in question are 'and the renter.' That basically requires that not only the rental watercraft be insured, but also the person renting it."

• News Service of Florida: Gov. DeSantis takes aim at the union dues of Florida teachers. "Gov. Ron DeSantis has signaled that he will make a priority of passing a long-debated proposal that would prevent teachers from having union dues deducted from their paychecks."

•NPR: Florida's effort to charge 20 people with voter fraud has hit some roadblocks. "The state's effort has been a controversial one. Many of the individuals charged with voting illegally in 2020 say they thought they were eligible to vote, despite past felony convictions, because the state had given them a voter registration card."

• Tallahassee Democrat ($): Trulieve spending big on Florida recreational ballot measure. "The Florida-based company with growing facilities in Gadsden County has contributed all but $124 of the $15 million raised to promote a proposed constitutional amendment for the 2024 ballot to decriminalize the plant for personal use."

• Florida Politics: North Atlantic right whale calves No. 3 and 4 spotted amid backlash to new protections. "North Atlantic right whales need more than 50 calves a season to stabilize the population and halt a human-caused dive into extinction. While that seems like it would take a miracle based on prior years and lack of effective whale protections, each new calf counts."

• WUSF-Tampa: A study shows the 2016 presidential election had an adverse effect on minorities' health. "It says population-level blood pressure — particularly among racial and ethnic minorities — might have increased following the 2016 presidential election."

• Spectrum News: Wait, what? Why the earliest sunset isn't on the winter solstice. "The winter solstice will occur at 4:47 p.m. ET on Dec. 21 this year, and even though the day of the winter solstice is the shortest of the year, the latest sunrise and earliest sunset do not occur on this day."

From NPR News

• Health: Investigation: Many U.S. hospitals sue patients for debts or threaten their credit

• World: The Taliban bans women from attending universities in Afghanistan

• National: Airlines have started rebooking flights across the U.S. as winter weather intensifies

• Technology: Elon Musk says he will resign as Twitter CEO once he finds a replacement

• Space: Goodnight, sweet spacecraft: NASA's InSight lander may have just signed off from Mars

• National: The weird, wild and wonderful stories you might have missed this year
Kristin Moorehead curated today's edition of The Point.