Heather Bushman

The air in McPherson Complex Auditorium in Ocala, once stale with bureaucracy, surged with something much more urgent upon the introduction of Item…

Buttons, bumper stickers, shirts and signs — all adorned with calls to “save it, don’t pave it” and “stop the turnpike” — were the accessories of choice for several Inverness residents on Tuesday evening.

With hurricane season on the horizon, rainfall already rolling in and relief efforts up in the air, Dixie County residents are bracing for this summer to be as wet as the last.

Potential construction on the Florida Turnpike could affect Royal, one of the oldest Black communities in the state.

There are four separate proposals to the Florida Turnpike that would extend the interstate from Wildwood through combinations of these counties: Citrus, Levy, Marion and Sumter. Each of the routes would pave over large swaths of rural land.