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The Point, July 24, 2024: Kent Fuchs named interim UF president

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The stories near you

UF President Kent Fuchs. (WUFT News file photo)
UF President Kent Fuchs. (WUFT News file photo)

• WUFT News: UF trustees unanimously vote for Kent Fuchs as interim president. "Fuchs served as UF’s president from 2015 to 2023, when he took a one-year sabbatical. According to the press release, he began teaching an electrical engineering course in the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering earlier this year."

• WUFT News: The hidden costs for youth to excel in baseball. "Travel baseball is full of aspiring athletes hoping to make it on a college team, but the financial hurdles to get there are often overlooked."

• WCJB: Ocala RV park Belleview Hills sold, residents ordered to vacate properties. "Belleview Hills RV Park residents said the original owners of the property informed neighbors that it had been sold. Residents were told they had until August 19 to vacate the premises."

• Central Florida Public Media: Central Florida could bring home statewide Teacher of the Year award. "Among the five finalists is Central Florida’s Jennifer Brown, a math teacher at Forest High School in Marion County."

• WCJB: ‘Mentally and physically decompress’: Gainesville Firefighters preparing for shift schedule change. "Across North Central Florida, recognizing the importance of the mental health of first responders has increased. Now, Gainesville Fire Rescue employees will be able to spend more time at home thanks to a shift schedule change."

• Mainstreet Daily News: Keep Alachua County Beautiful announces new executive director. "According to KACB’s website, the organization’s mission since it was established in 1991, 'is to beautify, conserve resources, recycle, educate and preserve our community’s environmental legacy.'"

• WUFT News: Veteran Meteorologist Tim Miller to Lead UFCJC’s Weather and Emergency Network Operations. "He will be responsible for strategic relationships and collaboration with governmental weather and public safety entities on a local, state, and national level, and establishing the FPREN strategic direction for content-creation and coordination with Florida public media stations."


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Around the state

• Central Florida Public Media: Florida sees surge in COVID-19 cases, but how dangerous is the virus today? "The strains are extremely contagious as they have mutated to avoid most people’s immune systems, but the infections they create are mild, said Dr. Ira Longini a professor of biostatistics at the University of Florida."

• Associated Press: Florida's population passes 23 million for the first time due to residents moving from other states. "Florida is the third most populous state in the U.S., trailing only California's 39.5 million residents and Texas' 30.5 million inhabitants."

• The 19th: Florida is quietly denying transgender residents updated birth certificates. "Although the agency says it is basing denials on pre-existing state statutes, transgender Floridians had previously been able to update their birth certificates for at least a decade. Now, they face an opaque process that seems designed to reject all applicants."

• WLRN-Miami: Could coral that survived last summer's heat wave seed more resilient babies? "In the last 40 years, about 90% of coral have been lost across the Keys, due to pollution, disease and bleaching fueled by warming waters. Last summer’s heat wave bleached coral around the Keys and shallow waters in Miami, providing a startling glimpse at what a warmer future could look like."

Farmworkers pick strawberries at Lewis Taylor Farms, which is co-owned by William L. Brim and Edward Walker who have large scale cotton, peanut, vegetable and greenhouse operations in Fort Valley, GA, on May 7, 2019. (Courtesy of the U.S. Department of Agriculture)
Farmworkers pick strawberries at Lewis Taylor Farms, which is co-owned by William L. Brim and Edward Walker who have large scale cotton, peanut, vegetable and greenhouse operations in Fort Valley, GA, on May 7, 2019. (Courtesy of the U.S. Department of Agriculture)

• WUSF-Tampa: The hottest states in the country, like Florida, are requesting a lot more agricultural workers. "They’re brought into the country on a temporary visa known as H-2A. So, the council used the H-2A application data from the U.S. Department of Labor to create a map showing the demand. It focused on the number of workers requested, not the amount that definitively came to work in the U.S."

• News Service of Florida: Florida moves forward on a new social media law. "Facing potential First Amendment challenges, Florida has proposed details about how it will carry out a new law aimed at keeping children off social-media platforms and blocking minors from accessing online pornography."

• Associated Press: Broward Schools unlikely to fire mom whose trans daughter played on girls volleyball team. "Most of the nine members of the Broward County school board appeared ready to reject Superintendent Howard Hepburn’s recommendation that Jessica Norton be fired as a computer information specialist at Monarch High School, where her daughter played on the varsity team last year."

• Politico: ‘Microschools’ could be the next big school choice battle. "Florida just enacted a little-noticed provision that would make it much easier for these schools — which typically have less than 30 students — to get established."

• WUSF-Tampa: All that remains of this former mining town are a bungalow and the memories. "Like so many other phosphate mining towns, Coronet thrived just south of Plant City until the 1960s. Thought it no longer exists, its residents recall a bustling industry and a tight-knit community."


From NPR News

• Politics: Secret Service director resigns in wake of Trump assassination attempt

• Elections: In an energized 1st campaign speech, Harris makes her pitch for 2024

• Business: Delta's flight delays and cancellations prompt Dept. of Transportation investigation

• National: About 200 people protesting Gaza war arrested in congressional building, police say

• Health: With the U.S. bird flu outbreak uncontained, scientists see growing risks

• Environment: A hydrothermal explosion sends Yellowstone visitors running

• Law: A Missouri prison again has ignored an order to free a wrongfully convicted inmate

• Politics: 'Haley Voters for Harris' pledge to fight on after Nikki Haley says cease and desist

• Animals: A study finds that dogs can smell your stress — and make decisions accordingly

Kristin Moorehead curated today's edition of The Point.