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The stories near you

• Florida Storms: Closing the books on the 2024 hurricane season, one of the costliest on record. "Seasonally, the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season is the first season to feature multiple Category 5 hurricanes since 2019 and one of the costliest in history."

• WUFT News: A special singer: Woman expresses herself through music. "Isabelle Grow, a 19-year-old with partial brain damage, faces daily challenges completing tasks like kindergarten-level homework, but she has found her voice in music."

• Gainesville Sun ($): Former Gainesville mayoral candidate reported missing in June charged with murder in Tennessee. "The Pulaski Citizen reported that Giles County Sheriff Joe Purvis executed two search warrants on properties owned by The Twelve Tribes, a local branch of a Christian group described by some as a cult."

• Mainstreet Daily News: Newberry Community School submits charter application to state. "Along the nine months’ journey so far, the elementary school has lost teachers, a main face of the conversion effort was arrested for luring a minor, and a commission meeting shouting match has resulted in letters between lawyers."

• Mainstreet Daily News: With help, Archer begins to dig out of financial crisis. "Alltop stepped into the position after the Archer City Commission fired City Manager Charles Hammond during an emergency meeting on Sept. 19 for misconduct after a citizen with accounting expertise looked into the budget and pointed out unexplained planned increases to the millage rate, an unbalanced budget, unapproved cost of living pay increases to his own salary and a failure to advertise the rollback rate."

• Are you a student, parent or teacher in Marion County whose school is in need of repair? If so, WUFT News wants to hear from you. Tell us what you're seeing and how it's affecting you by sending us an email feedback at wuft.org.

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Around the state

• WUSF-Tampa: Florida's Live Local Act may not be helping some people find affordable housing. "According to a Florida Policy Institute analyst, the law puts an unfair burden on those who are singlehandedly supporting children, parents or people with disabilities."

• WUSF-Tampa: Hillsborough Sheriff Chad Chronister tapped to lead the DEA. "Chronister has been with the HCSO since 1992, and has served as sheriff since being appointed by former Gov. Rick Scott to succeed David Gee when he retired in 2017."

• Inside Climate News: Everglades restoration should involve Indigenous tribes more, report says. "Now a new report on the progress of the $21 billion effort to restore the vast watershed acknowledges a lack of meaningful engagement with the Miccosukee and Seminole tribes, who consider the soaring cypress swamps and sweeping sawgrass prairies of the river of grass that saved them from annihilation more than 100 years ago to be sacred."

• News Service of Florida: Randy Fine seeks to replace Mike Waltz. "Fine’s announcement Tuesday came weeks after the Brevard County lawmaker was elected to the Florida Senate. Fine said he will step down from the Senate in March, about midway through the 2025 legislative session."

• News Service of Florida: Medical marijuana operators are ready to light up. "Weeks after Gov. Ron DeSantis helped quash a proposal seeking to allow recreational marijuana, state health officials announced they intend to award medical-marijuana licenses to 22 of dozens of applicants who vied for the licenses more than 19 months ago."

• MediaLab@FAU: Pretty poison: Is tropical milkweed doing more harm than good to monarch butterflies? "Milkweed is abundant in local nurseries as monarch enthusiasts seek to increase the declining population and backyard gardeners try to lure the famous flutterers. But critics say this non-native plant may be having the opposite effect."

• WLRN-Miami: Zoo Miami celebrates rare birth of giant eland calf, world's largest antelope. "The cow-like eland is the world’s largest antelope, with males weighing more than 2,000 pounds, said Zoo Miami officials. Zoo Miami is the nation’s only accredited zoo to exhibit elands. Two other female elands are due to soon give birth."

From NPR News

• Politics: President Biden pardons son Hunter

• Health: Here's why bird flu fears are intensifying

• Race: 'Tired. Damn tired.' Some Black women are processing the grief of a Kamala Harris loss

• Business: Come for the roller coaster, stay for the shops: Can malls be fun again?

• Environment: O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree, which is more sustainable: real or plasticky?

• Animals: Vito the pug is the first of his breed to win National Dog Show's top prize

Kristin Moorehead curated today's edition of The Point.