Members of the GFWC Lutz-Land O’ Lakes Woman’s Club stopped by to visit the clients of the Lutz Senior Center, to chat and serve breakfast treats. The visit was unexpected, but the seniors enjoyed the camaraderie and hospitality from the women. From left: Beverly Schnabel, Darryln Caudill, Marsha Gibson, Pam Blumenthal, Senior Center Director, Melba Pineiro, Barbara Booth and Linda Mitchell. For more information on this community service organization or membership information, visit GFWCLutzLandOLakesWomansClub.org, or its Facebook page.
Reasons To Smile
Southport Springs resident celebrates big birthday
Gene Poupard will be turning 100 years old on May 28 and soon will celebrate with his family in Michigan. Meanwhile, his friends in Southport Springs Golf & Country Club in Zephyrhills had a party to mark his milestone. His daughter, Marie, and her husband Paul Weston, also live in Southport Springs and, together with Poupard’s friends, threw him a party, according to Joe Grigelevich, editor of The Southport Sun, a community newsletter. ‘And, what a great celebration it was,’ the editor noted.
NFL ‘rookie class’
AdventHealth announced the newest “GOATs” of the 2022 NFL draft, the AdventHealth Bucs Babies, with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. This year, the true “GOATs” of cuteness and the tiniest Brady fans are ready to expand the depth of the Bucs Babies roster. All babies born at an AdventHealth hospital in West Florida are considered AdventHealth Bucs Babies and babies born the week of the NFL draft are official members of the “rookie class.”
A gesture of kindness
The GFWC Wesley Chapel Woman’s Club hand-made Easter bunnies from washcloths, and added an egg with candy for the children, to donate to the Sunrise Domestic Violence Shelter. The women also made up Easter baskets for the Sunrise staff. From left: Melissa Zincke, LeeAnn Carr, Annette Bellingar, Shantel Meyers, Carmen Quiles, Linda Jenkins and Liz Chavez. (Courtesy of Shantel Meyers)
An egg-cellent Easter event
The children cheered before they saw it. The blades whipping in the distance until the helicopter rose from behind Dollar General. It flew by, circled around New Walk Church in Zephyrhills twice and the children cheered some more.
At the church’s annual Egg Drop, the pilot dropped about 2,000 eggs onto a field as hundreds of children awaited to scramble after and grab as many eggs as they could on Easter Sunday.
Already on the field: another 20,000 eggs for children, ranging in ages from 1 to 10 years old.
The prizes inside? Candy, stickers, tattoos, even money.
In all, the church held seven egg drops over the three-day weekend and each one had hundreds of kids, the largest being at 12:45 p.m., on Easter Sunday, with about 600 sprinting for colorful plastic eggs.
New Walk Church is nondenominational, at 35008 State Road 54 in Zephyrhills. For more info, log onto NewWalk.church.
Published April 20, 2022
True blue support
The City of Tampa, including Old City Hall, the Tampa Riverwalk and downtown bridges on April 2 were lit up blue, at sunset, for World Autism Awareness Day. Tampa was the first Florida city to be designated as autism-friendly.
Taking a ride with the mayor through Dade City
Mayor Camille Hernandez and representatives from the City of Dade City joined in a 2½-mile casual bicycle ride through the city on March 25 to promote bicycling and pedestrian safety. The event was hosted by Bike/Walk Tampa Bay, a regional coalition of professionals, advocates, and residents committed to making walking and bicycling safe. The organization was there to pass out shirts and promote roadway safety. The ride started at The Spoke, the visitor’s center on Church Street, and cyclists traveled on the Hardy Trail and Seventh Avenue. Dozens of riders joined in, as did some members of the Dade City Police Department. To learn how to become an ambassador for Bike/Walk Tampa Bay, log onto www.bikewalktampabay.org.
Sheriff’s office adds three K-9s
The Pasco Sheriff’s Office (PSO) announced the addition of three new K-9s to its ranks —K-9 Blake, K-9 Ranger and K-9 Ripp.
The new teams recently completed the PSO’s K-9 patrol school, where they were trained in tracking, building searches, area searches, apprehensions and locating articles. These valuable skills will help deputies on a variety of calls, such as locating missing people and finding dangerous narcotics.
K-9 Blake is a German shepherd born in Slovakia on Aug. 28, 2020. He is assigned to the Highway Interdiction Team, where he assists deputies to stop the trafficking of illegal drugs on major Pasco roadways. Blake is partnered with Dep. Ryan Jackson, who started with the PSO in 2014 and became a member of the SWAT team in 2017.
K-9 Ranger is a Belgian Malinois born in the Czech Republic on June 6, 2020. He is certified in patrol and explosives detection, and is a member of the SWAT team. Ranger’s partner is Dep. Justin Case, who joined the PSO as a patrol deputy in 2021, and has been a member of the unified SWAT team since its inception.
K-9 Ripp is a Dutch shepherd born in the Netherlands on June 15, 2020. He is a patrol K-9 and will soon start work on his certification for narcotics detection. Ripp’s partner is Dep. Jeremie Garcia, who joined the PSO in 2014 as a patrol deputy and was assigned to the K-9 Unit in 2017.
K-9 teams would not be possible without the generous donations of community members. Funds to purchase, train and equip every PSO K-9 come from these community donations; no taxpayer dollars are used.
A splash of color, as garden work continues
The work that the members of the GFWC Lutz-Land O’ Lakes Woman’s Club have done on its Sensory Garden has progressed and taken shape with a very colorful look — brightly painted plant containers fashioned into floral petal shapes from recycled tires, and newly planted with perennials, in the hopes of attracting butterflies and bees. This garden, established “from scratch,” is to serve as a fun, colorful, quiet place of enjoyment for autistic and special needs children on the grounds of Camp Idlewild in Land O’ Lakes. Club member Deb Cardona paints planters to give a vibrant look to the garden.
A rollicking good time
The GFWC Lutz-Land O’ Lakes Woman’s Club members’ troupe gave a ‘Sisters Act’-style performance as old-school nuns in full habits, to entertain members and guests at a recent club meeting. The troupe sang and danced to the tune, ‘I Will Follow Him.’ From left: Dee Knerr, Kay Taylor, Annette Bellingar, and Elayne Bassinger, who portrayed Mother Superior. For more information on the club, visit GFWCLutzLandOLakesWomansClub.org, or its Facebook page.