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What You Missed This Week in La Gaceta

From As We Heard It, by Patrick Manteiga

► Move over Mayor Jane Castor, there’s a new boss in town. Jason Fernandez has been named Ybor City Alcalde.
One of his first major acts will be an act of defiance as he leads the Ybor Navy in a battle to clear the port for the Gasparilla invasion in January.
Fernandez has been at the helm of Bernini restaurant in Ybor City for over 30 years and is a big promoter of Ybor. … (to read more, buy a paper)

► Governor Ronald DeSantis has appointed many jerks to important roles in government. One of the biggest jerks is Florida Commissioner of Education Anastasios Kamoutsas. While this man runs education in Florida, he has never taught children or run a school, university or a school district. His background is as a prosecutor, PBA lawyer and a political hack for Governor DeSantis.
He was booed by the people he is supposed to lead last week at the Florida School Boards Association Conference in Tampa. He told his audience that they should get used to charter school operators taking over pieces of public school buildings and getting a free ride on the costs. He then threatened that traditional schools could face closures in the future for failing to perform. … (to read more, buy a paper)

► Here’s the plan – Mayor Jane Castor is going to sell the Tampa Police headquarters and parking garage Downtown for at least $36 million. The new owner will lease the building back to the City of Tampa to house the police for one year. Then, we have no idea what will happen.
Maybe we will have a new headquarters built somewhere by then. … Council should let the mayor know that it will not approve the sale of the police headquarters until there is a plan in place.
What size building do we need? What is the price to build one? Is there some existing building we could buy? What is the cost to modernize the existing building? Which is the best and most cost-effective path and how will it be paid for? … (to read more, buy a paper)

► School districts around the country have been buying AI weapon detection systems for big bucks that do little to make students safer.
At Lawton Chiles Middle School, in Oviedo FL, their AI system alerted that a gun was present and the school was locked down. Tuesday, the system thought a clarinet was a rifle because a student was holding it like a rifle. This makes us wonder if the child was holding a rifle like it was a clarinet would the alarm go off?
It also gave credence to the NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre’s quote “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a clarinet is a good guy with a gun.” …(to read more, buy a paper)

► Governor Ronald DeSantis has designated that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is a foreign terrorist organization and has directed Florida agencies to undertake all lawful measures to prevent unlawful activities and deny privileges and resources to anyone providing material support.
The governor has offered no new evidence that the group is a terrorist organization. The Federal Government has offered no report and has not claimed CAIR is a terrorist organization.
Ever since CAIR began in 1994 to promote and protect American-Muslim civil rights, it has faced such accusations. We can’t think of another organization that has faced so much governmental scrutiny and constant investigation and surveillance.
If DeSantis has evidence, he shouldn’t issue proclamations, he should show up with arrest warrants.
We believe he is trying to set the stage to keep school vouchers out of Muslim private schools. …(to read more, buy a paper)

From Chairman of the Bored, by Gene Siudut

► … I went through with no problem, but as soon as I was on the other side of the metal detector, I was asked to step to the side while a TSA agent bent down and started wiping my shoes with some sort of cloth that can detect explosives or contraband or something to that effect. They didn’t say what they were doing, only that it was random, which I found odd, as I’ve never been through that since I acquired the Global Entry pass.
I was cleared and I saw Tony heading over to the bar area to have one last libation before we got on the plane. I was going to join him, but with my wife and her sister in TSA custody, I figured I better stick by them to see what’s doin’.
It turned out that Lisa bought a candle at some craft store while we were there and the density of it combined with it being organic material triggered their alarms. After about 10 minutes of conversations with supervisors and finally getting permission to go to the gate, Lisa was given the option of leaving her candle with TSA or trying to get it through by allowing it to be tested, whatever that means. She elected to leave the candle, which set her back $40.
In the past, I would probably have started complaining about her bringing a candle on board, but like her, I had no idea that candles set off alarms. I also was only vaguely aware that a candle could cost $40. But I kept it all to myself, not knowing what my wife had in her bag. …(to read more, buy a paper)

From O’Pionions to Go, by Joe O’Neill

► Cog Test: More hand-bruise speculation. More embarrassing, high-profile nodding off. Another “aced” cognition test. We’ve seen this presidential pattern; we’ll see it again. And again.
But we haven’t, until now, actually seen the Trump cognition test. Some likely samples: Solve Hocus-Focus, count backwards from 3, name the day of the week, current century, two SCOTUS justices, three NATO members and the main ingredients of a cheeseburger.
Atorvastatin, Azerbaijan, Acetaminaphen: Which one is a country? What is Stormy Daniels real name? Name two books other than “Art of the Deal” and “Mein Kampf,” that you have read. What is Melania’s phone number?
Party of Lincoln: How can Republicans still maintain that their party is “the party of Lincoln”? Shouldn’t these Lincoln Day Dinners be realistically renamed? How about the Bull Connor or George Wallace Day Dinners? Stop using Lincoln as a disingenuous, hypocritical model. …(to read more, buy a paper)

From In Context, by Doris Weatherford

► At the holiday dinner of USF’s Women and Philanthropy, I learned another lesson in the need for teaching modern history, the real history that is important to real people. WLP raises money for scholarships, especially for young women who are the first in their family to go to college. The introductory speaker had been a recipient twenty years ago, when she was a single mother who lacked childcare and had to bring her baby to the interview. Now she has a good job in finance, and she was there to give back.
The impact of babies on careers was an inevitable topic at my table, and a scholarship recipient whose parents came from Haiti said that there were fourteen children in her family. The faculty member who sat with us came from a similarly sized family, and my mother was the oldest of twelve. We lamented their limited lives, and I said that I think historians in the future will recognize Margaret Sanger as the most important person of the last century. I was saddened when even the professor in the College of Public Health acknowledged that she did not recognize the name. …(to read more, buy a paper)

From Silhouettes, an interview with Jovan McNeill, by Tiffany Razzano

► Tampa native Jovan McNeill grew up on North Boulevard and Columbus Drive, attending B.C. Graham Elementary School, Stewart Middle Magnet School and Hillsborough High School.
He was raised by a single mother who had him when she was 16 years old. “Coming up as a kid, we didn’t have as much for ourselves,” he said, adding, “We moved six times by the time I was 18 years old. We didn’t have a house. I grew up in apartments and studios.”
Still, his mother tried to give back to others whenever possible and did as much as she could for her son.
She introduced McNeill to the love of the outdoors, often taking her son fishing. “As a single parent in the inner city, she didn’t know hunting as much. She didn’t know canoeing or kayaking. So, we fished,” he said. …(to read more, buy a paper)

From Líneas de la memoria, por Gabriel Cartaya

► Ybor City llega a sus 140 años con orgullo de su pasado, animado con el presente y esperanzado con el proyecto que aspira a recuperar su esplendor. Ese hálito se explica en una hermosa historia que arranca de su origen en 1885, cuando una superficie inhóspita se convirtiera en capital del tabaco torcido a mano. Desde entonces, evoluciona entre difíciles vaivenes que elevan, estancan o incluso hacen retroceder su desarrollo hasta una actualidad donde se aprecia el repunte de su aquel florecimiento.
Para rendir homenaje a este nuevo aniversario, las cinco instituciones más representativas de su historia han tenido la feliz decisión de juntarse en una gala conmemorativa a la que han nombrado Piquiniquí, palabra inusual que, si bien remite a la voz gala picnic, estuvo arraigada en la cultura asturiana que, con muchos miembros, estuvo –está– presente en este lugar. Quién sabe si el bautizo, en el inconsciente colectivo, nos remite a la asonancia de ese quiquiriquí con que cada mañana los gallos de Ybor City anuncian el amanecer. De todos modos, se explica en una más plausible razón: el Centro Asturiano es el anfitrión de este tributo que comparte con el Centro Español, el Círculo Cubano, la Unión Martí-Maceo y la Unión Italiana.
Hay que aplaudir a los cinco centros que representan la invitación. Cada uno de ellos expresa la presencia de su cultura originaria en el nacimiento y desarrollo de Ybor City. El Asturiano, por la enorme presencia de hombres y mujeres que vinieron de esa región ibérica y aquí contribuyeron no solo al desarrollo de la ciudad, sino también a que hoy convivamos con su descendencia, con apellidos como Cuesta, Carreño, Menéndez, Piniella, Salcines. Si bien el primer Centro Asturiano de Tampa, creado en 1902, es una prolongación del de La Habana con su mismo carácter mutualista y extendido a clínica-sanatorio y cementerio propio, pronto se independiza y crea su propia identidad tampeño-asturiana. El edificio, construido en 1914, es una joya de la arquitectura de la ciudad y sigue siendo un centro de actividades culturales, públicas y privadas, aun cuando la evolución histórica le hiciera modificar los fines para los que fue creado. Para los asturianos, habitantes de Tampa o visitantes, es siempre una referencia de su paso por la ciudad. … (to read more, buy a paper)

From Briznas culturales, por Leonardo Venta

► Al francés Marius Petipa, que llegó a ser director de coreografía del Ballet Imperial Ruso en el siglo XIX, le debemos el perfeccionamiento del modelo de ballet con argumento largo y completo que ha sobrevivido hasta nuestros días. La bella durmiente, El lago de los cisnes y El cascanueces, coreografías suyas, son magníficos arquetipos de estos tipos de producciones.
El cascanueces fue creado en 1892 bajo el minucioso cuidado de Petipa. Sin embargo, al enfermarse, su asistente ruso Lev Ivanov completó la puesta en escena. El libreto fue escrito por Ivan ¬Vsevolozhsky y el propio Petipa, basándose en la adaptación de Alexandre Dumas (padre) del cuento “El cascanueces y el rey de los ratones” de Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann.
Esta icónica pieza de la danza recrea la historia de Clara, una niña que recibe como regalo de Nochebuena un cascanueces, juguete maravilloso que la transportará por quiméricos lugares poblados por principescos moradores, así como devela la magia de soldados de juguete que cobran vida para enfrentar batallas contra jocosos siniestros ratones …(to read more, buy a paper)