La Gaceta Newspaper

Jane Hernandez

As a University of Tampa graduate, one of Jane Hernandez’s greatest passions is the restoration and preservation of the Henry B. Plant Hall on campus.
For the past 16 years, she’s been a member of The Chiselers, an organization that was founded in 1959 and is dedicated to raising funds – hundreds of thousands of dollars each year – to restore the historic building, and now serves as the group’s president.
Plant Hall was initially built between 1888 and 1891 by railroad magnate Henry B. Plant as the Tampa Bay Hotel. Today, it’s home to classrooms, UT administrative offices and the Henry B. Plant Museum, and is a designated National Historic Landmark.
“That building, while the university is living there, using it, it belongs to the city of Tampa. We all have a lot of love for that building,” she said. “People stop in front of it, take photos outside it. Tour buses pass it. It is a landmark for us living here and you just wouldn’t want to see anything happen to it.”
The organization’s signature annual fundraiser, the Chiselers Market at Plant Hall, kicks off March 14 with presale access with the market open to the public on March 15. Bidding on a companion online auction starts March 8.
When they were young teens, Hernandez’s parents – her father from Detroit, her mother from Knoxville – moved to Tampa, where they met and eventually married. A graduate of Hillsborough County Public Schools, she has spent her entire life living in South Tampa.
Her father was a banker and she worked in banking while studying political science at the University of Tampa. After earning her degree, she worked briefly for Seminole Electric Co-op before returning to banking, taking a job at the Bank of Tampa.
Hernandez spent 28 years with the Bank of Tampa, mostly in employee communications, before retiring in 2022.
She learned about the Chiselers through her work at the bank, which encouraged employees to be involved in the community. A coworker and friend who was a member of the group told her about it. “She said, ‘I think you’d be really interested in this,’” Hernandez said. “So, I started volunteering and felt, yeah, this is a good home for me.”
The organization aligned with her love for the University of Tampa and the city’s rich history. “I love the school and felt passionate about how important that building was – not just to the university, but to the city of Tampa,” she said. “It’s a symbol of the city and what got this city started.”
The Chiselers work closely with the university “to make sure nothing happens to” Plant Hall.
Work on the historic building is “just unending – like any old house,” she added. “The building is ¼-mile long, five stories high and over a hundred years old. It’s got a lot of work that it needs.”
Hernandez anticipates that about $140 to 150 million will be needed to complete all the work that needs to be done in the next 10 to 20 years. “The tough thing is you can’t close the building, even if you could raise all that money at once,” she said. “Projects have to be done in a manner that can keep the building going and working. We do projects that affect one area at a time to keep things going each year.”
Currently, critical foundation work is being completed at Plant Hall. The project is funded by two Hillsborough County grants totaling about $375,000 and additional funds from the Chiselers to bring the total amount to $1 million.
Another major project on the horizon is restoration work to the east veranda, which faces the Hillsborough River. “It’s so spectacular when you drive in and see that front facade,” Hernandez said. “There’s a ton of work there that needs to be done top down from the roof downspouts, which are inadequate and causing problems with intrusion.”
The floor’s decking is also “not pitched correctly and needs to be redone to take care of water intrusion,” she said. “That’s a real huge problem there for the building. We’re trying to solve all those kinds of issues. That’s why the money is as big as it is. We’re trying to get to the root and correct that and keep it going.
Last year’s Chiselers Market raised about $170,000 and the organization hopes to bring in just as much at its upcoming sale. The group collects donated items this year that are available to purchase at the market – everything from furniture and lamps to jewelry, books, and art to kitchenware and China. “We have a lot of silver this year, which is fabulous,” Hernandez said. “A lot of art, too. There’s really great fun things as far as collectibles.”
The online silent auction opens March 8 and people will be able to bid on specific items in the week leading up to in-person sale.
This is the first year the organization is offering a ticketed pre-sale access to the market. Tickets are $25 in advance and $35 at the door and allow people “to come in and shop before the crowds,” she said.
The Chiselers are also introducing a new fundraising event this year – Chiseling a Legacy, a dinner for preservation, on April 11. “It’s brand new. We haven’t done it before,” Hernandez said. “We felt we needed an opportunity to have an event where we could share with donors what is happening (at Plant Hall) and what is still needed and also thank them.”

By Tiffany Razzano

Allison Crume knew how important the access to education was even as a toddler. She credits her parents, who were both educators, for this. Her mother retired as a math teacher after more than 30 years, and her father taught in the school system as well before taking a position with Frito Lay, where he still focused on professional development and training.
“Education has always been a big part of my life,” she said. “When I was little, I would have my mom’s teacher edition books and I’d teach my stuffed animals, making up tests for them and all that stuff. I always understood education should be as accessible as possible.”
After graduating from high school in Warner Robins, Georgia, she went on to earn a bachelor of science in history from Georgia College & State University. She also earned a master’s degree in teaching there.
Crume started her career as a high school teacher in Crawford County, Georgia, where she coached soccer and taught history. “I just really had a great time working with students and started to get interested in what happened after graduation and wanted to learn more about how to support students after high school,” she said.
The school was in a rural area and many of her students “didn’t have as many options.” She began to research various options to share with them. “We were always looking at what are those different pathways, but it wasn’t always clear for the students,” she said.
This is how she decided to pursue her doctorate degree in higher education. When her now husband got a job in Tallahassee, the couple became engaged and she applied to Florida State University, where she earned a Doctor of Philosophy in higher education administration
“I’d always been really working with students not only on academic pursuits but their whole development,” Crume said. But she was also concerned about what they did outside the classroom. “What kind of things were they involved in in the community? Just all the different aspects that could help them be successful.”
At FSU, her dissertation focused on student government as a subculture with a focus on campus engagement and how involvement in the organization could lead to greater success for students. “From there, I became really immersed in higher education” with a primary interest in access and equity, she said.
Crume found that one of the best ways to bring access and equity to more students was through student engagement outside the classroom. Organizations like student government leveled the playing field and engaging with students of other backgrounds allowed them to learn from one another, she found.
After earning her doctorate, she took a position with the Board of Governors, State University System of Florida. She worked with the Division of Academic & Student Affairs doing “the same kind of work I was doing in the classroom,” she said, “just different policies and practices that impacted all public universities across Florida.”
One of her main focuses was on the K-20 initiative, which looked “at students right as they’re coming into VPK all the way through graduation from college,” Crume said.
She also served on the State of Florida College Reach-Out Program Advisory Council, a program for low-income and educationally disadvantaged students.
In 2006, she took a position at FSU as assistant director, later becoming associate director, of the Oglesby Student Union, where she focused on identifying opportunities for campus engagement and ways to connect with students. These initiatives were across various departments, including health and wellness, counseling and mental health, housing, and activities.
During her 15 years at FSU, she held various roles, including director of research and programs, assistant vice president and associate vice president for student affairs, interim director of university housing and childcare. No matter the role, they each were “vehicles for providing access and equity for student success,” she said.
A new opportunity came across Crume’s path during the COVID-19 pandemic and she joined the University of South Florida in Tampa as dean of undergraduate studies and associate vice president for student success in August 2020. “What was so exciting about this … was that it brings together that academic focus and support and student services,” she said. “We’re looking at the whole student. I work with all academic colleges to provide that to students.”
The move to USF was “a full circle” for her, she added. “Even when I think about my work as a high school teacher, talking to students and working with them to identify what their needs are and how to improve supporting faculty and supporting the overall university in a welcoming and positive way (that) allows for that space for success.”
The position taps into her true passion for working closely with students. “The other night I was at a late night breakfast hanging out with students,” Crume said. “And the cycle of a semester is just so exciting and helping them achieve their goals and to be a small part of that and being part of commencement (the) next week. It’s very fulfilling.”
Though she joined the university at the height of the pandemic, the transition was easy as USF “had a strong system in place for collaboration.”
“In some ways, it was a little easier to onboard,” she added. “Meetings were happening and everybody was at the table … (to) solve new ways of doing things. I was thrown into a really collaborative group of people who were all working for the same goals in a student-centered way.”
There are several recent initiatives at USF that she’s especially proud of. The university, long known for its support of veterans, was just named as a Purple Star Campus, a state designation for its support of military families. The university has nearly 1,400 student veterans, one of the largest populations for a state university in Florida.
To earn this designation, USF has named a military liaison, has a student-led program to help veterans with their transition at the university, offers professional development training opportunities on how to better serve military students to staff members, and provides web resources and priority course registration for student veterans.
USF has also been recently designated as a First Generation Campus, a national designation. “We worked hard to get that,” Crume said. The university offers programming, support and resources for first-generation students attending college. It also provides a “space for people to come together and celebrate being first generation,” she added.
The university helps to make the transition for first-generation students a little bit easier. For instance, when applying to and attending college, “certain language” and acronyms they might not be familiar with is used. “We break it down and talk about it. We demystify a lot of those things,” she said. “It’s not basic knowledge for everyone.”
The university also recently opened a new Transfer Center, which focuses on transfer student success. “We have a large population of transfer students at USF and many commuter students, and we didn’t have a dedicated space for them,” Crume said.
Outside USF, she’s also involved in the community, especially in areas that involve her family. She and her husband have three children, one a freshman at USF and the other two attending Wiregrass Ranch High School in Wesley Chapel.
The family attends St. Mark the Evangelist Church, where her kids participated in the youth group and Boy Scout Troop 148. She’s been involved with the scouting group, as well as the marching band at the high school.
Crume also serves as a member of the New Tampa YMCA Board and the Pasco Education Foundation Board, which provides support to K-12 schools and teachers in Pasco County.
Much of her community work intentionally involves students and education, as it relates to her work and her greatest passion. “I want to give back and invest in students, who are our future,” she said.

Bob Gilbertson

Bob Gilbertson knew from an early age exactly what he wanted to do for a living – he wanted to work for the YMCA. And that’s exactly what he went on to do, working to develop YMCA locations across the country.
He was recently honored by the Tampa Metropolitan Area YMCA at its annual Community Impact Celebration with its prestigious Red Triangle Award.
Growing up in Knoxville, Tennessee, he spent much of his time after school and during the summer at his local Y. “It’s maybe a little unusual … but I had developed relationships with these counselors and coaches,” Gilbertson said. “I developed this real affection for all the time and things that I did at the YMCA. I thought by the time I was 11, this is what I wanted my life to be about, coaching and teaching at the Y. The Y was always the place that I felt most at home and most supported.”
As a teenager, he was hired as a camp counselor and coach at his local Y, working with youth groups. After high school, he went on to the University of Tennessee, where he worked with the swim team.
After two years at UT, he was ready for something new and moved on to George Williams College in Chicago. The college, which was affiliated with the YMCA, offered an exercise science program that focused on topics such as anatomy, physiology and microbiology, and offered studying of human cadavers and live animal experiments. “It was a unique clinical experience that I couldn’t get in any other places,” he said.
Following his graduation from college in 1974, Gilbertson worked for the YMCA in Frankfort, Kentucky, for two years. There, he coached gymnastics and swimming, and ran other programs. He also continued his interest in exercise science through “exercise testing with an old boxing-style EKG machine.” This was around the time there was a push for running and aerobics. “It was a fascinating time when people were saying to exercise to prevent heart disease,” he said. “It was an exciting time to be part of the whole wellness movement. It was just as the stage of taking off. To incorporate that into the YMCA was an exciting time in terms of using education and the momentum to advance health and fitness.”
From Frankfort, Gilbertson moved on to Spartanburg, South Carolina, where he worked with “a bigger community and a bigger Y environment.” He continued to work in moving the wellness movement forward at the facility, including working with a local hospital physician who encouraged his patients in his cardiac rehab to continue their efforts at the local YMCA. “It was one of only a dozen places in the U.S. where people did that and we monitored it,” he said. “The hospital there didn’t have (a gym). This was their community clinic, if you will, at the YMCA.”
Gilbertson came to the Tampa YMCA in 1981, which at the time operated an older YMCA built in 1908 that had a hotel and a gym attached to it. “There hadn’t been a lot done to it since 1908 by the time I got there,” he said.
There were also satellite branches throughout the region. “The foundation of the Y was pretty shaky,” he said.
It was financially difficult to maintain and was only kept afloat because of a benefactor on Sanibel Island. The owner of Bailey’s General Store there owned multiple properties and after his death, left a dozen lots to the Tampa YMCA. Every time the organization needed money, it would sell off one of the properties.
“It’s completely different today,” said Gilbertson, who moved to Tampa as director of operations. “The idea was that I was an executive who would raise money and I would operate the Y. We had centers and the very beginnings of an after-school program, which grew to be quite large. The DNA for a good YMCA was there, but it just wasn’t there yet.”
Two years after moving to Tampa, his boss left and Gilbertson was tapped to take over the organization as CEO. Under his watch, they consolidated properties and before long they went from “losing $75,000 a year to making about $75,000 a year,” he said. “That was the beginning of getting things sort of going.”
During his time in Tampa, the organization “built an amazing board” and grew from serving about 5,000 people a year to more than 130,000 people. It grew into one of the 25 largest YMCA organizations in the country.
Similar to his previous YMCA locations, he also helped develop a cardiac rehab program at the Tampa YMCA and worked with the University of South Florida’s cardiology division.
His move to Florida also brought him several other “exciting opportunities,” including working with elected officials and about 30 other organizations to privatize child welfare and foster care in Tampa, which took about three years of work to accomplish. “At the time, it was viewed that the state was failing those kids,” he said. “Safety and permanency were the two key components.”
Once the program, Hillsborough Kids, launched, he served as its CEO for a period. “It became pretty well known for advancing adoption and the organization has had its ups and downs, but overall, the view of things, I think, is it’s better for kids,” he said. “That experience was absolutely phenomenal and it centered on what is the central mission of the Y, how to reach people who need services. It was an opportunity to do something completely out of our wheelhouse. It was an opportunity to learn and serve.”
Under his watch, the Central City YMCA on Palm Avenue was built. The goal was to bring together people from various sectors of the community at this location. “Our hope was to serve white, Latino and Black , and we also wanted to serve the full spectrum of economics,” Gilbertson said.
He added, “The idea was you would go in and work out one day and be on a treadmill next to a woman in a burka and on your other side you have a person who had been homeless at one point in time or you get a basketball game going up and you have a banker and maybe a young person who is unemployed. We saw equality in the way people treated each other and we just thought it was great and so did a lot of our members.”
The idea was people from various parts of the community would interact with each other at the YMCA. “Interactions they wouldn’t have in the course of their busy day,” he said. “It’s the essence of the best that YMCA can do – the intersection of different neighborhoods, different people, different backgrounds. It felt to me like when we were at our best.”
After several decades, Gilbertson left Florida in 2007 for Seattle, which was about 30 percent bigger than the organization he had been working for in Tampa and he felt had a lot of potential. “My job was to raise money to build new Ys and expand the service that the Y provides there,” he said.
Similar to the Central City YMCA, the new Ys being built in Seattle also brought together an intersection of the community with people of various economic backgrounds, races and cultures all coming together under one roof. “The real mission was to mix economic backgrounds,” Gilbertson said. “The term that we used (for it) was ‘YMCA on the scene.’ What that really meant was that on one side of the neighborhood were maybe people who could afford the YMCA and could afford to volunteer, and the other side was a neighborhood that didn’t have the same economic choices that the other neighborhood had.”
He was especially drawn to efforts made by the Seattle YMCA for emancipated foster kids, those in their late teens and early 20s who had aged out of the foster system. “When they turn 18, the state stops paying foster families and the kids’ belongings are placed in trash bags and it’s like, ok, you’re on your own,” Gilbertson said. “It’s horrible, absolutely horrible.”
In Seattle, the YMCA offers this community various services and support, including job training, education, mental health services and housing for emancipated foster kids. “The system there wasn’t privatized, but this was a step beyond,” he said. “We watched young people really begin to blossom and take off, even though they’ve had a tough life.”
After retiring in 2019, He joined the YMCA World Urban Network, a group of YMCA CEOs from large cities around the world that met to work on strategies to improve Y facilities and programming, for five years. He traveled the world for these meetings, visiting places like Shanghai, China, and Bogota, Colombia.
Now, he’s writing a book “on some of the great people in the YMCA who did things that are meaningful and left legacies,” he said. “I believe history is a really important thing and I felt like the history of some of the things people did could be lost in the next generation of the Y.”
As he reflects on his career with the YMCA, he’s proud of the work he put in for the organization and what he helped to accomplish. “I think people make choices to work in a career that brings them joy and makes them feel like they’re fulfilled in some fashion and so, for me, gosh, I helped and I gave as much as I got,” he said. “It’s been a great organization to work in and have a chance to lead and I can’t think of a better way to have spent my life.”

By Tiffany Razzano

During his more than two decades working in financial services for companies like Washington Mutual and Chase, John Seib was always drawn to educating his clients.
The Portland, Oregon, resident spent much of his career working with large mortgage teams across the country. “One of the things that I always was kind of moved by or broken-hearted by were individuals, young couples, young families who would come in and didn’t qualify for a home and didn’t understand why,” he said. “So, I’d sit down with individuals and try to coach them, help them understand. They don’t know what a credit score is or why they can’t buy a house. They just didn’t understand financial literacy at its base.”
So, Seib was excited by the opportunity to shift gears in recent years and focus on financial literacy among children.
He was an early investor and founder of Tampa-based Electus Global Education Co. and today, serves as the company’s chief revenue officer.
It was his nephew who tapped him to get involved with the then start-up company about eight years ago. “He told me, ‘You might want to take a look at this,’” Seib said.
Not only did he invest in the company, but he joined the advisory board. It wasn’t long before he got more involved in sales for Electus. And about four years ago, he was tapped as the president before becoming CRO. “That’s when I made the decision to really leave the career I had been a part of,” he said.
The company’s early years focused on finding investors, as well as research and development. “All around the idea of financial literacy,” according to Seib. “Could there be a solution? If there was a solution, what would it look like?”
During this time, Electus began developing its Life Hub financial education technology.
Initially, the company thought it might focus on adults, maybe high school students. “But all the research pointed the other way; it pointed to our youth and really hitting those formative years,” Seib said.
He added, “There’s a big difference between behavior modification and behavior formation.”
Modification is “very, very difficult,” he noted. “Once patterns or beliefs are set, it’s difficult to modify behavior.”
They realized they’d have more of an impact if they focused on forming “behaviors from the beginning, so you don’t have to go back and modify later,” Seib said.
Life Hub focuses on providing experiential learning through an app for youth ages 7 to 18. It teaches the broader philosophy of financial literacy, as well as entrepreneurship, career development and life skills. “Yes, it’s financial literacy, but to really make change and impact, it has to be more,” he said. “The solution would have to go beyond that.”
Through the Life Hub app, kids are paid to complete educational tasks on the platform. “Kids get excited when they’re earning money,” according to Seib. We’re not asking them to wash windows or anything. But they complete these tasks, these lessons, and once they’re completed, then they get paid real money deposited on a Visa card.
Most of the tasks pay between $1 and $3 and take anywhere from 10 to 25 minutes to complete. The budget for each task is set by the organization, often a nonprofit, that is utilizing the technology for the children they serve.
The tasks are designed to get students thinking about real-life financial scenarios. For instance, in one task, they’re asked to “buy a puppy” by a virtual pet store. They need to consider how much it costs to buy their pet food, take it to the vet and buy any other necessities for it. “The impact is when you understand the difference between what you pay for something and what it costs,” he said. “It’s a life principle.”
These virtual tasks get children participating in the program to think about their spending and saving. “The first foundation of making a chance is understanding and learning about money,” Seib said. “The other skills follow once they understand earning. That’s when changes to habits and beliefs and patterns happen.”
Electus launched its Life Hub technology two years ago in Tampa through partnerships with the likes of Big Brothers Big Sisters Suncoast and a private school, Academy Prep. “We launched it in a very, very controlled environment,” he said. “It’s brand new technology and a brand new concept. We wanted to feel out what was possible.”
Now, the company is growing rapidly, expanding its partnerships. They’re getting ready to work with Lutheran Services Florida and Friends of the Children in the Tampa Bay area, and even nationally, working with Big Brothers Big Sisters in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Chicago, and Friends of the Children in the San Francisco area. “We’re continually expanding not only in Florida but across the country,” Seib said.
While it might be challenging to get the Life Hub technology into public schools, it’s “perfect” for other educational spaces. “The areas that we’re really excited about are micro schools and home schools and even private and charter schools,” he said.
Within the next few weeks, Electus will move into the direct-to-consumer market, offering the Life Hub platform to individual families.
There are more than 1,600 tasks available on Life Hub and customization is available for each school, organization and student using the technology.
While the “sweet spot” for the technology is those ages 7 to 18, Electus is also exploring working with children as young as 4 and moving into universities and colleges.
The technology can be beneficial for a wide range of youth, Seib added. “Schools don’t teach financial literacy of entrepreneurship or career development … I think that the key is that what we’re doing changes the trajectory and it breaks generational habits and patterns, and I think that we’re changing the generation that is coming up. It’s what really drives all of us every day.”

Roni-Kay Elser

Roni-Kay Elser was diagnosed with epilepsy when she was just six weeks old after experiencing a grand mal seizure that was sparked by a high fever. “I’ve known nothing else ever since,” she said.
The disorder runs in her family. “There’s a genetic line,” according to the West Palm Beach native. “My great grandmother, back in the day, had what they called ‘fits.’”
She didn’t let it stop her, though. He had two brother’s and her father was into sports, so she was an active youth who participated in gymnastics, figure skating, swimming and other activities. “I taught myself growing up with it and I could sense them coming on,” she said. “I’d get somebody or sit down. Ninety percent of the time, I had an aura and felt them coming on.”
In 1991, when Elser was in junior high school, her family moved to Polk County and she graduated from Bartow High School.
Since then, she’s enjoyed a varied career. Initially, she was interested in journalism. “I loved stories and wanted to get behind the scenes,” she said.
She’s worked in accounting, as well as environmental permitting and engraving.
But one of her early jobs was in the medical field. Because of her epilepsy, she was frequently at medical appointments. At one point, one of her doctors told her, “You can relate and you explain this better than I did to a patient and I didn’t have to question it,” she said. He hired her to do secretarial work in his office and she eventually became office manager.
After her divorce, Elser switched gears and began working for Hillsborough County Public Schools so she could be on the same daily schedule as her children. She was hired as a production coordinator for a school kitchen.
Today, she’s a student nutrition manager for two schools – Brandon High School and Wimauma Elementary School.
She’s also an activist in the epilepsy community. Even as a child, she was a poster child for the Epilepsy Foundation, speaking to reporters and at events to share her story, and attended a camp in the Everglades. “I always wanted to make people aware that we weren’t the only ones out there. There are other people out there,” she said.
By the time she was an adult, Elser was having eight to 10 seizures a day. The most she ever had in one day was 108. “It was so up and down,” she said. “I’d have months with them and a year without. There was such a fluctuation. And throughout my life, it was a rollercoaster of medication, trials and errors, and what have you.”
A pivotal moment came in January 2008. While driving on Interstate 75, she had a seizure behind the wheel. “Luckily, I got my friend’s attention or I wouldn’t be here today,” she said. “I said, ‘Enough’s enough. Something has to happen.’”
After some research, Elser learned that Tampa General Hospital was seeking qualified candidates for a new brain surgery. “It was high risk at the time,” she said.
Doctors concluded that all of her epilepsy activity was happening on the left side of her brain and gave her the green light for a temporal lobectomy on the left side of her brain. She was warned of some side effects, but she’s felt very few after the surgery and she hasn’t needed any medication since.
This success inspired her to found the Seize the Moment foundation. “I wanted to get the word out there,” Elser said.
The organization works closely with patients and educates the public about epilepsy and the various treatment options available to them. She and her team also assist with new patient consultations for TGH and she walks people through her experiences with surgery.
Seize the Moment also raises money to assist with medical expenses, such as copays, and also research and development in epilepsy. This is set up through a fund in collaboration with TGH and the University of South Florida physicians group.
For the last five years, Elser’s primary fundraisers have been sporting events – bowling outings and professional hockey, football, and baseball games – and a barbecue competition, Que for the Cure.
She launched the competition during the COVID-19 pandemic, and though she’s still building it up, she’s raised about $256,000 for the cause through all her events.
The next barbecue fundraiser, Que for the Cure, takes place Aug. 23 and 24 in Riverview. This year, 70 barbecue teams will compete in the event, which is also still seeking sponsors.
The event is inspired by her husband, a barbecue professional who owns a shop and makes and manufactures sauces and rubs. In fact, he’s even created two rubs and once sauce to sell as a fundraiser for Seize the Moment. They’re available at the upcoming barbecue competition.
Elser’s goal is to reach as many people as she can, whether it’s sponsoring patients or educating the community.
“(Epilepsy is) more common than you think. It’s more common than 90 percent of neurological disorders (like Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis) but people can recognize them more than epilepsy,” she said.
In fact, one in 100 people have epilepsy, she added. “That’s about 67 million people worldwide. I just want to help as many people as possible and help the doctors who are helping them.”

Saundra Weatehrs

As a high school student, Fort Lauderdale native Saundra Weathers decided on the car ride to tour Florida A&M University that she would study journalism. She wrote for her high school newspaper and had a natural interest in what was going on around her. “I don’t like to say nosy; I like to say curious. I was always very curious. I want to know more,” she said.
That’s how the Spectrum Bay News 9 reporter launched her news career. Admittedly, she wasn’t always a model student. “There’s a saying at FAMU; that it’s FAMU-ly and it truly is a family,” Weathers said. “I had some of my professors rein me in and say, ‘Listen girl, get it together.’”
Initially, she wanted to be an entertainment reporter. But after interviewing some celebrities, she realized she didn’t enjoy it. Then, thanks to one of her professors, she fell in love with hard news.
Weathers worked at FAMU’s radio station and an internship led to her being hired for an on-air television reporting job for WCTV, a CBS affiliate, during her junior year. “By that time there was no stopping me,” she said.
She stayed with the station for a few months after graduating before deciding it was time to move on. “If you know anything about living in a college town after you graduate, you feel so old,” she said. “It was time for me to go.”
“Before I graduated, I naively told my sister I was moving to Atlanta right out of college and getting a job in news,” Weathers said. “That was not true. So I was trying to figure out what was the most realistic path news wise and also near the water I love so much.”
She hoped one day to get to the Tampa Bay area, the largest market in Florida, but first she landed at WBBH, an NBC affiliate in Fort Myers. She worked there for two years covering four counties in Southwest Florida. “I knew I had to make a stop before” getting to Tampa, she said. But Tampa was “the No. 1 in the state. It’s where I wanted to be.”
Once her career hit the five-year mark, Weathers was hired by Spectrum Bay News 9 and she moved to Polk County. “It was very interesting. It’s great for news. You can’t even make it up the stuff that happens there. And there were great people in Polk County,” she said. “There wasn’t a lot to do, but workwise, it was fantastic.”
After about three years, she moved over to the media outlet’s main office in St. Petersburg to work the night shift. “That means covering everything from every single county,” she said. “Wherever the news happens, you go.”
She remained in that role until 2020, when she launched the Justice for All beat for Spectrum, focusing on issues of equity, inclusion and disparities in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of a white police officer in Minneapolis.
During the protests surrounding Floyd’s murder, Weathers and her boss at the time “had long, hard conversations about the coverage and being intentional,” she said. “After some back and forth, I got the green light. I said, ‘Listen, I want to do these stories and do them in a way that makes a difference.’”
Weathers has always been drawn to social justice stories, but with this current beat, they’re her sole focus.
To start, she made a list of potential story ideas. But it wasn’t long before the stories were coming to her and members of the community were suggesting topics to cover.
One of her early stories focused on the arrests of Black children in the local juvenile justice system and how many were sent to adult prisons compared to children of other races. “The difference was astronomical,” she said.
She also focused on stories about representation in various fields, such as Black male educators. “I looked at the numbers and was astounded,” Weathers said.
She focuses on the good news too, she added.
She’s also been amazed by the action that’s been taken in the community because of her reporting. In one story, she looked at the reading scores of Black students, which were set back even further because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
She recalls Spectrum creating a graphic around these scores that was widely shared on social media. This was gratifying for Weathers as she read the posts that accompanied these shares. The data backed up what many followers already seemed to know anecdotally. “It was like, ‘We’ve been saying this; now there’s the proof,’” she said. “When you have that type of reporting and so much response, it leaves so much opportunity for resolution.”
After that story came out, a number of organizations and individuals created reading programs “to try to close the gap for African American students,” she said, adding that it was “a real catalyst for change and people making a difference.”
Weathers has also reported extensively on Black maternal health, a topic that is “near and dear” to her. After airing a special on the issue last year, she received tremendous feedback from viewers in both the Tampa and Orlando areas.
“After it aired, a woman reached out to me and said, ‘Listen, I lost a child during birth. I already have a nonprofit, but I want to do more. This special was the kick I needed to do more,’” Weathers said.
Months later, the woman called back to say she launched an ongoing series of town hall meetings with health care and nonprofit leaders to discuss how to lower infant and maternal mortality rates in the Black community. “It led to this huge conversation in the Tampa Bay area,” Weathers said.
This year, the University of South Florida is even hosting a series of talks and other events, as well as offering mothers various resources, from April 11-17 for Black Maternal Health Week. “It’s really amazing to see how this conversation is now spreading like wildfire,” she said.
She’s touched by the momentum that stemmed from her stories. “I embrace my humanity in my reporting. I never try to tell a story as a robot. There is always a human behind that and I try to let that come out in my reporting. I’m not biased; I’m human,” she said. “I hope people feel that when they see that, that when they reach out to me, they know that’s coming from a place of someone who wants to help. I do this 100 percent to help people.”