WEEK OF JULY 23, 2025 FLIER INSIDE
MangoMania
Chamber thanks islanders for supporting event; contest winners announced
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PINEISLAND-EAGLE.COM
VOLUME 49, NUMBER 11
Celebrating Pine Islanders: Cody Allen By PAULETTE LeBLANC
pleblanc@breezenewspapers.com
Matlacha/Pine Island Fire Control District Assistant Chief of EMS Cody Allen said he would describe himself as someone whose life is both dedicated to his family and his job. “I took this position (2021) to provide a high level of care to a large number of people,” Allen said. Once upon a time he found himself an EMT in the ER, he said, as this was where he’d begun. He explained that he knew early on that he wanted to impact more people on a larger scale — something he’s able to achieve each day when he reports to Fire Station 1 in Pine Island Center. His goals to help bring about the utilization of
Cody Allen
Advanced life Support to the crews of M/PIFCD shows that his career covers much more than meets the eye. Adding Allen to the roster allowed the department to expand the medical capabilities, which is something that had been explored for the past several years. “The goal for the department was to bring in somebody that could build a paramedic program that
would allow the district to provide paramedic care to the island,” Allen said. Pine Island has the small-town feel that Allen said he was looking for when he was considering where he’d wanted to be. “I like the small department feel, in that, I know everybody by name. I feel like I have an opportunity to get to know the people that I work with on a much more personal level and I like to be able to talk to the community. It’s such a small island that I get to have a personal relationship with a lot of different people. Being able to have those relationships is really the biggest draw for me and this position offered me that ability,” Allen said. See CODY ALLEN, page 11
Local community rallies to aid flood victims in Texas
Cape Council member, Collaboratory spearheading ‘The SWFL Hearts for Hill Country Fund’ relief effort By CJ HADDAD
cjhaddad@breezenewspapers.com
Islander called to Florida Emergency Operations Center to consult for FEMA in Texas flood disaster
By PAULETTE LeBLANC
pleblanc@breezenewspapers.com
Matlacha/Pine Island Fire Control District Fire Commissioner Joe Hernandez is also a medical coordinator on FEMA Florida Task Force Team 2, still serving on the incident report team. This week, he has been asked for his expert knowledge on the Texas food disaster. He explained some details on the order of a state’s involvement in the event of a disaster as first contacting the state, which then gets the Emergency Management Division the help needed. “The state has the responsibility to put together an Incident Support Team (IST) of individuals tasked with
the various disciplines within a response organization,” Hernandez said. Hernandez views his role with FEMA these days as someone who helps put missing pieces together, saying he’s older now, and not likely to be counted on to get dirty but more than likely to assess the situation, to a certain degree. As agencies begin sending resources, he said, the See TEXAS FLOOD, page 10 Cody Gould, a manufacture’s rep, with a handheld sonar underwater camera used in rescue operations. PHOTO PROVIDED BY JOE HERNANDEZ
A Cape Coral City Council member is spearheading an effort in conjunction with a local community foundation to assist financially with the recent floods in Texas. District 4 Councilmember Jennifer Nelson-Lastra, has established The SWFL Hearts for Hill Country Fund at Collaboratory in Fort Myers. The fund supports relief and rebuilding efforts in Kerr County, Texas, following the devastating floods on July 4. Nelson-Lastra knows many people from Kerr County — and in Southwest Florida — who lost loved ones on that tragic day. On July 4, while Nelson-Lastra was attending Red White & BOOM! in Cape Coral, her friends from the Hill Country area in Texas were texting her to let me know that they were OK. “I wasn’t sure what they were meaning because I’d been at the event all day and hadn’t seen the news,” Nelson-Lastra said. “But when I got home, I realized that the Guadalupe River had flooded, and the water rose 26 feet. My heart sank, because I attended a camp along that river as a child, and I know there were many other camps like Camp Mystic located much closer to the river than my childhood camp.” The next day, Nelson-Lastra’s friend and her husband, who live in Kerrville, Texas, in Kerr County, reached out to her to ask how they could help and mobilize help locally. “They asked me because they know my background is in non-profits recovery efforts from my years with Goodwill,” she said. “I recommended they find their local Salvation Army, and reach out to the leadership there as Salvation Army’s mission is emergency care. I told them to offer their assistance to mobilize volunteers, See RELIEF EFFORT, page 9
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