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M A Y 9 - 1 5 , 2025
3A | SAFE LANDING?
5A | ORCHESTRA’S FINALE
3B | CURTAIN CALL
Airport’s commitment to safety
Orchestra will close its doors June 30
debut at Sugden Community Theatre
City Council has questions about Naples
Tim Aten Knows Tim Aten
The Southwest Florida Symphony
Performing arts school to make its
PADDLE SEASON
Businesses coming throughout Collier Q: Do you know what’s going in the old Stein Mart space by Publix? Thanks! – Dana Laskowsky Bilicki, Pelican Bay Q: What’s going on at the Sunshine Ace at Pelican Bay Marketplace? Work seems to have come to a halt. – Larry Hughes, Naples A: Sunshine Ace Hardware will take the majority of the space Stein Mart vacated in 2020 after operating for nearly 25 years in The Marketplace at Pelican Bay on the southwest corner of U.S. 41 North and Vanderbilt Beach Road. “Our plan is that we will hopefully be open by the first week in September,” Sunshine Ace Hardware President Michael Wynn said. Work is progressing inside the 20,190-square-foot space at 8811 Tamiami Trail N., said leasing agent Andrew J. Saluan of AJS Realty Group. “Everything is moving full tilt on Ace,” Saluan said. “Things just took longer at the county [level] than anticipated.” Another tenant has not been signed yet for the neighboring 15,800-square-foot space remaining from the Stein Mart vacancy in the Publix-anchored center. Elsewhere in Marketplace at Pelican Bay, Regatta opened a new
Patrons gave generously at the Golisano Children’s Museum of Naples gala on Feb. 8, raising more than $1.5 million. Photo by Charlie McDonald Photography
Many nonprofits set records for fun, giving By Therese McDevitt terry.mcdevitt@naplespress.com
When it comes to holding up their auction paddles to raise money for nonprofits, Naples gala patrons are on a record-setting roll. It’s not just the Naples Winter Wine Festival, which set a new record in 2025 with $34 million raised for Naples Children and Education Foundation in support of nearly 50 area organizations. For perspective, the Met Gala — the hyper-glam fundraiser each May that supports the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum in New York City with the help of global celebrities and Vogue editor Anna Wintour — raised $26 million in 2024, which was a record to that time for the event. During what The Naples Press has dubbed “paddle season” in Naples
See ATEN KNOWS, Page 11A
— its own season-within-a-season filled with galas galore — many nonprofits set records this year, as well, with more than $45 million raised, listed here, that were held between November 2024 and March 2025. While this list is not exhaustive and focuses primarily on galas featuring auctions or fund-a-need paddle raises, with a few exceptions, it shows just how successful this season was for nonprofits supporting areas including the arts; children and education; health and community; seniors; social services; the environment; and nature and animals.
Galas help bring nonprofit missions to life
What is behind the money-raising magic that might make Wintour wonder just what is going on down here in Naples? How do local See PADDLES, Page 8A
C E L E B R AT I N G M O T H E R ’ S D AY
Her long road: Noemi Perez remembers motherhood before adulthood 0
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By Harriet Howard Heithaus harriet.heithaus@naplespress.com
Some written announcements of motherhood don’t begin with a baby shower list of onesies, diapers and other musthaves. Noemi Perez’s began with a note, quietly left on the kitchen table for her parents. She was 15 and too terrified to face them with the news: She was pregnant. Perez remembers the emotions, racing around her head like a swarm of angry flies: “There was the fear of letting my parents know. Of some shame and embarrassment. And [I
was] sort of disappointed, too, because of everything everyone would say about people in Immokalee — specifically girls in Immokalee — it was like I proved that now, because I’m pregnant. And what is that going to do for my future?” She feared most of all that she would not escape the cycle of menial jobs to which teen mothers seemed confined. To delay one dreaded moment, she revealed her condition in a note, deposited it and left for school. “Then, in the middle of the day, I was called down to the office with the announcement that my parent was there to pick me up. And my heart dropped to my stomach,” she said. See PEREZ, Page 6A
Noemi Perez
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