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A P R I L 2 5 - M A Y 1 , 2025
3A | ON THE FLY
3B | ART OUTREACH
11B | GROWING SPORT
over the results of airport survey
more collaborations, partnerships now likely
Championships a worldwide sensation
Collier County commissioners pore
Tim Aten Knows Tim Aten
New businesses sprouting in Ridgeport Plaza
Baker Museum wins accreditation;
Wasson: Minto US Open Pickleball
A BATTLE WITHIN GI Holocaust rescuer saved lives with his pen
Q: Any new information about the vacancies in “Bed Bath & Beyond Plaza”? – Chris Wowk, Naples A: Four new businesses are coming to Ridgeport Plaza in North Naples, including Sprouts Farmers Market, which plans to share the vacated Bed Bath & Beyond anchor space with Golf Galaxy. The more than 45,000-squarefoot big-box store at 5351 Airport-Pulling Road will be divided for the two co-anchor tenants: a 24,491-square-foot Sprouts supermarket and a 20,780-square-foot Golf Galaxy retail store, according to site improvement plans recorded this month by Collier County Growth Management. Sprouts will take the northernmost unit created in that large space at Ridgeport Plaza, the retail center on the northwest corner of Airport-Pulling and Pine Ridge roads. An opening date is still to be determined for the new Sprouts grocery store, which will be slightly smaller than the Phoenix-based chain’s first regional location in North Naples. That initial 29,843-square-foot store launched in 2019 to anchor Logan Landings at Logan Boulevard and Immokalee Road. The new Golf Galaxy will be downsized considerably from its existing 35,355-square-foot freestanding building nearby in the Promenade at Naples Centre. The retail chain plans to relocate less than a half-mile south on Airport-Pulling Road to the inline space in Ridgeport Plaza. Owned and operated by Dick’s Sporting
By Harriet Howard Heithaus harriet.heithaus@naplespress.com
Robert Hilliard, with the typical curiosity of a journalist, was fascinated with the idea of Holocaust survivors offering a concert at St. Ottilien. It would make a great story for his Army base newspaper, he reasoned. These rescued people were performing what they termed a “Liberation Concert” with the instruments the Nazis had issued them for sham performances, to disguise their killing grounds as “work camps.” Part of the monastery and its village near his base had become a hospital and displaced persons camp for Holocaust survivors. The camp was now under the administration of U.S. and Allied occupied forces, at the close of World War II. But the audience, not the music, would haunt him. Some of them were too weak to sit up, thin and frail and still starving under what should have been life-giving care by Allied forces at the end of World War II. “They looked like they were dying in front of my eyes,” he said, reflecting on that day. “And in fact, they were.” It led an 18-year-old serviceman to risk court-martial for publicly calling out the U.S. on its deadly neglect of Jewish survivors — both Jewish and Roma people — under its care. For his courage, Hilliard is on the list of honored rescuers displayed in the Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Naples. His work and that of others in Southwest Florida are why there are also prayers of gratitude during the 4 p.m. Sunday, April 27, Yom Hashoah Robert Hilliard talks about his efforts to call out the U.S. on its neglect to care for Jewish Holocaust survivors.
See HILLIARD, Page 5A
Photo by Liz Gorman
See ATEN KNOWS, Page 8A
CITY GOVERNMENT
Naples might reinstate New Year’s fireworks By Aisling Swift
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1 New Year’s fireworks may return to the city of Naples, just not on New Year’s Eve. Naples City Council is mulling holding fireworks on New Year’s Day or a weekend instead of New Year’s Eve, when police officers are needed to focus on drunken drivers and other illegal activities, and an added event would strain the 95-officer police force.
“New Year’s Eve fireworks has become something that [residents] are particularly passionate about and it stands at the very top of the list — or near the top of the list — of things that are important to them as an event,” Councilman Ray Christman said at an April 15 workshop discussion on special events. “So this is the dilemma and the reality that we’re facing. “And they say, ‘Look, this is why I live here, this is what I pay taxes for, this is what is important to me and cities and communities across Flor-
ida and the nation find a way to put it on, so why can’t we?’ ” The decision to cancel this past year’s New Year’s Eve fireworks occurred in September, when two fireworks contracts were up for approval; July 4th fireworks remained. The New Year’s fireworks cost $141,000 because they require a barge, increased police staffing and overtime salaries, plus other costs to ensure safety. Police Chief Ciro Dominguez had pointed out police resources are strained during the holidays due to
heavy traffic, drunken drinking and large gatherings, and money could be better spent paying 10-12 more officers to patrol key areas and respond to noise complaints. He wanted to focus on fireworks being set off on beaches — a hazard to people and wildlife — in addition to traffic congestion, parties and drunken driving. The decision to cancel wasn’t communicated to Collier County until December, when it hit social media, giving the county little time See FIREWORKS, Page 7A
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