VOLUME 4 ISSUE 25
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Taverna Berrocal reopens JUNE 23 - JUNE 29, 2023
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MCBOCC chooses replacement for Salvation Army misdemeanor probation services
By Jim Saunders Florida News Service
Clockwise from left: Marion County Judge Tommy Thompson, right, speaks about the Marion County Misdemeanor Probation Services item on the agenda as Mike McCain, left, looks on during the Marion County Commission meeting at the McPherson Governmental Complex in Ocala on Tuesday, June 20 2023. Commissioner Carl Zalak. Commissioner Craig Curry. Commissioner Kathy Bryant. [Bruce Ackerman/Ocala Gazette] 2023.
By Julie Garisto julie@magnoliamediaco.com
W
ith time running out for Marion County Board of County Commissioners (MCBOCC) to find a solution on how to oversee
residents on probation and convicted of misdemeanor crimes, the decision seemed to come down to weighing human welfare concerns on the one hand, budgetary feasibility on the other. Some background: Marion County’s Salvation Army gave the board of
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commissioners 180-day notice of their intent to discontinue providing misdemeanor probation services. The agency will continue to provide services through Sept. 12, 2023. The issue arose on March 16, when the See Probation, page A4
Second fatal shooting in 2 weeks claims 18-year-old in Ocala By Andy Fillmore andy@ocalagazette.com
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n 18-year-old man died Tuesday morning after he was shot the evening before in Northwest Ocala, the second fatal shooting in the area in two weeks, according to the Marion County Sheriff ’s Office. Tylique Le’John Christie died around 9:30 a.m. after being transported to a local hospital, the sheriff ’s office said in news release. Deputies responding to reports of “multiple shots fired” around 6 p.m in the 4400 block of Northwest 22nd Avenue found Tylique
Le’John Christie. Christie was transported to a hospital in critical condition before deputies arrived, the release stated. Major Crimes detectives conducting a homicide investigation termed the shooting death an “isolated incident” in the release. Christie’s shooting death comes after Lezarius Graham, 17, was found deceased June 7 in woods in the 2100 block of Northwest 43rd Street. Investigators believe Graham was shot on June 6. MCSO Public Information Officer Zachary Moore responded to a question emailed whether the two shooting deaths are linked. “It looks like they are
nearby; however, detectives have no evidence to suggest that they are connected,” Moore stated. The “exact circumstances surrounding the shooting” are not being disclosed, he wrote. Anyone with information that might help in the investigation of Christie’s death is asked to call Detective Daniel Pinder at (352) 368-3508 or MCSO (non- emergency) at (352) 732-9111.
To remain anonymous, call Crime Stoppers of Marion County (352) 368-STOP (7867) and reference 23-36.
Tylique Le’John Christie [Supplied]
MCBOCC approves new contract with Fire Union By Jennifer Hunt Murty jennifer@ocalagazette.com
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he Marion County Board of County Commissioners unanimously voted to approve a new contract with the Professional Fire Fighters of Marion County (PFFMC) after it received approval by 93% of its members. The contract includes raises and “loyalty incentives” to help attract and retain employees for a department struggling to fill vacancies. The three-year contract is expected to cost $21 million, according to a county news release. Commissioner Carl Zalak said that while the contract reflects a commitment from the board to support the department, the board would have to make difficult decisions in other parts of the county’s budget to support it
going forward. Negotiations began in September 2022 and the sides became frustrated after no progress was made and the short-handed department had to provide increased services due to a rapidly growing population. One of the reasons for renegotiating the contract earlier than expected had to do with meeting minimum wage requirements. While most businesses impacted by the 2022 General Appropriations Act were allowed to increase to a $15 minimum wage gradually, Florida was required to pay employees who provide direct care to Medicaid recipients $15 per hour. This initiative meant all Marion County EMTs were bumped immediately from $13.75 an hour to $15, significantly impacting the wage matrix previously negotiated. See Loyalty, page A2
[Supplied]
Sides battle over speech rights, academic freedom niversity professors and students are urging a federal appeals court to uphold a decision blocking a 2022 Florida law that would restrict the way racerelated concepts can be taught in classrooms — a law that Gov. Ron DeSantis dubbed the “Stop WOKE Act.” Attorneys for two sets of plaintiffs filed briefs Friday arguing that the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals should back a preliminary injunction that Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker issued in November against the law. The plaintiffs contend, in part, the law violates speech rights and academic freedom. “Not since the anti-communist measures of the McCarthy era has a state legislature interfered so directly with the academic freedom of university instructors,” said one of the briefs, filed on behalf of six instructors at Florida A&M University, the University of Florida, the University of South Florida, the University of Central Florida and Florida State University. “It was in that period, when legislatures, like Florida’s today, sought to suppress views they disfavored, that the Supreme Court developed the First Amendment principles of academic freedom.” But in an April brief filed at the Atlanta-based appeals court, attorneys for the state argued that Walker’s ruling should be overturned, saying it “anoints individual professors as universities unto themselves, at liberty under the First Amendment to indoctrinate college students in whatever views they please, no matter how contrary to the university’s curriculum or how noxious to the people of Florida.” “The constitutional question in this case thus boils down to this: Who decides what is, and is not, to be taught in Florida’s college classrooms — individual professors or their employer, the state, in prescribing by law the content requirements and standards that govern public universities in setting their course curricula?” the state’s lawyers wrote. DeSantis made a priority of the law, which he called the “Stop Wrongs To Our Kids and Employees Act,” or “Stop WOKE Act.” The law lists a series of racerelated concepts and says it would constitute discrimination if students are subjected to instruction that “espouses, promotes, advances, inculcates or compels” them to believe the concepts. As an example, the law labels See Academic, page A2
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