07/15/2021 ISSUE 28

Sweeney seen heir apparent as
Shores town attorney. P9
Seaglass: Island’s
newest community. P8
Speed limit on A1A will be

restored to 45 mph in fall. P10

Strunk Funeral For breaking news visit
Homes at center
of family feud New software ups
the stress level at
Cleveland Clinic

BY RAY MCNULTY BY MICHELLE GENZ
Staff Writer Staff Writer

In a Peyton Place-like dra- MY PHOTO BY BRENDA AHEARN Longtime Vero Beach neu-
ma, the owners of the Strunk VERO rologist Dr. Leslie Huszar be-
Funeral Homes and Cremato- lieves in working past retire-
ry have accused the company Wanted: 14 more property owners for beach replenishment ment age – keeping the brain
founder’s widow of fraudu- stimulated is good, he says.
lently selling the real estate BY RAY MCNULTY ers are stubbornly blocking beaches behind their homes
on which the longtime local Staff Writer the beach renourishment disappear rather than tem- Living with chronic stress,
business operates to a new others desperately seek along porarily tolerate the sight though, is not good. And when
company that allegedly wants The island has a big prob- a stretch of shore deemed and sound of dump trucks he came out of retirement to go
to offer similar services on the lem along its southern coast- “critically eroded.” filled with sand – or, heaven back to work with Cleveland
property. line, where a number of forbid, see people walking Clinic Indian River Hospital,
oceanfront property own- Apparently, the naysay- the stress was epic. Literally.
In a lawsuit filed in Cir- ers would rather watch the CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
cuit Court in Vero Beach Cleveland Clinic has used
last month, Strunk Funeral Epic, the electronic health re-
Homes is asking Judge Janet cords software, longer than
Croom to “preserve the status almost any other hospital sys-
quo” by issuing a temporary tem. After Cleveland Clinic’s
restraining order and injunc- takeover of the Vero hospital in
tion to prohibit the defen- 2019, Epic had to be installed
dants from interfering with in order for Indian River to link
the funeral home’s operations with the rest of the system’s 18
until the properties’ owner- hospitals.
ship disputes can be legally
resolved. So far, only the outpatient
practices and facilities have
The lawsuit also requests had to deal with the transi-
the disputed properties be tion, and among those, Vero
Radiology and Primary Care
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2

New COVID-19 infections here double Iceland: What ‘normal’ looks like when people get vaccinated
as number getting vaccinated declines
BY MILTON R. BENJAMIN look at such a world on a 10- new cases during the most re-
BY LISA ZAHNER of people getting vaccinated Staff Writer day visit to Iceland. cent one-week period.
Staff Writer continues to steadily decline.
Want a glimpse of how much Unlike Indian River Coun- None. Zero. In fact, as of the
The rate of new, weekly CO- The number of new infec- better the future could be if ty, where COVID-19 is again start of this week, no new posi-
VID-19 infections here more tions rose from 51 cases dur- only enough people would get surging and nearly 18 people tives – except for a handful dis-
than doubled over the past ing the week ending June 24 to vaccinated to protect the most a day are testing positive (see covered in arriving tourists –
two weeks, as the number 95 cases during the week end- vulnerable? accompanying story), Iceland have been reported in Iceland
– with a population twice that since late May.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 6 My wife and I just got a brief of our county – reported NO
CONTINUED ON PAGE 8

July 15, 2021 Volume 16, Issue 28 Newsstand Price $1.00 High-speed rail
contractors step up
News 1-14 Editorial 28 People 15-22 TO ADVERTISE CALL work here. P11
Arts 37-40 Games 31-33 Pets 56 772-559-4187
Books 30 Health 41-47 Real Estate 59-68
Dining 52-55 Insight 23-36 Style 48-51 FOR CIRCULATION
CALL 772-226-7925

© 2021 Vero Beach 32963 Media LLC. All rights reserved.

2 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

Strunk Funeral Homes Neither Kopchak nor her attorney, nance and capital improvements, as  Rent would increase from $6,000
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Richard Sneed, responded to phone well as expenses such as taxes, insur-
messages seeking comment. Dorothy ance and debt service – even though to $12,000 per month, as of the date of
placed in a trust to prevent Dorothy Strunk’s attorney, James Covey, de- the properties were titled in the names the letter.
Strunk from selling or transferring clined to comment. of Glenn and Dorothy Strunk.
ownership of other local real estate in  The letter served as a 15-day no-
which the funeral home claims to have Reached by phone Monday, Young The current lawsuit claims that Dor-
a vested interest. described the lawsuit as “frivolous” othy Strunk was aware of, participated tice that the funeral homes’ lease was
and said he’ll seek to have it dismissed. in and benefited from the arrange- being terminated.
In addition, the lawsuit seeks the ment, which had been in place since
voiding of Dorothy Strunk’s sale of the “They’re grasping at straws,” Young 1981, and therefore knew she didn’t “She tried to work something out
funeral home property to her nephew, said.“It was a legitimate sale. Look at the solely own the properties she sold to with Glenn’s adult children, but they
James W. Young Jr., who owns Millenni- deeds to the properties. They’re in the Millennium to enrich herself at the wouldn’t do it, so she sold the prop-
um Funeral Home and Crematory LLC. names of Glenn and Dorothy Strunk, plaintiff’s expense. erties to me,” Young said. “They stole
and when Glenn died, she owned those the business from Dorothy on their
Named as defendants are Dorothy properties.” The lawsuit also alleges that the father’s deathbed, two days before
Strunk, whose husband, Glenn, owned conduct of Young, Millennium and Glenn died.
the local funeral home business since Dorothy Strunk attempted to re- Dorothy Strunk threaten interrup-
1973, running it for 47 years before solve the property-ownership dispute tion of the funeral homes’ operations, “Now, they owe us more than
he died in February 2020; Young, who in March 2020, when she took the claiming the defendants have threat- $200,000 in back rent,” he added, “and
purchased the Strunk properties last matter to court, where she opposed ened to take possession of the funeral we’re getting ready to evict them from
month for $3.1 million; and Millen- her three adult stepchildren: Kevin homes’ properties – and that such ac- the buildings.”
nium. and April Strunk, and Kopchak. tions would cause irreparable harm to
the business. Along with injunctive relief and
According to state records, Glenn However, County Court Judge Robyn voidance of Dorothy Strunk’s sale of
Strunk’s daughter, Mary Kopchak, Stone dismissed the case this past May On June 17, in fact, Dorothy Strunk the properties, the plaintiff seeks dam-
is the president of Strunk Funeral because of “lack of prosecution.” notified Kopchak in a hand-delivered ages and reimbursement for legal fees
Homes, having replaced her father on letter that: and court costs.
Feb. 24, 2020 – two days prior to his In its lawsuit, Strunk Funeral Homes
death at age 79. argues that the disputed properties  The Strunk Funeral Homes owed No trial date has been set.
were jointly owned by the business, Young said he plans to sue the
because business operations covered $90,000 in rent it hadn’t paid since Strunk Funeral Home and its owners
the costs of their acquisition, mainte- March 1, 2020. for “clouding the title” of the prop-
erties he purchased from Dorothy

Stone. 

Cleveland Clinic Dr. Leslie Huszar at his home in Vero Beach. PHOTO BY BRENDA AHEARN Had Dr. Huszar been asked to par-
ticipate, he likely would have worn out
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 to make it less aggravating – “stupid” is high level,” the hospital said, with the the GROSS button.
the word the input effort used. software’s integration here.
of the Treasure Coast practices have As for Cleveland Clinic Indian River,
yet to make the change. Problems ranged from “alert fa- In November 2018, Merlino and a statement acknowledged the chal-
tigue” – so many alerts, doctors tune others at Cleveland Clinic in Ohio sur- lenges in implementation, but added
Even so, the outpatient go-live has them out – to overflowing in-baskets veyed doctors about whether Epic was that “there are far more benefits to our
been bumpy to say the least, derail- and no time to clear them. providing them the “tools and resourc- patients.”
ing phone systems for months and es” they needed for their practices.
provoking untenable frustration lev- Doctors also complained of having “We anticipate that issues will de-
els for staff and physicians. Since the to click through five to 10 more pages “Many physicians answered no,” crease and eventually resolve in the
September launch of Epic, more than than necessary to get to where they wrote Merlino and another IT execu- future as caregivers become more
a dozen physicians and advanced want to go. And they took umbrage at tive on an AMA website, explaining accustomed to the new system,” the
practitioners have resigned, including the barrage of questions aimed at max- the program called Getting Rid of Stu- statement went on.
some of the hospital’s best. imizing billing and reimbursement. pid Stuff, or GROSS, that let physicians
flag things they would like to get rid of Of all the physicians having to adapt
“It’s a chaos,” said Huszar. “They cre- Leading that cleanup effort was or change in Epic. to Epic, Huszar would seem among
ated a chaos.” Cleveland Clinic’s system-wide chief the least likely to overload. Huszar
medical information officer, Dr. Amy “The message was clear: tell us what is has been writing computer programs
Any changeover in corporate soft- Merlino. Merlino is one of two ma- ‘stupid’ in Epic,” Merlino and her co-au- since the 1970s, and marketed his own
ware is bound to cause turmoil. But ternal fetal medicine specialists with thor wrote.“Share the unnecessary tasks, EHR, MedArc, around 2010.
Epic, considered among the best elec- privileges at Indian River. But she has duplicative documentation, and extra
tronic health records system in some not yet seen patients here. Instead, she clicks that increase daily workload.” Huszar’s practice merged with In-
regards, is legendary for driving physi- has been helping with the complica- dian River Medical Center in 2017,
cians crazy. tions of Epic’s delivery, “engaged at a Nearly 700 suggestions poured in, around the time of his 70th birthday.
most within a month. When his contract expired in July
Despite that, Cleveland Clinic is 2019, Huszar decided to retire.
hardly alone in its use of Epic. All of
the top 20 hospitals on U.S. News By then, Cleveland Clinic had taken
Best Hospitals list have Epic EHR. And over but was holding off on significant
since Indian River’s partnership with changes.
Cleveland Clinic went into effect in
2019, two other top contenders for the Six months later, Huszar changed
merger – Orlando Health and Adven- his mind and rejoined the hospital to
thealth – are switching to Epic. ease the burden on the neurology de-
partment.
Cleveland Clinic is more than aware
of the software’s potential to cause phy- “There’s too many patients,” the
sician burnout – what Kaiser Health office manager told him, when she
News called “death by a thousand called to tell him she was at the brink
clicks.” of quitting.

Several years ago, Cleveland Clin- “Don’t quit. I’ll come back and help
ic’s IT team set up a response button out,” Huszar told her.
on Epic for doctors to flag their pain
points, as the lingo goes. Cleveland Cleveland Clinic approved his re-
could then try to modify the software turn in January 2020. Cleveland Clin-
ic’s promised year-long grace period
of minimal change was over, and, in
short order, more and more patients

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 3

NEWS

began to appear on Huszar’s schedule, “I have kept my cool for decades and plan. You don’t have a diagnosis. I have land Clinic, it was one of multiple
he said. decades until Epic,” he said. “With Epic, to understand the patient a little bit opportunities for training that were
I literally had a stress level that was un- more than just the symptoms. So, we provided, specifically “at-the-elbow”
“They started pushing more and believable. had this epic failure.” training with physicians.
more patients on us. It was not dis-
cussed, nobody told me that I need “I was running through a visit as At one point, when things were “spi- But some of the problems with
to see more patients. It was more of fast as I could with the Epic so I could raling out of control,” as Huszar put Epic amounted to age discrimina-
a gentle progressive push. More and spend some time with the patient. it, Cleveland Clinic sent in a team of tion, Huszar maintains. Older physi-
more patients just ended up on the And in neurology, if you don’t under- more than 20 from Ohio, one of whom cians are more likely to have vision
schedule.” stand the patient, you don’t have a re- shadowed Huszar to see what prob- problems and have trouble reading
lationship. You don’t have a treatment lems he was encountering. For Cleve-
When COVID-19 arrived that March, CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
the fear of the unknown and the need
for extreme precautions added to the
stress of staff members. Huszar lauds
the hospital for handling the pandem-
ic well and keeping infections in the
outpatient side largely at bay.

As bad as COVID anxiety seemed,
it was nothing like the inescapable
aggravation that came in September
with the launch of Epic. After only
two weeks of training – nearly all of it
virtual due to COVID – the new soft-
ware was in place, with its thousands
of niggling differences and laborious
new requirements.

Meanwhile, patients continued to
pour in, and phones rang off the hook
until the whole system went haywire.
Soon, furious patients braved COVID
and marched into offices demanding
to know why they couldn’t get through.

“The staff was pushed beyond its
limits,” said Huszar, who speaks rever-
entially about his key office assistants.
“The pandemic was too much, and
then they came out with Epic.”

As people left, they were not re-
placed, Huszar said. That appeared
to be hospital policy. “‘We are not re-
placing; we are in transition. We are in
COVID.’ That was just weird,” he said.
“You ask for something: We’re miss-
ing people. And the response was, Yes,
you’re missing people. Totally unre-
sponsive system.”

For the neurology department, that
meant functioning for months with
only half the usual staff.

Stretched thin, the demands of Epic
training and adjustment turned nor-
mal office functions into mayhem.
“The pressure from inside was con-
tinuous on these people and it was not
spun in a positive way. It was puni-
tive,” Huszar said. “The tone was, this
is what you do and no choice.”

As for physicians, their chief func-
tion – seeing patients – suddenly
became incidental, Huszar said.
Overnight, the new software was con-
suming his workday. “It took 95 per-
cent of my time to deal with Epic and
5 percent was left for patients.”

“I am a person who is not anxious,
who is not nervous,” said Huszar,
who did his advanced training at Mc-
Gill University’s renowned Montreal
Neurological Institute, but who grew
up in Bucharest, Hungary, amidst op-
pression and political turmoil. He was
granted political asylum in Germany
before moving to Canada.

4 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

New software ups stress level Huszar was not shy about letting ket are billing oriented, not patient turned away last week after an appoint-
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3 hospital brass know about the prob- oriented,” Huszar said. ment for a CT scan set up by a Cleveland
lems he encountered. The most seri- Clinic doctor’s office never made it to
the small font. Others never learned ous, he said, had to do with sessions “They check on how much time I Vero Radiology’s books.
to type. “For the older physicians, you not timing out properly. spend with the patient, they check
take it slow to make it work. You don’t on how many characters I type, they Another patient, Barry Anshell, was
kill everybody in one week.” At one point, he called over Dr. Greg check on every little step and they put referred to a Cleveland Clinic cardiolo-
Rosencrance, Indian River’s president, more and more rules in it, so we see gist by a Cleveland Clinic doctor, part
It took Huszar three months of “liter- to show him what Huszar regarded as less and less patients. of the former Primary Care of the Trea-
ally typing double blind” before some- a “major security gap” – when a doc- sure Coast group. The referral was sent
one finally showed him the path to en- tor signed into the system, the session “On the other hand, Cleveland Clin- to the cardiologist on May 21.
large the lettering. “You can change it, did not automatically end if the doctor ic comes in and they want to make
but they don’t program that in,” he said. left without signing out. Another per- money and they want you to see more “They never called, nor did they re-
son could come along and access the and more patients. Somewhere this turn my call and message,” said An-
“I was typing, and I would look at same session without having to sign paradigm is not going to work.” shell. Eight days later, on May 29, An-
the screen and I couldn’t see what I in, Huszar told Rosencrance. shell had a heart attack. Doctors found
was typing. It was incredibly stressful. In addition to being a stress bomb, a 99 percent blockage of the right cor-
The Russians invading Budapest in “It was very nice of him to come,” the Epic launch is also expensive; onary artery and put in a stent.
1956 didn’t stress me as much as this Huszar said. “He understood the prob- Cleveland Clinic Indian River’s switch
software,” he said. “It’s clearly age dis- lems. We had absolutely no issues.” will cost more than $15 million. Anshell is recovering. But his case
crimination. Why can’t you make it big may not be unique. Recently, as he
and bold so elderly people can read it?” But when Rosencrance referred the Another $2 million was spent on was leaving the cardiologist’s office
matter to Dr. Lori Posk, a transplant upgrades for the hospital to be able to after a checkup, Anshell was told staff
Refilling prescriptions is also a night- from Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland who handle the new system. had to go through 1,000 phone mes-
mare. Huszar said it was easier to can- serves as Indian River’s EHR and data sages backed up since January in order
cel the old one and write a whole new expert, she seemed to view Huszar’s Patient care was the original moti- to get current.
one than to go through all the steps for concern as an unwillingness to adapt to vation for EHR, which only became
a refill. the new system. “You’ve just got to learn ubiquitous over the past 15 years. The “No one is addressing the ques-
Epic,” she told him. systems were intended to give patients tion of how many people die during
And all of it was draining his allot- access to their charts, no matter where a transition (of EHR software) due to
ted 15 minutes for the patient, he said. Seven months into the Epic rollout, they went. But that notion quickly ran not being able to see their physician,”
“There is no time left after all that you Huszar decided to leave the hospi- into a wall called interoperability. said Huszar. “How will the internist ac-
have to do.” tal a second time. He has not retired, count for the fatigue caused by over-
though. He now practices out of a Today, two key entities on Indian work? How many medical errors will
The pace of the rollout seemed re- small office near Perkins Medical Sup- River’s outpatient side still don’t have she make?
lentless. Stress levels “built up over days ply, along with his favorite staff mem- Epic – Vero Radiology and the doctors
and weeks and it was worse and worse bers who followed him. at the recently acquired Primary Care “The majority of physicians hate
and worse,” Huszar said. “And there was of the Treasure Coast. their EHR and we are totally ignoring
no relief. Every single week there was “Basically, they forced on us an un- them and we are forcing a system on
some new thing we had to do.” workable EHR system. EHR is a bad Both are scheduled to get Epic some- them that is clearly harmful to patient
idea anyway. All the EHRs on the mar- time next year. In the meantime, in-
teroperability issues may have had care on many levels.” 
something to do with why a patient was

My Vero ebbed, the water would redistribute or cluding five who gave no reason and But the project is too important for
wash away the newly added sand, de- one who stated he was against beach county officials to abandon: Severely
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 feating the purpose of the project. renourishment. eroded beaches reduce the level of
storm-surge protection and puts dunes
along the shore beyond their dune line. “These projects are a challenge Six of the naysayers cited the coun- – and possibly homes – in jeopardy.
Those property owners’ intransi- when we don’t have everyone partici- ty’s requirement that the easements be
pating,” Flesher said. “If a significant granted in perpetuity – a mandate that Despite those facts, county officials
gence forced the County Commission number of property owners say no, it’s makes unnecessary the tedious and say there is at least one Sector 7 property
to vote last week to postpone until next a waste of time and money.” often-exasperating permission process owner who is actively urging neighbors
year its $9.9-million Sector 7 Beach and every time the beaches need to be re- to join him in denying the easements.
Dune Restoration Project, covering the The county needs another 14 proper- plenished.
stretch of beach between the Treasure ty owners to grant easements if it hopes “There’s a protagonist in the group,”
Cove subdivision and Floralton Beach to replenish the southern section of Two embraced a wrongheaded and Flesher said, echoing the sentiments
on the southern tier of the barrier is- beach for the first time since 2007, three still-controversial Florida statute en- he shared during last week’s County
land. years after Hurricanes Frances and acted in 2018, when the Legislature Commission meeting, where he told
Jeanne blew through Vero Beach. allowed beachfront property owners the audience, “It defies all logic that
“We can’t justify going ahead with to restrict access to the dry sandy ar- there would be a group of individuals
the project knowing the mission is go- Those signatures won’t be easy to eas behind their homes – unless local churning the waters and ensuring that
ing to fail,” Commission Chairman Joe get, however, even though the project governments can legally establish a people say no.”
Flesher said, “and right now, we don’t will cost property owners nothing. history of the public’s “customary use”
have the numbers.” of those beaches. All of the commissioners appeared
“It’s free sand,” County Public Works baffled by the resistance to the project.
So far, only 59 of the 82 property Director Rich Szpyrka said, explain- In addition to the 14 denials, Szpyr-
owners in that sector – 72 percent – ing that the project’s costs will be cov- ka said there are four other responses “This is a problem I didn’t figure we
have signed agreements that provide ered entirely by Federal Emergency pending the county’s review, includ- would have,” Joe Earman said.
the county with the easements neces- Management Agency funds, Florida ing two from property owners who
sary to access and repair their beaches. Department of Environmental Protec- said they have enough sand on their Peter O’Bryan noted that a major-
tion grants, insurance payments and beaches. ity of the property owners who denied
The commissioners require at least money from the county’s bed tax. easements were at the northern and
90 percent of property owners in a Five property owners still hadn’t re- southern ends of the sector, and he
particular sector to agree to the ease- “Since 2013, we’ve been losing about sponded to the county’s multiple re- wondered aloud whether those people
ments before embarking on such proj- 1½ feet of beach per year,” he added. quests, and officials aren’t overly op- feared an intrusion – particularly of
ects, because replenishing the beach- “If the project doesn’t go forward, the timistic that any of them will get on beach volleyball players – from public-
es behind some homes and not others beach will continue to deteriorate un- board. access beaches to the north and south.
is impractical. til there’s nothing left.”
“The bottom line is that 23 of the 82 It’s possible such concerns contrib-
The incoming tides would flow into FDEP, in fact, has described sector 7 properties have not given us permis- uted to the property owners’ decisions,
the gaps created by the parcels that beaches as “critically eroded.” sion,” Szpyrka said. “That’s a big chunk.” but Szpyrka said South Beach Park is
weren’t replenished and, as the tide 1.4 miles north of Treasure Cove and
Yet, 14 property owners have al- Too big. Round Island Beach Park is 1.9 miles
ready refused to grant easements, in-

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 5

NEWS

south of Floralton Beach – a long way delay adds to the risk of severe weather erty owners are willing to chance it, Aren’t property owners preventing
for public beach users to trek to sun- further decimating sections of the sec- preferring no beach to a wide stretch the beach-restoration being selfish?
bathe or play volleyball. tor’s beaches. of sand where people might occasion-
ally walk by. “They are,” Flesher said, “because
The Atlantic hurricane season has “If we wait too long,” he said, “even- the people who want the sand can’t get
begun, and named storms have al- tually there will be nothing left but a But what about their neighbors – the it. You’re going to have some people
ready begun heading our way, prompt- seawall.” ones who want to preserve their beach- saying, ‘I’m paying my taxes for a nice
ing Flesher to warn that the project es and welcome the county’s efforts?
Clearly, some of south island prop- CONTINUED ON PAGE 6

6 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

My Vero their concern. But that’s not the case.
“We don’t have that usage here, es-
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5
pecially in that area,” he added. “This
beach. Now I can’t have it anymore?’ isn’t Daytona.”
And I understand that.
Nor do we want to be.
“The property owners who don’t Just as our picturesque beaches
want the sand have a right to say no, contribute mightily to the area’s sea-
but I see it as very shortsighted.” side charm, our small-town sense of
community – our civility and consid-
Flesher said he doesn’t understand eration for others – has long made
why any of the sector’s beachfront Vero Beach special.
homeowners would resist the project. Let’s not lose either.
They’re “not forfeiting their personal We need at least 14 more ocean-
property rights,” and there’s no reason front property owners in Sector 7 to
for them to worry about their beaches care about their neighbors, allow the
drawing unwanted crowds. county to save our beaches, and take
pride in knowing they’re making this
“The areas we’re talking about, community a better place.
you’re not going to see a lot of people Otherwise, the project goes nowhere,
going there with their beach blankets the funding goes back to the state and
and umbrellas,” Flesher said. “If this federal governments, and a scenic
project were going to create a spring-
break environment, I’d understand stretch of our beach goes away. 

COVID-19 infections double hospitalizations, and potentially more
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 deaths,” the CDC warned.

ing July 1 to 125 cases during the week But there seems to be good news for
ending July 8. So less than three weeks those who have had their shot or shots.
ago, fewer than eight people per day “So far, studies suggest that the current
were being infected. Now that number authorized vaccines work on the circu-
is nearly 18 per day. lating variants. Scientists will continue
to study these and other variants,” ac-
To put that in perspective, the last cording to the CDC.
time Indian River County saw a new in-
fection rate this high was late April, so Roughly two thirds of Indian River
two-and-a-half months’ worth of prog- County residents aged 12 and older
ress has been wiped out in two weeks. are vaccinated, according to the latest
state report. But the remaining third
The local case positivity rate – the have been slow to line up for their jab.
percentage of people tested who turn
up positive for COVID-19 – also more As cases rose recently, the number of
than doubled in that same span of people getting vaccinated dropped sig-
time, rising from 3.1 percent the week nificantly each week, with 589 people
ending June 24 to 8.3 percent the week being vaccinated the week ending June
ending July 8. 17, then 541 people the week ending
June 24, 450 people the week ending
We only have weekly data now since July 1, and only 408 people in the week
the Florida Department of Health dis- ending July 8.
continued daily reporting.
The most recent number could be
Federal Centers for Disease Control artificially low due to Independence
and Prevention officials project that Day closings and festivities, but it’s
what’s been termed the Delta vari- still on-trend with the past month,
ant of the coronavirus is responsible with a 25 percent decline in weekly
for more than half the recent surge in vaccinations since mid-June.
cases nationally.
Walk-in vaccine clinics at the Indian
Though no cases of that variant have River County Health Department were
been documented through sampling in cut back from four days per week to two
Indian River County, the new twist on days per week starting on July 7, com-
the virus is widely circulating through- mensurate with the reduced demand.
out Florida and has been found else-
where on the Treasure Coast. The vaccine is still available at Pub-
lix, Walmart, Sam’s Club, Walgreens and
According to the CDC, the B.1.617.2 CVS pharmacies, or through Cleveland
(Delta) variant was first detected in Clinic Indian River Hospital. Informa-
the United States in March after being tion about appointments can be found
identified in India in December. Delta at: my.clevelandclinic.org/landing/
is now the dominant strain of the virus covid-19-vaccine/florida.
for new cases.
The county health department offers
“These variants seem to spread no-appointment shots from 8:30 to 11 a.m.
more easily and quickly than other and 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Mondays andWednes-
variants, which may lead to more days at 1900 27th St., Vero Beach.
cases of COVID-19. An increase in the
number of cases will put more strain For additional information on CO-
on healthcare resources, lead to more VID-19 immunizations, call 772-794-
7425 or go to www.indianriver.florida-

health.gov. 



8 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

More vaccinations needed here This almost-90-percent vaccina- shot that it is not just to protect them – the U.S., our minds must still have
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 tion rate made it possible for us to fly it’s to protect our society, and to protect been in Iceland because it was an hour
to Reykjavik the morning of July 1 and a normal way of life,” she said. “That into our meal before I began wonder-
Might that possibly have anything spend the following week circumnavi- generally seems to persuade them.” ing whether the young server – who
to do with vaccinations, which have gating Iceland on a Viking cruise ship, had spent so much time maskless only
fallen way off here in Vero? visiting towns and cities all over the Sounds about right to me. But would a couple of feet from us explaining the
country. that work here? In the days before we menu – had been vaccinated.
In recent weeks, Iceland’s vaccina- left, we encountered a young nurse in
tion rate has soared – the countrywide While the ship took extreme COV- the Cleveland Clinic Emergency Room. “I was vaccinated a couple of weeks
total of those fully vaccinated last week ID-19 precautions onboard, we spent She hadn’t had a shot and didn’t plan ago,” she later assured us. “But I know
passed 70 percent, with an additional days exploring coastal communities to get one. Getting vaccinated was all so many young people who aren’t get-
18 percent of adults partially vaccinat- on our own, dining in packed Icelandic about her. She wasn’t concerned. She ting the shot. It’s just crazy.”
ed and awaiting a second shot. restaurants, buying gifts in crowded didn’t think she needed it. An Emer-
shops, joining locals in dispensing with gency Room nurse! Crazy, and frightening.
The result: On June 26, Iceland be- our masks and social distancing, savor- Now that we are back in Vero, I
came the first country in Europe to ing a life that seemed almost normal. On our way home from the airport guess we will have to be more care-
drop all restrictions on its residents, in- Sunday night, we decided to end our ful about wearing a mask and so-
cluding social distancing, mask-wear- A taxi driver and part-time police- vacation by dining at a local restau- cial distancing once again. Unless
ing, and limits on gatherings. And on woman we met in the small eastern rant. something happens to change young
July 1, visitors with an approved vacci- Icelandic town of Seydisfjordur had an minds about vaccination, I fear the
nation certificate no longer had to un- explanation for the country’s high vac- Told there would be a 40-minute future here is not going to look like
dergo testing to enter the country. cination rate. wait for an outside table, we decided the “normal” we’ve been hoping for
to have dinner in an inside dining
“We tell anyone reluctant to get the room. While our bodies were back in any time soon. 

Island’s newest community, Seaglass, about to break ground

BY STEVEN M. THOMAS PHOTO BY ROSS ROWLINSON in 2019, paying $6.9 million for the and hotel efficiencies, instead of the
25.9-acre tract. The rest of parcel C – 580 units originally approved for Dis-
Staff Writer The subdivision parcel originally 14-acres on the west side of A1A – still ney.
was part of Disney’s 70-acre Florida belongs to Disney and is utilized as
Ground-breaking is expected “any Beach Resort planned development, parking, maintenance facilities and There will be a mix of single-family
day now” for what will become the which was approved in the 1980s and recreation space. and duplex units in Seaglass, accord-
island’s newest community, Seaglass, included three parcels – A, B and C ing to Handler and county documents,
located across from the Disney Resort As a result of the two sales, density with 44 single-family homes and 28
on Highway A1A. Disney built its existing 214-room will be drastically reduced within the duplex units.
hotel and resort with its Mickey Mouse- overall planned development. Zana’s
Bill Handler, president of GHO shaped swimming pool on parcel A in parcel B was approved for 50-some Access will be via a gated entry on
Homes, said the county approved a the 1990s but ended up selling parcel condos but will only have only seven Route 510, where GHO will build a
land development permit last month B during the real estate downturn. The homes when complete. new west-bound left turn lane.
for the start of work on a 72-home developer who bought the land lost it
subdivision on a prime 26-acre tract at to the bank and it was then purchased Handler is building only half as Handler has not decided on all the
the intersection of A1A and Route 510. by Yane Zana of Coastmark Construc- many homes on his land as zoning design details or set prices for the new
tion who developed it as North Shore would allow. The final unit count when homes yet, citing uncertainty about
In the current hot home market, Han- Club, a neighborhood of large, ocean- Seaglass and North Shore are finished material costs and the housing mar-
dler doesn’t intend to waste any time front estates. will be less than 300, including houses ket, though it can be assumed the du-
getting started. He said new homes will plex units will cost less than the single-
be available for purchase in Seaglass in Handler bought most of parcel C family homes.
2022.
Prices for new homes in three oth-
GHO intends to create an “Old Flori- er island subdivisions where GHO is
da” ambiance in the subdivision, a state- building and selling houses probably
ment backed up by a county staff report define a ballpark range for prices in
prepared for the Planning and Zoning Seaglass.
Commission that says the developer
will “preserve or relocate a majority of At Sommers Place, the closest of
the hardwood trees within preservation the three subdivisions to Seaglass lo-
tracts and or perimeter buffers.” cated about a quarter mile north on
A1A, GHO is selling homes that start
“We have gone to extremes to pre- in the $600,000s. At nearby Orchid
serve the mature trees in there, to Cove, a short distance west on route
maintain a canopy and an Old Flor- 510, Handler’s homes are selling in the
ida feel,” Handler told Vero Beach $800,000s.
32963 last week. “We moved the roads
around to save trees and there are nine GHO’s most expensive island homes
islands in the road, where it splits and are located in The Strand in Indian
goes around stands of trees. River Shores, where houses are priced
between $1,187,900 and $1,327,990,
“We walked the site for hours figur- according to the company’s website.
ing out how to preserve the natural
scene and we are continuing to do Handler says homes in The Strand
that. Many developers just mow things have enough high-end features and
down, but we want to keep everything finishes included that some buyers
natural as possible. may opt to pay the base price, pur-
chasing their home as designed, while
“From the treescape to the topogra- others may add $100,000 or more in
phy and angles of the lots, pretty much luxury upgrades, bumping prices up
every lot in Seaglass is special.”
close to $1.5 million. 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 9

NEWS

PETE SWEENEY HEIR APPARENT TO
POST OF SHORES TOWN ATTORNEY

BY LISA ZAHNER “I am delighted that we will have a
professional with Mr. Sweeney’s skill
Staff Writer joining us as our new town attorney.
His tenure as Fort Pierce city attorney
Fort Pierce City Attorney Pete Swee- ensures he has the breadth of experi-
ney was the only applicant interviewed ence required by the position.
out of five lawyers who applied to re-
place Indian River Shores Town Attor- “I was also impressed that he re-
ney Chester Clem, so while he has not searched in advance many of the im-
been hired yet, it seems the decision is portant issues confronting the town so
a formality at this point. he may hit the ground running,” Foley
said, adding that the council must still
Sweeney, a longtime Vero Beach resi- vote next week.
dent, resigned from his post as top le-
gal counsel of the City of Fort Pierce on The town council turned over re-
May 20, giving the city 90 days’ notice, sponsibility for vetting candidates to
before interviewing with each of the Town Manager Jim Harpring, also a
five Shores Town Council members. practicing attorney with knowledge
of the local legal talent. Knowing all
The Shores job is only part-time, but five council members would need to
Sweeney will also have a new full-time schedule individual interviews with
position as a member of Block and any finalists separately due to Flori-
Scarpa law firm on Miracle Mile in da’s Sunshine laws prohibiting more
Vero, where Chester Clem’s daughter than one council member from being
Mary Kate Clem is an associate. in the room at a time, Harpring nar-
rowed down the field to one person
Should the council vote next week who rose to the top of the applicants
to hire him, as expected, Sweeney is to see if that person was a good fit with
eager to get started and available to the council.
start work for the town as soon as Aug.
1, he said on Monday. Interviews were conducted through-
out June around members’ travel sched-
“I am extremely honored and ex- ules.
cited to have the opportunity to be the
next town attorney for Indian River Sweeney is Florida Bar board certi-
Shores. Having met all of the coun- fied in city, county and local govern-
cil members and being familiar with ment law and in construction law,
town manager Jim Harpring, I do not and has worked the past nine years as
believe I could ask for a better group of a full-time governmental attorney. A
educated and experienced individuals Florida State College of Law graduate,
to work with.” he has 17 years of experience.

Prior to serving Fort Pierce for two Before focusing on municipal law
and a half years, Sweeney was Palm full time, Sweeney worked for eight
Bay’s assistant city attorney. Shores years as a litigation associate at the
Mayor Brian Foley said on Monday Vero Beach firm of Clem Polackwich
that Sweeney’s solid, full-time munici- Vocelle and Berg. Now just Vocelle and
pal experience serving much larger Berg, that firm is representing Indian
cities demonstrated to him that he River Shores in a breach of contract
could handle whatever might arise in
the town’s legal matters. lawsuit with the City of Vero Beach. 

3 small commercial buildings on A1A
are being renovated by new owners

BY SAMANTHA ROHLFING BAITA Cumulatively, the three projects com-
Staff Writer prise a small but significant upgrade of
the island’s built environment, as build-
Three commercial buildings along a ings that had become shabby and/or
1.5-mile stretch of Highway A1A, from unused are brought back to life with
just south of Beachland Boulevard to notable upgrades.
Shore Drive near the northern Vero city
limit, are being renovated by new own- One block south of Beachland Bou-
ers for new purposes, including an ar- levard, the two-story building at 664
chitect’s office, a CPA’s office and, most Azalea, at the intersection of Azalea and
likely, a new island real estate office. A1A, is being renovated by architect

CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

10 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

3 commercial buildings says will be part of the company’s style commercial building at 5055 ant & Associates – with the leverage to
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 9 “compound.” Combined, the two lots Highway A1A, at the intersection of get the right subs on the project in a
are nearly half an acre. A1A and Tropic Drive. timely fashion.
Clem Schaub as an office for his archi-
tectural firm, Clem Bruns Schaub and The two properties were purchased Formerly the home of Rebecca Star A block north of Nuttall’s project,
Associates. by an investor group at auction in May Interior Design, later a real estate office, at 5075 Highway A1A at Shore Drive,
2019 for $832,000, according to county the 11,400-square-foot building, which is a 1,651-square-foot, single-story
Good things usually happen when property records and commercial real was built in 1990 on a .33-acre lot, was office/retail building that sat empty
an architect designs something for estate broker Kollin Kite who was in- empty and had become an eyesore for months after the previous ten-
him- or herself, and that appears to volved in the deal. by 2020, when CPA Scott Nuttall pur- ant, The Kitchen Scene, closed its
be the case with this building, where a chased it from Starr, paying $600,000. doors last year. (The Kitchen Scene
floating exterior staircase can be seen “The investors were planning on sign still stands at the corner of the
wrapping around and showcasing “an building some type residential, a small With a staff of 13 serving 1,200 cli- property.)
incredible old oak tree” near a near a apartment building, I think,” Kite says. ents, Nuttall had outgrown his current
small entry courtyard. “When that deal didn’t come to frui- office space in the Atrium on Cardinal Built in 1984, the building was ac-
tion, they sold the property to the ar- Drive and needed to expand. quired in January by Robenson Juste,
The interior, previously divided chitect, who had previously shown a broker associate with cloud-based
into four suites, has been complete- interest. I think he will end up with a “It’s an exciting time,” says Nuttall. eXp Realty, who bought the building
ly opened up, increasing the usable very nice office.” “The demolition was super success- and quarter-acre lot from Robert and
square footage to “almost 4,000 square ful. Now with the stucco on the second Patricia Stoddard for $500,000.
feet,” according to Schaub. “We’re us- Schaub, who purchased the proper- floor, and getting rid of that crazy red
ing the entire building for our offices.” ty in August 2020 for $1,150,000, said paint, the visuals are great. It was an The property has been given a com-
rehab was delayed by “some COVID- ugly interior; now it’s coming to life.” plete makeover “inside and out,” and
He says the style of the renovation is related issues – materials, people – but now sits, trim and tidy on a nicely land-
industrial – wide open, minimalist, all we’ve worked through that, and we When complete, renovations will scaped lot, awaiting what comes next.
white, with open trusses and clean lines. hope to be in by August. include installing new windows and
doors; replacing the roof; adding an Commercial real estate broker Billy
Built in 1985 and used for various “I’ve been in that building on Ocean elevator; installing cutting-edge tech- Moss, who was involved in the sale,
purposes over the years, including Drive, where Kemp’s Shoes is, for 25 nology; a complete landscape up- expects Robenson to establish a real
recently as a travel agency, the cool- years. So, this is big for us. We think it grade; and replacing the wrap-around estate office at the property, which
looking building, partly elevated above is a great location.” balcony. he describes as highly desirable. “It’s
slender concrete columns, comes with close to the beach. It’s got good vibes.”
a single-story companion building About a mile and half to the north, Nuttall says the project is still on
next door at 662 Azalea, which Schaub a $1 million renovation project is target to make the original Nov. 30 Juste said he will have more details
coming along on schedule on a long- completion date, the result, he says of about his plans for the property in Au-
neglected, two-story, Mediterranean- having the right contractor – Bill Bry-
gust. 

A1A speed limit will be restored to 45 mph, but not until the fall

BY RAY MCNULTY pacts,” adding that he should be able PHOTO BY BRENDA AHEARN First, Dempsey cited “FDOT speci-
to do so in the coming weeks. fications,” which she said prohibited
Staff Writer needed to redirect the flow of traffic. work being done from Dec. 24 through
Last week’s rains, in fact, prevented The removal of the barricades from Jan. 2 “to avoid impacting traffic flow
Island residents who haven’t seen work crews from embarking on “as- during the holidays.
any work being done along A1A – from phalt corrections” deemed necessary the construction zone ended the daily
just north of Vero Beach to the Wa- after the contractor conducted tests frustration felt by island residents who Then, in January, work was inter-
basso Causeway – are asking when the on the newly resurfaced roadway, he endured bumper-to-bumper backups rupted by what Dempsey described as
reduced-for-construction speed limit wrote, though some work was taking during the daytime hours, especially “asphalt plant issues” that delayed the
will be returned to 45 mph. place near the 7-Eleven when a Vero during the busy winter season. delivery of material needed to pave
Beach 32963 reporter drove by Sun- the roadway.
The latest projection? day night. Too often during the project, which
Late September. began in June 2020, motorists mired In early February, Dempsey said
“I’ve been getting a lot of those in- Canedo warned that “lane closures in A1A traffic saw no tangible prog- work had resumed two weeks ear-
quiries,” said Kathleen Dempsey, local will occur during the day and night ress being made, prompting flurries lier, but it was being done at night
spokesperson for the Florida Depart- throughout the project” to make the of phone calls to this newspaper, local – between 8 p.m. and 6 a.m., Sunday
ment of Transportation’s $6.7 million necessary fixes. government officials and FDOT. through Thursday – to minimize the
road-widening project, which began project’s impact on the island’s busy-
13 months ago and prompted the Weather permitting, he stated, crews Many island residents complained season traffic flow.
speed limit to be lowered to 35 mph. need to continue the installation of new in early April that they hadn’t seen any
“I can tell you the 45-mph speed traffic signage, thermo-plastic striping significant work done – for any ex- However, island residents who con-
limit will be restored when the project on the roadway and new 7-foot-wide tended period, anyway – since before tacted this newspaper said they saw
is completed, but we’re not done yet,” “green bike lanes” on both sides of A1A Christmas. little or no night work being done.
she added. “The entire corridor is still – work that began last month.
an active construction zone, and you’ll FDOT offered several explanations. The reason, perhaps, was because
still see lane closures.” Asked about the new signage, Cane- work had been halted by rain and cold
FDOT District Communications do wrote that FDOT is replacing pre-ex- weather, particularly the January and
Manager Billy Canedo wrote in an isting signs and adding “rapid flashing February nights when local tempera-
email to Vero Beach 32963 last week beacons” at the pedestrian beach-ac- tures dipped into the 40s and even 30s.
the project was “substantially com- cess crossings where A1A intersects
plete,” but that the agency doesn’t with Turtle Trail and Seagrape Trail. In late March, Dempsey said work
expect its work to be totally finished had been suspended for three weeks
until “towards the end of September.” The orange barricades that lined because the site was being surveyed
Canedo said he was unable to pro- long stretches of the 6.74-mile con- before crews began the next phase of
vide a specific completion date at this struction zone for nearly a year the pavement operation.
time “due to possible weather im- were removed in late April, when
the repaving of those sections of Now, repairs must be made to work
the island’s main thoroughfare was completed earlier, which will be sure
completed and they were no longer to bring more calls from frustrated

motorists. 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 11

NEWS

Brightline contractors step up work on
bridges and crossings for high-speed rail

PHOTO BY ROSS ROWLINSON

BY GEORGE ANDREASSI struction of the high-speed passenger
rail line.
Staff Writer
Brightline is spending $2.7 billion
Brightline contractors have moved to extend high-speed passenger train
more construction equipment and service from South Florida to Orlando,
materials into Indian River County in upgrading 129 miles of FEC tracks from
the aftermath of a peace accord that West Palm Beach to Cocoa and con-
ended a seven-year conflict between structing 35 miles of new tracks from
the county and the high-speed pas- Cocoa to Orlando International Airport.
senger rail company.
Brightline anticipates running 32
HSR Constructors placed stacks of trains per day through Indian River
railroad crossing foundation panels County at speeds of up to 110 mph
near most of the county’s 32 Florida when service between South Florida
East Coast Railway crossings, includ- and Orlando starts in 2023.
ing alongside the tracks behind down-
town’s historic Vero Beach Train Station. Work has been underway for more
than a year on the $33 million replace-
The contractors also deployed sev- ment of the 95-year-old St. Sebastian
eral bulldozers and front-end loaders River Railroad Bridge, which is due to
at the railroad crossings at Highland be completed by the end of 2022.
Drive and 1st Street in South Vero to
clear brush and grade the FEC right-of- Brightline is preparing to switch the
way for a second set of railroad tracks. tracks being used by FEC freight trains
from the historic bridge to the first
The uptick in activity came in the of two new 1,625-foot-long concrete
month since Brightline settled the bridges over the river, said spokes-
county government’s state lawsuit woman Katie Mitzner.
against the company by agreeing to
make $31 million in safety enhance- Meanwhile, HSR Constructors com-
ments at railroad crossings and along pleted work in early June on a second
the tracks. railroad bridge over South Canal, be-
tween the 1st Street and 4th Street rail-
Judge Katie Dearing, sitting in the road crossings. The $1 million project
state Circuit Court in Jacksonville, dis- took five months.
missed the lawsuit June 11 with preju-
dice based on the seven-page settle- HSR Constructors plans to start
ment agreement and four-page list of work later this year on new $1 million
improvements. railroad bridges over the Main Canal
and North Canal.
The agreement ended Indian River
County’s $4 million lobbying and le- The new bridges will support the sec-
gal campaign aimed at stopping con- ond set of tracks being added alongside

CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

12 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

Brightline steps up work ing service between Miami and West
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11 Palm Beach later this year.

the existing FEC tracks, which are bring Brightline operated trains on that
upgraded to handle high-speed pas- stretch of tracks from January 2018 un-
senger trains. FEC freight trains travel til March 2020, when it shut down in
40-to-60 mph. response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

HSR Constructors also is in the pro- Despite the recent activity along
cess of building a 573-foot-long bridge the tracks, Vero Beach and Indian
over Interstate 95 in Brevard County River County officials said Brightline
for the tracks between Cocoa and Or- still has not notified them about the
lando International Airport. schedule for closing railroad crossings
for construction.
The project has required periodic
lane and ramp closures on I-95 and the “We have not received any updates or
Beachline Expressway/State Road 528. a timeline regarding construction from
Brightline,” said county spokeswoman
Brightline is conducting signal test- Kathleen Keenan last Thursday.
ing along its tracks in West Palm Beach
through July on its Positive Train Con- Also up in the air is the location of a
trol system in anticipation of restart- promised train station somewhere on
the Treasure Coast, for which various

cities are competing. 

SOUTH ISLAND RESIDENTS ORGANIZE TO
GAIN CLOUT IN UTILITY DISCUSSIONS

BY LISA ZAHNER might look like should the unincorpo-
rated south barrier island remain on Ve-
Staff Writer ro’s water-sewer system. This week they
were on the Board of County Commis-
South Beach residents who live in sioners agenda to outline their goals.
the unincorporated county don’t have
a town council or mayor to represent Doug DeMuth, a chemical engineer
their interests in utility matters, but and Sandpointe resident, requested
they still want a seat at the table when time to speak to the county commis-
major decisions are contemplated. sion. DeMuth said his group represents
about 71 percent of south barrier island
A case in point is Indian River Coun- residents, which translates into 1,600
ty’s proposal to settle a utility dispute households paying water and/or sewer
with Vero Beach by signing a new fran- bills to the City of Vero Beach. Now in
chise agreement with the city to con- the data-gathering phase, the group
tinue providing water-sewer service to aims to bring back utility service op-
south island neighborhoods. tions to the residents, and to explain the
risks and rate impacts of each option.
For the past four years, while Vero
has served south island residents with DeMuth said his group was not
water and sewer without a franchise blindsided by the county’s proposal in
agreement because the county and city June to commit South Beach residents
couldn’t agree on the contract language, to county rates until 2027, then Vero
the residents have still been paying a rates with limited annual increases,
6 percent franchise fee. And they still and finally uncontrolled Vero rates
have utility rates and bills they can’t un- starting in 2032.
derstand.
“We talked to [county officials] ... about
While living in this utility limbo, a it a month or so ago and those things
loose coalition of residents who live were discussed, but we did not agree to
south of the Vero city limits recently anything,” DeMuth said of a meeting
gathered to research water-sewer utility with County Administrator Jason Brown,
issues as they relate specifically to the County Attorney Dylan Reingold and
history of legal agreements and own- Utilities DirectorVincent Burke.
ership of utility assets in The Moorings
and surrounding communities. “What we want is a voice in our future
on a number of things.” DeMuth said.
The goal is to know where they stand “We want long-term, transparent, sim-
and what their rights and options are. ple, comprehensive rates for services
The group includes people with back- provided. We want written instruments,
grounds in corporate finance, mu- documents and agreements that are
nicipal utilities, engineering and the clear and fulfilled.”
law, and they’ve built on 15 years of
groundwork laid by retired utility ac- DeMuth currently is trying to get
tivist Dr. Steve Faherty, who advises solid cost and rate projections from
the group behind the scenes. both Vero and the county, including
the costs of complying with the Clean
They’ve met with both county of- Waterways Act and costs of building
ficials and Vero Beach Mayor Robbie
Brackett to talk about what the future CONTINUED ON PAGE 14



14 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

South island utilities

17th Street bridge repairs only a temporary fixCONTINUEDFROMPAGE12

any new capacity at water and waste- BY LISA ZAHNER work could begin underneath. “It was This project is currently funded for
water treatment plants. Staff Writer initially a lighting repair project that construction in fiscal year 2024. How-
evolved into another type of repair. ever, if stimulus funding becomes avail-
DeMuth said he wants everything in Repairs to the 17th Street bridge able, the department may seek to ad-
writing so no parties can go back on ver- that have disrupted traffic for eight “Weather is always impacting these vance the project into an earlier fiscal
bal promises. “When personnel change, months and are set to continue until projects,” Canedo said. year.”
the agreements can’t change,” he said. at least November are just an interim
solution, with the 42-year-old bridge With that in mind, and more stormy “It will not be a full bridge replace-
While the matter of Vero’s claim to now set for a major overhaul in 2024, months on the way, is it realistic to ment,” Canedo said. “The department
a permanent service territory that in- according to the Florida Department think that repairs to the eastbound does a cost-benefit analysis of how
cludes the south island area is still in of Transportation. side of the bridge – slated to begin in much it costs to make temporary re-
dispute, the group is looking at what August – will take only three months. pairs to a bridge, and ultimately, how
it would take to get service from other Since early December, both east- much it costs to replace it.
providers – both public and private. bound and westbound traffic on and For now, traffic is still projected to
off the barrier island have been routed be back to normal by Thanksgiving if “When you reach a certain tipping
They also would like an up-to-date to the eastbound side of the bridge work is completed on time. point under a certain analysis, you de-
cost estimate on connecting to Indian while the westbound side of the bridge cide OK, the best deal for the taxpay-
River County Utilities. If South Beach is being repaired. That was slated to Canedo, headquartered in Fort Lau- ers is for us to replace that bridge and
ends up hitched to Vero for another 15 take three months but now is sched- derdale at the district office, promised use new construction, new techniques,
or 30 years, they want the county to uled to take three times that long. last week to track down some more new materials and meet new require-
stick up for their rights as customers. technical answers from engineers ments with new information. Then
“The repairs have gone slower than working on the project, but as of press we’ll build a new bridge – when money
“If the county continues to use ser- originally planned due to scope chang- time, no details had materialized. He becomes available.”
vice providers like the City of Vero es and cure times for the new concrete,” did point out that the slower-than-
Beach, we expect the county to support said FDOT District Four Communica- expected repair job is only “a mainte- The 17th Street bridge, which was
residents of our area in any challenges tions Manager Guillermo Canedo. nance temporary repair” under an as- completed in 1979 and named after
or disagreements,” DeMuth said. set maintenance contract. Alma Lee Loy by an act of the Florida
“They found more that needed to Legislature in 2012, was found to be
He and group member Laurie Bark- be done,” Canedo said, noting that “There is another construction proj- structurally deficient in May 2020 and
horn plan to ask county officials to the bridge also sustained damage ect in 2024. The department has hired in critical condition needing prompt
help them track down documents go- from Hurricane Irma, which added an engineering firm to prepare the repair in 2018, according to FDOT in-
ing back to the development of the tasks on top of the bridge before the plans for the full replacement of 10
south barrier island and the first util- spans located on the east end of this spection reports. 
ity pipes laid to service customers bridge,” Canedo said.

there. 

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PENT-UP PATRIOTISM
BURSTS FOURTH!

16 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

All across the county, pent-up patriotism bursts Fourth!

Craig Munshower. PHOTOS: BRENDA AHEARN Zac Wyckoff and Denise Piercy.

RED, WHITE AND BREW 5K Kathryn Gray, Chloe Gray and Bethany Bramble. Amanda and Ruben Bermudez.

Sara Wise and Rachel Williams.

BY MARY SCHENKEL and STEPHANIE LaBAFF Sebastian, reminding all that this sun had gone down, fireworks filled goon near Riverside Park and Veter-
Staff Writers country’s independence should not the sky, closing the special day in a ans Memorial Island Sanctuary.
be taken for granted. The ensuing Se- fitting and colorful way.
The Independence Day weekend bastian Fourth of July Freedom Fes- Among them were a group of
was packed with patriotic pride, with tival, hosted by the Sebastian Lions On Sunday, July 4, firework fans Moorings Yacht Club members and
residents eager to shake off those Club and Sebastian Masonic Lodge made their way to Riverside Park their guests, who arrived early for a
COVID blues and turn them into red, #232, had something for everyone. for Boom on the Lagoon, the annual raft-up to enjoy dinner and visit one
white and blue at events throughout Fourth of July celebration hosted by another, boat to boat. The group in-
the county. Families lined up early to get the the City of Vero Beach and made pos- cluded Sheila and George Marshall
best viewing spots for the annual sible in part by presenting sponsor aboard their 36-foot Sabre, “Blue
Activities kicked off Saturday parade along Indian River Drive and Mulligan’s Beach House. Magic,” Mike and Pat Bell aboard
morning, with participants gather- were rewarded with a stream of pa- their 57-foot McKinna, “Reel Late,”
ing “by the dawn’s early light” for triotic displays from businesses, Some families staked out choice Jay and Terri Mitchell on their 47-
a Red, White and Brew 5K to ben- community and civic groups, the Se- spots in the park, setting up tents foot Sea Ray, “Miss T,” and Craig and
efit United Against Poverty of In- bastian River Marching Sharks, poli- and grills to host intimate tailgate Trish Walker on their 28-foot Grady
dian River. Nearly 300 runners laced ticians, and representatives of local gatherings before crowds descended White, “Phoebe.”
up at the American Icon Brewery law enforcement and first respond- upon the park. The party started in
for the 5K, hosted by the Running ers. earnest, with folks relaxing on lawn As darkness approached, all eyes
Zone Foundation, and were treated chairs and blankets while listening turned to the sky to watch the spec-
to after-race refreshments and well- As the last float passed by, skydiv- to live music and watching as chil- tacular fireworks display. Synchro-
earned brews. ers dropped from the sky and attend- dren worked off pent-up energy. nized music from the local radio sta-
ees made their way to Riverview Park tion added to the sense of patriotism
Also Saturday, a full day of pa- for a festival filled with food, fun, Some of the best seats in the house welling amongst the onlookers, who
triotism began with a ceremony at entertainment, contests, and a host to watch the fireworks were aboard watched with awe as the celebratory
the Veterans Memorial Flagpole in of arts-and-crafts vendors. Once the the huge variety of maritime vessels day came to a rousing close. 
anchored along the Indian River La-

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 17

PEOPLE

Mitch Kuss, Chris See and Jake Hilton. Nicole Jewell, United Against Poverty Executive Director Matt Tanner, Alora, Autumn and their mother Solana Morris.
Allison Zukowski and Lindsey Sumpter.

Phillip Buchanan and his daughter Ophelia.

Natalie Byrne and Katie Profeta.

Mike and Trish Gabriel.
Jennifer and Marcus Rogers.

18 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

Margot, Amelia, Gracie and Jojo. PHOTOS: KAILA JONES Rebecca Palmer.

Chloe Vickers. Stan and Nancy Sparkman. Aiyana Long and Daniel Long.

PROPERTY INSURANCE REFORM IS HERE. SEBASTIAN FOURTH OF JULY FREEDOM FESTIVAL
Below are highlights of the revisions effective July 1,
2021 relating to property insurance claims in Florida. Winnie and Lenee. Sam Kouns.

Contact us to discuss additional questions on how this
might impact you or your business.

• Deadline to submit claims reduced to
two years from the date of loss, with an
additional year for supplemental claims.

• Prohibits any written or electronic
communication by a contractor encouraging
contact with a contractor or public adjuster
for the purpose of making an insurance
claim for roof damage.

• Bans offering of anything of value in
exchange for allowing someone to inspect a
roof, interpret an insurance policy, or file a
claim on an insured’s behalf.

• Requires contractors to provide a good faith
estimate of the itemized and detailed cost
of the services and materials required to
complete repairs related to an insurance
claim. The actual cost of repairs may differ
from this estimate.

Julie Lewis Hauf, Esq., a graduate of Boston College Law School, has been practicing
law for more than 20 years in the areas of civil, business, and insurance litigation. The
firm is based in Vero Beach, Florida, and maintains offices in Central Florida, South
Florida, and Southwest Florida, serving clients around the state.

700 Beachland Blvd., Vero Beach, FL 32963
www.lewishauf.com (772) 492-6591

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 19

PEOPLE

Tammy Bursick and Jim O’Connell. Andrew Underwood. PHOTOS: STEPHANIE LaBAFF & KAILA JONES Cathi and Edmund Nalzaro.

Vicki Soule and Dennis Bartholomew. Ruby and George Trusty with Ruby and Georgette. Gini Elliott, Elaine Jones and Andrea Barkett.

Ian Rudd and Austin Carter. Karolyn Conley with Adeline.

BOOM ON THE LAGOON Christina Carter and Braylee Chapman.

Grant Homa and Katy Dombrowski.

20 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

Paul and Audrey Johnson.

Barbara and George Bryant. Lori and Sean Donovan.

Patti Miller and Anna Brooks.

MOORINGS RAFT-UP Georgia and Earl Jacobsen.

Patti and Bob Miller.



22 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

Jeff and Helen Camp. PHOTOS: MARY SCHENKEL Rhonda McCrea, Trish Walker, Laura Hyland, Cathy Richey and Craig Walker. Pat and Mike Bell.

Sheila and George Marshall. Jay and Terrie Mitchell.

Jim and Ann Hill. Bonnie and Steve Smith.

MOORINGS RAFT-UP Janice and Mike Kreuser.

Terri and Chris Ryan.



24 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT COVER STORY

Rods and waders were already ters worse, the answer varies from one A ChargePoint electric never have considered a car such as
packed into the electric Jaguar I-Pace minute to the next, depending on ter- vehicle charging the I-Pace (it was a loaner), or any of
as it gorged a few more electrons from rain and speed. station at Plummer the dozens of Tesla rivals set to debut
the wall of my New Jersey garage. A Park in Los Angeles. in coming years.
quick glance at a map of northeastern Desperate battery-powered travel-
Pennsylvania revealed charging sta- ers can be easy to spot: They are often stinctively leaning forward in their For the future of electric vehicles in
tions clinging to the Delaware River sweaty (no air conditioning), driving seats. America, that’s a really big problem.
like so many spots on the brown trout I slowly and – when going uphill – in-
was hoping to catch. Failing to note the difference be- Before the pandemic struck, the auto
tween a level 2 charger and a harder- industry had plans to spend at least
A few days later, I pulled up to one to-find level 3 charger is often the $141 billion over the next few years to
of those chargers on the picturesque mistake of an electric vehicle rookie. retool supply chains in a historic shift
main street of Honesdale, only to re- Had I realized the distinction, I would from internal combustion to battery-
alize it was a level 2 unit – one step driven machines. The financial reason-
above a standard outlet. It would take ing was clear: Roughly one-third of U.S.
four hours before the car had enough drivers say they may go electric the next
juice to make the 100-mile trip home. time they buy a vehicle.

Eleven miles down the road, it was Dozens of new electric models have
the same story. And while that spot been planned, almost all of which will
had a superfast Tesla charger, it was have a 200-mile charging range. But
incompatible with the I-Pace. The while range anxiety will soon be ban-
nearest level 3 charger that would ished from the showroom, it remains
work was 58 miles away. So I gave up very much alive on the open road.
and settled in for a while.
Huge swaths of the U.S. are without
Electric car-range anxiety revolves charging stations, a reality that con-
around a brutal equation: Remain- sultants such as McKinsey say may be
ing miles of battery life (as estimated the largest barrier to mass EV adop-
by the car) minus miles to destination tion in America.
equals hope (or despair). Making mat-
On average, Americans drive only 37
miles a day, a distance easily covered

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 25

INSIGHT COVER STORY

by almost every EV on the market. Only An EVgo station in staring contest of sorts: Without char-
15% of the miles logged by the average Baker, California, is gers, rural drivers aren’t likely to go
U.S. car come during trips that are 100 one of the few charging electric. And without enough buyers,
miles or longer. stops between Los automakers aren’t likely to ramp up
Angeles and Las Vegas. production.
Buying a vehicle in the U.S., how-
ever, has long meant purchasing the A range of charging startups do “It is the classic chicken-and-egg
freedom to go anywhere you like. Nick promise thousands of new chargers, problem,” said Brian Collie, senior part-
Nigro, a former engineer and founder though timelines are hazy, and even ner at Boston Consulting Group. “And
of EV research group Atlas Public Pol- the most ambitious plans will still skip this is something that is not going to be
icy, said the limiting factor many see much of the country. solved in the next year or two. It’s going
when they look at an electric vehicle is to take a decade-plus to get what we re-
the risk of being stranded on the side Thus the U.S., the world’s No. 2 auto ally need.”
of the road, even if it would rarely if market, is stuck in a microeconomic
ever be an issue. In the Upper Midwest, the future of
driving comes to a halt in the parking
Charging speed is another problem: lot of Noodles and Co., in Moorhead,
Of the 64,000 vehicle-charging plugs Minnesota.
in the U.S., only about one in five can
juice a dry machine in less than an Hard by I-94, customers can plug
hour. in while picking up gluten-free Mac
& Cheese and cauliflower rigatoni. To
Most plugs are essentially for shop- the west, just across the Red River, is
pers or commuters, not long-distance North Dakota, but for EV drivers plan-
travelers. When filtered for level 3 char- ning a road trip it might as well be the
gers, small EV deserts become big ones: Rocky Mountains. The closest public,
All of North Dakota and most of Missis- fast-charging station in that direction
sippi, West Virginia and Wyoming are is 759 miles away, at a Harley-David-
just a few examples. Alabama, Mon- son dealership in Belgrade, Montana
tana, Nebraska and western Kansas are – and it closes at 6 p.m.
pretty parched for power, too.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 26

26 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 INSIGHT COVER STORY Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 25 plug, which equates to roughly half of
all licensed drivers. Ideally, each cus-
For charging networks, the calculus tomer has a few plugs to hit regularly
is unforgiving. Not only is a rural sta- – say, one at a grocery store, one at a
tion a bet on future demand, but an gym and a third near the local school.
expensive one at that. The hardware
for a level 2 charger costs $2,500 to in- The company prefers to position
stall. Infrastructure for a level 3 char- chargers in clusters around higher traf-
ger, however, can easily top $320,000, fic regions, as opposed to long strands
according to a recent study by the of plugs that would help shrink charg-
Rocky Mountain Institute, a nonprofit ing deserts but get less use. In some
focused on energy. parts of the country, EVgo said it can’t
build chargers fast enough.
Such a unit can pump up to four
times more electricity per minute The companies use rate is high
than a standard outlet because it’s because it has skipped over much
equipped with liquid-cooled wires of the country. “What we won’t do is
and a high-capacity conduit. The sur- build willy-nilly and then wait three
rounding grid often requires stronger years for demand to show up,” Julie
feeders, new meters and transformers Blunden, EVgo’s executive vice presi-
that cost up to $173,000 apiece. Dig- dent of business development, said.
ging trenches for cables and building Population density, the number of
a structure to protect the pumps adds nearby EV owners and traffic at exist-
to the price tag. ing EVgo stations dictate where new
chargers will go.
In other words, only the busiest
fast-charging stations operate in the ChargePoint, another big name in
black. Build one too far from a buzz- charging infrastructure, has about
ing city or interstate corridor, and you 715 fast-plug stations and thousands
might as well set your money on fire. of slower charging stations and is
“The math just doesn’t work,” Bloom- squarely focused on regions where EVs
berg analyst Kevin Tynan said. already live. Apartment buildings and
urban parking garages are low-hang-
As for consumers, charging rates ing fruit, according to CEO Pasquale
vary widely by region, based predomi- Romano. Lately, the company’s fastest
nantly on rates set by the state util- growing business has been company
ity regulator. On average, commercial parking lots whose electric output is
electricity in the U.S. trades at about often subsidized by the employer.
10 cents per kilowatt hour. At that rate,
it costs about $6.60 to fill up a Chevro- “Would I say that it’s perfect? No,”
let Bolt, roughly 2.5 cents per mile. Romano said of the current business
model for charging infrastructure. “Is
But it’s seldom that cheap because it close enough for where the market
EV stations typically charge by the is right now? Yeah.”
minute, rather than by the amount of
electricity used, and they often add Even EV owners in major cities need
service or membership fees. plan carefully. Traveling from Raleigh-
Durham, North Carolina, to the Outer
EVgo, a 10-year-old charging com- Banks, for example, is dicey; there are
pany based in Los Angeles, said it op- just two public, fast-charging outlets
erates 815 fast-charging stations in the on the entire strip of barrier islands.
U.S. At least 115 million Americans live
within a 15-minute drive of an EVgo

The Tesla Tejon Ranch Supercharger
station in Lebec, California.

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 27

INSIGHT COVER STORY

From Austin, Texas, the Hill Country charging landscape. It’s a scrappy Shrewdly, Tesla made its charging but only one fast-charging plug suit-
to the Northwest is ill advised. And a young company you may have heard club exclusive. The company’s fast out- able for a Jaguar I-Pace.
ski trip from Albuquerque, New Mexi- of: Tesla. lets are proprietary and can’t be used
co, to Taos is still a nail-biter. by another brand’s vehicles (adapters But small clusters of plugs are pop-
The long-held narrative of main- are, however, available such that Tes- ping up all over the country. In the
Automakers, however, are largely stream auto executives (“We would las can use other charging systems). In past two years, the city of Healdsburg,
staying on the sidelines, waiting for make more electric vehicles if people the U.S., there are slightly more Tesla California, 70 miles north of San Fran-
EVgo, ChargePoint and others to fill actually wanted them”) has been flat- charging outlets than there are on all cisco, installed 12 level 2 chargers that
the gaps. General Motors has said tened under a parade of Teslas, from other fast-charging networks com- are free to use after business hours.
it’s focused on a “zero-emission” fu- the Model S and Model X to the popu- bined.
ture, yet it’s neither building charg- lar Model 3. The automaker decided “At 5 o’clock, it’s like EV sharks in the
ing stations nor buying any. Rather, early on to build its own charger net- Because Tesla CEO Elon Musk is parking lot,” said Felicia Smith, the city’s
it’s teamed up with Bechtel Group, a work, realizing there would be little more interested in selling vehicles utility conservation analyst. “They’re
Virginia-based engineering company, financial incentive for the private sec- than electricity at charging stations, swarming, trying to get a spot.”
to pitch outside investors to bankroll tor to take a capital-intensive risk on a his plugs are scattered more widely
thousands of new chargers. new market – one essentially created around the country. For example, Wy- At some point in the next 10 years,
by a single company. oming has 10 Tesla charging stations convenience stores and infrastructure
Ford, meanwhile, has cobbled to- investment funds will likely rush into
gether a network of sorts – dubbed the charging space. 
FordPass – that will help its EV buyers
find and use plugs operated by EVgo,
Chargepoint and others. The network
will be “the Pokemon Go of charging,”
said Ted Cannis, Ford’s head of elec-
trification. “‘Look, they’re all around
you; here’s how you find them.’”

Ironically, it took a pollution scandal
to get Big Auto into the charging game.
Volkswagen, as part of its “Dieselgate”
settlement, is spending $2 billion to
install new chargers across the U.S. via
a company dubbed Electrify America.

At the moment, 428 of those sites
are on line, and the network will ex-
pand to 800 by 2022. Its “convenience-
store” model is focused on building
out regional networks of chargers, ide-
ally at retail sites, said Brendan Jones,
the company’s chief operating officer
until he left in March.

An additional $2.7 billion is being
funneled by VW to individual states,
up to 15% of which can be used to
build charging infrastructure. Slowly,
that money is trickling into new char-
gers. Maine, for example, intends to
use $3 million to subsidize up to 80%
of the cost of new fast-charging sta-
tions along a number of predeter-
mined travel corridors.

While charging tendrils creep, the
small convoy of new, battery-powered
vehicles has been struggling to gain
traction.

From its debut in October 2018
through the end of last year, Jaguar has
sold fewer than 3,000 I-Pace SUVs in
the U.S., the machine that I sputtered
around the Delaware River; (Tesla has
been selling more of its Model 3 ma-
chines of late). Audi’s E-Tron has been
slightly more successful since it hit the
road in spring 2019, but it has yet to
sell more than 2,000 in a quarter.

Meanwhile, last year saw huge de-
clines in demand for older, more estab-
lished EVs, including BMW’s i3 (-21%),
the Chevrolet Bolt (-9%) and Nissan’s
Leaf (-16%). Given the high cost of mas-
sive batteries, profit margins are still far
fatter on gas-burning machines.

There is, of course, a helpful proxy
for figuring out what EV demand
might look like in a more robust

28 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT OPINION

The famous Olympic motto, translated from Latin, Those who do make it to Tokyo will compete with- athletes clad in designer leisure wear. Small countries
is “Faster, Higher, Stronger.” For the Tokyo Games, out the psychological lift from the stands. Will that like Bhutan or Kiribati or Comoros, who may not
set to kick off at the July 23 Opening Ceremonies, we make a difference in the results? Some athletes de- have sent enough competitors to fill a minivan, get to
need to add a fourth exhortation: quieter. monstrably play to – and draw energy from – the parade nonetheless, waving their national flags, and
crowds. Others are more inner-directed and seem to to be welcomed and embraced by the lusty cheers of
Much quieter. In fact, organizers announced last be able to tune everything out. a standing-room-only crowd.
week that all spectators will be barred from events
held in and around the Japanese capital. That deci- Those of us who watch the Olympics from afar will Japan’s slowness to vaccinate its people against
sion followed Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide lose something important as well. COVID-19 is the cause of this sudden silence. Only
Suga’s announcement putting Tokyo under a state about 15 percent of the Japanese population is fully
of emergency because of rising covid-19 infections The Olympic Games are one of two quadrennial vaccinated, and that is following a crash all-out ef-
driven by the dangerous delta variant. sporting mega-events – soccer’s World Cup tourna- fort to get shots into arms in recent weeks.
ment is the other – that turn clichés like the “thrill of
It’s the right call, but it’s still a stark reminder of all victory” and “the agony of defeat” into real celebra- The nation did well in keeping coronavirus num-
we’ve lost and have yet to lose in this ongoing pan- tions of our common humanity. bers down with mask-wearing and other prophylac-
demic. tic measures – Japan has seen only around 800,000
We can all share in the heroic triumph of some ob- cases and fewer than 15,000 deaths. But the low vac-
Think of the mighty roars that have always ac- scure competitor from a faraway place we’ve barely cination rate leaves the country especially vulner-
companied iconic Olympic moments. even heard of. We can all feel the pain when some able to the more-transmissible delta variant.
plucky underdog falls just short.
A wave of sound followed Usain Bolt down the The Japanese public is aware of the risks: Last
track as he separated himself from the field and set Even the Olympic Opening Ceremonies in all their month, a Fuji Television poll showed that 30.5 per-
a world record in the 100-meter dash in Beijing in kitsch are inspiring because of one perennial rite: The cent of respondents believed the Games should be
2008. If anything, the crowds were even louder when parade of athletes into the stadium. Every nation has scrapped, while another 35.3 percent said the com-
he did it again in London four years later. its moment in the spotlight, not just the behemoths petition should be held, but without spectators.
like the United States and China, with hundreds of
Though spectators are traditionally relatively qui- It will be weird.
et during gymnastics routines to avoid distracting The National Basketball Association proved that it
the competitors, it was thrilling to hear fans explode is indeed possible to have reasonably satisfying com-
with joy and relief as Simone Biles nailed the ele- petition without fans in the stands. But something is
ments that brought her four gold medals in Rio de clearly missing. Look at this year’s exciting NBA play-
Janeiro and established her as perhaps the greatest offs, with full arenas full of screaming fans, versus last
gymnast of all time. year’s spectatorless playoffs. There’s no comparison.
Millions of us, however, will be watching the Olym-
Michael Phelps may not have been able to hear pics anyway. We will see thrilling photo-finishes and
the spectators cheering him on as he knifed through world records smashed. And many will be ready to
the water on his way to winning an incredible 28 clap when the little team from Kiribati walks into the
medals in cities around the world, but the rest of us stadium waving their flags.
could. All the while, though, we will be reminded – by
thousands upon thousands of empty seats – that the
Imagine those moments taking place in silence. COVID-19 crisis is not done. Not by a long shot. 
The elite Olympic athletes have already endured A version of this column by Eugene Robinson first
a punishing ordeal. When the COVID-19 pandemic appeared in The Washington Post. It does not necessar-
postponed the 2020 Games, they had to repeat gru- ily reflect the views of Vero Beach 32963.
eling and precisely-timed training cycles, taking into
account new injuries, new competitors and other
life events.

During the coronavirus crisis, our Pelican Plaza office is closed to visitors. We appreciate your understanding.

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 29

INSIGHT OPINION

Why is Eleanor Johnson still waiting cancel the reservation 90 days or more ANSWER: re-accommodated or adequately com-
to get her money back on her CroisiEu- before my departure date, they would pensated."
rope river cruise? She canceled the trip refund the deposit less a $100 admin- A year is way too long to wait for a re-
more than a year ago. Isn't that enough istrative fee per person. fund. CroisiEurope promised it would Can you make a refund move fast-
time? return the money within five weeks. er? Sometimes. Disputing your credit
I notified CroisiEurope via email on They're really testing your patience. card charges under the Fair Credit Bill-
QUESTION: April 6, 2020, that we wanted to can- ing Act might help. You have to notify
cel our reservation. They responded At the same time, the delay is under- your bank so that it reaches the credi-
Last year, I made a $1,641 deposit for that our money would indeed be re- standable. To call 2020 the worst year tor within 60 days after the first bill. For
myself and a friend on a CroisiEurope funded (less the fee) back to my credit ever for the travel industry might even a transaction like this one, where you
river cruise through Portugal and Spain card. They further stated that “refunds be an understatement. It was a disas- purchase a river cruise months in ad-
for the summer. The deposit represent- are delayed and are taking four to five ter! Some companies barely survived vance, it's a long shot. Some banks will
ed 25 percent of the cost of the tour. weeks." the pandemic, and too many went un- accept the dispute, but most won't.
der. The cruise industry was especially
CroisiEurope’s terms stated that if I I never received the refund. I have con- hard hit, as it ground to a halt. Travelers in a situation like yours
tacted them several times in the interim might have gotten a better deal by
to inquire about the refund. Each time And that's exactly what happened. waiting for the cruise line to cancel
they respond that refunds are delayed. "As I am sure you understand, we’ve the sailing. Typically, cruise lines offer
faced an extremely difficult year," Mi- either a full refund or (at least during
CroisiEurope is not disputing that chael DaCosta, the general manager the pandemic) a 125 percent cruise
they owe me the money. It has been for North America at CroisiEurope credit. But you also risk having the
more than a year since I canceled the River Cruises, explained. "Policies have cruise actually sail, which might have
booking. I would like help in getting been put in place that all guests affect- been dangerous.
this refund. ed by the coronavirus pandemic can be
I asked CroisiEurope River Cruises
to review your case. It did and issued
a prompt refund for the total amount,
minus the administrative fee. 

Get help with any consumer prob-
lem by contacting Christopher Elliott at
http://www.elliott.org/help

30 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT BOOKS

One late December in the doesn’t seem scripted. The conversational style is the historian Simon Sebag Montefiore.
1950s, Sen. John F. Kennedy received a Christmas not new – its roots run back to the fireside chats of The classics, Montefiore contends, have not lost
present from his speechwriter, Ted Sorensen: a Franklin Roosevelt – but in the past few decades it
thick, clothbound volume titled “A Treasury of the has become the default. It fulfills our yearning for their power to inspire, to instruct, to challenge the
World’s Great Speeches.” It was not an immodest “authenticity”: Colloquial speech sounds direct conscience. But today, given the global reach of
gift. Both men imagined that someday, their work and unpremeditated. It also happens to suit a time technology, “oratory is flourishing in a way that is
together might merit inclusion in an anthology like when speeches are delivered to screens of little more visceral and popular than it ever was.”
that, alongside Cicero, Lincoln and Disraeli. Ken- people-squares rather than crowded ballrooms.
nedy “devoured” the book, Sorensen recalled years Grandiloquence plays poorly on a laptop. But Montefiore’s focus is on noting – and warn-
later, “often citing passages to me” for use in his own ing – that “words have consequences.” Those con-
speeches. Our sense of what constitutes a great speech is, sequences, as this collection shows, have been mea-
as ever, evolving. So is our sense of who might de- sured both in human progress and in bloodshed.
No one can argue with the results. (Indeed, later liver one. The compendium that Sorensen gave “Our age of populism, racism, anti-Semitism and
editions contained two speeches by JFK.) Why, then, Kennedy contains about 150 speeches. These in- conspiracism,” Montefiore writes, makes us acutely
is it so hard to picture a present-day politician dog- clude three by the 18th-century French statesman aware that “the violence of language … leads in-
earing the pages of a speech anthology and study- Comte de Mirabeau, but only two by women (Queen exorably toward the practice of violence.” While the
ing, as Kennedy did, the cadences of Churchill? Even Elizabeth I and Elizabeth Cady Stanton) and two by balance sheet here favors the peacemakers – the
the word “oratory,” from our postmillennial point of Black speakers (Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Gandhis, Kings and Mandelas – the book includes,
view, seems outdated, the rhetorical equivalent of Washington). “Lend Me Your Ears,” edited by Wil- as it must, despots and demagogues. If we ever did
knee breeches and frock coats. The surest way to get liam Safire, remains the gold standard after nearly before, we can no longer read the maledictions of
yanked off the stage – any stage – is to clear one’s 30 years in print, but its gender imbalance is almost Himmler or of Robespierre (“Terror is nothing oth-
throat and begin to orate. as glaring as that in the “Treasury.” It is hardly alone er than justice”) with a sense of safe remove; the
in this regard, as an analysis by the speechwriter narcissistic pathos of Eva Perón (“You will pick up
Highly polished, heavily rehearsed remarks still Dana Rubin reveals. The canon of great speeches is my name and will carry it to victory as a banner”)
have an audience, as the popularity of Ted talks a stag party. and Nero in his final moments (“What an artist the
makes clear. But most modern speeches reflect world is losing in me! … So this is loyalty?”) have an
what Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the University of Clearly, the anthology of speeches, as an institution, all-too-familiar and ominous ring. Evil, as Monte-
Pennsylvania has called the “conversational style”: is ripe for a reboot. If it is to remain – in that cruelest fiore notes, often arrives in the guise of absurdity,
not ineloquent, necessarily, but informal, plain- of adjectives – relevant, it has to make room for new but we cannot, today, be quick to laugh.
spoken. The trick, the sleight of hand, is a script that voices and for “talk” that reads, in many cases, like a
transcript. And it must do these things while estab- As anthologies go, this one is fairly compact: Mon-
lishing, for readers who might assume otherwise, that tefiore intends his book to be read, not consigned to
we still have something to draw from the traditional the reference shelf. Yet he seems a bit worried about
wellsprings of rhetoric: the Greeks, British prime min- losing his audience. A writer of fiction and popu-
isters, American presidents. The late Brian MacArthur, lar histories, Montefiore is a vivid storyteller, but
a British journalist, worked assiduously for years to his commentary on speeches often has a rushed,
update Penguin’s volumes of speeches; now we also perfunctory feel. For instance, Winston Churchill’s
have “Voices of History,” a compelling collection by vow to “fight on the beaches” gets only a paragraph
of introduction. The texts, one might argue, speak
for themselves, but “Voices of History” would have
greater value if it shed more light on how they were
drafted, on the tools and techniques that achieve
their effects, on their echoes of great speeches of
the past.

Still, this collection contains plenty of fodder for
future Sorensens – maybe even a JFK. There are
words to echo and recall, and words better thrown
on the ash heap of history. Either way: “Words mat-
ter,” as Montefiore concludes. “Respect them.” The
voices in this book make a strong case for that. 

VOICES OF HISTORY

SPEECHES THAT CHANGED THE WORLD

BY SIMON SEBAG MONTEFIORE | VINTAGE. 298 PP. 16.95
REVIEW BY JEFF SHESOL, THE WASHINGTON POST

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 31

INSIGHT BRIDGE

MIRROR DISTRIBUTION CAUSES TROUBLE WEST NORTH EAST
A 10 8 6 Q732 9
By Phillip Alder - Bridge Columnist 92 J854 10 6 3
K 10 7 A6 Q98542
There is a German proverb that goes: “If you have a good friend, you don’t need a Q J 10 4 752 983
mirror.”
SOUTH
If you have a good bridge partner, you don’t need a mirror, because from his bids KJ54
and plays, you will learn what he has in his hand — assuming you are watching and AKQ7
interpreting, of course. J3
AK6
When you are the declarer, though, occasionally it would help to have a mirror to see
the defenders’ cards. In this deal, how should South play in four hearts after West leads Dealer: South; Vulnerable: Both
the club queen?
The Bidding:
The auction was a simple Stayman sequence.
SOUTH WEST NORTH EAST OPENING
When the dummy appeared, declarer noted the mirror distribution, both hands being 2 NT Pass 3 Clubs Pass
4=4=2=3. This usually causes problems because there are no ruffs or discards. 3 Hearts Pass 4 Hearts All Pass LEAD:
But here things looked okay. South anticipated taking three spades, four hearts, one Q Clubs
diamond and two clubs. The only worry was a bad split in one of the majors. (If both
were 4-1 or worse, the contract was probably hopeless.)

Declarer took the first trick with his club ace and drew trumps ending on the board.
Then he played a spade to the nine, king and ace. Back came the club 10 to South’s
king.

Now there was a temptation to play another spade. Yes, that would have been fine if
declarer had finessed dummy’s seven, but that would have risked going down with
spades 3-2. Instead, South carefully played the ace and another diamond. West won
that trick and cashed his club 10. Now, though, to avoid conceding a ruff-and-sluff,
West led his spade six. Declarer covered with dummy’s seven to win the trick and make
his contract.

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3920 US Hwy 1, Vero Beach FL 32960

32 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT GAMES

SOLUTIONS TO PREVIOUS ISSUE (JULY 8) ON PAGE 58

ACROSS DOWN
1 Verrucas (5) 1 Enfolding (8)
5 Two score (5) 2 Acts in response (6)
8 Habitual (5) 3 Parasol (8)
9 Once more (5) 4 Kit; clothes (6)
10 Protect (9) 5 Whip; sell (4)
11 Favourite (3) 6 Stay (6)
12 Clever-clogs! (11) 7 Garden (American) (4)
15 Street urchin (11) 13 Rips more (anag.) (8)
19 Brazilian city (3) 14 Subversive wrecker(8)
20 Animal fibre (9) 16 Crowd (6)
22 Hold forth; speak(5) 17 Go hungry (6)
23 Roof overhang (5) 18 Stray; wandering (6)
24 Big cat (5) 20 Clue (4)
25 Go in (5) 21 Always (4)

The Telegraph

How to do Sudoku:

Fill in the grid so the
numbers one through
nine appear just once
in every column, row
and three-by-three
square.

The Telegraph

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 33

INSIGHT GAMES

ACROSS 94 Job you practice 44 It gets wetter the more it The Washington Post
1 Forumwear 97 Forward, actress Volz; dries
5 Chooses PUNFEST By Merl Reagle
9 Don Jose’s gypsy backward, actress Eve 46 Wartime prez
15 Start of a studio motto 99 Claws 47 Defame THE Art & Science
18 Bohr bit? 100 Shakespeare’s favorite 49 Friday party, briefly
19 1492 vessel 50 Moisten anew of Cosmetic Surgery
20 Truman’s Dean entree? 52 Old cars
22 San Francisco’s 106 Was broached 53 Got by
107 Mauna ___ 54 Dine
___ Valley 108 It means “equal” 56 Seating closest to the stage
23 Jimmy Carter’s 109 L.A. film org. that bestows 58 WWII spy grp.
61 Baton races
bridgework? Life Achievement Awards 63 Takes home,
26 Motivation for Manolete 110 L&M followers
27 Bard’s preposition 111 The Tigers’ sch. in a way
28 A piece of one’s mind, 112 Walter’s influence on 64 Soap plant
65 “Better him ___”
perhaps Broadway careers? 67 Type of punch
29 Hair shade? 117 Pot top 68 Singer Gaye or Hendryx
30 The hi sign? 118 Spiced hot beverage 69 “Let’s ___ Twist”
31 Shop-till-you-drop places 119 Mrs. Munster 71 Inclination
33 With 51 Across, a mother’s 120 Verne’s center-of-the-earth 73 Herb once used in medicine
75 Unfettered by scruples
hope that her daughter visitor, ___ Saknussemm 78 Guy in gray
marries a doctor? 121 “I’m listening ...” 79 Unemotionally
37 A her in the herd 122 Words of rejection 81 Serious laziness
38 Tatum O’Neal’s character in 123 Rude response 82 Section of Brooklyn
Paper Moon, ___ Pray 124 DJIA arena 83 Snaky sound
39 Noted Herbert 84 Wind dir.
40 “Great writers are DOWN 85 Ger. or Sp., e.g.
born, ___” 1 Domesticates 87 Check the addition
41 Tangled abodes 2 City in Japan 88 Artworks by Claude
43 25,000 ft., e.g. 3 Luckless one 90 Detroit nightmares
45 Eisenhower and others 4 “What ___ thinking?” 93 Alicante article
48 Something to 5 Monotheism tenet 95 Girlfriends, in Latin
ruminate on 6 Genus of thorny trees 96 Genie service
49 Fillmore’s predecessor 98 Dallas’s Patrick and
51 See 33 Across (not a disparaging remark)
54 Motor oil brand 7 It might have a short fuse Newhart’s Julia
55 More like a tyro 8 Hindu holy man 100 Paddled
57 Underhanded one 9 You ___ Home Again 101 Voodoo land
58 Sure thing, to Seurat 10 Deed 102 Carols
59 Some small fry 11 Charging beast 103 Contest (form)
60 Passed, as a hard, slow day 12 Proton kin 104 Roger Rabbit’s friends
62 Stuck 13 Foundation stone abbr. 105 Bender
66 Watcher of the skies: abbr. 14 Common conjunction 107 Popular connecting blocks
67 Truffaut heist film? 15 Perfect date for a perfume 113 Mr. Solo
70 1960s madame 114 Vital: abbr.
72 Of layers salesman? 115 ___ Fail (coronation stone)
74 ___ bigger and better things 16 Furled 116 Give a pink slip to: slang
75 Food thickener 17 Hits the ceiling
76 Chicago player 21 ’69 World Series champs SPECIALTIES INCLUDE:
77 “Admirer” adjective 24 Eats • Minimal Incision Lift for the
80 Attacking, a la cinema 25 Certain nobleman
ghosts 32 Goal Face, Body, Neck & Brow
82 Evita character 34 Roof features • Breast Augmentations
83 Oslo lothario’s greeting? 35 Part of SASE
86 Huge, to a Huguenot 36 Tube prizes & Reductions
87 2004 Jamie Foxx film 37 Actor Dennis who played • Post Cancer Reconstructions
88 ___ a mile • Chemical Peels • Botox
89 Grinning extreme, perhaps Inspector Lestrade in the • Laser Surgery • Tummy Tucks
91 Perry’s creator 1940s Sherlock Holmes • Obagi Products • Liposculpture
92 Put in an envelope, e.g. films • Skin Cancer Treatments
40 Penpoint
41 ___ toast (roasty)
42 Weather forecast for
pirates?

The Telegraph Proudly caring for patients over 28 years.

3790 7th Terrace, Suite 101, Vero Beach, Florida

772.562.5859

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Ralph M. Rosato
MD, FACS





36 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT BACK PAGE

In wake of parents’ divorce, a boyfriend sours on marriage

BY CAROLYN HAX parents’ marriage, and now, traumatized, he
Washington Post has to start over. Of course he’s a skeptic. (One
who might benefit from counseling, if he’s re-
Dear Carolyn: My boyfriend’s ceptive to that.) That’s why your strategy of
offering him blind faith in you to replace his
parents split up a few years ago blind faith in his parents won’t help, and may,
in fact, put distance between you. “Forever”
after 23 years of marriage and it love is just not a promise either of you can
make; we don’t have that kind of control over
left him devastated. His moth- our feelings. What if 10 years of his once-mild-
ly-but-now-thoroughly-crazy-making habits
er just up and left and never douse every last ember for good?

looked back. He was very angry A more realistic, therefore more effective
alternative – not to mention healthier, I think
with her. One year after the split she passed away – is to promise things you actually can deliv-
er. Say, to treat him with respect. To listen to
from cancer without any warning. He never had him, to be honest, to share feelings, to weigh
his needs as the equal to your own, to admit
an opportunity to reconcile with her and still has mistakes fully, freely and quickly. To tend the
flames.
a lot of guilt.
These things are in your control, so these are
After their divorce he adopted the attitude of promises you can keep no matter how much
you or your feelings or your circumstances
“nothing lasts forever.” While he professes his change – so these are assertions he can believe.
When, and if, he’s ready. To that end – counterin-
undying love for me often, he does not seem too tuitive as it sounds, he might be more receptive to
a downer than a pep rally. “You’re right, marriage
keen on the idea of marriage. After I felt comfort- won’t make me love you more” isn’t what he be-
lieves, it’s what he knows – so by having the cour-
able enough to tell him he was the one I wanted age to accept and admit this, you’d at least make a
credible case for trust. 
to marry, he countered with, “Why is marriage so

important? Is a piece of paper going to make you

love me more?”

To hear him degrade my confession was very

hurtful. How can I get him to realize that not all

relationships are like his parents’? I am ready to know it’s going to happen until it actually does,
even when you’ve dutifully put in the effort. Mar-
love him forever; how can I get him to see that? riage may help, but it hardly has final say.

– Hopeful in California Even if I did see things your way, though, I
would still say this is the right thing to do for a
Hopeful in California: You are ready to love him partner: Stop trying to “get him to see” how you
forever; that doesn’t mean you will. You may call feel, and start seeing how he feels instead.
that pessimism, but I call it useful. Some relation-
ships do go the distance. It’s just that you don’t He built his understanding of forever on his

UPCOMING RIVERSIDE SEASON PROMISES
TO BE ‘SOMETHING SPECIAL’

38 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

ARTS & THEATRE

‘SOMETHING SPECIAL’UPCOMING RIVERSIDE SEASON PROMISES TO BE
BY PAM HARBAUGH | CORRESPONDENT

Although Riverside Theatre won’t be cent. There’s always something spe- Joe Truesdale. Amy Bowman.
starting this coming season’s produc- cial going on.”
tions until January, seven months from PHOTOS BY KAILA JONES Kondas says that the next season
now, if you wish to get a seat in the au- She credits the sense of teamwork is looking “fantastic.” Here’s a little
dience for what promises to be another among Riverside’s staff for the theater’s behind the theater are four 53-foot sneak peek of what you can expect to
spectacular year, you might want to beautiful productions. And, while many trailers that currently store the com- see on Riverside Theatre’s Stark and
purchase your tickets well in advance. theaters around the world needed to let plete sets for four shows. Two more Waxlax stages beginning in January.
Season ticket renewals were sent out ear- staff go or furlough them during the pan- trailers will be added to store the final
lier this year, and since individual tick- demic closures, Riverside kept its staff show sets that the crew will be build- The Stark Stage:
ets went on sale July 7, the box office has working. ing. Staffers take a peek at the scenery “Carousel” by Rodgers & Hammer-
been inundated with requests. now and then to make sure it all re- stein, Jan. 4-23, 2022
Doing so not only helped employees, it mains in good condition. This classical musical will be directed
“We’re thrilled,” says Oscar Sales, Riv- also enabled the theater to have the staff and designed by Allen D. Cornell, Riv-
erside’s marketing director. “But we’re work on shows far ahead of time. It gave “We are about a year in advance,” says erside’s producing artistic director and
not surprised. When we opened the the backstage crews a unique opportu- Dan Kondas, the theater’s production CEO. “The plan is to be as impressive
Comedy Zone at the end of May last year, nity to build the scenery, erect it on stage manager. “We hope in the future our as Riverside can be,” Kondas says. “Ro-
we saw there were a lot of people who and make necessary final touches in ad- scenery will stay a year ahead.” mantic elegance is a major focus for Al-
wanted to come enjoy comedy and mu- vance. len; to come back and warm everybody’s
sic again. We had a lot of people asking As the production manager, Kondas heart.”
when the theater was opening again.” Already, the theater design and sits in on early design and planning ses-
construction crew is nearly finished sions. And, while he doesn’t engage in “A Comedy of Tenors” by Ken Ludwig,
When they do show up, Riverside dev- building all the scenery for the sea- artistic decision-making, he does take Feb. 1-20, 2022
otees will see a theater entirely ready to son’s main-stage productions. Sitting charge of the logistics, making sure that
welcome audiences back. Indeed, the or- Riverside’s reputation for high-quality
ganization has been focused on making productions is maintained, while also
this season’s set designs among the most staying within the budget.
beautiful ones yet.

That says a lot for a professional the-
ater rightfully known for creating exqui-
site theatrical productions that frequent-
ly cost $1.5 million per show.

They knock it out of the park every
time, says Carol Buhl, one of River-
side’s generous and enthusiastic Patron
Producers, whose annual donations of
$10,000 or more enable Riverside to pro-
duce such excellent big-budget Broad-
way shows.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,”
Buhl says. “The scenery is magnifi-

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 39

ARTS & THEATRE

This is a madcap farce set in 1930’s ver” by Harold Thou, May 10-29, 2022 Stage individual tickets are $65; there are 231-6990 or online at www.RiversideThe-
Paris, where one elegant hotel suite is Riverside reverses course and ends its no subscription tickets available, but Stark atre.com. The box office will be closed to
the background for four tenors, two Stage season ticket holders can get Wax- walk-up transactions until further notice.
wives and three girlfriends. It is de- season with a musical revue. Here, that lax Stage tickets for $52. All tickets can be Riverside Theatre is at 3250 Riverside Park
signed by Michael Schweikardt (“Evi- will be the beautiful music of John Den- purchased by calling the Box Office at 772- Dr., Vero Beach. 
ver, who had more than 25 chart-topping

ta”). “This is going to be a beautiful hits, including “Rocky Mountain High”
show,” Kondas says. “Hand-painted and “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”
wallpaper, a curving staircase, beau- Cornell creates the scenic design here.
tiful chandeliers; it’s very rich.”
The Waxlax Stage:
“On Your Feet!” by Emilio & Gloria Es- “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now
tefan, March 8-27, 2022 Change” by Joe DiPietro and Jimmy
Roberts, Jan. 18 to Feb. 6, 2022
Kondas describes this story about This fun show is one of Off-Broadway’s
the life of Gloria Estefan as being longest-running musicals. Now updated,
filled with Latin beats and a lot of en- it takes audiences on a humorous, musi-
ergy. The show is a co-production with cal and touching ride into the lives of
Philadelphia’s venerable Walnut Street lovers, husbands, wives, in-laws and
Theatre and is designed by Regina just about anyone who has ever been in
Garcia. “There will be a fountain,” he a romantic relationship. The look here,
says. “And there will be stage magic, designed by Emily Luongo, will be more
but it’s not very magical if everybody high-concept, Kondas says, with generic
knows what it is.” set pieces.

“Billy Elliot: The Musical” by Elton “Bakersfield Mist” by Stephen Sachs,
John and Lee Hall, April 12 to May 1, March 22 to April 10, 2022
2022
A smart comedy set in a Bakersfield
This is the award-winning inspiration- trailer park, where a world-class art ex-
al musical of a young boy whose passion pert visits an unemployed bartender
for dancing pits him against the culture who believes she has a Jackson Pollock
of his northern England mining town masterpiece. Cornell designs this show,
home. Here, Schweikardt uses minimal- which originally had been slotted for the
ist scenic elements to bring a large cast previous season. “This is a realistic set-
of dancers and the audience into many ting,” Kondas said. “There’s a lot of stuff
spaces “You’re going to have 30 people we scavenged from trailers, like (trailer)
dancing at one point. They take up a lot windows and shag carpets. It’s a time
of space, so you can’t have a lot of scenery capsule.”
muddying the waters.”
Stark Stage individual tickets start at
“Almost Heaven: Songs of John Den- $45; subscriptions start at $180. Waxlax

40 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

ARTS & THEATRE

COMING UP! Watch as clay artisans’ soup bowls take shape

BY PAM HARBAUGH July 20; and 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Thursday,
Correspondent July 22. The bowls will be sold at the
29th Annual Samaritan Center Soup
1 Indian River Clay invites spec- Bowl fundraiser in November. These
tators to view its production of are all handcrafted bowls created in a
range of styles, from whimsical to tra-
soup bowls to raise funds for the Sa- ditional. Indian River Clay supplies the
studio and clay for the potters. A visit
maritan Center. The production of to the IRC event could be not only fun,
but personally inspirational as well. If
these colorful and unique bowls will

take place from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sun-

day, July 18; 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesday,

you come away saying “I wish I could “I’ve worked with a lot of musicians
do that,” then consider taking lessons: with a track record of great things. He’s
Private individual lessons are $45 per just an easy-going guy and makes my
hour with a minimum of three hours. job easier.” The entire program is go-
Additional guests at the individual ses- ing to be “really fun,” Collins said. “I’ve
sions are $15 per hour. Or, gather some been wanting to do the Rachmaninoff
friends and arrange your own clay par- Symphonic Dances for years now. It’s
ty: Clay parties are $35 per person, with extremely difficult but one of my favor-
a minimum of six people. IRC is at 1239 ite pieces in the repertoire.” As far as
16th St., Vero Beach. Call 772-202-8598 people getting the urge to dance in the
or visit IndianRiverClay.org. aisles during the Marquez “Danzon No.
2,” go for it, Collins said. “I’m OK with it.
2 Wake up from your summer I’ve seen it before.” The concert begins
slumber with some electrify- 3 p.m. Sunday, July 18, at the Commu-
nity Church of Vero Beach, 1901 23rd St.
ing music at “Dance Party,” the Space Tickets are $30 in advance and $35 at
the door. Admission is free to people 18
Coast Symphony. Led by maestro Aar- years and younger and to college stu-
dents. Moreover, because of the SCSO’s
on Collins, the program includes Ar- “Symphony for Everyone” initiative,
anyone who cannot afford a ticket is
turo Marquez’s “Danzon No. 2,” a com- asked to simply pay what you can. For
more information, call 855-252-7276 or
position filled with sensual energy and visit SpaceCoastSymphony.org.

syncopated Latin rhythms. That will

set the stage for Sergei Rachmaninoff’s

“Symphonic Dances,” a powerful, viva-

cious orchestral suite in three move-

ments originally called “Noon,” “Twi-

light” and “Midnight.” The work was

the composer’s last major composition. 3 Vero Beach Rowing is offering
“Learn to Row” classes for young
The program also includes the world

premiere of Thomas Joseph’s “Con- people from rising seventh-graders to

certo Dystonia” for horn and orchestra. 12th-graders. The organization sup-

“He’s a very young composer and is up plies everything the young rower needs.

and coming,” Collins said. “He’s got a They will be rowing in 1, 2, 4 or 8 people

lot of great talent and I’m excited about sculls along the intracoastal waterway.

presenting this work.” Joseph’s compo- “People are surprised how addictive it

sition is inspired by a nerve disease he is,” said director of rowing Brian Col-

suffers called “focal dystonia,” which gan. “They say, ‘Oh my gosh, this is so

can cause tremors or pain in the lip, much fun, I want to do more of it.’ And

making it challenging if not impossible it’s good for fitness, self-confidence,

for horn players. The concerto features learning teamwork.” The Youth Row-

Joseph Lovinsky, the principal horn for ing program runs weekly through July

the Space Coast Symphony and fre- 23 with beginner camps at 11 a.m. to 2

quent soloist with the Maryland Sym- p.m. weekdays and advanced camps

phony Orchestra. High on Lovinsky’s 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. weekdays. The cost is

impressive list of credits is the former $200. Later, the organization will offer

principal horn for the United States rowing programs for high school and

Army Band, the Army Orchestra and middle school students, plus programs

the Army Brass Quintet. Add to that a for adults wanting to give the sport a

position as teaching assistant at the try. Vero Beach Rowing is at 310 Acacia

Juilliard School, and you know this is a Road, Vero Beach. For more informa-

rare musician. “Aside from his bio, he’s tion, call 772-261-0747 or visit Vero-

such a gentle, warm soul,” Collins said. BeachRowing.org. 

SURGEON HAS STRATEGY TO REDUCE
BONE FRACTURES, MEDICARE COSTS

42 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

HEALTH

Surgeon has strategy to reduce bone fractures, Medicare costs

BY KERRY FIRTH The cost to Medicare in Pennsylvania, which increased
fracture prevention treatment rates
Correspondent just to treat second to over 70 percent among those at
high risk, could serve as a model for
Osteoporosis is medical condi- Dr. Seth Coren. fractures suffered by the national program.
Floridians was nearly
PHOTOS: KAILA JONES The Geisinger Health System
stresses the importance of getting
tion that affects bone strength. The $470.3 million. bone density tests that measure
bone strength by comparing your X-
body is constantly breaking down The good news is ray with that of an average healthy
young adult. Your bone density, or
old bone and building new bone, that the medical com- T-score, will determine your risk
for a broken bone. The lower your
but as you age your body breaks munity has the tools T-score, the greater your fracture
risk. Once your doctor knows the
down more old bone than it creates to help reduce the in- condition of your bones, he can de-
cide what treatment is best for you
new bone. As a result, bones can cidence of fractures based on your T-score, or degree of
osteoporosis. That treatment may
become weak and may break from due to osteoporosis, include lifestyle changes, medica-
tion and exercise.
a fall, or in more serious cases from but doctors and nurs-
Secondly, cuts to Medicare pay-
minor bumps or even sneezing. es need assistance ment rates for osteoporosis screen-
ing should be reversed. In the last
“There are literally no symp- from the government. five years, osteoporosis diagnosis in
older women has declined by 18 per-
toms [of osteoporosis], until you Dr. Coren, who serves cent. This is not because osteoporo-
sis has become less common, but be-
break a bone,” said Dr. Seth Coren, as an ambassador for cause screening payment rates have
been cut by 70 percent. Bone density
a Vero Beach orthopaedic surgeon the National Osteo- screening has become a money-los-
ing proposition for medical facilities
who specializes in diagnosing and porosis Foundation, administering the scans, so they
simply aren’t done enough.
treating the disease. “According to has worked with the
And finally, Congress should
the National Osteoporosis guide- foundation to map create and fund a national educa-
tion and action initiative aimed
lines, post-menopausal women out a three-step strat- at reducing fractures among older
Americans. Setting national goals
over 65 should be screened with a egy prevent fractures. for the prevention of osteoporosis
and fractures and prioritizing re-
bone density scan every two years. “Medicare already duction of racial disparities would
have a meaningful impact, accord-
If you’re post-menopausal and have es of a second break are high.” pays for bone density testing to ing to Dr. Coren.

a fracture of the spine, hip, wrist The cost of treating osteoporo- identify those at risk of bone frac- “We already know how to help
Floridians who suffer from osteo-
or forearm, your risk for osteopo- sis is staggering. The disease af- tures, allowing for preventative porosis and the necessary reforms
will save taxpayers billions and
rosis is higher and you should get fects about 1.8 million Medicare steps and intervention,” Dr. Cohen help keep Medicare solvent,” he
concluded. “I hope others in our
screened once a year. Diabetics are beneficiaries with approximately explained. state will join me in calling on our
representatives, senators and the
also at a higher risk because their 2.1 million osteoporotic fractures “Medicare also pays for FDA-ap- Biden Administration to take these
commonsense steps.”
bones are denser, but not as strong.” nationally each year. Those bone proved drug treatments for osteo-
Dr. Seth Coren practices with Vero
While the disease is usually fractures due to osteoporosis are porosis that can help reduce spine Orthopaedics. He received his medi-
cal degree from the State University
caused by a drop-in estrogen after responsible for more hospitaliza- and hip fractures by up to 70 per- of New York and completed his gen-
eral surgical internship and ortho-
menopause, certain medications tions than heart attacks, strokes or cent and cut repeat fractures by al- paedic residency at the University of
Miami. He is board-certified in or-
can also bring on osteoporosis in breast cancer. A recent study found most half. Plus, there are new mod- thopaedic surgery and has been prac-
ticing orthopaedics in Indian River
both men and women. that the total annual cost for os- els of coordinated, post-fracture County since 1979. Call 772-569-2330
or schedule an appointment online at
“I started focusing on the diag- teoporotic fractures among Medi- care that have proven effective at www.veroortho.com. 

nosis and treatment of osteoporo- care beneficiaries was $57 billion reducing fracture rates. Unfortu-

sis about three or four years ago,” in 2018, and it’s expected to grow to nately, though, we’re just not using

Dr. Coren says. “Most orthopaedics over $95 billion in 2040. the tools we have.

don’t treat osteoporosis because it Florida is hotspot for the disease. “Only 9 percent of Florida resi-

takes a lot of time to evaluate and A study from the National Osteopo- dents in traditional Medicare re-

treat a patient, and for somebody rosis Foundation found that Florida ceived bone density screening

with a busy surgical practice it is has the second highest fracture within six months of suffering an

not something they are trained to rate in the nation among those osteoporotic fracture. And screen-

do or want to do. One of the prob- on Medicare. In 2016 there were ing rates for Black beneficiaries in

lems is that patients who have these 144,000 Medicare beneficiaries in our state were even lower, with just

fractures are not followed up with a the state who suffered 172,500 bone 5 percent being similarly screened.

bone density scan and their chanc- fractures linked to osteoporosis. Other studies have shown that

DR. KEITH KALISH around 80 percent of those who
have suffered a fracture have not
OVER 30 YEARS EXPERIENCE received effective drug therapies to
help prevent additional fractures.

Bunions • Hammertoes “There are a few commonsense
Corns • Ingrown • Fungal
Warts • Calluses • Heel steps that would reduce healthcare
Arthritis & Diabetic costs and save lives both nationally
Custom Orthotics and here in Florida. In fact, prevent-
& Diabetic Shoes ing only one in five of secondary
fractures could save Medicare over
Same Day $1 billion in two to three years.”
Appointments
The first step Dr. Coren suggests

DUAL BOARD CERTIFIED MEDICAL is for Congress to direct the Centers
& SURGICAL FOOT for Medicare and Medicaid Ser-
SPECIALIST PODIATRIST
vices to incentivize the use of the

best practices for secondary frac-

772-567-0111 I KALISHFOOTCARE.COM ture prevention and care coordi-
nation. Methods used by the well-
VERO BEACH I 1285 36TH ST I SUITE 203 respected Geisinger Health System

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 43

HEALTH

Advocates say tai chi offers many health benefits

BY FRED CICETTI rious. We heal more slowly as we age. lifestyles, hip fractures have steadi-
Columnist And osteoporosis, arthritis and weak ly increased.
cardiopulmonary systems can delay
Question: They’re starting a tai rehabilitation and prevent full recov- Tai chi is generally a safe activ-
chi class at our senior center. Do you ery. ity, but you can hurt yourself if you
think this is worth taking? don’t do it properly. It’s possible you
According to the Centers for Dis- could strain yourself or overdo it
Tai chi (tie-chee) has helped ease Control, 33 percent of Ameri- when first learning. The best way to
many people feel better. However, cans 65 or older have at least one learn tai chi is from a qualified tai
you should check with your doctor serious fall each year. About 60 chi instructor. Tai chi class are of-
first to see if this form of exercise is percent of falls occur at home dur- fered at not only senior centers, but
OK for you. ing normal daily activities. With at YMCAs and YWCAs, health clubs,
seniors leading increasingly active and community centers. 
Tai chi is practiced all across Chi-
na, where it was developed in the
12th century. It’s common in Chi-
nese hospitals and clinics. In Asia,
tai chi is considered to be the most
beneficial exercise for older people,
because it is gentle and can be mod-
ified easily if a person has health
limitations.

Tai chi began as a powerful mar-
tial art and evolved into a series
of fluid movements that relax and
stimulate the body and mind. Tai
chi is based on the flow of chi, vi-
tal energy that is believed to flow
throughout the body and regulate
a person’s physical, spiritual, emo-
tional and mental balance.

Advocates of Traditional Chinese
Medicine (TCM) say chi is affected
by yin (negative energy) and yang
(positive energy). When the flow of
chi is disrupted and yin and yang
are unbalanced, the condition leads
to pain and disease, according to
TCM.

A person doing tai chi progresses
slowly and gracefully through a se-
ries of movements while breathing
deeply and meditating. Tai chi has
been called moving meditation.
The entire body is always in motion
during tai chi. All the movements
are performed at one speed.

Tai chi can include dozens of
movements. The simplest style of tai
chi is limited to 12 movements. These
include such colorful names such
as grasp bird’s tail, carry tiger to the
mountain and step back to repulse
monkey.

Western medical research suggests
that tai chi may offer many benefits
that include reduced stress, anxiety
and depression; improved flexibil-
ity, strength, balance and coordina-
tion that lead to fewer falls; improved
sleep; reduced bone loss in women
after menopause; lower blood pres-
sure; better cardiovascular fitness;
relief of chronic pain and stiffness;
and higher immunity to shingles.

Reducing the number of falls is
especially important to seniors be-
cause falls in older people can be se-

44 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

HEALTH

Too many men ignore depression, mental health issues

BY JOSEPH HARPER mental illnesses are less likely to 25 years as a social worker, thera- Too many men think they are
The Washington Post have received mental health treat- pist, hospital administrator, ad- supposed to be strong or macho all
ment than women. This poses in- junct faculty member at the Uni- the time – even when in pain. For
It was another Monday morn- teresting questions: Are men truly versity of Southern California, and many, it would be unimaginable,
ing and my first patient of the day experiencing fewer mental health presently the executive director of intolerable for anyone to know they
walked in. He was a man in his mid- problems, or are they more likely a facility that specializes in com- were battling anxiety, depression,
30s who came to see me for stress to ignore them and hope they go prehensive mental health and sub- or were bogged down by their emo-
and anxiety. He appeared nervous away? stance abuse treatment programs. tions. Many of my male patients
and had trouble getting his words I have worked with thousands of also seem to believe that because
out. And the thing I remember most My career in mental health spans men in both one-on-one and group they are not physically ill they are
– which I see again and again with settings. I am convinced the sta- not truly sick.
many of the men I treat – was his tistics are skewed and the number
inability to maintain eye contact of men who struggle and fail to get These incorrect beliefs keep
with me. It’s a telltale sign of fear help is much greater than we have many men from getting the help
and shame. been led to believe. they need for their mental health.
In 2021, for anyone, men or wom-
Many men recently have become I have watched mothers and en, to believe that mental health is
better at taking control of their wives literally drag the men they something to be ignored or that it is
physical health, being more heart love into my office. I often struggle not real is both unfathomable and
healthy and getting preventive with some male patients to pull in- dangerous. It adds to the stigma,
screenings such as colonoscopies formation about their emotional can push a patient who is already
as they get older, but when it comes issues out of them because they struggling with a diagnosis deeper
to their mental health, too many are so reluctant to speak. Others into denial and prevent him from
men still struggle, lagging way be- simply downplay their problems getting treatment.
hind women. saying things like, “It’s not really
a big deal,” or “My wife is blowing In addition, it can condemn the
According to the National Insti- this out of proportion.” Then there sufferer to unnecessary emotional
tute of Mental Health (NIMH), the are the men who are simply embar- pain that can harm their quality of
prevalence of mental illnesses in rassed and ask, “Nobody will ever life, their health and their ability to
men is often lower than women. know I was here, right?” work.
The NIMH also says that men with
I had a male patient who was ter-

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 45

HEALTH

rified to drive on the highway. His crutches. But mental illness is usual- pass, changes in appetite, gaining for your particular mental health
recovery with therapy was going ly not visible. Just because you can’t or losing weight, feeling hopeless condition to find one. I also rec-
well, and he got to the point that he see it, however, doesn’t mean it’s not and losing interest in activities that ommend Support Groups Central,
could drive small distances on the real. Anxiety, depression and other are usually enjoyable, feeling overly which can point you in the direction
highway. But one day, 10 miles be- mental health problems can lead to stressed and anxious, being unable of an online support group for your
tween highway exits, he had a ma- high blood pressure, weaker immune to leave the house or avoiding situ- particular condition. Focus on self-
jor panic attack and pulled over to systems, stomach issues, chronic fa- ations in which being able to leave help such as meditation, stress relief,
the side of the road. Almost an hour tigue, changes in weight, substance might be difficult, no longer want- muscle relaxation and physical activ-
later, a state trooper pulled behind abuse and even suicide. If you think ing to socialize, having thoughts of ity – all of which have been shown to
him to see if he needed assistance. your mental health problems are just harming yourself or taking your life, help reduce anxiety and depression.
My patient, feeling embarrassed and going to vanish on their own or go experiencing a decline in concentra- In an emergency, don’t forget the Na-
shaken up, explained his phobia to away like the common cold, you are tion and job performance, turning tional Suicide Prevention Lifeline at
the trooper, who thankfully was able likely mistaken. to substance abuse, and having un- 800-273-8255.
to empathize. The trooper’s wife also explained physical symptoms such
suffered with a driving phobia. The These days, there are some amaz- as stomach aches and headaches. Educating men about the impor-
trooper safely escorted my patient to ing treatment options when it comes (These signs that help is needed ap- tance of mental health is not just a
the next exit. to mental health, including different ply to women as well as men.) priority. According to the American
forms of psychotherapy, different Foundation for Suicide Prevention,
The point of the story: We all have classes of medications and alterna- Whatever you do, just do some- men died by suicide 3.63 times more
our struggles in life. Never be em- tive methods such as yoga, acupunc- thing. Talk to someone, be it a close often than women, with middle-aged
barrassed to ask for help. Conditions ture, meditation and mindfulness. friend, family member, professional white men having been particularly
such as anxiety and depression are No matter how bad your condition in the mental health field or fam- vulnerable.
much more common than you re- is, and even if you feel extremely lost ily doctor. Online resources, such as
alize, and they don’t discriminate. and hopeless right now, I promise those offered by the NIMH and the The good news is when mental
They are often deeply rooted in brain you that you can get better. I have Anxiety and Depression Association health intervention begins early –
chemistry and chemical imbalances. seen men severely consumed by of America can provide detailed in- in other words when you just begin
The pandemic hasn’t helped. These mental illness and even housebound formation about mental health for to notice symptoms and before they
conditions can take a toll on anyone who with help have been able to take patients and their families. Many severely limit your ability to func-
regardless of sex, race, religion, geo- control of their lives and recover. men feel more comfortable doing tion or engage in your day-to-day ac-
graphical location or anything else. online therapy sessions. Look into tivities – and the right combination
Many men will make excuses websites such as TalkSpace.com and of treatments are put in place, men
If you were experiencing chest when things aren’t going well, but BetterHealth. will feel better and suicide ideation
pains, you would call an ambulance there are some signs that should not is dramatically decreased. The key is
or go to the emergency room. If you be ignored. These include changes In-person and online support encouraging men who may not nat-
broke your arm or leg, you would in mood, including anger outbursts groups are also helpful. You can urally reach out to get the help they
have a cast and walk around in or long periods of sadness that don’t check with the national organization need when they need it. 

46 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

HEALTH

Why does Parkinson’s strike more men than women?

BY MARLENE CIMONS that makes men more susceptible to ity to perform unconscious actions, and women, but much more evident
The Washington Post Parkinson’s, or what it is about wom- for example, blinking, smiling or in men,” Savica says of his study.
en that may protect them — or both. arm swinging while walking. There
J. William Langston, who has been But they are trying to find out. is no cure, but certain medications The phenomenon is not unlike cer-
studying and treating Parkinson’s and other treatments can ease the tain other illnesses that afflict one
disease for nearly 40 years, always “We in the research community symptoms. sex more than the other, although in
has found it striking that so many have been working for decades to most cases it’s women who carry the
more men than women show up in sort this out, but the answers are still Scientists regard it as a disease greater burden. They suffer more au-
his clinic. His observation is not an- elusive,” says Caroline Tanner, a neu- of aging — most patients are older toimmune diseases, migraines, eye
ecdotal. It is grounded in science and rology professor in the Weill Institute than 60 when diagnosed — although disorders and post-traumatic stress
shared by many physicians: Men are for Neurosciences at the University about 4 percent of cases occur than men, for example, among other
roughly 1.5 times more likely than of California at San Francisco. “Nev- among people younger than 50, one ailments.
women to develop Parkinson’s, a ertheless, it’s important to keep at it. prominent example being the actor
progressive disorder of the nervous We need to understand the mecha- Michael J. Fox, whose symptoms be- It is well established that exposure
system that impairs movement and nisms that underlie the specific dif- gan at age 29, and who established to environmental toxins — pesticides
can erode mental acuity. ferences between men and women a Parkinson’s research foundation and industrial solvents, for example
so we can apply them to trying to that bears his name. Nearly 1 million — raises the likelihood of Parkin-
“It’s a big difference that is quite prevent Parkinson’s.” Americans are living with Parkin- son’s, as well as aging, head trauma,
real,” says Langston, clinical profes- son’s, and about 60,000 new cases are and to a lesser extent, genetics. The
sor of neurology, neuroscience and Parkinson’s results from the death diagnosed annually, according to the latter, which often can significantly
of pathology at the Stanford Univer- of key neurons in the substantia nig- foundation. influence many diseases, seems to
sity School of Medicine and associate ra region of the brain that produce play only a minor role in Parkinson’s,
director of the Stanford Udall Center. the chemical messenger dopamine. Moreover, research indicates the except perhaps in early onset. “There
“It’s pretty dramatic. I think anyone Over time, the loss of these nerve incidence of Parkinson’s has been are about 26 or 27 known genetic
who sees a lot of Parkinson’s will tell cells disrupts movement, dimin- rising in recent years among both mutations in Parkinson’s, but they
you that.” ishes cognition, and can cause other sexes, but more so among men, ac- account for only a minority of cases,
symptoms, such as slurred speech cording to Rodolfo Savica, associate from 3 to 10 percent,” Savica says.
While the disproportionate impact and depression. professor of neurology and epidemi-
is clear, the reasons for it are not. “It’s ology at Mayo Clinic. “Thirty years Moreover, researchers have found
a great mystery,” Langston says. Re- Outward signs can include tremor, of observation showed an increasing no genetic association with the sex
searchers still don’t know what it is muscle rigidity, slowed motion, poor number of cases, valid for both men disparity. “At the moment, there is
posture and balance, and the inabil- no solid genetic basis for sex differ-

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Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 47

HEALTH

ences,” says Cornelis Blauwendraat, release of industrial chemicals in
a staff scientist at the National In- communities doesn’t favor men
stitute on Aging (NIA). “We and oth- over women.
ers have assessed this in fairly large
studies, and the overall result was “The vast majority of people are
that there are no obvious genetic not exposed professionally, while
risk differences between males and we are all exposed through food
females.” and the environment,” says Alberto
Ascherio, professor of epidemiology
Most experts believe it takes a and nutrition at Harvard T.H. Chan
combination of factors to prompt School of Public Health, who studies
the disorder, both in men and wom- how drugs, diet and lifestyle affect
en. “I see Parkinson’s as a multifac- Parkinson’s risk. “But these expo-
torial disease involving a number sures don’t differ between men and
of variants,” Savica says. “Combine women, so that really can’t explain
these with environmental expo- it.”
sures to one or more agents, and it
causes the perfect storm.” Tanner agrees. “There are lots of
moving parts working together, and
Confounding the picture is evi- probably no single cause accounts
dence that coffee drinking and for more men than women develop-
smoking are protective against Par- ing the disease,” she says. “While it’s
kinson’s, although experts don’t true that many of these are tradi-
know why, and these habits don’t tionally male occupations, there is
seem related to the gender gap, they clearly more to it, and we just don’t
say. They have not found evidence know yet what it is.”
that women drink more coffee than
men, or that women smoke more De Miranda has seen identical
than men. While smoking by both sex differences in rats she exposes
men and women has declined dra- to chemicals. One such study found
matically in recent years, men still more male rats develop Parkinson’s-
are more likely than women to be like symptoms than female rats,
cigarette smokers, according to the even though both received the same
Centers for Disease Control and Pre- level of contact with the insecticide
vention. rotenone. “Male animals are more
at risk than female animals even if
Some researchers speculate that you give them the same exposures,”
occupational hazards in jobs tradi- she says.
tionally held by men might explain
the difference. “The idea is that men In a 2019 journal letter, Tanner de-
are more likely to be in a workplace scribed similar results in humans,
where they might be exposed to that men working in agriculture
these chemicals,” Langston says. bore a larger share of Parkinson’s
compared with women who were
Research suggests a relationship similarly exposed. “This suggests
between Parkinson’s and agricul- there is something else in the biol-
ture, where herbicides and pesti- ogy, and biology is always compli-
cides are used heavily, and indus- cated,” Tanner says.
tries that rely on solvents. Human
studies have linked exposure to the Disease outcomes also differ be-
herbicide paraquat and the pes- tween men and women. Studies
ticide rotenone to Parkinson’s, as show women tend to develop Par-
well as to the industrial solvent tri- kinson’s later than men, have slow-
chloroethylene. (The use of many of er progression of the disease and
these substances is now restricted, respond more favorably to medi-
although not banned.) cation. “Generally women have a
better prognosis than men,” Savica
“Parkinson’s disease is probably says.
the neurodegenerative disease most
influenced by the environment,” Although some cognitive research
says Briana De Miranda, assistant has produced mixed results, one
professor of neurology at the Uni- recent study found that men fared
versity of Alabama at Birmingham, much worse than women, including
who studies the effects of chemi- in attention, processing speed, deci-
cals on animals. “We know that ex- sion-making, memory and language,
posure to certain chemicals leads among others. “We found that men
to the development of Parkinson’s. were more cognitively impaired than
We’ve seen people exposed to pesti- women across the board,” says Eliza-
cides and solvents who have devel- beth Disbrow, associate professor of
oped Parkinson’s.” neurology and director of the Cen-
ter for Brain Health at LSU Health
But when it comes to the sex dif- Shreveport. “Their cognitive issues
ferences, scientists point out that were much more pronounced.”
many men who develop Parkinson’s
don’t hold these jobs, while some Experts agree that the male/fe-
women do. Moreover, exposure to male Parkinson’s puzzle will persist
pesticides and other substances until researchers discover more in-
through food, well water and the formation and can put all the pieces
together. 

48 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Style Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

Razzle dazzle: Glittering highlights from Haute Couture week

BY EMILY CRONIN Jones looked to the England of Virgin-
The Telegraph ia Woolf’s Orlando.

Fendi, Balenciaga and Armani Privé His second couture outing found
showcased their new couture collec- him in a more Italian mood, with film-
tions in Paris and Rome. maker Pier Paolo Pasolini on his mind.
“I was particularly interested in his
Fendi Couture: From Orlando’s poetry, and how he lived between the
England to Pasolini’s Rome old Rome and new Rome, and his grav-
itation toward this building,” he said
For his Fendi couture debut, Kim with a sweep taking in his office in the
Fendi Palazzo, the landmark building

on one of Rome’s highest hills. And the clothes? The improbable
From Pasolini he followed his cu- weightlessness of Bernini’s marble
sculpture filtered in via silks printed
riosity to Maria Callas, to the art in with trompe l’oeil drapery and lace
the Villa Borghese (Raphael’s “Young mini dresses with an astonishing level
Woman with Unicorn” is a favorite), to of embroidery. The Colosseo Quadrato
Bernini’s sculpture “and how he made (Fendi HQ) made an appearance in the
stone look fluid,” to the city’s mosaics arched heels of white shoes and boots.
and light and the assorted forms of There were mother-of-pearl mosaics,
beauty at every turn. “Everything Ro- pressed leather pleats, sunset-pink
man fused together in this collection.” silks and ultra-intricate crystal bead-
ing. No Fendi women appeared in
He enlisted supermodel friends the show this time around, but Silvia
Kate Moss, Christy Turlington and Fendi created the couture handbags
Amber Valetta for a film of the collec- and Delfina Delettrez was behind the
tion directed by Luca Guadagnino, of
“Call Me by Your Name” fame.

Dr. Charles Celano
will return to

private Cardiology
practice on
7-1-2021.

Both routine insurance and
Medicare will continue, as well

as hospital privileges and
services. Concierge services

will also be available.
Location and telephone number

will stay the same.

3607 15th Avenue, Suite A., Vero Beach, FL 32960

772-562-8522

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Style Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 49

hand-carved marble earrings and mo- a more decadent vision for couture.
saic jewelry. There was so much to look The show, presented in front of a
at, you couldn’t help but be grateful for
the slow pans from shoulder to hem. live audience at the Italian Embassy
in Paris, struck an undeniably cel-
“Couture is probably more relevant ebratory note with its abundance of
now than it has been for a while, to be crystals, iridescence and all manner
honest,” Jones suggested. “There are a of sheen.
lot of people that do have money and
want to buy special things.” Armani built the collection around
silk organza that flowed over the
Balenciaga: A reverent return to models’ bodies like molten silver and
couture gold. To this, he added sequins, crys-
tals, metallic embroideries and gos-
Cristóbal Balenciaga closed his samer-like layers, turning his women
couture salon 53 years ago. Demna into butterflies.
Gvasalia reopened it last Wednesday
for an in-person presentation of his The gowns came in degrees of froth-
first couture collection for the house iness, from a one-shouldered tiered
blush column dress to a watercolor-

Cate Blanchett and Jodie Foster as What can the non-couture clients
they hit the red carpet at the Cannes among us extrapolate from the show?
Film Festival. (Last Tuesday, the first When dressing for our own special
day of the 11-day glamour spree, Fes- occasions and once-ordinary, now
tival juror Melanie Laurent sparkled extraordinary-seeming nights out,
in a customized look from the spring now is no time for the understated.
’21 couture collection: a silver crystal- Bring out the razzle-dazzle. Mr. Ar-
embellished backless top and skirt.) mani insists. 

Cristobal built. His team recreated the floral organza gown with a fully crys-
salon decor as it appeared at its point tal-embellished strapless bodice. The
of closure, down to the peeling plaster palette moved from mercury through
moldings around each doorway and cornflower blue, electric lilac, fuchsia
the water stains on the ceiling. and mint green.

The show itself proceeded in silence, For the non-gown-fans in the audi-
complete except for the odd gasp at a ence, there were fluid champagne silk
tangerine skirt suit or embroidered harem trousers styled with hip-length
ballgown. There was tailoring, there evening jackets. Evening coats over
were hats, there were couture jeans – cigarette trousers. A fully sequined tip-
all of it heralding the arrival of a new of-the-shoulder jacket with a deep-V
couture talent. neckline and elbow-length sleeves.

Guests were as high caliber as the The Armani team said all the em-
historic French maison itself: Vogue’s bellishment was there to “create an
Anna Wintour and Hamish Bowles impression of joyful levity,” and the
were present, alongside a younger collection did seem effervescent, even
breed of stars including supermodel viewed from afar on a screen.
Bella Hadid and NBA All-Star James
Harden. Kanye West attended in a face Woven into the looks were a number
mask that covered his entire head. of garments from Armani’s last Privé
collection, shown without an audi-
Armani Privé: Now is the time for ence in January. Which makes sense.
glitter and glam These dresses, gowns and evening
suits are entrance-makers, demand-
Giorgio Armani: minimalist? Al- ing ballrooms (or embassies) full of
though the Italian designer remains admirers. They’re made to be worn in
the name to know for impeccable society, not at home: the opposite of
suiting and has stayed true to his all- isolation-wear.
navy personal uniform for decades,
his latest Armani Privé show proposed Expect to see pieces from the col-
lection appear on Armani fans like

50 Vero Beach 32963 / July 15, 2021 Style Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

The ultimate summer shoe guide: How to wear every style

BY LISA ARMSTRONG, BETHAN HOLT, very effective tone switcher. Whether wedge can be as demanding as a sti- egant they look but while a block heel
CAROLINE LEAPER, EMILY CRONIN, you’re wearing a trouser suit or a midi letto after eight hours. Look for leather provides more support than a pin thin
dress, teaming it with any footwear padding inside and a gradual incline or heel, comfort levels depend on the
TAMARA ABRAHAM and KRISSY TURNER with a rope sole will give it a more re- flat form. LA amount of cushioning in the sole. Test
The Telegraph laxed, slightly boho feel. You can go full them out first, ideally on a hard floor.
vacation mode with canvas, or opt for Block-heel sandals With dresses, a block heel can look
The arrival of summer presents many something sleeker with leather. Person- What they are: The elegant height more modern and less twee than a
a shoe dilemma. Look no further, these ally I avoid one with ribbons that tie up giver. kitten heel, especially in sandal form.
are the styles to consider now. the legs or ankle – they’re too compli- How to wear them: Block heels go Look for wide straps which not only
cated and not especially flattering. with everything from flared pants to work proportionally with the heel but
Espadrilles pencil skirts and will lend whatever cover any bits of your foot you’d like to
What they are: Gateway to laid back To make ankles look slimmer, look for you wear them with a slightly retro, ’70s keep hidden. LA
style. ties or a narrow strap that look – smart, but less effortful than sti-
How to wear them: Espadrilles aren’t sits just below the indent lettos. Think Caroline de Maigret rather Sneakers
just a summer classic, they’re a of your ankle. And re- than Carine Roitfeld. What they are: Those shoes that
member that they’re not Although some come with pointed used to be reserved for the gym but
all as comfortable as they over the past few years have been
look. Rope interiors toes, they work best when the creeping into every walk (sorry) of life,
will rub and a high chunky heel is balanced by a
chiseled or square toe. The from the office to

higher you go the more el-