07/27/2017 ISSUE 30

Memorial Island to get a new
veterans monument. P22
Big Tobacco goes on
trial here – again. P8
Are longer terms for Vero

City Council a good idea? P9

MY VERO Hospital push for
nonprofit partner
BY RAY MCNULTY may pose problem

Police bodycams not
seen likely here soon

Indian River County Sheriff Florida Institute of Technology’s marine research lab. FIT has abandoned its grandiose dreams, and is selling the land. PHOTO BY BRUCE CADY BY RUSTY CARTER
Deryl Loar, Vero Beach Police Staff Writer
Chief David Currey and 19th What led to FIT marine laboratory’s demise?
Judicial Circuit State Attorney Hospital leaders who have
Bruce Colton all say they're BY RUSTY CARTER of Technology long operated President Dr. Anthony James formed a collaborative com-
"not opposed" to local law Staff Writer a marine research lab raised Catanese said, “We plan to mittee to find a financially
enforcement officers wearing questions about what hap- build a significant new build- strong partner to up the
body cameras. News last week that Indian pened to big plans for the ing that will include some chances of Indian River Med-
River County is preparing a 32963 site that FIT announced kind of public facility where ical Center’s long-term sur-
"Any tool that can help us do bid to buy four oceanfront with fanfare several years ago. members of the community vival may have unwittingly
our jobs is a plus," Currey said. acres where Florida Institute jeopardized their effort by
In 2013, then university CONTINUED ON PAGE 4 steadfastly and publicly re-
In fact, Loar predicted that peating their preference for
most law enforcement agen- partnering with a nonprofit
cies would be using them healthcare provider.
"within the next decade."
County Hospital District
By then, perhaps, the county Board members Marybeth
Cunningham and Allen Jones,
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 and Indian River Medical
Center Board chair Wayne
Officer with body cam in Melbourne Beach. Hockmeyer, are among those
who have said they want a
nonprofit white knight.

After the issue came up at
last Thursday’s meeting of
the publicly elected District

CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

Fired Gifford principal Vero attorney arrested for battery domestic violence Caregiver, who stole
rehired for a new post from John’s Island
BY LISA ZAHNER Attorney Adam Chrzan County Jail that Wednesday senior, back in jail
BY KATHLEEN SLOAN Staff Writer evening after a police report
Staff Writer says Sheriff’s deputies were BY BETH WALTON
Local criminal defense at- called to the family’s home in Staff Writer
School Superintendent Mark torney Adam Chrzan was southwest Vero in response
Rendell has rehired Roxanne arrested on July 19, and was to a disturbance with his A Vero Beach home care-
Decker – who he recently fired charged with misdemeanor estranged wife. He was re- giver who swindled an elderly
as principal of Gifford Middle battery domestic violence. leased after midnight on his John’s Island resident out of
School – as a countywide spe- own recognizance. nearly $78,000 in 2014 is back
cial education expert, despite The 52-year-old was in jail after repeatedly violat-
her failures at Gifford and her booked into the Indian River CONTINUED ON PAGE 6
CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
CONTINUED ON PAGE 7

July 27, 2017 Volume 10, Issue 30 Newsstand Price $1.00 Christmas in July
‘presents’ kids with
News 1-10 Faith 58 Pets 57 TO ADVERTISE CALL midsummer fun. P18
Arts 21-24 Games 39-41 Real Estate 61-72 772-559-4187
Books 34-34 Health 43-46 Style 47-49
Dining 50 Insight 25-42 Wine 51 FOR CIRCULATION
Editorial 32 People 11-20 CALL 772-226-7925

© 2017 Vero Beach 32963 Media LLC. All rights reserved.

2 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

My Vero Here, now, bodycams would be a storage and complying with public re- from bodycam companies that would
luxury – something we might want to cords requests, which would include cover maintenance, technology up-
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 have when all of our other policing redacting some images to protect the grades and video storage.
needs are met and we've got some ex- privacy of bystanders.
will have grown to a point where there's tra cash to spend. "We've had a couple of demonstra-
more violent crime, more felony arrests And, of course, people possessing tions this year," Currey said, adding
and more officer-involved shootings. A lot of cash. the necessary video and technology that leasing the equipment – both
Whenever the time comes, equip- skills would need to be hired to handle body cams and dashboard cameras –
Maybe, by then, we'll need our local ping local law enforcement agencies all this new information. for 40 officers and their vehicles would
police officers and sheriff's deputies with bodycams won't be cheap. Loar cost the city roughly $80,000 per year.
to wear bodycams to shield them from estimates the start-up costs for the Remember: These videos can be
bogus claims of brutality and bad Sheriff's Office would be somewhere used in criminal cases and other legal But he said it's unlikely Vero Beach
shoots, defend their agencies from between $450,000 and $650,000. proceedings, including civil lawsuits, police officers will be getting body-
frivolous lawsuits and protect the Then there are the recurring ex- and a secure chain of evidence must cams any time soon.
citizenry from cops who are overly ag- penses, such as licensing for each be established and preserved to pro-
gressive or too quick to pull the trigger. camera, equipment maintenance and tect their integrity. "It comes down to money," Currey
replacement, officer training, video said, "and, right now, it's not at the top
But we don't need them now. That's why Currey is exploring the of our list of priorities."
possibility of leasing the equipment
Nor should it be.
Simply put: We don't have enough
of these police-versus-suspect inci-
dents, particularly those that involve
gun play, to justify the expense.
While more than two-thirds of the
police departments in America's ma-
jor cities are equipped with bodycams,
we're not Chicago, New York or Balti-
more. We're not Miami. We're not Fer-
guson, Missouri.
We're not even Fort Pierce, which
began equipping its police department
with bodycams in June, nine months
after a grand jury recommended them
in the wake of an April 2016 traffic stop
during which a man was shot by an of-
ficer, who was not charged.
The Fort Pierce Police Department is
leasing 100 bodycams for five years at
an average annual cost of $90,000. The
hope there, as it is in other communities
with similar equipment, is that trans-
parency will enhance accountability,
which will encourage greater civility be-
tween the police and the public.
But with all due respect to our
neighbors to the south: There's more
crime, more gang violence and more
shootings in Fort Pierce than we expe-
rience here.
If it weren't for the protests in Gifford
following the fatal shooting of a 21-year-
old woman by the sheriff's SWAT team
during a drug raid in March, it is un-
likely anybody in this county would be
talking about bodycams.
Asked if county residents, other than
those attending the protests, have
been pushing for bodycams, Loar re-
plied, "Absolutely not."
And for good reason: They're not
needed.
Only recently has the relationship
between the Sheriff's Office and Gifford
showed signs of strain. Previously, Loar's
outreach into the black community
spawned unprecedented cooperation
between civic leaders and his deputies.
However, Loar launched a crack-
down on illegal drugs and guns in the
community after an off-duty deputy,
Garry Chambliss, was fatally shot
standing outside a house in Gifford in
February. That crackdown included
the March raid in which Alteria Woods
was killed at the residence of Andrew

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 3

NEWS

Coffee III and Andrew Coffee IV, who they get different technologies, it makes dacted to ensure the privacy rights of would prompt suspicion, particularly
Loar said used the woman as a shield storage and keeping up with public-re- bystanders. Also, not all of the videos in cases of officer-involved shootings.
"for protection." cord requests even more challenging." are public record – at least not until
the discovery phase of a trial. A new state law that allows police
Loar said he's still attending the The Florida Legislature requires law officers equipped with bodycams to
monthly meetings with Gifford com- enforcement agencies using bodyca- Some videos are not immediately review videos before filing their re-
munity leaders and residents, despite ms to have policies in place regulating subject to public records requests ports or testifying under oath also has
the protests sparked by the deadly officer training, use of the devices and because they're considered evidence the potential to arouse suspicion.
raid, during which a deputy also was the footage they capture. and part of the police's investigative
shot and wounded. file. However, an agency's refusal to So does redaction, which some law-
As for public-records requests, Loar release such a video almost certainly enforcement critics will seize upon to
"We're there the third Monday of ev- said some of the images must be re-
ery month," the sheriff said. "It's impor- CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
tant to have that face-to-face contact."
Exclusively John’s Island
For that reason, Loar prefers to put
his money into manpower rather than This exceptionally renovated 5BR/4.5BA family retreat is a must-see! Custom
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Besides, Loar said, as more law en- 772.231.0900 : Vero Beach, FL : JohnsIslandRealEstate.com
forcement agencies opt for bodycams,
more companies compete for cus-
tomers, and technology improves, the
cost should eventually come down.

Colton, too, said he expects to see
more law enforcement agencies in his
four-county circuit begin equipping
officers with bodycams in the coming
years. And he welcomes the technology.

But he warns that it's not a fool-
proof system.

"I can see the positives, but I also
can see problems," Colton said, add-
ing that his office investigates all offi-
cer-involved shootings in the circuit
and presents its finding to a grand jury
as a matter of policy. "Sometimes, the
videos can be misleading."

He cited variables that affect what is
visible on the videos, such as where on
the officer's body the camera is placed
and whether the officer's head is turned.

"You can get different angles and
different views that might not pres-
ent an accurate depiction of what's
happening," Colton said, recalling an
incident where a bodycam video ap-
peared to show that an officer chased
down a suspect and shot him.

"On the dash-cam video, however, you
can see the suspect turn and point a gun
at the officer," he continued. "If you re-
lied solely on the bodycam, you'd think
the officer shot the guy for no reason."

While bodycam and dash-cam videos
often provide visual evidence that aids or
exonerates good police officers or brings
bad cops to justice, Colton said cities
and counties must weigh the benefits of
adding bodycams against the costs.

Indeed, the costs to his office will be
significant, too. He said the videos must
be stored and preserved for years, long
after cases are resolved and sentences
are imposed – because they could be
needed for appeals and possibly re-trials.

"It's going to be very expensive to do it
and do it right," Colton said. "We've got
multiple agencies in the circuit, and if

4 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

My Vero Caregiver sentenced olation of probation, my recommen- He worked for Beck, Mack & Oliver,
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 dation was to revoke his probation an investment counseling firm found-
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3 and send him to prison.” ed by his father and other Princeton
ing the terms of his probation. alumni.
argue that the process offers police an Gregory White Jr., 23, had his sen- Exploitation of an elderly or dis-
opportunity to tamper with the videos abled adult is a third-degree felony, After his termination, White Jr.
before they're released to the public. tence for felony exploitation of an el- punishable by a maximum of 5 years wrote Marilyn Beck an email to apol-
derly or disabled adult reinstated and behind bars. ogize and explain he only wanted
So until our law enforcement agencies modified in Judge Cynthia L. Cox’s to emulate the family’s success. He
have all the manpower and other equip- courtroom last Thursday. White Jr. was sentenced last week pleaded for forgiveness and leniency,
ment they need to protect and serve – to 364 days in county jail with credit begging them to help him stay out of
and unless our communities produce a “White failed to make his required for 249 days time served, according to jail. He said he loved the family and
surplus of tax dollars waiting to be spent restitution payments, tested positive the office of the Indian River County was sorry he had lied to them from
– let's forget about bodycams. for using marijuana, and absconded Clerk of the Circuit Court. He also day one.
from supervision,” said Assistant State must appear before the county’s men-
Here, at least, they'd be a waste of Attorney Brian Workman. tal health court. White told the Beck his dad had
money and, possibly, more trouble than been in prison and that he was raised
they're worth.  “At the sentencing hearing on his vi- His initial sentence was for six months by a single grandmother in a rough
jail time and five years of probation. part of Wabasso.

The case got underway when Vero “You have been more of a mother
Beach Police Department responded and father figure than anyone I’ve ever
to a report of theft at the Chase Bank at came in contact with on this earth,” he
the corner of Beachland Boulevard and wrote in the email included in court
A1A in May 2014. documents. “You pushed me to begin
my own [life] and told me I could be
There, island resident John Beck somebody. That’s something I never
and a bank manager were inquiring heard before and it’s something I will
about abnormalities in Beck’s bank never forget. If there is anything I can
account. There had been at least 26 do not to go to jail, I WILL DO IT. I want
suspect withdrawals between January to see my one and only child grown up.”
and April 2014 totaling $77,730, ac-
cording to court documents. White Jr. said he became a certi-
fied nurse assistant with VNA Home
Beck told police these transactions Health and Hospice of the Treasure
were done without his consent and Coast when his girlfriend became
that his signature had been forged. He pregnant and his job at Subway wasn’t
said he believed his caregiver, White paying the bills, according to the
Jr., was responsible. email.

The family hired White Jr. in 2013 He recalled observing a Thanksgiv-
to help Beck, then 82, get around. The ing holiday at the Becks’ John’s Island
retired investment executive had re- home and said one day he wanted the
cently broken his hip and also suffered same for his family.
from Parkinson’s disease.
“I wanted to be able to send my kids
The two men would stop at the Chase off to college. I wanted me and my
Bank on their trips to town so White Jr. sons to have stories about fishing and
could receive payment for his services. camping. I wanted to establish some-
thing like Mr. B did. But, in reality,
Near the end of his employment, with bills, a new wife, a baby, I didn’t
White Jr. was earning $20 an hour. see a way out.”
During his employment with the fam-
ily he earned $17,170. White Jr.’s lawyer, Brook Butler, did
not respond to a request for com-
Marilyn Beck told authorities that ment. 
he was an “excellent employee and
would never have expected him to FIT marine laboratory
take advantage of her husband,” court CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
documents state.
can observe our marine and aqua-
She said the memory loss associ- culture labs. We want to have a learn-
ated with the Parkinson’s, medication ing center and other features that will
and her husband’s physical pain left make the lab a destination people will
him unaware the extra money White drive in to visit.”
Jr. was withdrawing was not related to
the cost of employment. The university launched a fun-
draising effort in Vero to build a
During the investigation, White 20,000-square-foot $10 million facility
Jr. told police Beck was offering him projected to open in 2015, and Cat-
more money because he knew he anese said FIT planned to add new
needed help supporting his family. faculty and expand research into the
areas of lagoon preservation, beach
Beck, an avid sportsmen and navy renourishment, ocean engineering
veteran, died at the home he shared and general oceanography, bringing
with his wife on Paget Court in John’s many more scientists and science stu-
Island in June 2015, according to an dents to Vero Beach.
obituary in the New York Times.
“There have been rumors since we
The New York native attended Phil-
lips Exeter Academy before graduat-
ing from the Wooster School in 1949.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in his-
tory from Princeton University in 1953
and graduated from Harvard business
school in 1959.

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 5

NEWS

got ownership of the property that we An architect’s rendering circulated which the lab was operating. But those Lin and perhaps more importantly a
offered to sell it to developers, but that at the time depicted a handsome mul- plans never materialized. lack of donations.
is absolutely untrue,” Catanese said. tistory building, presumably contain-
“Our goal is to become much more in- ing offices and laboratories, and neat University spokesman Wesley Sum- “Private fundraising never devel-
volved in Indian River County and get rows of aquaculture tanks above the ner last week attributed the demise oped,” Sumner said. “As for our fun-
people to view us as their private tech- beach, all intended to replace the di- of the university’s initiative to several draising goals [for the lab], there was
nological university.” lapidated former military buildings in factors, including the death of long- nothing of significance in 2016-2017.”
time lab supervisor Professor Junda
CONTINUED ON PAGE 6

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6 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

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FIT marine laboratory in 1980, when the U.S. Air Force decom- served as director of the Institute for “When she would not let him take
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5 missioned the property and turned it Marine Research since it was found- the kids, he shoved her against the
over to the school on a 30-year lease. ed. His work was focused on devel- garage wall. When she hit the wall her
Sumner says the university has re- oping what reefbuilders.com dubbed head hit the wall and she fell to the ga-
ceived multiple bids on the 4-acre The Melbourne-based university “aquaculture technology for marine rage floor striking her left elbow,” the
property, which is located behind the took ownership of the property in ornamental species to offset and re- report states.
7-11 on A1A, adjacent to Tracking Sta- 2010, around the time it first began place wild collection.”
tion Park, and has an appraised value thinking of an expanded facility. “The victim had redness and swell-
of $2.1 million. When Lin died, the lab seemed to go ing of her elbow area and redness to
Sumner talked about the scope of dark. There was no summer camp that the left side of her face. Her clothing
County Administrator Jason Brown the lab’s work during its more than 30- year and in November 2016 Sumner was soiled with dirt from her contact
said he’s certain the site has “some ap- year existence. Research focused on told Vero Beach 32963 that “the uni- with the garage floor,” Deputy Gary
peal” for other potential buyers, per- seahorse lifecycles, improved aqua- versity is assessing how to best utilize Farless wrote in his report.
haps drawing interest from developers. culture techniques for both orna- the facility. In the interim, university
mental and game fish, and rebuilding activity has been curtailed while we Farless also wrote that the child
Should the lab site wind up in the game fish populations in the Indian complete this assessment.” confirmed witnessing the above
county’s hands, it would allow county River lagoon following a series of de- events.
planners to expand parking and beach structive algae blooms. That activity never resumed and
access for visitors at Tracking Station now the site is up for sale. Sumner said On a “first appearance question-
Park. Activity at the center reached its apex Pham’s seahorse research and other naire” signed by the responding of-
around 2013-14. First came the expan- programs that were housed at the lab ficer, Chrzan’s wife answered yes to
Indian River Board of Commission- sion announcement. Then seahorse have been moved to FIT’s main cam- the question, “Has the defendant
ers chairman Joe Flescher is excited researcher Nancy Pham launched a pus in Melbourne.  previously assaulted or battered you,
about that possibility. summer camp for children ages 10- whether or not an arrest was made?”
12. In 2014 she added a second week Vero attorney arrested
“Location, location, location,” he to the camp program and more than CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 She answered no to questions ask-
said during a phone interview. “There’s doubled enrollment. At the same time, ing if he had threatened to hurt her
beach access; it can be a great draw, several private aquaculture companies According to the report, an argu- in the future, or if she or anyone else
and a draw for tourism.” were working with FIT scientists and ment over Chrzan wanting to take the would be in danger should he be re-
raising aquarium fish on the site. couple’s two children turned physi- leased from jail.
Flescher also addressed potential cal in the garage of the home with a
competition from builders. “Can we But then the fundraising effort fal- young child present. Chrzan’s release on July 18 without
match a developer’s bid? I don’t know.” tered and Dr. Junda Lin passed away having to post bond was on the con-
in March 2016 following a seven-year dition that he have no contact with
FIT opened its seaside laboratory battle with cancer. Lin was a Professor his wife, who according to the arrest
and aquaculture operation near the of Biological Sciences at FIT and had report, said she is separated from her
southern border of Indian River Shores husband.

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 7

NEWS

She has also petitioned for a “tem- female was reportedly in his vehicle. Fired Gifford principal to get away from chaos at the school
porary injunction for protection No case file is available in St. Lucie CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 resulting from her failures as a leader.
against domestic violence with mi- County, as no charges were filed in The lack of effective special education
nor children” and a hearing on that is the incident. lack of special education credentials. programs and poor teacher support
scheduled for next Wednesday in fam- By doing to, Rendell appears to be re- made it impossible for them to teach
ily court before Judge Robert Pegg. Chrzan’s mugshot and certain per- and the school was dangerous, by
Chrzan’s next criminal court date is sonal information were redacted from neging on a promise he made when in- their account.
an arraignment set for Aug. 22 before the Sheriff’s Office online booking terviewing for the superintendent’s job
County Court Judge David Morgan. report, as spokesman Lt. Thom Rau- in 2015. At that time, he said he would Decker dismissed their concerns and
len cited the statutory provision that not move underperforming principals blamed them for “having poor class-
No defense attorney is listed yet on “provides for the exemption of former around but rather “move them out.” room management skills,” but Julin and
the court records as representing Chr- assistant state attorneys' information Wood were not alone in their opinions.
zan. including photographs.” School Board Member Laura Zorc
took Decker’s hiring off the consent Out of 21 principals, Decker received
It is anticipated that State Attorney On his law firm website, Chrzan’s agenda, where it would have been ap- the largest number of negative com-
Bruce Colton’s office may petition biography states, “My professional ca- proved without comment as part of ments on the 2015-2016, end-of-year
Gov. Rick Scott to have the criminal reer began as a staff writer for several a package of routine decisions, and teacher survey – the most recent avail-
case moved out of the 19th Circuit as newspapers in Florida, including the made it an action item for discussion able.
Chrzan is not only a criminal defense Press-Journal in Vero Beach.” Chrzan at last week’s special meeting.
attorney, but a former Assistant State at no time ever worked for Vero Beach A typical teacher review was: “She
Attorney from that agency. 32963 Media. “Based on what I know occurred at seems to follow unquestioningly any-
that school, [special education] is a thing sent down from the county [dis-
Previous criminal cases involving The Florida Bar shows that Chr- huge area of weakness [for Decker],” trict administration] office. She denies
former employees of the office have zan earned his law degree from Nova Zorc said. “And there is the perception that there are problems when faculty
been handled in the 18th Circuit by Southeastern University – Shepard of shuffling around employees if they presents concerns and she lashes out
prosecutors in Brevard County. Broad Law Center in 2003 and was are not qualified.” at those who speak up. Faculty is over-
admitted to the bar in October of that whelmingly afraid of retaliation for
It was widely reported in July 2009 year. Teacher turnover was exceptionally speaking up. This administrator is a
that Chrzan resigned suddenly from high at Gifford under Decker’s leader- bully and has become dangerous.”
his job as a prosecutor, under mys- He is listed as a member in good ship, with the school losing 30 percent of
terious circumstances. It was also standing, with no notations in his 10- its teachers during the past school year. In fact, Decker failed by Rendell’s
widely reported that the resignation year disciplinary history, as of press own standards. After being hired, he
followed a May 20, 2009 incident in time on Monday. Two former Gifford teachers, Bon- instituted school report cards with
which Chrzan had a physical alter- nie Julin and Bill Wood, went before more detail than the standard state
cation with an unknown female at a Chrzan also serves on the Florida the School Board to complain about evaluations. Gifford’s report card went
gas station in Fort Pierce when the Bar’s 19th Judicial Circuit Grievance Decker. Both said they retired early
Committee.  CONTINUED ON PAGE 8

8 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

Fired Gifford principal – have Exceptional Student Education Big Tobacco about to go back
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 certifications requiring four-year col- on trial once again in Vero
lege degrees, many with ESE-related
from an A to a C over the last five years graduate degrees and multiple ESE BY BETH WALTON tisements promoting smoking during
of Decker’s tenure, and discipline met- certifications. game breaks.
rics “did not meet expectations” for Staff Writers
the last three years. So-called exceptional students in- Gould Cooksey will argue that R.J.
clude the physically handicapped, sight Some 850 summonses went out for Reynolds Tobacco Company’s willful
Despite all those problems, and Deck- and hearing impaired, autistic, emo- jury duty at the Indian River County misconduct resulted in Jones’ wrong-
er’s abrupt dismissal in June, School tionally disturbed, learning disabled, Circuit Court last month, nearly dou- ful death, according to the pretrial
Board members voted 4-to-1 to support mentally handicapped and those with ble the normal amount, as the court- brief. Marketing efforts at the time
Rendell’s decision to hire her as special other disabilities, as well as the gifted. house gears up for its third Big Tobac- were intentionally focused on impres-
education supervisor. co trial since 2015. sionable youth, it says.
Federal law requires each student
“It’s all perception,” said board mem- have an Individual Education Plan, a Jury selection in the case that pits Between the 1950s through the year
ber Dale Simchick. “I think she is over- contract, which lays out how the stu- Phyllis Jones and family against the R.J. 2000, cigarette manufactures “en-
qualified and was subject to a smear dent’s needs are to be addressed in the Reynolds Tobacco Company and its gaged in a widespread effort” to dis-
campaign in the media. I feel she did a least restrictive environment their dis- successors begins this coming Mon- credit research suggesting there was
fine job at Gifford.” abilities or gifts allow. day, according to the office of the In- link between smoking and cancer and
dian River County Clerk of the Circuit that nicotine was addictive, the brief
Simchick also warned Zorc the As a Resource Specialist, Decker Court. Island law firm Gould Cooksey states. It goes on to say, the compa-
board would have to have “legal just will oversee Individual Education Plan Fennell will represent the plaintiffs in nies used “shams” like filters and sup-
cause” to deny Rendell’s recommen- meetings, which often include par- the high-stakes civil action. posedly low-tar cigarettes “to create
dation Decker be hired for the job, and ents, doctors, physical therapists, oc- doubt about the [health] concerns,” in
expressed her disappointment that cupational therapists, language and Gould Cooksey served as co-coun- the minds of consumers.
the school district couldn’t find Deck- speech specialists, ESE teachers, so- sel in a 2015 lawsuit, Gloria Gore ver-
er a job that would pay what she had cial workers and legal representatives. sus R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris, Bryan D. Hatchell, director of com-
been making at Gifford. Decker was ESE student files include neurologi- which awarded $2 million in damag- munications for Reynolds American
paid nearly $92,000 as principal and cal, medical, psychological and intel- es to the plaintiffs, who claimed that Inc., the parent company of R.J. Reyn-
will make about $63,500 as resource ligence testing, and examination data the cigarette manufacturers know- olds Tobacco Company, declined to
specialist. not understandable to the layman. ingly sold deadly products. The to- comment on the case or the historic
bacco companies have appealed that context of the suit.
Decker’s new job title is Resource Though she lacks education in this verdict.
Specialist and there are 12 in the dis- area, Decker will head and direct dis- Thousands of similar cases have
trict. All but two – Decker and Tammy trict ESE specialists and teachers, and Another Indian River County to- been filed in the state of Florida in the
Broxton-Brown, both hired by Rendell decide if the Individual Education bacco jury trial that year, Fannie Col- wake of a 2006 state Supreme Court
and approved by the board last week Plan is well written and meets legal re- lar versus R.J .Reynolds, was decided ruling that such lawsuits are legiti-
quirements.  in favor of Big Tobacco. Gould Cook- mate but must be heard individually
sey was not involved with that law- instead of as a class action. Cases are
suit. tried in the county where the smoker
was living at the time of his or her
“These cases are somewhat unique death.
in that they require evidence to be
presented from another era,” said Arguments made by plaintiffs and
David Carter, an attorney at the firm. their attorneys in the so-called “Engle
“This is not a case about a smoker progeny” cases are boosted by Florida
who grew up with the knowledge that Supreme Court’s findings that smok-
is available today.” ing causes certain diseases and that
tobacco companies hid its dangers.
Former Indian River County resi-
dent Demos Jones, born in 1931, start- Cases like the one that will get un-
ed smoking in the mid-1940s between derway next week at the courthouse
the ages of 14-16, according to a pre- on 16th Avenue often result in jury
trial brief filed by his wife’s lawyers. He verdicts for the plaintiffs – frequently
continued to smoke until he died from followed by lengthy appeals on the
lung cancer in 1995. part of the defendants. Many plain-
tiffs have died before ever seeing a
The South Carolina native was a penny of the amount awarded to
college graduate and Air Force vet- them, but because large payouts do
eran who fathered four children and eventually result in many instances,
worked as a golf professional and res- law firms like Gould Cooksey often
taurateur. For several years he owned take the cases with a contingency
and managed the now closed Golden agreement.
Corral restaurant at the intersection of
U.S. 1 and Route 60. Trials typically take two to three
weeks, primarily because of the time
Smoking was entrenched in popular it takes to select a fair and impartial
culture in the 1940s, endorsed by film jury, Carter said.
stars, musical entertainers and other
celebrities. Medical and historic researchers
are often called as expert witnesses to
Black-and-white images showed testify to the history of the tobacco in-
soldiers at war with cigarettes in their dustry and smoking-related illnesses
mouths. Announcers at collegiate in the United States. 
sporting events would read adver-

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 9

NEWS

If it ain’t broke ... Vero wastes time on City Council terms

BY LISA ZAHNER square miles and roughly 15,000 peo- looked like they were produced in the All the City Council meetings and
Staff Writers ple. The city staff is more than patient pre-computer era – Finance Director committee meetings are videotaped,
and willing to spend as much time as Cindy Lawson has remedied all of that. archived and available to watch from
For the past 98 years, Vero Beach necessary educating council members any smart phone or computer. So there
City Council members have been on issues and background and general Lawson came on in 2011, and she has is no excuse for not being up to speed
elected to two-year terms, giving vot- city operations and finances. since demystified and streamlined the on major issues the day a City Council
ers the opportunity to get rid of them city’s financial reporting. Now, every- member takes the oath of office.
in fairly short order if (as all too often Though it was nearly impossible to thing is online and user-friendly, so any
happens) they fail to perform. make heads or tails out of Vero’s ac- person familiar with basic private-sector Another reason it should not take a
counting system a decade ago – be- financial reports, or even an average lay- year to get up to speed: The City Coun-
Now, two years before the city’s cen- cause the city was still using arcane man, can easily access, read and under- cil used to be heavily involved in con-
tennial, there’s an effort underway to bookkeeping methods established in stand the city budget and quarterly bud- tentious personnel and labor disputes
change council terms to three years. the 1960s, and printing reports that get-to-actual analyses the staff produces.
That’s already a rollback from initial CONTINUED ON PAGE 10
proposals to change them to four-year
terms – like those served by Indian Riv-
er County commissioners. But the idea
of longer terms, whether three years or
four, is a bad, bad idea.

Anyone who has followed some of the
clueless and borderline reckless people
who have served on Vero’s City Council
knows that two years is a long time to
suffer the consequences of the poor de-
cisions voters occasionally make.

NEWS ANALYSIS

At the same time, if council mem-
bers actually do a good job, represent
their constituents well, or curry favor
with enough special interests, they can
– and often do – serve four, six or eight
years, and sometimes longer. Vero has
no term limits.

The main argument made by pro-
ponents of longer terms is that it takes
the first year or so for a new City Coun-
cil member to learn his or her job,
which only leaves a year for effective
action. That is a scary thought.

First of all, the ideal City Council
candidate would have served on one
of Vero’s volunteer advisory commit-
tees. Through this experience, the can-
didate would have grown accustomed
to reading and digesting large agenda
packets, to deliberating important is-
sues, to dealing with the city staff and
to the proper order that meetings and
motions and votes and public com-
ment should take. They would have had
at least a couple of briefings on Florida’s
public records and open meetings laws.

Second, asuccessfulCityCouncilcan-
didate should have a decent amount of
real-world professional experience. If –
as has been known to occur – the voters
are duped into electing someone with-
out the required intelligence, analytical
ability and life skills to muddle through
as a City Council member, two years of
that person can seem like an eternity.

And third, Vero Beach City Hall is
not the halls of Congress or even the
labyrinth that is the state capital com-
plex in Tallahassee. Vero is a city of 13

10 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

NEWS

Longer terms for Vero Council plus decades of utility experience as are readily available online, or if the Hospital search for partner
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 9 several of the city’s he’s managed had council member cannot find them, CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
their own water, sewer or electric utili- City Clerk Tammy Bursick is quick
with police officers, Teamsters and ties. And O’Connor is one of the best and ready to provide elected officials Board, local physician Val Zudans, a
other groups, but Vero now has a tough, sources of no-nonsense answers and whatever need – just as she does for former District Board member, pro-
seasoned labor attorney in Jason Odom information in the State of Florida the public and for the media. duced a passage from Florida’s 2016
of the Gould Cooksey Fennell law firm when it comes to how to run a city. state statutes that cut to the issue.
who shepherds the negotiation of Why is the City Council wasting its
union contracts and handles person- Being a City Council member on the time, not to mention City Attorney The law (Title XI, 155.40) requires any
nel issues to keep the city out of court cusp of Vero’s 100th birthday is prob- Wayne Coment’s time, researching this petition for a hospital sale or lease to re-
whenever possible. And he manages to ably easier than it has been in the city’s boondoggle and drawing up a draft or- ceive a final order from the office of the
explain things to the City Council with- history. dinance to establish three-year terms Secretary of Health Care Administration
out sounding much like a lawyer. that would go to the Council for a first approving or denying the transaction.
Agenda packets are loaded onto reading at its Aug. 8 meeting with a There are more than two dozen criteria
City Manager Jim O’Connor has electronic tablets, making it simpler public hearing to follow on Sept. 5? that must be met to secure approval,
nearly 40 years of municipal man- to prepare for meetings and make in- including one that “the proposed trans-
agement experience under his belt, formed decisions. Communication is This is an idea whose time has not action does not unreasonably exclude a
effortless and timely due to technolo- come. Forget holding a referendum on potential purchaser or lessee on the ba-
gy. Public records needed for research this demented idea.  sis of being a for-profit or not-for-profit
Florida corporation or other form of
business organization.”

In an interview afterward, Zudans
said some District board members
were dismissive of his warning. “Already
three members of that board have pub-
licly expressed a preference for a not-
for-profit partner. I think they’ve left
themselves legally exposed.”

The peril is that a for-profit suitor
could claim the waters were poisoned
against it well in advance. That could
be a viable complaint to test in court.

District Board member Barbara Bod-
nar shares Zudan’s concern.

“Look at for-profits as well,” she said.
“We don’t want the public saying we’re
only looking at nonprofits. If you’re go-
ing to explore, explore everything.”

That point was reiterated several
times at the last meeting of the Col-
laborative Committee, a group com-
posed of District Board members
and members of the Medical Center
Board, but some hospital leaders still
say they want a nonprofit partner.

“The gist is the resolve that the
IRMC board intends to explore poten-
tial partnership opportunities with a
special focus on not-for-profit enti-
ties, to provide the long-term delivery
of high-quality healthcare services to
the residents of Indian River County,”
Medical Center board chairman Hock-
meyer said last week.

Those insisting on a nonprofit part-
ner seem to fear that a for-profit cor-
poration would be more likely to make
draconian cuts to programs.

In other business, the District Board
also voted 6-1 to raise property taxes
by about 15 percent, with Tracy Zu-
dans cast the lone dissenting vote. If
the proposed rate goes into effect, In-
dian River County homeowners would
pay, on average, about $11 more each
year to support the facility.

The board also approved a $2.2 mil-
lion increase to its budget, which will
rise to $15.3 million in 2018. Fully $1
million will be used to cover legal and
consultant fees for the effort to find
the hospital a partner. 

CHRISTMAS IN JULY
‘PRESENTS’ KIDS WITH
MIDSUMMER FUN P. 18

12 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

12 3

CAPTIONS

1. U.S. Army Cpl. Andres Rosa is welcomed to his

new home in Vero Beach. 2. Marty Zickert with

Eli and Patrick Williamson. 3. Master Sgt. George

Vera and service dog Bronco. 4. Cpl. Rosa’s new

mortgage-free home. 5. Cpl. Andres Rosa with

daughter Luiza, along with Susan Cole, JPMorgan

Chase and Kim Valdyke, Building Homes for

Heroes. PHOTOS: GORDON RADFORD

45

Building Homes for Heroes opens new doors for veteran

BY MARY SCHENKEL regional construction & operations “We’re all about privacy for our vet- Land O’Lakes home in early Decem-
Staff Writer manager. erans,” said Valdyke, pointing out the ber. “We actually live two doors down
privacy fencing on either side of the from where we’ll be,” said Vera, add-
To the cheers of family and well- “I’m so overwhelmed and honored small backyard and pool. She also ing that he would likely stay in the
wishers, U.S. Army Cpl. Andres Rosa to present you with this home. JPM- noted the soothing sound from a tiny Army for another three years.
and daughter Luiza stepped over the organ Chase in 2011 committed to waterfall into the pool, adding “most
threshold of their new mortgage-free 1,000 homes for veterans and so far of our vets have some sort of tinnitus U.S. Army Specialist Hugo Gonza-
home last Wednesday morning. The we’ve given away 900. You’re 901,” and the sound helps drown out noise lez, critically wounded while serving
lovely home in the peaceful Green said Susan Cole, JPMorgan Chase and helps with PTSD.” in Baqubah, Iraq, received his Port St.
Vista Estates community was gifted vice president. Lucie home two years ago.
to Rosa through a partnership be- Humbled and a little overwhelmed
tween Building Homes for Heroes Valdyke also recognized Advanced by the outpouring of support, Rosa “He is so inspirational; he could
and JPMorgan Chase & Co. Auto Parts, stating that over the past said he plans to attend school to pos- inspire a turnip to do something,”
four years they have donated more sibly work in radiology or as an EMT. said Valdyke of Gonzalez, noting that
Rosa served in the Army for more than $6.8 million to Building Homes Participants choose from the numer- he recently flew to New York to help
than a decade before taking a medi- for Heroes. Additionally, she said that ous homes BHH has available across New York City Triathlon participants
cal retirement after a catastrophic for the fourth year in a row the Flor- the country and Rosa said he opted Liz Claman and Christopher Hahn of
injury while on a mission in Afghani- ida legislature and Gov. Rick Scott for Vero Beach after visiting friends Fox Business Network raise $86,000
stan left him with “lumbar interver- have provided BHH with a grant. This in the area. to benefit BHH.
tebral disc syndrome, fibromyalgia year’s was $1 million to enable BHH
(chronic pain), sleep apnea, a trau- to renovate as many homes as possi- Told that his sister, Arlene Perales, “We have more than 6,000 appli-
matic brain injury (TBI), hearing loss, ble in one year while putting as many had said he loved the sport so much cants currently,” said Valdyke of Gon-
and severe PTSD.” contractors as possible back to work. that “he eats and breathes fishing,” zalez, stressing the demand. “We’re in
he smiled in agreement saying, “I’m the high season now of giving homes.”
“Thank you so very much for com- “Our plan is to renovate, modify going to fish as much as possible,
ing out to welcome home Andres and and build 25 homes in the state of when I’m not in school.” The national nonprofit organiza-
Luiza Rosa to their forever home. We Florida from July 1 to June 30,” said tion was founded in 2006 to support
could not do what we do without our Valdyke, noting that the addition of Also on hand were two other returning men and women wounded
wonderful, biggest supporter, and those 25 homes will bring to 100 the wounded combat veterans accepted while courageously serving in the
that is Chase Bank,” said Kim Val- number of BHH homes gifted in Flor- into the BHH family. armed forces during Iraq or Afghani-
dyke, Building Homes for Heroes ida; each modified to meet the indi- stan wars.
vidual’s particular needs. Master Sgt. George Vera was look-
ing forward to moving into his new For more information, visit build-
inghomesforheroes.org. 



14 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

Cycling for Cameron: A 3,143-mile labor of love

BY MARY SCHENKEL
Staff Writer

Part-time Windsor residents Kevin Cycling for Cameron racers: Andy Cooper, Chris Peters, Kevin Bespolka (team captain), Nicky Szápáry, Fred Horwood, Mark Colman, Marc Christensen and Stuart Baldwin.
and Corinne Bespolka recently ral-
lied friends and family from around
the world to support their Cycle for
Cameron team and raise funds for
the Cameron Bespolka Trust through
the annual Race Across America. The
couple, who also reside in Winchester,
England, founded the trust in memory
of their beloved son Cameron, who was
just 16 when he was killed in Decem-
ber 2013 by an avalanche while skiing
in Austria.

A budding ornithologist, Cameron
was passionate about birds, nature,
the environment and spending time
outdoors. The couple expects to raise
roughly $300,000 to provide oppor-
tunities for youngsters in the UK and
Vero Beach to experience that same
joy.

Kevin Bespolka led a team of eight
racers and 12 crew members from New
York, Utah, Florida, South Carolina,
the United Kingdom, Canada, Austria

and Venezuela in the grueling test of hours depending on conditions. A 12-
endurance, billed as the world’s tough- bunk bus tailed them, as did a follow-
est bicycle race. Windsor Gun Club Di- car with crew members providing nav-
rector Nicky Szápáry joined as a rider igational instruction via earpieces.
and the crew included Cameron’s trip-
let siblings, Megan and Nicholas. “Every crew member had to be to-
tally tuned in, committed and alert,”
“It was wonderful,” said Kevin Be- stressed Szápáry. “There’s no way you
spolka. “One of the really nice things can doze off for a second. You have to
about it was all the support we’ve got- be able to react to any type of condition
ten in so many ways, both monetary and be flexible. It was amazing how
and emotional, and the many volun- committed the crew was.”
teers who helped before and during.”
“One of the real surprises that Nicki
The team took off June 17 from and I both felt was what a logistical
Oceanside, Calif., and rode relay-style effort it was. When Nicki and I first
24 hours a day before ending their came up with the idea we thought it
strenuous journey in Annapolis, Md., would be fun to do,” said Bespolka.
six days, 15 hours and 22 minutes later. “We really didn’t appreciate, probably
They were welcomed at the finish line a good thing, what a mammoth logis-
by Corinne and daughter Sienna. Be- tical undertaking it was. We all spent
cause of slight route changes, the origi- many months training for this, quite
nal 3,070 miles became 3,143 miles. intensively, to make sure we could get
through it and have the strength to go
“It was an amazing experience; we day after day through difficult weather
saw so many wonderful parts of the conditions and terrain.”
United States. It’s really hard to sum
it up,” said Kevin Bespolka. “It’s hard “I think for all of us, the hardest part
to believe it’s been and gone. The first was the extreme heat at the first part
few days were hard and then the time of the route. When we got into the Bor-
flew by. Traveling at 20 miles per hour rego Desert in Arizona it was 117 de-
on a bicycle you see and experience so grees; it’s like being exposed to a blow
much more than you would in a car. dryer. You could not escape the heat,”
You see much more of the nature of said Szápáry, noting that they rode
the world around you, particularly out from below sea level to 7,500 feet in
west where the countryside is so big those broiling temperatures. “Kevin
and so open.” and I were lucky enough the next day
to go through Monument Valley at
Clearly no Sunday ride in the park, sunrise and that was something I’ll re-
the riders were split into two teams of member all my life. It was just out-of-
four, each on duty between six and 11

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 15

Cycling for Cameron finish line. PEOPLE

who need help; a lot more than you is a fantastic cause. We’ve had a home
would think in our community,” ex- in Vero since 1999 and Cameron really
plained Kevin Bespolka. “I think what grew up in Vero. We spent our holidays
was interesting to us, amazing and sad, in Vero and it means a lot to us as a
is that in a place as idyllic as Vero Beach family. We’re delighted to expand our
that you have so many homeless chil- charity to try and help kids here and in
dren that don’t have the opportuni- the UK.”
ties that others have, and that don’t get
exposed to the beautiful nature that’s Locally they hope to raise enough
around Vero.” to purchase a bus to transport home-
less children to their adventures, and
“There is a really big need; it’s so in England they are working toward
incredibly high,” Corinne Bespolka building a nature-based retreat for
added. “We were obviously delighted young people called Cameron’s Cot-
to help in any small way. We were very tage.
thrilled to be able to work with the
Homeless Children Foundation, which To donate or for more information,
visit www.cameronbespolka.com. 

Megan, Kevin, Corinne, Nicholas and Sienna Bespolka.

this-world spectacular, the light and Cameron Bespolka.
rock formations.”
was the one thing we could do to keep
“You realize just what a diverse his memory alive, by giving other chil-
country the United States is, and how dren the opportunity to be exposed to
massive, and how different. You start and to love nature as much as he did.”
at California at the ocean, you cycle
through the agricultural belt and then In Vero, the couple provides funds
all of a sudden you’re in the desert to the Homeless Children Founda-
and then you’ve got Monument Valley tion, which facilitates opportunities
and then the high plains and then the for homeless children, identified by
Rockies and then Kansas and rolling various local organizations, to attend
hills and it goes on and on and on. It’s nature camps.
really quite something,” Bespolka said.
Of a particularly memorable moment “It’s really important to expose chil-
in Colorado he recalled, “descend- dren to the world around us. There ac-
ing down a mountainside in the very tually are all these homeless children
early morning, just as the first bits of
light were starting in the sky. It was
completely quiet and then you could
hear the dawn chorus of all the birds
starting to sing. I was just freewheeling
down the path and listening.”

It was precisely the sort of experi-
ence their son would have relished.

“We set up the trust after Cameron
died,” said Corinne Bespolka. “We just
felt it was one way for us to continue do-
ing something that he absolutely loved
and was passionate about. We felt it

16 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

Literacy on the Lagoon is summer success story

BY STEPHANIE LaBAFF
Staff Writer

For the past 100 years, summer Yanitezel Zamarripa. PHOTOS: GORDON RADFORD ELC Naturalist Sarah Rhodes-Ondi (center) talks with Literacy on the Lagoon participants.
school has been earmarked for aca-
demic remediation or as a way to gan working with the school district came evident that something more seine nets into the lagoon, but when
make up failed classes so that stu- toward the Moonshot Moment goal than traditional classroom instruc- they get back to school they are re-
dents can advance to the next grade. of 90 percent of students reading at tion was needed. flecting on those experiences and do-
With the growing number of students grade level by the third grade, it be- ing research before they come back to
falling behind in school, summer Barbara Hammond, TLA co-found- the ELC again.”
learning has become the new norm. er and CEO, recalled that the ques-
tion posed was, “So how do we create Today, rising third-graders in the
In Indian River County struggling wonder and curiosity and real learn- alternative summer school program
students are getting a boost through ing to close the gap that these kids are showing great gains. They have
Literacy on the Lagoon, a hybrid are experiencing in school?” gone from scoring below grade level
summer school/camp at the Envi- in reading to surpassing their peers.
ronmental Learning Center that uses The answer came four years ago Data collected indicates that the pro-
immersive learning to stop the sum- when Sebastian River and Treasure gram not only stopped the summer
mer slide and create confident, life- Coast Elementary School students slide but showed students making
long learners. participated in the pilot Literacy on gains.
the Lagoon program, co-developed
A 1996 Review of Educational Re- by the ELC, TLA and the school dis- Prior to entering the program
search indicated that students not trict. campers were 30 percent behind
engaged in summer enrichment ac- their peers academically, whereas
tivities lose roughly one month of “This program is more than just post assessments showed them be-
grade-level equivalency. And a 2007 summer school and it’s more than ginning the school year 6.5 percent
Beginning School Study cited “by just summer camp. It really is a hy- ahead of their peers.
the end of fifth grade, disadvantaged brid of those two programs,” ex-
youth are nearly three grade equiva- plained Heather Stapleton, ELC ed- According to Stapleton, total im-
lents behind their more affluent peers ucation director. “Kids are outside mersion in the four-week camp is
in reading; two-thirds of the ninth- having fun, going canoeing, taking what makes it work. Monday and
grade reading achievement gap can
be explained by unequal access to
summer learning opportunities dur-
ing the elementary school years, and
nearly one-third of the gap is already
present when children begin school.”

According to Kelly Baysura, the
former principal of Treasure Coast
Elementary School who will become
executive director of Elementary Pro-
grams in the fall, “students lose about
25 percent of their literacy skills dur-
ing the summer. The benefit of the
Literacy on the Lagoon program is
that we keep them in school, we keep
them engaged and they actually gain
skills rather than losing skills.”

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Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 17

PEOPLE

Elijah Mackay. Allie Haigler. Alexis Peralta, stormwater Shomon Thomas.
educator for Indian River County.

Friday students roll up their sleeves average score on the pre-test in 2016 to Literacy on the Lagoon. Rising The Learning Alliance has since
and seine, dig, scoop and paddle was 19.05 percent, and on the post- first-graders identified as perform- presented the program to state poli-
their way through the Indian River test, it was 96.91 percent. The trans- ing below grade-level were offered cymakers in Tallahassee and the
Lagoon’s unique ecosystem. Three formation was amazing.” the opportunity to attend a summer Wallace Foundation in Jacksonville,
days a week they read, write, com- program rooted in the arts, which hoping others will institute similar
plete projects and discuss what they “We’re creating a time and a space utilizes movement, art and music to programs to encourage learning and
saw during their ELC visits. Expe- that’s fun for students to learn. We enrich the learning experience. to stop the summer slide. 
riential learning is key to the pro- have to bring this kind of learning
gram’s success, with each day struc- into the classroom every day,” added
tured around a storybook associated Baysura.
with the study topic.
She noted that the program would
“For example, we read the ‘Wart- not have even gotten off the ground
ville Wizard,’ which emphasizes the without the support of local philan-
importance of recycling and not lit- thropists such as Kjestine and Peter
tering. Activities that day focus on Bijur, who were integral to the re-
nature appreciation and personal ceipt of funding from the Windsor
responsibility to the environment,” Charity Polo Cup.
explained Stapleton, adding that the
curriculum builds on environmental “The Bijurs are big fans of the
topics and the science of the lagoon. program and really stand behind
it,” said Baysura. “They are true ad-
“They are having fun and it’s to- vocates. When funding it becomes
tally integrated with what’s going on an issue, they always step up to the
during the school day,” shared Ham- plate. They are humble, quiet he-
mond. “Meanwhile, the school day roes. Otherwise, I don’t know that
doesn’t feel like a school day because the program would be able to hap-
it’s highly multisensory arts-inte- pen. Kjestine has brilliant ideas and
grated learning. It really is a model really believes in the power of sup-
for how schools marry fun with rig- porting students, especially those
orous academic standards. This is who are struggling.”
how we create literate, compassion-
ate, creative, lifelong learners who “It’s a very rigorous program with
will improve our world.” very dense curriculum, which I’m
very proud of,” shared Kjestine Bijur.
Stapleton said the increase in stu- “They get out there in the lagoon;
dent self-confidence has been signif- they do the netting project where
icant and campers have also shown they scoop up stuff out of the lagoon.
a 10 percent growth in their math They look at it and they learn about
skills, again putting them ahead of it. They love it, it’s like camp and rig-
their peers. orous classroom combined into one.
We’re having a huge success. We
“The first year we used a pre-test want them all to succeed. We want
to assess their knowledge and the them all to have a chance.”
children started crying because they
couldn’t read the tests or answer any When the collaborative realized
of the questions,” she recalled. “By that reaching children at an even
the time the students took the post- earlier age would prevent the learn-
test, they couldn’t stop writing. The ing gap from widening, they insti-
tuted Literacy in Motion as a prequel

18 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

PEOPLE

Christmas in July ‘presents’
kids with midsummer fun

Santa arrives! PHOTOS: GORDON RADFORD

BY STEPHANIE LaBAFF tropical shirt, chatted with good little
girls and boys.
Staff Writer
Riley Carter, a 5-year-old sport-
A snowstorm hit Sebastian’s Riv- ing fairy wings and a painted face,
erview Park last Saturday afternoon showed off the LEGO alien that Santa
and meteorologists speculated that had given her – after she had assured
the snow on the ground was caused him she would be good for the rest
by the wake of the jet ski used by Saint of the year. She also told the jolly old
Nicholas as he zoomed into town for fellow that she has her heart set on a
the fourth annual Christmas in July mama and baby unicorn for Christ-
event to support Shop with a Cop. mas.

With the help of local law enforce- Sebastian Police Chief Michelle
ment and a little Christmas magic, Morris kept her cool – literally – by
the community came together to sup- taking one for the team in the dunk
port the collaborative effort, which tank. There seemed to be an inordi-
provides families in need with a boost nate number of Sebastian police offi-
during the holidays. Proceeds from cers among those in line to try their
the summertime extravaganza en- luck at drenching their boss, with one
able officers to take roughly 150 chil- officer appearing to fund youngsters
dren on a December shopping spree at in their attempts after his failed to hit
Walmart to search for presents to put the target.
under the tree. Each child receives a
$100 gift card and is escorted by their “Y’all can dunk me 1,000 times as
own personal shopper who assists long as you’re paying,” laughed Mor-
them with their selections. Even more ris. “My goal is to make the most mon-
importantly, the relationships forged ey and it’s certainly cooling me off.”
during the shopping excursion en-
able children to see members of law Indian River County Sheriff’s Office
enforcement in a whole new light. Deputy Teddy Floyd, as much a part
of the event as Santa himself, danced
“The community always comes to- to the music with DJ SHHH-Op and
gether for us when it comes to help- the Sebastian Has Hip Hop dance
ing out the children and taking care team, and also threw his fair share of
of each other,” said Ashley Penn, Se- snowballs.
bastian Police Department school re-
source officer. “After a long week with all the stuff
that’s been going on in the commu-
On Saturday, families enjoyed an nity, this is a breath of fresh air,” said
afternoon of games, a scavenger hunt, Floyd. “You can interact with the kids,
dancing and watching a demo by the make money to help the less fortu-
Sebastian Police Department’s K-9 nate and have some fun. This is what
Unit. To keep them frosty cool, chil- it’s all about.”
dren frolicked in the trucked-in snow,
raced to put on frozen T-shirts and “This year is the biggest year yet,”
slurped Italian ices. shared IRSO Deputy Roberta Barker.
“It’s been a great turnout. The people
Santa, clad in Bermuda shorts and a are just wonderful and, of course, it
all benefits the kids.” 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 19

PEOPLE

SPD Detectives Rich Snell and Todd Finnegan work the grill. SPD Officer Andrew Evans, Lorne Phillips and Colby Smith. Cassidy Harmon, Tina Ioffredo and Brooke Griggs.

Tobby Teague and Sebastian Police Chief Michelle Morris.

Celina Galasso with daughter Haileigh.

Dominic and Tammy Fullington with Holly Wolack.

Dee Hollenbeck with daughter Alora.

IRSO Deputy Cliff Labbe and SPD Officer Ashley Penn.



NEW VETERANS MONUMENT
WILL SUIT SANCTUARY TO A ‘T’

22 Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

ARTS & THEATRE

New veterans monument will suit sanctuary to a ‘T’

BY STEPHANIE LABAFF Ross Power - ‘Focus’ sculpture on display in the Biscayne Bay Sculpture takes them to a website and audio tour.
Garden at Florida International University. The use of technology allows visitors to
Staff Writer hear snippets of veterans’ descriptions,
Afghanistan veterans,” says Capt. Doy monumental sculptor Ross Power, a poetry and thoughts.
Veterans Memorial Island Sanctuary Demsick, program manager of the Vet- well-known Miami artist and developer
is a testament to the level of respect the erans Council of Indian River County. now living in Vero Beach. “This is an ongoing war, and the
people of Indian River County have for sculpture is also alive and ever-chang-
those who served and sacrificed their The veterans expressed a wish to cre- Power’s intention at first was to ad- ing,” explains Power.
lives in times of war. Now, plans are in ate a piece of art. Conversations began vise on the monument. After he met
motion to add a sculpture to the stars between former U.S. Marine Corps with Hoffman and Cady, it occurred to The concept wasn’t without contro-
and stripes snapping in the breeze, Capt. Bruce Cady and Barbara Hoff- him he could do more. “I felt their pas- versy. Members of the Veterans Memo-
brightening the beacon the sanctuary man of the county’s Cultural Council. sion,” he says. “I was so moved, I knew rial Island Committee take seriously
provides for people honoring those lost At Hoffman’s suggestion, they met with this could be one of my greatest piec- the responsibility of maintaining the
in battle. es. It was what I call the ‘aha’ moment integrity of the island and its mission
where the three of us knew ‘this is it.’” to honor veterans. To that end, some
Since the park’s dedication in 1964, thought the proposed design didn’t fit
monuments to each branch of service Power’s artistic career has spanned with the style of the memorials cur-
have been erected as well as memori- more than 40 years. Typically his work rently on the island.
als honoring Purple Heart veterans has focused on pieces appealing to
and POW/MIAs. Veterans of Pearl Har- social conscience or environmental It wasn’t until community members,
bor, WWII and the Korean and Viet- awareness. His public art projects can veterans and family members of fallen
nam wars also are recognized within be seen in Hawaii, California, Flori- soldiers shared their thoughts that a
the sanctuary. da and Spain, among other locations clear picture of the Iraq/Afghanistan
around the world. Memorial took shape during a July 5
Missing among the honored are those committee meeting. That forum drew
who had tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. After numerous interviews with vet- record attendance, organizers say.
Given that the fighting continues today, erans who served in Iraq and Afghani-
veterans’ groups felt it was time to hon- stan since 2001, one iconic image kept The basic shape of the T-wall is
or the nearly 7,000 Americans who have recurring: a portable concrete vertical something of an icon to most modern
died in combat. wall attached to a base. Known as T- veterans. Standing 16 feet tall in a war
walls, the structures are clustered to- zone, the wall sits on a wide base that
“We found that people were not aware gether on the battlefield to afford fight- forms the “T.” “They’re massive, and
of what was happening with Iraq and ers protection. they protect everyone from small arms
fire, mortar rounds, and vehicle-borne
Power, Cady and Demsick met for IEDs,” Demsick explains.
breakfast and ended up walking out
with a sketch on a napkin. U.S. Army veteran Ryan Gridley, re-
counting his time at a forward operat-
“Bruce was pushing for something ing base before there were T-walls, said
that would bring a new demographic it was customary for soldiers to sit, eat
in, something avant-garde. The first and sleep with flak jackets on. Once the
thing I thought of was an interactive walls were built, soldiers felt protected
sculpture with words.” enough to take their helmets and flak
jackets off.
The final design for the sculpture
incorporates word art with an audio For one Gold Star mother, the pro-
aspect. “It’s pretty avant-garde, but at tective wall was unfamiliar. Michelle
the same time it is rooted to the ground Dale’s son, Cpl. Dale Kridlow, was killed
with true words from veterans,” says in action in Kunar Province, Afghani-
Power. The monument will consist of stan, on Nov. 7, 2010, when insurgents
three, 7-feet-tall concrete T-walls con- attacked his unit.
nected by a dome at the center. Each
wall will contain the raised and etched “I never got a chance to talk to my
“words of war.” son before he was killed. I didn’t know
anything about the T-walls,” said Dale,
As visitors observe the wall, they can who was moved by the committee’s
use a smartphone to scan a code that presentation.

“I felt some peace and closure just
looking at the picture of it and listen-
ing to what they said,” said Dale. “This
memorial will give anyone who had
someone in this war some closure. It’s
important for parents to know there
was something that gave their kids a
feeling of well-being while they were in
Afghanistan and Iraq serving. It really
opened up my heart.”

“I counted myself among the uncon-
scious regarding veterans of this war,”
said Sean Sexton, a well-regarded poet
and painter and longtime rancher. “I
believe that art should be used in ser-
vice of social expression and in the ser-
vice of honoring our veterans.” 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 23

ARTS & THEATRE

PHOTO: DAVID GONSIER

Modern-dance guest stars to
shine in Ballet Vero opener

BY MICHELLE GENZ job. For the past 11 years, he has been SEE THESE AND OTHER FINE THINGS AT VERO’S FINEST
executive director of the America-Israel COLLECTION OF AMERICAN-MADE ART AND JEWELRY
Staff Writer Cultural Foundation, an organization
formed in 1939 that supports the arts THEL AUGHINGDOGGALLERY.COM 2910 CARDINAL DR.
Ballet Vero Beach’s upcoming August in Israel through grants. Over the years, VERO BEACH, FL
concert opens the fifth season for the it claims to have helped 18,000 art- 7 72 . 2 3 4 . 6711
company, and caps the sixth Riverside ists through more than $140 million in
Dance Festival. And for the enthusias- grants, with offices in New York and Tel
tic Vero audience for modern dance, the Aviv. Alumni include Itzhak Perlman,
annual performance typically ranks Pinchas Zuckerman, Gil Shaham and
first among summer cultural events. Daniel Barenboim.

In what has now become a tradition Grossman teaches part-time at a
of having its first program of the season dance studio; with a graduate degree in
feature a guest modern dance company, early childhood education, she has also
Ballet Vero Beach artistic director Adam taught pre-school.
Schnell is bringing in a New York and
New Jersey-based company that he’s Grossman trained at the Joffrey Bal-
had in mind for the past two years: Ariel let School and the highly selective La-
Rivka Dance. Guardia High School of Music and Art
and the Performing Arts. She majored
The all-female company is led by a in dance at Skidmore College, and after
husband-and-wife team, one choreo- graduating won a commission to set a
graphing to the other’s compositions. dance on Skidmore dancers. Her college
minor was women’s studies, and that
The Joffrey-trained Ariel Grossman, too came into play when she formed
a New York native, and her husband, Ariel Rivka Dance and determined the
classical composer David Homan, who company would only include women
is from Gainesville, Florida. began the dancers.
dance company in 2008. It now per-
forms at New York Live Arts, the Chelsea That aspect piqued the interest of
theater that is home to the renowned Schnell when Grossman sent in an ap-
Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Compa- plication two years ago for her compa-
ny. There, Ariel Rivka Dance’s 10th an- ny to teach and perform at Ballet Vero
niversary festival will run Sept. 6-9. Beach’s summer intensive. Both Schnell
and Ballet Vero Beach ballet master Ca-
For those upcoming New York perfor- milo Rodriguez have created multiple
mances, Homan will play his own com- works with gender as a central theme,
position for piano as Grossman’s chore- often blurring lines between male
ography fills the stage. In Vero, Homan and female dancers, and sometimes
is offering a class in composition for switching genders altogether. Both men
dance as part of the Riverside Festival. danced professionally with the all-male
comic touring company, Les Ballets
The couple, who arrived in Vero last Trockadero de Monte Carlo.
weekend, is staggering their time teach-
ing to take care of their two young chil- Like other modern dance compa-
dren, a daughter, Eva, 3, and a baby boy,
Max, just 3 months old. CONTINUED ON PAGE 24

Besides composing, Homan has a day

24 Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 23 ARTS & THEATRE

nies invited to Vero for the Riverside children with developmental disor- Coming Up: Arrrrrrrrgh you
Dance Festival, Ariel Rivka Dance is ders. ready for the Pirate Festival?
young but earning notice. “We started
very small and we’ve really grown,” Dancer Caitlyn Casson has a Florida BY SAMANTHA BAITA Comedy Zone, always featuring two
says Grossman. connection. She graduated from the Staff Writer comedians. This week brings you Pat-
University of South Florida with a BFA rick Garrity and Todd Riley. Garrity
This year, the company traveled to in Dance. Casson, who like other danc- 1 1 Oppor- has performed in comedy clubs from
Houston and Baltimore. Two years ago, ers freelances with several companies, tunities coast to coast, during what he calls
it performed in Philadelphia; the year has traveled extensively – most recently, “the never-ending tour.” The Comedy
before, at Saratoga Artsfest. In Hous- to Rwanda – with MindLeaps, an inter- for fun abound Zone Worldwide website calls Gar-
ton and Baltimore, performances were national program to teach dance and rity’s humor “fresh and original,” as
held at Jewish community centers and offer vocational training to street kids this weekend he employs characters, impressions
included Grossman’s work, “Book of in developing countries. and, as fuel for his routines, real-life
Esther.” Set to a score by Homan, the in Vero Beach, situations such as growing up with
18-minute dance in four movements Dancer Danita Shaheen has a strong a little brother and “why Irish don’t
follows the narrative of the biblical sto- ballet background, having trained in where you can trash talk.” Riley has appeared with
ry of the salvation of the Jewish people the Balanchine technique with New comedians such as Jon Reep and Dov
in ancient Persia; it is the basis of the York City Ballet soloist David Otto. She enjoy music, Davidoff at comedy venues across the
traditional festival of Purim. The story has performed extensively with more country for the last five years, includ-
involves two queens: Vashti, who is than a dozen modern dance companies art, festival fun – and pirates. This ing Comedy Central’s Up Next Na-
asked by the king to publicly show off and has founded a company of her own, tionwide Comedy Competition, and
her beauty naked; she refuses, a gesture Dance Riot Rep. Friday through Sunday the third an- is known for his “sarcastic viewpoint
that to Grossman earns her the title of … and for pointing out the obvious in
the first feminist in the bible. Esther is And Kristin Licata graduated from nual Vero Beach Pirate Festival is hap- everyday life,” according to Riverside’s
the queen who replaces Vashti. the Ailey School of Fordham University, bio. Shows are at 7:30 p.m. and 9:30
and has worked with modern dance lu- pening, inarguably the prettiest event p.m.
Together with its national tour- minaries including William Forsythe,
ing, the company has also reached a Robert Battle and Seán Curran. venue in the county, beneath the oaks
milestone by forming its first board
of directors. Along with an impres- Those dancers and others are teach- in Riverside Park. It’s commemorat-
sive array of architects and attorneys, ing at the Vero ballet camp.
there are several members with strong ing the 302nd anniversary of the sink-
dance backgrounds. Vero artistic director Schnell has
kept Ariel Rifka Dance in mind for the ing of the 1715 Plate Fleet (which is
Among those is Hana Ginsburg Tiro- August program ever since viewing
sh, a principal dancer with the com- company videos two years ago. “I was why the area’s commonly referred to
pany. A Princeton graduate in interna- torn between Wylliams/Henry Con-
tional affairs, she earned a master’s in temporary Dance Company (last year’s as “The Treasure Coast”). Live music
dance performance and teaching from performers) and Ariel Rifka Dance,” he
SUNY Purchase College Conservatory says. “I really wanted to represent the on stage will, of course, accompany
of Dance. She is also New York City ethnic diversity of Wylliams/Henry, but
director of the New York Institute of I thought that Ariel’s choreography is the event, described by organizers as
Dance and Education. Tirosh serves as just simply so well.”
Ariel Rivka Dance’s rehearsal director. “pirate bands.” Pirate garb is encour-
Ariel Rivka Dance performs at River-
Another SUNY Purchase Conserva- side Theatre Aug. 4-5 at 8 p.m. Tickets aged for attendees, so dust off your eye
tory grad in the company is Kyleigh are available online at www.balletvero-
Sackandy. She went on to earn a mas- beach.org. or by visiting or calling the Riv- patch and cutlass. 3 Pirate garb will also be apropos
ter’s from Sarah Lawrence College in erside Theatre box office, 772-231-6990. on the west side of the river Friday
movement therapy and works with The festival’s Student Showcase is Aug. 5
at 2 p.m. That performance is free.  2 The Riverside action doesn’t stop night, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., at the monthly
at dusk this weekend. There’s
Downtown Friday event in Vero’s his-

music, comedy and food well into the toric downtown, along and around

night: First, there’s Riverside Theatre’s 14th Avenue. A good time is typically

extremely popular Live in the Loop had by all, and this Friday, in support

free outdoor concert, Friday and Sat- of the Pirate Festival across the river,

urday, 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. This week- you’ll likely run into more individuals

end, you’ll totally enjoy an area favor- of the swashbuckling persuasion. In

ite, the rock/jazz/party band Bobby addition to food, drinks and a variety

and the Blisters (think hot sax). Then, of vendors, there’s always music, this

inside the theater, prepare to laugh month by area favorite Souljam, a hot

with Riverside’s double-the-laughs jam band from Vero Beach. 



26 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT COVER STORY

BY JOBY WARRICK AND LOVEDAY MORRIS In Washington, independent nu- the bullet-pocked campus building and stymied by a practical concern: how to
clear experts drafted papers and ran peered into the storage room where the dismantle the machines’ thick clad-
WASHINGTON POST calculations about the potency of the cobalt machines were kept. ding without exposing themselves to a
cobalt and the extent of the damage burst of deadly radiation.
On the day the Islamic State over- it could do. The details were kept un- They were still there, exactly as they
ran the Iraqi city of Mosul in 2014, it der wraps on the chance that Mosul’s were when the Islamic State seized the More certain is the fact that the dan-
laid claim to one of the greatest weap- occupiers might not be fully aware of campus in 2014. The cobalt apparently ger has not entirely passed. With doz-
ons bonanzas ever to fall to a terrorist what they had. had never been touched. ens of Islamic State stragglers still loose
group: a large metropolis dotted with in the city, U.S. officials requested
military bases and garrisons stocked “They are not that smart,” a relieved that details about the cobalt’s current
with guns, bombs, rockets and even whereabouts not be revealed.
battle tanks. Liberation from militants leaves devastation in Mosul.
They also acknowledged that their
But the most fearsome weapon in Iraqi military commanders were ap- health ministry official said of the city’s worries extend far beyond Mosul. Sim-
Mosul on that day was never used by prised of the potential threat as they bat- former occupiers. ilar equipment exists in hundreds of
the terrorists. Only now is it becoming tled Islamic State fighters block by block cities around the world, some of them
clear what happened to it. through the sprawling complex where Why the Islamic State failed to take in conflict zones.
the cobalt was last seen. Finally, earlier advantage of their windfall is not clear.
Locked away in a storage room on a this year, government officials entered U.S. officials and nuclear experts spec- “Nearly every country in the world
Mosul college campus were two caches ulate that the terrorists may have been either has them, or is a transit country”
of cobalt-60, a metallic substance with through which high-level radiological
lethally high levels of radiation. When equipment passes, said Andrew Bien-
contained within the heavy shielding iawski, a vice president for the Wash-
of a radiotherapy machine, cobalt-60 ington-based Nuclear Threat Initiative
is used to kill cancer cells. In terror- who once led U.S. government efforts
ists’ hands, it is the core ingredient of a to safeguard such materials.
“dirty bomb,” a weapon that could be
used to spread radiation and panic. “This,” he said, “is a global problem.”
The worries began within hours of
Western intelligence agencies were the Islamic State’s stunning blitz into
aware of the cobalt and watched anx- Iraq’s second-largest city.
iously for three years for signs that the As TV networks showed footage of
militants might try to use it. Those triumphant terrorists parading through
concerns intensified in late 2014 when Mosul’s main thoroughfares, intelli-
Islamic State officials boasted of ob- gence agencies took quiet inventory of
taining radioactive material, and again the vast array of military and material
early last year when the terrorists took wealth the Islamist militants had sud-
over laboratories at the same Mosul denly acquired.
college campus with the apparent aim The list included three Iraqi military
of building new kinds of weapons. bases, each supplied with U.S.-made

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 27

INSIGHT COVER STORY

weapons and vehicles. It also included The institute quietly shared its find- been far less than when the equip- bers of casualties, but it can be enor-
bank vaults containing hundreds of ings with U.S. intelligence and military ment was new, but still easily enough mously effective, he said, as a weapon
millions of dollars in hard currency, as officials in late 2015 but declined to to deliver a lethal dose at close range, of terror.
well as factories for making munitions publish its report, fearing that Islamic the report said.
and university laboratories for mixing State occupiers would benefit from the “The worst case would have been
chemicals used in explosives or as pre- information. The Washington Post be- David Albright, the president of the the Islamic State widely dispersing
cursors for poison gas. came aware of the report last year but institute, noted that groups such as the the radioactive cobalt in a city, caus-
Islamic State have long discussed the ing panic and an expensive, disrup-
U.S. officials also were aware that tive cleanup,” said Albright, a nuclear
the Islamic State had gained control A classroom at the Uni- weapons expert and former U.N.
of small quantities of natural or low- versity of Mosul after the weapons inspector. “There would like-
enriched uranium – the remnants of city’s liberation in June. ly not have been that many deaths, but
Iraq’s nuclear projects from the time of ISIS occupiers tried to use the panic could have been profound,
Saddam Hussein’s presidency – as well labs to build weapons. leading to the emptying of parts of the
as some relatively harmless radioactive city as residents fled, fearful of the ef-
iridium used in industrial equipment. Damage is shown at fects of radiation.”
the University of Mosul
But a far bigger radiological concern amid a military operation There was one question that U.S.
was the cobalt. Intelligence agencies by Iraqi security forces officials and private researchers could
knew of the existence in Mosul of at against ISIS fighters. never conclusively answer during the
least one powerful radiotherapy ma- months of Islamic State occupation:
chine used for cancer treatment, one agreed to a U.S. government request to possibility of using such material in a Where was the cobalt exactly?
that could potentially provide the Islam- delay writing about it until after Mo- dirty bomb, a simple device that uses
ic State with a potent terrorist weapon. sul’s liberation. conventional explosives to spread ra- In strife-torn Mosul, there were no
dioactive debris across densely pop- publicly available records about the
Outside experts were becoming Because cobalt-60 decays over time, ulated urban terrain. Such a bomb city’s two radiotherapy machines since
aware of the threat as well. the potency of the Mosul machines’ would probably not cause large num- 2008, when one of them was mentioned
30-year-old cobalt cores would have in a scholarly article. The last known
In 2015, the Institute for Science and addresses were a teaching hospital and
International Security, a nonprofit or- a cancer-treatment clinic, both on the
ganization in Washington that moni- western side of the city, in neighbor-
tors global nuclear threats, began con- hoods that were heavily contested by
ducting research to answer the basic Islamic State fighters and were among
questions: How many machines were the last to fall to Iraqi liberators.
in Mosul? Where were they deployed?
And exactly how powerful were they? Finally, recently, Iraqi officials of-
fered an explanation, saying that both
The group obtained documents machines had been in Mosul through-
showing that two different medical cen- out the Islamic State’s occupation, but
ters in Mosul had obtained cobalt-60 not in the places where the terrorists
machines in the 1980s. Other records might have thought to look for them.
showed that at least one of the devices They had been placed out of commis-
was in active use as recently as 2008, sion for several years because of a lack
and in the following year Iraqi officials of parts and had been put in storage
had sought replacement parts, includ- in a building owned by the Univer-
ing new cobalt-60 cores, for both. sity of Mosul, somewhere in the city’s
eastern side.
From the records, the institute’s ex-
perts could draw broad conclusions They were still there when health
about the cobalt inside the machines. officials from Nineveh province went
In a draft report written in November to look for them after that sector of the
2015, research fellow Sarah Burkhard city was secure, said Laith Hababa, a
calculated that the radioactive cores, physician and head of the provincial
when new, contained about nine health ministry.
grams of pure cobalt-60 with a potency
of more than 10,000 curies – a standard The machines are now in secure
measure of radioactivity. A person storage and “weren’t used by Daesh,”
standing three feet from the unshield- Hababa said, using a common Arabic
ed core would receive a fatal dose of acronym for the Islamic State.
radiation in less than three minutes.
U.S. officials and nuclear experts
expressed relief over what, by all ac-
counts, had been a near-miss. Some
speculated that the terrorists never
learned of the whereabouts of the
machines, although that explanation
seemed unlikely, given the terrorists’
efficiency in looting university build-
ings across the city.

Albright said the task of remov-
ing the cobalt cores may have been
viewed as too difficult or too risky. Or
maybe the group’s commanders were
just too busy, especially during the lat-
er months of the occupation, as gov-
ernment troops closed in.

“Its leaders were preoccupied else-
where,” he said, “and [perhaps] did

STORY CONTINUED ON PAGE 28

28 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 27 INSIGHT COVER STORY | WORLD

not learn about the sources in Mosul, heavy concentrations of cobalt-60, or are underway to replace the most dan- but for now, he said, older machines
or have a chance to think through the other radioactive elements such as ce- gerous models with new technology such as the ones in Mosul are common-
opportunities.” sium-137, which comes in a powdery that cannot be easily exploited by terror- ly found in developing countries where
form that is even easier to disperse. ists, said Bieniawski, the former Energy the risk of theft or terrorism is greatest.
Leaders of the Islamic State and Department official. His organization,
al-Qaeda are known to have sought The machines are a necessary fix- the Nuclear Threat Initiative, has raised “The ones we see overseas are in the
materials for a dirty bomb, a threat ture in many cancer clinics around the money to try to speed up the transition, highest category – the highest levels of
that has added urgency to efforts by world, but in Western countries efforts curies – and they are also portable,” he
U.S. agencies and private groups to said. “They are exactly the ones we are
improve security for machines with ISLAMIC STATE most worried about.” 

Dying on the battlefield, winning on the Internet

BY ROMESH RATNESAR |BLOOMBERG much of the civilian population to flee
the city. The remaining Islamic State
After Iraqi forces reclaimed control militants, who number in the thou-
of Mosul, the country’s second-largest sands, “are not just going to say the war
city, on July 10, Iraq Prime Minister is over and then have kids and settle
Haider al-Abadi declared “total vic- down on the farm,” says Reardon. He
tory” over Islamic State. The American expects hardened fighters to slip back
commander of the global coalition to into Iraq’s vast and dispossessed Sunni
defeat the group, U.S. Army Lieuten- heartland, where they will find climes
ant General Stephen Townsend, said genial enough to maintain their on-
the loss of Mosul had dealt a“decisive line media operations, rebuild, and re-
blow” to the terrorist organization. emerge at the right moment.

With U.S.-backed Kurdish and Arab The military campaign has damaged
fighters preparing to capture Raqqa, the group’s ability to generate propa-
the terrorists’ stronghold in Syria, Pres- ganda. An analysis by the West Point
ident Donald Trump predicted “the to- Combating Terrorism Center found that
tal destruction of ISIS.” the number of Islamic State-produced
“visual media products” – videos, illus-
Three years since the insurgent trated reports, and photos embedded in
group declared the establishment of Twitter posts – declined by 75 percent
an “Islamic caliphate” straddling Iraq from August 2015 to September 2016.
and Syria, it faces military defeat. Is-
lamic State no longer possesses a base Technology companies have also
of operations from which to coordi- begun to police their platforms more
nate sophisticated attacks. The group’s aggressively, in part because of pres-
estimated annual revenue has plum- sure from European regulators to
meted, from almost $2 billion in 2014 combat hate speech. Facebook Inc.,
to less than $870 million in 2016. for instance, now has 150 employees
working full-time on identifying and
Yet as Islamic State evolves from a removing terrorist content in more
self-governing quasi-state to a net- than 30 languages.
worked global insurgency, “the threat
of ISIS-inspired attacks may grow, It also has partnered with Google
including on Western targets such as Inc., Twitter Inc., and other compa-
the United States,” according to a July nies to create a database of “digital
18 report, “Countering ISIS and Its fingerprints” that can identify ac-
Effects,” by the U.S. Government Ac- counts linked to terrorists.
countability Office.
The problem is they’re often chasing
The more territory it loses, the more ghosts. Islamic State operatives are ad-
it will use online platforms to inspire ept at creating social media accounts
followers to carry out violence in their that remain dormant, and undetect-
home countries. “Their narrative isn’t able, until the moment they’re activat-
going away,” says Joshua Geltzer, a ed. Jihadists forced off Twitter and Face-
former senior director for counterter- book turn increasingly to encrypted
rorism at the National Security Coun- platforms such as Telegram and What-
cil. “On the messaging front, they will sApp. While that may reduce the size of
adapt or stay one step ahead.” their audience, it makes them more dif-
ficult for intelligence agencies to track.
At its peak, Islamic State command-
ed an army of 40,000 foreign fighters Large-scale operations to remove
(including 6,000 from Europe) in Iraq terrorist postings have yielded limited
and Syria. Much of that cadre was killed results. Last year, Operation Glowing
during the fight for Mosul, according to Symphony, conducted by the National
Martin Reardon, senior vice president Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Com-
for the Soufan Group, a private intelli- mand, managed to wipe out troves of
gence firm staffed by former senior U.S. Islamic State videos and social media
and European intelligence officials. handles – only to have most of the con-
tent reappear within days.
The ferocity of the fighting forced

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 29

INSIGHT WORLD

“There are no silver bullets,” says an adversary that’s smart, dedicated, Abu Dhabi-based hub that produces Trump hailed the creation of the Sau-
Brian Fishman, Facebook’s head of and focused.” social media content that challenges di-run Global Center for Combating
counterterrorism policy. “Even as the Islamic State narrative. But plans Extremist Ideology, which adminis-
we’re developing new capabilities During the Obama administration, to expand that model to other coun- tration officials hope will become the
to keep our platform safe, terror- the U.S. sought to increase the influ- tries, such as Malaysia, have stalled, linchpin of counterterrorist messag-
ist groups are watching and taking ence of credible, mainstream voices U.S. officials say. ing in the Arab world.
countermeasures. We’re up against in Muslim societies – through initia-
tives such as the Sawab Center, an During his visit to Riyadh in May, STORY CONTINUED ON PAGE 30

30 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 INSIGHT WORLD Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 29 solving the problem of today and not
thinking enough about what it’s going
Whether the Saudis use the center ment does not have a cohesive strategy to look like tomorrow.”
to target Islamic State or the kingdom’s or process for assessing the countering
geopolitical rivals, Iran and Qatar, re- violent extremism effort.” In a recent published interview, the
mains to be seen. Sami Nader, head of head of strategic operational planning
the Beirut-based Levant Institute for The U.S.-led military campaign for the U.S. National Counterterrorism
Strategic Affairs, says Trump’s efforts to against Islamic State may be nearing a Center, U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant
push governments in the region to take climax, but defeating the terrorists’ ide- General Michael Nagata, echoed that as-
the lead in fighting terrorist propagan- ology will require a wider set of policy sessment. “Terrorism in its various forms
da was “a step in the right direction. tools. “We’ve focused far too much on is not just ‘here to stay,’ ” he said, “but
But it was more geared toward fighting the military piece and not enough on is going to continually adapt and seek
terrorism in general instead of dealing finding a holistic solution to why peo- growth in ways that we probably cannot
with the post-Islamic State situation.” ple seek out this ideology,” says Farah completely anticipate or predict.” 
Pandith, an adjunct senior fellow at the
Terrorism experts say counter-mes- Council on Foreign Relations. “We’re The ferocity of the fighting
saging also needs to be integrated with forced much of the civilian
programs that address the process of population to flee the city.
radicalization, which still takes place
largely offline – in gyms, schools, pris-
ons, and mosques. The Strong Cities
Network, a consortium of mayors and
community leaders from 200 cities
around the world, illustrates the role of
local institutions in developing coun-
ter-radicalization policies.

The Trump administration, however,
has taken a dim view of community-
based efforts, which went by the label
“countering violent extremism” (CVE)
under the Obama administration.
The White House’s 2018 budget would
eliminate the Department of Home-
land Security’s $50 million budget for
CVE programs. In its July 18 report,
the Government Accountability Office
concluded that “the federal govern-



32 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT OPINION

The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming!

BY DICK KERR or the near hysterical statements of Largely with our help, they have the executive branch.”
The Russians must be giggling up congressional leadership, particular been successful. Many Republicans are assisting in
the “loyal” Democratic opposition.
their sleeves at Americans. Panic in The bottom line in this fiasco is that this destructive process or passively
the U.S. media, paralysis in the U.S. Nor can Russia be blamed because little or nothing is being accomplished watching the disaster unfold.
Congress, a single-minded preoccu- the President has a political tin ear, in the U.S. Congress at a time when
pation with Russian interference in and that he, his family and his staff dramatic problems – health care, bud- “Resistance” was real and necessary
the 2016 election. are innocents in a capitol filled with get and tax issues and international in France and Norway during World
sharks. crises – weigh heavily on the country. War II.
The Russians favored Donald Trump
. . . there was collaboration – or was it Russia has an evil regime and is U.S. intelligence and the FBI have In this country in 2017, “resistance”
collusion – between the Trump team led by a thug. As a friend, a Russian lost credibility and respect. is totally inappropriate.
and the Russians . . . Trump is soft on expert and scholar, reminded me,
Putin . . . the Russians fixed the election “Their statecraft going back centuries The Executive Branch has been America should be embarrassed!
. . . and on and on. places high value on deceit, skulldug- able to accomplish little except
gery and covert action. They mean us through executive orders. Richard Kerr, an island resident and
Many in the media – and those no good and clearly have been trying former Deputy Director of CIA, writes
who did not and do not want Donald to delegitimize U.S. politics and gov- As the Wall Street Journal recently columns for Vero Beach 32963. The
Trump as president – are invested in ernment.” wrote, “The Trump Administrative views do not necessarily reflect the
getting him out of office, or at a mini- barely exists. Senate Democrats are views of Vero Beach 32963.
mum paralyzingly his administration abusing Senate rules to undermine
so nothing can be accomplished.

The hope is he will soon be broken,
impeached, will quit – or if all that
fails defeated in the 2018 mid-terms
and finally lose in 2020. Nothing will
change their view of this president.
They have too big a stake in it.

The Russians have been able to
bring the U.S. to this state of incoher-
ence merely by finding their way into
a vulnerable computer of the head
of the Hillary Clinton’s presidential
campaign, and getting some of Mrs.
Clinton’s “private” e-mails released.

The Russians almost certainly took
other action; propaganda place-
ments in the media, some carefully
orchestrated claims about election
manipulation and other false flags.

But the real damage to the United
States has been self-inflicted. It is
not possible to blame Russia for in-
ept performances by the former di-
rectors of the FBI, the DNI, and CIA

ARE YOU AN INPATIENT OR OBSERVATION PATIENT? PART III

Generally, patients enrolled in Original SCENARIO INPATIENT PART B PAYS more than your inpatient hospital de-
Medicare foot more of the bill if their OR OUTPATIENT? PART A PAYS ductible.
hospital stay is deemed observation
rather than inpatient status. You come to the ER with chest Outpatient until When you were ad- Doctor services. The boxed scenarios (left) will help you
pain and the hospital keeps you’re formally vanced to inpatient understand what Medicare Parts A and B
WHAT YOU PAY IF YOU you for two nights. One night admitted as an status, the entire cover for inpatient and observation care.
ARE AN INPATIENT is spent in observation and inpatient based on stay became inpa-
Original Medicare Part A covers inpa- the doctor writes an order for your doctor’s order. tient and is covered HOW DOES INPATIENT OR OBSER-
tient hospital services. You pay a one- inpatient admission on the Inpatient following by Part A VATION STATUS AFFECT ADMISSION
time deductible for all hospital services second day. such admission. TO A SKILLED NURSING FACILITY?
for the first 60 days you’re in the hospi- Eligibility for Medicare coverage in a
tal. Doctor’s bills (inpatient AND outpa- You go to a hospital for out- Outpatient. Nothing. Doctor services skilled nursing facility (SNF) after your
tient) are paid through Medicare Part patient surgery, but they keep and hospital out- hospital stay depends upon whether
B. You are responsible for 20 percent you overnight for high blood patient services you have a “qualifying inpatient hospi- © 2017 VERO BEACH 32963 MEDIA, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
of the Medicare-approved amount for pressure. Your doctor doesn’t (i.e., surgery, lab tal stay” of at least three days in a row
doctor services. write an order to admit you as tests, or intrave- (counting the day you were admitted
an inpatient. You go home the nous medicines). as an inpatient, but not counting the
WHAT YOU PAY IF YOU ARE AN OB- next day. day of your discharge).
SERVATION PATIENT (OUTPATIENT)
Part B pays 80 percent of Medicare- Your doctor writes an order Outpatient. Nothing. Doctor services If you don’t have a three-day inpatient
approved outpatient physician and for you to be admitted as an and hospital out- hospital that includes three midnights
outpatient hospital services; you pay inpatient, and the hospital later patient services. as an inpatient stay and you need care
the remaining 20 percent. You are also tells you it’s changing your after your discharge from a hospital,
responsible for paying a copayment hospital status to outpatient. ask if you can get care in other settings,
for each individual outpatient hospital Your doctor must agree, and like home health care, or if any other
service. Fortunately, your copayment the hospital must tell you in programs like Medicaid or Veterans’
for a single outpatient hospital service writing – while you’re still a benefits can cover your SNF stay. 
can’t be more than the inpatient hospi- hospital patient before you’re
tal deductible. discharged – that your hospital Your comments and suggestions for future
However, your total copayment for all status has changed. topics are always welcome. Email us at
outpatient services may end up being [email protected].

Note: The scenarios above are subject to change. Always inquire to determine your hospital status.

34 Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT BOOK REVIEW

Ben Sasse is a brave man. In his even to try. Perhaps more problem- sons, martial arts, select soc- mere governmental and should in-
new book, “The Vanishing Ameri- atic, the older generations have for- cer and travel baseball, track clude a recognition of shared, com-
can Adult,” the Republican senator gotten that we need to plan to teach meets, swim meets, art class- mon and very public problems, such
from Nebraska makes it clear that them. It’s our fault more than it is es, language enrichment and as helping our kids become increas-
he has had enough of our nonsense theirs.” all the rest, it should come as ingly responsible.
and we had all better shape up. Sasse no surprise that the kids have
rips into an increasingly hedonistic, Sasse sprinkles the book with oc- only the vaguest idea of how Sasse points to his 14-year-old
shallow and pleasure-seeking Amer- casional disclaimers that however to make decisions for them- daughter Corrie’s formative time
ican culture that is producing a gen- much he may be criticizing, if not selves. All that many of them working on a ranch as Exhibit A for
eration of ignorant, passive young lambasting, millennials, his true have ever had to do by age 18 his belief (and, I would think, that of
adults who don’t read, have no grasp wrath is reserved for the parents rath- is to be dressed and in the car most parents) that manual labor is
of American civics, don’t embrace er than their slothful progeny. But I at the appointed hour.” important for all teens to experience.
work and don’t know how to do much don’t buy it. Sasse offers occasional Consuming less, knowing the differ-
of anything because their meek heli- stories from his tenure as president But America is a country ence between needs and wants, and
copter parents have both applauded of Midland University in Fremont, where nearly 1 in 3 children reducing reliance on the Internet
and waited on the little darlings for Neb., and seems eager to point out live in poverty and presum- and anything with glowing screens
far too long, to their detriment and that the millennial generation has a ably millions more are part are all important lessons not just to
to the peril of our shared future. reputation for being “needy, undisci- of families who never had the impart to the young, but for adults
plined, coddled, presumptuous.” Af- money or the access for help to model. Chapter 8 contains sug-
“We are living in an America ter two decades of having their lives with college entrance exams, gestions for what should constitute a
of perpetual adolescence,” Sasse micromanaged and choreographed and whose “language enrich- basic list of 60 “life-changing” books
writes. “Our kids simply don’t know for “playdates, dance practices, extra ment” occurs in bilingual house- to have at home. The choices are
what an adult is anymore – or how to tutoring for standardized tests and holds. With this statement and something we can all argue about,
become one. Many don’t see a reason college entrance exams, music les- others like it (“Almost all of us live but there is little debate that a house
within walking or short driving with books – whether the volumes
distance of a supermarket with two are owned or borrowed from a pub-
dozen brands of bread, twenty-six lic library – offers any child a built-in
kinds of ham, thirty-one kinds of advantage.
mustard, more than forty varieties
of mayonnaise, and lettuce from Sasse reaches into his doctorate
multiple continents”), Sasse gives and intellectual background to bol-
the impression that his book is in- ster his arguments and his solutions,
tended as a warning siren only for quoting widely from Alexis de Toc-
those with incomes in the top 20 queville, the English author Doro-
percent. It shouldn’t be. thy Sayers, Thomas Jefferson, Teddy
Roosevelt, Edward Gibbon, and even
Sasse, with a doctorate in his- the 300 BC philosopher Zeno of Ci-
tory and a background more var- tium and many others to make his
ied than many others in the Sen- points. Though Sasse holds a day job
ate, is too smart not to perceive as a U.S. senator, he avoids policy
the plight of the working poor or, prescriptions of any kind, preferring
to cite an example entirely absent to challenge parents and sidestep
from these pages, the challeng- partisanship.
es faced by a high school junior
who is already working 20 hours Yet, at the very same time, he ad-
a week to help his mother pay the mits the obvious: There is a place for
rent. While the book ignores that broad debate and creating a frame-
demographic, Sasse’s overarching work in government for many of
point is a good one. “They [teen- these issues. 
agers] need direction about how
to acquire the habits essential for THE VANISHING AMERICAN ADULT
navigating adulthood and experi- Our Coming-of-Age Crisis — and How to
ences that introduce and instill
those habits.” We need young people Rebuild a Culture of Self-Reliance
who read, and read well; who are By Ben Sasse
grounded in civics and history; who
understand hard work and engage in St. Martin’s. 306 pp. $27.99
it; who are self-reliant; who are not Review by Maura Casey
captive to rampant consumerism; The Washington Post
and who are influenced by people
other than, and far older than, their
peers. We need, in short, to prepare
our children for adulthood.
His vision for how to accomplish
those goals makes up the text and
bulleted lists at the end of most
chapters. Many suggestions are in-
arguable. Despite the thousands
of hours children spend in school,
many of life’s most worthy and deep-
est educational lessons occur far
beyond the schoolhouse walls, and
we adults should help young people
seek out such lessons. Our view of
“public” should be separate from the

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 35

INSIGHT BOOK REVIEW

New York in 1746, three decades to govern.” “Golden Hill” offers sparring with chalk and street-spatter; yours is
before “Hamilton” and all that, was Our young, hand- lovers, hidden identities, theater, clear though, to the soul behind. ”
a small but industrious town of 7,000, “spectacular debauchery,” a duel
an inkling of the Gotham it would be- some hero is an in- (take that, “Hamilton”!), sedition, In 1756, London was the largest
come. “This is a place where things ternational man a prison stint, insidious small- city in Europe with a population of
can get out of hand very quick: and of mystery, fresh town politics, a voluptuous thes- 700,000, a hundred times that of striv-
often do,” the exquisitely named and off the boat from pian named Terpie Tomlinson ing New York. Smith is a man of the
clearly clairvoyant Septimus Oake- London with no (“Every time she misremembers world, well-traveled, a master of lan-
shott warns in Francis Spufford’s ex- introduction but a line, she’ll give a flash of thigh”) guages, a master at fitting in almost
hilarating first novel, “Golden Hill.” a note for a thou- and multiple reversals of fortune anywhere, yet he’s completely at sea
Residents, he declares, are “wild, sus- sand pounds ster- (naturally). A feast! Also, mul- on land that is not yet a nation or even
picious, combustible – and the devil ling, a fortune wor- tiple secrets and masked identi- an idea of one.
thy of Croesus and ties, including that of the novel’s
enough to break wry narrator. Almost everyone is Spufford has immersed himself in
a trading house. an actor on the stage of nascent the 18th-century quotidian world on
His name is Smith, New York. either side of the ocean. “Golden Hill”
project onto him possesses a fluency and immediacy,
what you will, for he Upon arrival, Smith immedi- a feast of the senses, without ever be-
reveals little. ately goes to cash his note with ing pedantic. It is a historical novel for
the prosperous trader Lovell, people who might not like them.
The man in the resident of Golden Hill, the high-
green coat – green est spot in all of tiny New York (home In a year already ripe with tremen-
to the new world, now to the Financial District) and fu- dous fiction, did I mention that I love
not so much to ture site of a 1770 battle that provided this book? I love this book. 
performing a part tinder for the Revolutionary War. Un-
– quickly becomes fortunately, all Lovell can deliver is a GOLDEN HILL
known as “the very small offering until Smith’s legitima- A Novel of Old New York
rich boy who won’t cy is confirmed: stacks of coins and
answer questions. ” wads of paper from multiple coun- By Francis Spufford
tries and several colonies, the use- Scribner. 302 pp. $26
And whoosh – we lessness of Rhode Island currency a Review by Karen Heller
are off! running gag. The Washington Post

Spufford, a prize- Ah, but Lovell has two daughters: fair,
gilded author of five honorable and – wouldn’t you know
works of nonfiction, it? – dull Flora; and stern, dark-tressed
including “I May Be Tabitha, a woman of pronounced intel-
Some Time,” has ligence and bite. A fan of Shakespeare,
finally delivered Tabitha says, “I am not a great one for
a novel, and it’s a novels, ” even while becoming the
wonder. It has racked up a mantel fetching heroine of this one.
of English literary awards and was
crowned the British Sunday Times’ Smith and Tabitha spar exquisitely,
novel of the year. claiming not to be at all like Benedick
“Golden Hill” is a homage to the and Beatrice but fooling no one.
action-packed works of 18th-centu- “You make everything else in a room
ry masters like Sterne, Smollett and look dull,” a smitten Smith informs
Fielding but with Spufford’s nimble Tabitha. “Your face is more alive than
fingers on fast forward, speeding anyone else’s, to me. All the other fac-
along character — such characters! — es are dirty windows, to me, smeared
and plot at a delirious pace.

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38 Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT TRAVEL

An ice place to visit? neither living nor a mineral. In 1983
Floating some ideas for new ’berg the treaty’s governing body passed
a resolution calling for research on
BY PETER COY what to do about icebergs. “Nothing
Bloomberg happened,” he says. “There was no
real follow-up.” Why? “Lack of com-
The tabular iceberg that just broke ing algorithms on Wall Street that ry his most relevant article is “Iced mercial interest.” Despite the lack of
away from the Antarctic Peninsula is exploit profit opportunities that last Freshwater Resources: A Legal Explo- legal clarity, Viñuales says he expects
said to be as big as the state of Dela- milliseconds. ration” (2009/2010) in the Yearbook the treaty’s signatories would restrict
ware. One difference is that the state of International Environmental Law. flagrantly commercial exploitation
of Delaware, in addition to being The bigger question is legal. Who of the giant ’berg.
warmer and closer to Philadelphia, gets to decide what happens on the According to Viñuales, the key de-
has a population of 900,000, while titanic iceberg as it bobs in the south- terminant of the iceberg’s legal treat- If the iceberg floats north above
the iceberg has a population of zero ern seas like a giant ice cube in the ment is where it floats to. If it stays the 60th parallel and winds up with-
... so far, that is. world’s biggest shot glass? What hap- south of the 60th parallel – the line in the exclusive economic zone of a
pens if one entrepreneur wants to of latitude that runs between Antarc- country – say, New Zealand, Argen-
Are you thinking what I’m think- put in a runway right where someone tica and the tip of South America – it tina, or Chile – it becomes subject to
ing? This brand-new, empty, pris- else has made another ice sculpture will most likely be governed by the that nation’s laws. The zone extends
tine, flat-topped iceberg is ripe for of Donald Trump? You can’t exactly Antarctic Treaty of 1959, which froze up to 200 miles off a nation’s coast-
commercial exploitation. You could take your case to the iceberg’s small- nations’ territorial claims to the con- line.
put a string of hotels on it like the ice claims court. tinent and guaranteed that it would
hotels in Sweden and Canada. You be used for “peaceful purposes only,” The most interesting possibil-
could organize an extremely danger- For answers, I tracked down one such as scientific research. The trea- ity is what happens if it floats north
ous ice-climbing expedition up one of the world’s leading experts in ice- ty permits limited exploitation of above the 60th parallel but not into
of its edges. berg law, Jorge Viñuales, a native of biological resources but no exploita- any country’s exclusive economic
Argentina who is a chaired professor tion of mineral resources. zone. Then it’s considered on the
You could mine it for ancient “fos- of law and environmental policy at “high seas” and essentially becomes
sil water” that could be sold straight the University of Cambridge in Eng- The status of icebergs in the South- a legal no-man’s land. Any dispute
or used to make premium vodka, as land. Viñuales is a wide-ranging legal ern Ocean is ambiguous under the over it would probably go to the In-
Newfoundlanders are already doing scholar, but for purposes of this sto- treaty, says Viñuales, because ice is ternational Tribunal for the Law of
up north. You could try to tow it (or the Sea in Hamburg, Germany, or the
part of it) to the Middle East, as one International Court of Justice in the
Abu Dhabi-based company is already Hague, Netherlands, Viñuales says.
seeking to do with smaller Antarctic
icebergs. Meanwhile the iceberg is going
through another harsh southern
Or you could get really decadent winter entirely untouched by human
and invite a few thousand rich hip- hands. It’s hard even to see it except
sters in for an ultra-ironic Climate by plane.
Change Dance Party.
“It’s in an area where ships don’t
True, the ’berg isn’t long for this typically go” because it’s stormy,
world. Within a few years – nobody and chockful of ice, and there’s not
can say how long – it no doubt will much wildlife to see except emper-
enter what scientists call its final or penguins, says Steve Wellmeier,
“ablation.” But taking advantage of U.S. managing director for Poseidon
evanescent profit opportunities is Adventures. Danger aside, “There’s
what capitalism is all about. Think of nothing that would prevent you from
those pop-up stores that sell Hallow- going on it. I’m not sure what the at-
een costumes. Or consider the trad- traction would be other than to say
you did it.”

Well, yes, that probably is the main
attraction: bragging rights. Imagine
racing snowmobiles on an iceberg
that has twice the fresh water of Lake
Erie, knowing that in a few years it
will dissolve into nothing.

I spoke with the daredevil explorer
Will Gadd, who has climbed Arctic
icebergs and is the first person to
ice-climb Niagara Falls. “You could
climb it,” he says. “I actually looked
into doing an expedition into getting
on that thing. It was just too much
cash. It was a lot of money, and I was
not at all sure I would be able to get
on it,” he says. “And you’re putting
other people at risk, on the boat.”

But what about just ’coptering out
onto the aircraft-carrier-like iceberg
for the heck of it? “If you get a party
going, I’d buy a ticket,” Gadd says.
Somebody, somewhere just might
take him up on it. As the planet
warms, a new vista of economics and
law is opening before us. 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 39

INSIGHT GAMES & CO.

THE NUMBER OF TRICKS GOVERNS THE STRATEGY NORTH
K74
Winston Churchill said, “However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at WEST 8653 EAST
the results.” 9632 J 10 2 J 10 8
K AKQ J 10 9
Strangely, in bridge, sometimes the strategy is chosen first and in one way the concern K974 A653
for tricks is secondary. In Chicago or a team tournament, making the contract is all that 8532 SOUTH J74
matters. But in a duplicate pair event, overtricks are usually valuable. If the room is winning AQ5
only 10 tricks in four spades and you can collect 11, you get a top. If the odds are in your AQ742
favor, you should try for the extra winner. Q8
10 9 6
The difference is highlighted by this deal. How should South tackle four hearts in teams
and in pairs? The defenders start with three rounds of diamonds. Dealer: North; Vulnerable: Neither

The auction was straightforward. Note that South should have at least five hearts for The Bidding:
his jump to game because North might have raised with only three-card support and a
singleton spade. SOUTH WEST NORTH EAST OPENING
1 Clubs Pass
When South’s only concern is making the contract, he can afford one trump loser, but 1 Hearts Pass 2 Hearts Pass LEAD:
not two. Then the correct play is to cash the ace first. If nothing good happens, declarer 4 Hearts Pass Pass Pass 4 Diamonds
crosses to the board and leads toward his queen. He will succeed whenever it is possible.

However, if an overtrick is desired, South should take the heart finesse. A priori, East will
have a doubleton king some 20 percent of the time, and the chance that West will hold a
singleton king (when finessing costs the contract) is only 6.25 percent. But if declarer’s
queen does lose to the singleton king, and he goes down one, it helps to be sitting
opposite a sympathetic partner, not a result merchant.

40 Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™
SOLUTIONS TO PREVIOUS ISSUE (JULY 20) ON PAGE 60
INSIGHT GAMES & CO.

ACROSS DOWN
7 Rabbit-like animal (4) 1 Coop (4)
8 Publications (8) 2 Drink (8)
9 Representative (8) 3 Particulars (7)
10 Hold on to (4) 4 Bed sheets etc (5)
11 As a rule (7) 5 Connection (4)
13 Sphere (5) 6 Group (8)
16 Snooze (5) 12 Answer (8)
17 Coupon (7) 14 Place or position (8)
19 Mix (4) 15 Bodily stance (7)
21 Elevation (8) 18 Useful (5)
23 Strainer (8) 20 Meander (4)
24 Pledge (4) 22 Obligation (4)

The Telegraph

Locally Owned And How to do Sudoku:
Operated For 38 Years
Fill in the grid so the
ARE YOU READY? numbers one through
nine appear just once
HURRICANE SEASON JUNE 1ST- NOVEMBER 31 in every column, row
and three-by-three
square.

BE PREPARED! The Telegraph

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Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 41

INSIGHT GAMES & CO.

ACROSS today’s 4 New York island of Party of Five The Washington Post
busy mollusk? 5 Zip, nada, goose 77 Klinger portrayer
1 Oaxacan OK 75 It’s a gas: abbr. 79 Garrulous equine BY THE SEA, BY THE SEA By Merl Reagle
8 ___ down 76 Desecrated egg 82 “If I ___ Rich Man”
78 “In ___ purple- 6 In installments 83 ___ in the
(inverted) black ...” (G.K. 7 Free, as a hand
14 Penne et al. Chesterton) conversation
19 Dye category 80 A Chekhov sister brake 86 Buffalo bunch
20 Crazy ___ 81 Conductor Seiji 8 Most of Asia, 87 “Don’t have ___,
21 The gift of acting? 84 Currier & ___
22 Where mollusk 85 Mus. work once: abbr. man!” (Bart
89 John of 9 Wait for baby? Simpson)
grievances are tractordom 10 ___-mo (replay 88 Sermon seating
settled? 91 Some makeup 90 Ms. Bombeck
24 One of a quotable 93 Jason’s quest speed, for short) 92 Follower’s ending
150 95 Siren sound, 11 Red marker 93 40 hours a week
25 Big rig in the comics 12 Roof window 94 Prevaricated
26 Adjust, Tim Allen- 97 Reddish brown 13 Heraldry term 96 Places people get
style 98 Last stop for 14 Ricky’s term for stuck
27 Simone’s sea downtrodden 99 Put down, as a
29 Nevada city mollusks? Ozzie riot
30 Lou Grant’s 100 Rukeyser’s old 15 Personal plus 100 Watch spots
“Happy series: abbr. 16 Sampling of 101 Soap, for example
Homemaker,” 102 Toast heard at a 103 Draw off
___ Nivens kosher mollusk mollusk opinion? 104 Female fox
32 1989 film, wedding? 17 Loquacious one 108 Ms. Lauder
___-Devil 105 Diminutive suffix 18 Military building 111 Scratch, for
34 Horse tender at 106 Pink Scrabble 20 ___ acids example
an inn square: abbr. 23 Oat bristle 112 Shivering dish
36 Joan, to John 107 Prepare leftovers 28 Director Nicolas 115 Sicilian spewer
Cusack 109 See 69 Across 31 Authorities on the 116 Olympic sled
39 Clinic VIPs 110 Ferdinand wed 117 Stub ___
40 Have some her field 119 Ici, in Indiana
brewskis at a 113 Tees off 32 Helmet adjunct 120 Interstate across
mollusk bar? 114 Calendar abbr. 33 Ho’s the
44 “Kid” of jazz fame 116 Ex-Senator Paul southern U.S.
45 Taken, as a from Nevada predecessor? 121 Sibilant
seat on Mollusk 118 Use UPS 35 Trade attention-getter
Airways? 122 Like a delta’s 36 London area 123 Info on wine
48 Other, to Orozco bottom 37 Cold storage bottles: abbr.
49 Let out ___ 124 Mollusk’s favorite 38 Gladiator wound 125 Last page
(show shock) sci-fi series? 41 Rum drinker’s 126 Americas alliance:
51 Examiner exec 128 Word with care or abbr.
52 1934 song, “The ticket refrain 127 Base watchdogs,
Sweetest Music 129 Stop sign plus 42 Sault ___ Marie familiarly
This Side ___” one? 43 Rear-end features
55 Of an insect stage 130 Vast holdings
58 3-D circles 131 Fizz fruits of some birds and
59 Cold, in Colombia 132 Wait ___ fish
60 It means “five” 133 Pepe Le Pew’s 46 Bears, in Italy
62 “Passenger problem? 47 Rock Hudson
loading,” e.g. co-star, often
63 “All is calm, all DOWN 50 Actress Parker
___” 1 Lip 53 Kadota fruit
67 Warning shout 2 “I didn’t know I 54 Participants
when slop is 56 Soon, once
thrown out a had it ___” 57 Actor Carroll
window 3 Anna’s second 59 Fridge parts
69 With 109 Across, 61 Guitarist Guthrie
from a plane home 64 Refreshing spot
72 Fashion item for 65 Czech Republic
city
66 Explosive
68 Brit. award
69 Like two peas in
___
70 Perry’s creator
71 Mollusk signoff?
73 Japanese religion
74 Actress Campbell

The Telegraph

42 Vero Beach 32963 /July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

INSIGHT BACK PAGE

Battle of will-nots: He won’t apologize, she won’t let go

STORY BY CAROLYN HAX THE WASHINGTON POST Not because you’re awful or he is (necessarily), it now, thanks,” not “You still owe me an apology.”
but because this argument says you’re audibly aw- Funny thing about this outrage-vs.-resistance
Dear Carolyn: My partner said ful together.
something hurtful, which was not dynamic: It’s often irrelevant who’s howling or
meant to hurt me but did. After I I do see your point. I support the free flow of withholding, who started what, or why. To parse it
explained why it hurt and how apologies. I can step on my husband’s toe after ful- is to miss the larger point that you’ve both stopped
I felt, he refused to apologize for ly not intending to step on it and will still ungrudg- trying to engage or embrace each other. He feels
hurting my feelings. ingly say, “Sorry! You OK?” misunderstood and over-prosecuted for an errant
remark, and you feel misunderstood and under-
When I explained that people But: If he responds to my accidental toe-step by nurtured for an injury. All me, no us.
who care about each other are howling as if I sledgehammered him on purpose,
supposed to apologize if they then I might suddenly (and yes, pettily and wrong- So I’ll ask this: Do you actually like him? Yes or
cause hurt even unintentionally ly) get stingy on owning my part. no. Stay or go.
and I consider being able to do so an essential rela-
tionship skill, he said he “could just give me a sincere If someone credibly explains the innocence of a If stay, then do so by dropping your dukes. See
sounding but fake apology.” However, he wouldn’t comment I found offensive, then I’m saying, “I get whether he does the same.
do that because it is important to him to be honest.
He doesn’t think what he said should have hurt my Dear Carolyn: My 28-year-old daughter does not
feelings because he clarified it. want the names of her future in-laws on her wedding
I am no longer upset about the original remark, invitation. Part of it is financial – my husband and I
but I find myself lastingly troubled by his refusal are paying the ample tab. The other issue is that she
to simply apologize for hurting me. He has offered loves the father-in-law but finds the mother-in-law
about six variations of “I’m sorry you feel that way” extremely mean-spirited and vindictive.
to add insult to injury.
Am I correct to conclude this person is giving me My husband and I don’t like the woman, either,
every reason to believe he doesn’t care about my feel- but think we should put that aside and include the
ings as much as he cares for his pride? in-laws’ names because it’s respectful and might
I’m trying to find some way to justify staying in the make life easier in negotiating a polite, working re-
relationship but I haven’t yet. lationship for our daughter. What’s your opinion?

– Sorry I Only Date Grown Folks – C.

Sorry I Only Date Grown Folks: If I were beside C.: My opinion is that it’s weird not to say anything
you two in a restaurant, I’d have asked to be re- about the groom’s opinion.
seated.
They’re his parents. And, presumably we aren’t so
far gone on the details that we’ve forgotten half of
this wedding is his. 

‘CUTTING EDGE’
HIATAL HERNIA SURGERY
AVAILABLE HERE

44 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

HEALTH

‘Cutting edge’ hiatal hernia surgery available here

BY TOM LLOYD Dr. Patrick Domkowski. phragm and up into the chest region.” part of the stomach actually moves up
Staff Writer That protrusion can make life miser- into the mediastinum. The mediasti-
PHOTOS: GORDON RADFORD num is the space between the left and
By the age of 60, a whopping – and able. right lung. It’s where the heart lives, the
oddly symmetrical – 60 percent of all of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgeons, as Food and stomach acid can back up esophagus lives, and then part of the
seniors will develop some form of hia- well as chairman of surgery for the Se- stomach,” and that, he says, may well
tal hernia. bastian River Medical Center. into the esophagus, leading to heart- indicate a need for surgery.
burn or acid reflux, belching, trouble
The Yale University School of Medi- So, just what is a hiatal hernia? swallowing, chest pain, shortness of And while no one likely welcomes
cine says that super-majority of seniors As Yale describes it, “a hiatal her- breath, abdominal pain and even the the news that surgery is needed, Dom-
translates into roughly 15 percent of nia occurs when part of the stomach vomiting of blood. kowski’s description of the procedure
the total U.S. population. protrudes upwards through the dia- he favors does seem to soften that blow.
The extremely affable Domkowski,
The good news, according to local however, quickly steps in to offer some “Ten years ago, 15 years ago, 20 years
surgeon Dr. Patrick Domkowski, is that good news. ago,” Domkowski says, “when I [was
only 10 percent to 15 percent of hiatal initially] trained, we would make a
hernias require surgery. In the vast majority of cases, he says, big incision and it was a very difficult
the symptoms of hiatal hernias can be recovery. Very painful. Then laparo-
The even better news is that patients “managed medically with a pill that scopic surgery came along and that
who do need surgical relief from hiatal you can buy at Walmart, over the coun- changed the playing field. Now, in the
hernias do not need to leave the Trea- ter.” last couple of years, the robot is on the
sure Coast to get it. scene and the robot has allowed us to,
Sometimes, however, more sophis- as Emeril Lagasse would say, ‘Kick it up
Domkowski, a Georgetown Uni- ticated medical diagnostics and treat- a notch.’”
versity medical school graduate who ment are required.
served his internship, fellowship and While some surgeons who haven’t
residency at Duke University and is Breaking out one of the longest words trained extensively on robotic proce-
board-certified by the American Board of the conversation, Domkowski says, dures may not feel comfortable em-
of Surgery, performs multiple hiatal “When [patients] become symptom- ploying the newest method of repairing
hernia surgeries right here each month. atic and they don’t respond to medical serious hiatal hernias, Domkowski is
His patients are in good hands, as he is therapy, you have to investigate fur- clearly a fan and he backs that up, say-
a fellow of both the American College ther and that usually involves an EGD, ing “the robot has added another level
of Surgeons and the American Society which stands for esophagogastroduo- of technology that benefits the patient.
denoscopy.” And it makes us better surgeons.

Fully aware that most folks don’t car- “We are able to do these surgeries
ry a medical dictionary around with minimally invasively, robotically, and
them, Domkowski leans forwards and really restore the patient’s ability to
explains the term. eat, to lose their reflux and return them
to a good quality of life. And they do
An esophagogastroduodenoscopy, not need to leave the area to have this
he says, is nothing more than “a scope” done.”
or a tiny camera used to look inside the
upper gastrointestinal track. Of course, any discussion of any her-
nia surgery these days needs to include
With the aid of that and other diag- what’s now become a different kind of
nostic and imaging tools, Domkowski four-letter word to both surgeons and
can determine if a “paraesophageal insurance companies: mesh.
hernia” is the real culprit for a patient’s
symptoms. Law firms now regularly advertise on
TV about class-action lawsuits involv-
“That,” Domkowski explains, “is the ing various synthetic mesh products
more complex hiatal hernia. If you take that, in the past, caused multiple medi-
100 people with hiatal hernia, maybe 10 cal problems after surgery.
will have paraesophageal. That’s where
Domkowski, however, actually
smiles when the topic is broached.

“We sometimes do use mesh in these
procedures. However, we use an ab-
sorbable mesh. Those meshes incor-
porate [or dissolve] into the diaphragm
and become part of it so there’s no
chance of recall or infection because
they’re biologic. They’re not synthetic
mesh, which is normally made of poly-
propylene or some other synthetic ma-
terial that can be recalled, can stretch
or can get infected.”

Dr. Patrick Domkowski is at Riverside
Surgical & Weight Loss Center. He is also
the chairman of surgery at the Sebastian
River Medical Center. His offices are at
14430 U.S. 1 in Sebastian. The phone
number is 772-581-8003. 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 45

HEALTH

What to know about Sen. McCain’s brain cancer

BY LAURIE MCGINLEY, LENA H. SUN motherapy and radiation. Sometimes well a person was functioning before ma, so far the studies haven’t shown a
AND LENNY BERNSTEIN that course of treatment is reduced being diagnosed and the molecular strong survival benefit, experts say.
to three weeks for older people. After characteristics of the tumor.
The Washington Post that, most patients get chemotherapy Another approach involves a device
several days a month for an additional 4. What about immunotherapy and that delivers alternating electrical cur-
Glioblastoma, the cancer with six months. other treatments? rents to the scalp. Some medical cen-
which Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has ters are already using it, but George-
been diagnosed, is a highly lethal ma- The median survival time following New treatments that unleash the town is still evaluating the treatment,
lignancy that killed Sen. Edward Ken- treatment is about 12 to 16 months, ex- immune system against malignancies according to Subramaniam. A patient,
nedy (D-Mass.) and Beau Biden, the perts said. But that varies considerably. can help patients with several kinds whose head is shaved, must wear
son of former vice president Joseph of cancer, including metastatic mela- the cap-like device for 18 hours at a
Biden. Here is what you need to know: Age can affect how long a person noma and lung and bladder cancers. stretch. “If you’re a frail patient, it may
survives; in general, being young is But while there are many clinical trials be hard,” she said. 
1. What is glioblastoma? better. Other key factors include how testing immunotherapy for glioblasto-
Glioblastoma is an aggressive cancer
that is the most common of all malig-
nant brain tumors. About 12,400 new
cases are expected in 2017, according
to the American Brain Tumor Associa-
tion. A glioblastoma is, by definition, a
grade IV astrocytoma, a kind of tumor
that arises from the star-shaped cells
that make up the supportive tissue of
the brain, according to the associa-
tion.
Typically, said Matthias Holdhoff,
associate professor of oncology at Sid-
ney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer
Center at Johns Hopkins University,
“the tumors are considered not cur-
able.”
About 23,000 adults, more of them
men than women, are diagnosed with
various types of primary brain cancers
a year, according to Cancer.net, a web-
site of the American Society of Clini-
cal Oncology. They are more common
in older adults – McCain is 80 – than
in younger people. Unlike most other
cancers, brain tumors do not spread to
other parts of the body. They kill by in-
terfering with normal body function,
depending on their location.
2. What are some symptoms of a
glioblastoma?
Depending on the location of the tu-
mor, a patient can have seizures, head-
aches, blurred vision and confusion.
“If it affects the portion of the brain
that controls your strength, you could
have weakness on one half of the body,
speech problems, sometimes double
vision, the inability to understand or
express yourself, even cognitive prob-
lems or understanding what you’re lis-
tening to, or the lack of insight,” said
Deepa Subramaniam, director of the
brain tumor center at Georgetown
University’s Lombardi Comprehen-
sive Cancer Center.
3. How is the cancer treated?
Surgery is performed to remove as
much of the tumor as possible. But
microscopic “infiltrating tumor cells”
generally invade healthy brain tissue
and are responsible for recurrence,
said Weinberg.
To target those cancer cells, patients
typically receive six weeks of oral che-

46 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

HEALTH

Low-dose aspirin may cut breast cancer risk by a fifth

BY MARIA CANFIELD fornia educators. The women com- aspirin on breast cancer is likely due
Correspondent pleted questionnaires in 2005 out- to the fact that it is a weak “aroma-
lining their use of aspirin and other tase inhibitor.” Aromatase inhibitors,
A new study suggests that taking non-steroidal anti-inflammatory such as Arimidex, are treatment op-
low-dose aspirin at least three times drugs (NSAIDs). tions for “hormone-positive” breast
a week may reduce the risk of breast cancers. She adds, “the anti-inflam-
cancer by up to 20 percent. The research team is from City of matory properties of aspirin may also
Hope Beckman Research Institute in play a significant role in its preventa-
In the study, researchers analyzed Monrovia, California. In 2013, eight tive nature, as chronic inflammation
information from more than 57,000 years after the participants submit- is considered a possible factor lead-
women, participants in an ongoing ted their questionnaires, the team ing to cancer development.”
study monitoring the health of Cali- determined that women who took
Each year in the United States,
Dr. Daniela Shapiro. more than 300,000 women receive
a breast cancer diagnosis. Surgery,
PHOTO: DENISE RITCHIE radiation, chemotherapy and hor-
mone therapy – sometimes in com-
a low-dose “baby” aspirin (81 milli- bination – have long been treatment
grams) at least three times each week mainstays, but ongoing research has
were 16 percent less likely to develop resulted in the development of even
any breast cancer and 20 percent less more approaches. Doctors are often
likely to develop the most common able to tailor treatments to the indi-
breast cancers, compared to wom- vidual woman, prescribing specific
en who took a baby aspirin less fre- medicines for their specific type of
quently, or not at all. breast cancer.

Dr. Georgia Daniela Shapiro, a Vero One newer approach, called “tar-
Beach oncologist, is familiar with the geted treatments,” focuses on spe-
study and the concept that low-dose cific molecules and cell mechanisms
aspirin has a potential impact on the thought to be important for can-
prevention of breast cancer. She says cer cell survival and growth. Tar-
“this study adds to the continually geted treatments are meant to spare
growing body of research on the role healthy tissues and cause less severe
of low-dose aspirin role as a preven- side effects than chemotherapy. A
tative for certain types of disease.” number of targeted treatments have
been approved by the FDA for specif-
While previous research had sug- ic breast cancer subtypes.
gested there may be a link between
frequent regular-dose aspirin use As is widely known, low-dose as-
and a lower risk of breast cancer over- pirin has long been associated with
all, this is the first study to focus on other health benefits. The most re-
the effects of baby aspirin on specific cent government guidelines, issued
breast cancer subtypes. For HR-pos- in 2016, recommend that adults 50
itive and HER2-negative breast can- to 59 years old take a daily low-dose
cers, the risk reduction associated aspirin to help prevent heart attack,
with the regular use of baby aspirin stroke and colorectal cancer. (The
was 20 percent (compared to 16 per- guidelines come with some caveats:
cent for all types combined). This is a the aspirin-taker should have a 10
significant finding, as the majority of percent or greater risk of developing
women diagnosed with breast cancer cardiovascular disease in the next
have either the HR-positive or HER2- 10 years, have a life expectancy of at
negative subtype. least 10 years, and not be a high risk
for internal bleeding.) The task force
The results were reported in the responsible for the guidelines says
journal Breast Cancer Research and, that more research is needed to de-
according to the researchers, re- termine whether taking low-dose as-
mained viable even after accounting pirin is beneficial for people younger
for other possible factors, such as a than 50 or older than 70.
family history of breast cancer. Strik-
ing a note of caution, the researchers Dr. Shapiro cautions that aspirin,
stress that further studies are needed even at a low dose, is not without risk,
before firm recommendations can be and that individuals should speak
made about the use of baby aspirin to with their physician about their spe-
reduce the risk of breast cancer. cific health situation to determine if
low-dose aspirin might be beneficial
Vero’s Dr. Shapiro says the poten- for them.
tial risk-lowering effect of low-dose
Dr. Shapiro practices as part of
Scott, Weeks, McGarry & Shapiro, lo-
cated at 1460 36th St in Vero Beach; the
office number is 772-562-7777. 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Style Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 47

How to wear head-to-toe white

BY OLIVIA BUXTON SMITH taken your style cues from a ’90s WAG A duster coat, cotton trench or bags to break up an all-white outfit. A
The Telegraph lineup, the key is to avoid synthetic printed kimono-style wrap are all neutral base really makes these pop.
fabrics and opt for silk, wool and cotton chic options for summer that will also
If you consider yourself to be acci- pieces that fit well. help you combat the unreliable rainy “I wear a lot of white - I’m quite Aus-
dent-prone (we’re talking regularly weather. tralian in my aesthetic,’’ Molly God-
spilled coffee cups or dropped food), Generous hemlines will also help dard, founder of pajama brand Des-
inherently grubby (sorry, but some ensure you bypass dodgy references. Add colorful accessories mond & Dempsey tells The Telegraph.
people just are), or particularly active: Think wide-leg trousers and a silky Look to silky scarfs, statement sun- “But I find a good way to introduce col-
Look away now, because wearing head- blouse, or a cotton button-down midi glasses, colorful jewelry and bright or and print is by making little neckties
to-toe white probably isn’t for you. skirt and a tie-waist shirt. out of left over sample fabric.’’ 

But, if you quite fancy experiment- Incorporate off-white denim
ing with tonal dressing, are looking White denim should, unequivocally,
for a new way to nail sleek summer be loose. That said, there are a plethora
eveningwear or to emanate off-duty of styles that fall under into this catego-
cool on holiday, the all-white dressing ry, with boyfriend, wide-leg, cropped
strategy is very chic option. frayed-hem, and straight-leg styles all
good options.
“Keep your makeup au naturel,’’ ad- When it comes to wearing white
vises blogger Camille Charriere, “you denim as part of a tonal look, avoid
don’t want to get foundation or lippy optic shades and reach for ivory, ecru
on that outfit, nor do you want to look and beige instead. These neutral tones
like you’re attending a ‘Marbella’ white look far better with white T-shirts and
party.’’ shirts, and will stop your outfit being
one dimensional.
To help you avoid Elvis in Vegas ref-
erences, and any other sartorial faux Play with texture
pas, here is our grown-up guide to A ruffle here, a piece of knitwear
wearing top-to-toe white ... there: tonal dressing lends itself very
well to mixing and matching different
Don’t rule out a white suit fabrics and textures. Whereas multiple
We know we said avoid the Elvis pieces of clothing in the same color and
references but, done right, white suit- fabric can look a bit matchy-matchy,
ing is a sleek option. Loose-fit trousers incorporating difference materials will
– either slightly flared or a silhouette- both grant your outfit a cooler edge,
skimming straight leg style – are by far and give it a bit more depth.
the most flattering. A slightly oversize Think a ruffled blouse underneath a
blazer is also the superior option – al- linen suit, or a crisp shirt with a knit-
though make sure it’s snug around the ted, handkerchief hem skirt.
shoulders to avoid you being swamped
in swathes of ecru fabric. Opt for a lightweight cover-up in a
Layer you suit over a simple slouchy different shade
tank top, and elevate it with block heel
sandals (the latter should also stop it Layering a lightweight cover-up on
your hemlines trailing along the street). top of an all-white outfit is not only
practical (you can sit down on the tube,
Look for luxe fabrics – and long for one), but the languid layers will also
hemlines endow your outfit with a level of insou-
ciance.
If you’re worried your all-white look
might leave you looking like you’ve

48 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Style Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

Exhibition further cements Yves Saint Laurent’s legacy

BY ROBIN GIVHAN a Paris design competition, to his rise long gallery, his late-career frocks form day to imagine a time when wearing
at Dior and the critical acclaim for his a rainbow of satin and taffeta, includ- trousers was scandalous. The late New
The Washington Post first collection, in which he introduced ing a particularly glorious pumpkin- York socialite Nan Kempner, whose own
Dior customers to the trapeze dress colored evening cloak — a style that wardrobe was the subject of an exhibi-
There are few designers, alive or and its easy, swinging silhouette. The made a generation of socialites swoon. tion at the Met, recalled being stopped
dead, who have had a greater influ- exhibition zips along to the launch of at the entrance to a fancy New York res-
ence on fashion than Yves Saint Lau- Saint Laurent’s signature brand with There are a lot of beautiful clothes taurant because she was wearing pants.
rent. In the 1960s, he blurred gender his business and life partner, Pierre here, and some carry great appeal to “I had to drop my pants and go in in a
lines by crafting pantsuits and tuxedos Bergé. It highlights his professional contemporary eyes. There are myriad tunic, and this was the early ’60s,” she
for women at a time when such no- revelations, such as when he turned to opportunities for a visitor to murmur, told The Washington Post.
tions were considered revolutionary a workaday peacoat as inspiration for “I’d wear that.” Or, “I own a jacket like
and subversive. He popularized the a dress. And it celebrates his personal that.” For a designer at Saint Laurent’s lofty
safari jacket. He took inspiration from mythmaking – his partying through perch to champion not just trousers, but
the street, the nightclubs and popular the night with friends such as model For many, that visual pleasure and also a tuxedo in lieu of an evening gown,
culture – injecting youth and a sub- Betty Catroux and his posing nude in self-congratulatory familiarity will was jaw dropping. That’s hard to absorb
versive spontaneity into fashion. And advertisements for his perfume. be enough. “The most popular exhib- now, when leggings count as pants.
he helped set the industry on a more its now are fashion and jewelry,” says
democratic trajectory by opening his Because this show was organized by Barry Shifman, the museum’s curator “The Perfection of Style” does not
Rive Gauche boutique in Paris, which the Seattle Art Museum in partnership of decorative arts after 1890. The VMFA engage the viewer in a conversation
was devoted to more accessible ready- with Paris’ Fondation Pierre Bergé- hopes to attract 100,000 visitors to the about social taboos or cultural barriers.
to-wear, while his colleagues were fo- Yves Saint Laurent, it benefits from an Saint Laurent show, he says. It mentions Saint Laurent’s ground-
cused only on rarefied and expensive archive that is arguably unmatched by breaking use of black models on the
haute couture. any design house. It also had the stat- The newfound allure of fashion for runway but doesn’t connect that de-
ure and connections to draw from pri- museums can be traced, in large mea- cision to his work as a whole. Did that
Because of Saint Laurent’s accom- vate collections. sure, to 2011’s record-breaking “Alex- choice reflect his affection for North
plishments, there has been no shortage ander McQueen: Savage Beauty” at Africa, particularly Morocco, where he
of films, books or exhibitions examin- All the professional hits are here: the Metropolitan Museum of Art. That spent considerable private time? Did it
ing life details as varied as his profes- a Mondrian dress with its geometric show was not only the museum’s most flow from his interest in modern art,
sional beginnings as an assistant to blocks of color, the slick black trench successful fashion exhibition to date, in African art? Was it simply a matter
Christian Dior and his obsessive devo- coat worn by Catherine Deneuve in the but it also ranked among the 10 most- of aesthetics – his favoring the contrast
tion to his French bulldog, Moujik. In- film “Belle du Jour,” the early pantsuits. visited exhibitions in general – right up of sun-drenched colors on darker skin?
deed, in 1983, only 25 years into a career Glass cases practically burst with Saint there with the Mona Lisa, Picasso and
that lasted almost 50, the designer was Laurent’s costume jewelry. And in one Jeff Koons. (The McQueen record was A gallery dedicated to “The Genders”
the subject of a celebrated retrospective later shattered by “China Through the is home to a selection of pantsuits, a
at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In Looking Glass” in 2015.) tuxedo dress and evening pants. One
1998, Saint Laurent mounted a massive of contemporary fashion’s current ob-
fashion show at the Stade de France for At their best, these exhibitions con- sessions is the gender line – blurring it,
the final of the World Cup soccer tour- nect fashion’s creativity, auteurship erasing it. Saint Laurent, who died at 71
nament in front of a television audience and technique to the broader world. in 2008, is quoted as having said that
estimated at more than 1 billion. The story of a garment can push visi- women should accept men’s feminin-
tors to reconsider their own definition ity and that men should concede some
What is left to be revealed? Who is of beauty and their assumptions about of their virility to women. It would be
left to inform of his greatness? gender. It can highlight the emotional worthwhile for this exhibition to con-
urgency of self-creation, the universal- sider Saint Laurent’s role in today’s
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is ity of humanity and the power of the lively conversation. And as today’s run-
betting there remains something to say exceptional. ways honor the quotidian, did Saint
and people who are willing to listen. Laurent’s elevation of peacoats and
Countless intellectual debates and sailor sweaters lead us to Vetements’s
The retrospective “Yves Saint Lau- visceral urges can blossom from some- DHL T-shirt?
rent: The Perfection of Style,” at the thing as familiar and relatable as a
Richmond museum through Aug. 27, dress or a coat. The exhibition doesn’t pose ques-
moves briskly from the designer’s birth tions to be wrestled with. It doesn’t re-
in Algeria in 1936 to his early success in But it’s often that very familiarity that quire you to think. And it doesn’t allow
makes fashion exhibitions especially Saint Laurent’s work to engage with the
challenging and that can render them rest of the fashion world, let alone the
banal. It’s difficult for most women to- creative world. It simply tells you that
Saint Laurent, the man, was great. To
make that case, there are examples of
the paper dolls he created in his youth.
There are swatches of fabric and sketch-
es that date to 1962, as well as press clip-
pings, photographs and video clips. In
saving every bit of ephemera from the
beginning of their company, the de-
signer and Bergé were either extraordi-
narily prescient or incredibly egotisti-
cal. Probably a bit of both.

Saint Laurent’s stature as a designer
is evident. This exhibition reconfirms
it. His continued relevance, however, is
more elusive. 

Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™ Style Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 49

How to master the art of competitive summer dressing

BY CHARLIE GOWANS-EGLINTON
The Telegraph

In winter, the daily commute is a – Wood/Grey do a similar style to Kat
drab affair. Black coats, black boots, Farmer’s leather handled one. Since
ashen, vitamin D-deprived skin. But I’ve yet to book a beach escape, I’ve
oh, what a difference a little sun- been wearing a straw bag in the city,
shine makes. Suddenly, the streets with a zip-up clutch inside to stop
are awash with florals, stripes, leop- anything important falling out.
ard print. There are wedge espadrilles
and embroidered blouses at the school The boyish beach hat
gates, and jeweled sunglasses at the Floppy brims can look a little too
golf club. The ladies restroom at my Marbella beach club for my liking, but
office could be the oyster tent at the a boyish straw boater is just the thing
polo, for the amount of tea-dresses in with floaty summer dresses. Lucy
view. Williams’ one is particularly good –
though if anybody asks, you bought
But if you think this is bad, best yours off a family of artisan hatmak-
brace yourself – it’s about to get worse. ers while on vacation.
Once the summer holidays begin,
there’s really no living with your fel- The stylish swimmers
low woman. Who could possibly need I could easily fall down an Insta-
a monogrammed straw bag, I won- gram rabbit hole here, as Morgane
der, but also – why don’t I have one? Sezalory is one stylish woman. She’s
Instagram, usually my favorite tool also the founder of French online-
for finding new brands, researching only label Sezane, which has just de-
street style trends, and watching vid- buted swimwear. I’ve got my eye on
eos of puppies eat strawberries, be- the teal one-piece ...
comes simply unbearable in the sum- The fashionable fan
mer months, as images of Campari Yes, really – sweating never looked
spritzes (the new Aperol, folks), de- so good. This trend comes courtesy of
signer beach towels and niche swim- one trick pony (in a good way) brand
wear brands reach me at my desk. Fern Fans - Susie Lau is wafting one of
their designs here. Fern’s designs sold
This attention-seeking need for out faster than you can say “hot flush,”
likes is completely transparent, of but fear not: Label Khu Khu has some
course – nobody really wears jewelry great options. 
on the beach, or drives a convertible
with their hair wrapped in an Hermes
scarf. And sure, it’s all a bit naff, and we
should all just go out and actually en-
joy ourselves, without putting it on so-
cial media. But there’s no reason why
one shouldn’t look chic, even when one
is off grid, is there? And if you were go-
ing shopping anyway ...

So here are the pieces to buy – the
niche swimwear, the wedge espa-
drilles, even some fashionable fans –
just in case. As the saying goes, if you
can’t beat them, then you’re not shop-
ping in the right place.

The easy espadrilles
French ‘It’ girl Jeanne Damas’ la-
bel, Rouje, specializes in pared-back
french style, with Damas on hand to
show you how to style her wares via the
medium on vacation Instagrams. Ex-
tra points for the not-too-high wedge
you can walk all day in.

The everything-but-the-kitchen-
sink beach bag

You know, with space for your towel,
factor 50, and Jilly Cooper paperback

50 Vero Beach 32963 / July 27, 2017 Your Vero Beach Newsweekly ™

DINING REVIEW

12A Buoy: For fresh local seafood, this is the place

BY TINA RONDEAU crusted wahoo ($25), and our compan-
Columnist ion chose the Florida lobster tail ($26).

For most of the past decade, our go- My wonderful plump, juicy scallops,
pan-seared medium rare, just melted
to place for fresh local seafood has been in your mouth. Some of the best ever.
Our companion’s 10-ounce grilled lob-
the 12A Buoy. ster tail was accompanied by delicious
crispy French fries. And my husband’s
Since we first discovered this little perfectly cooked wahoo was served
over a roasted garlic parmesan potato
shack eight years ago on the edge of Fish- cake with tomato pomodoro and wilt-
ed arugula.
erman’s Wharf in Fort Pierce, we have
For dessert, there now are three
dined there three or four dozen times. choices: a key lime pie, a peanut butter
pie, and now a fudge brownie a la mode.
Fine dining this is not. The 12A –
Even the simplest dishes here are so
which has kind of a dive-bar vibe – is good they make you wish this restau-
rant was here in Vero. If you really like
far from fancy. No white linen and fan- fresh seafood, this is the place. The 12A
Buoy is the best in our area.
cy tableware. The ambiance is set by
I welcome your comments, and en-
the pickup trucks with boat trailers out courage you to send feedback to me at
[email protected].
front. It is the type of place where you
The reviewer is a beachside resi-
would expect locals to hang out, and dent who dines anonymously at
restaurants at the expense of this
they do.
newspaper. 
But the fresh seafood, which is what

draws us there, has been consistently

excellent (though I should also note

there are steaks on the menu which are

pretty darn good as well).

The only thing that has

changed over the years

– other than a small in- Seafood Tower.

crease in what remain PHOTOS BY GORDON RADFORD

very reasonable

Bacon Gorgonzola Whole Hogfish.
Encrusted KC Strip

prices – is the 12A seems to get crowded dozen Malpeque oysters on the half shell Burrata Salad. Hours:
earlier. Since it does not take reserva- ($12). Our companion went for the Jack’s Wednesday through Monday
tions, during season you can anticipate Miami Vice chowder ($5). Malpeques lived up to expectations,
a goodly wait for a table. my clams were even better – steamed in (closed Tuesdays)
Jack’s Miami Vice is the name the a garlic herbed butter and sherry sauce, 11 am to 9 pm
Now, it seems, there’s a waiting list restaurant gave some years ago to a cup and served with a chunk of grilled
pretty much all year around. filled half with clam chowder, and half bread perfect for mopping. (10pm Fridays and Saturdays)
with conch chowder. The 12A’s version is
On our most recent visit, even though amazing. You really want to try this. Then for entrées, I ordered one of my Beverages:
the evening was warm, the first table favorites, the grilled scallops ($24), my Beer and wine
to come open was outside on the deck While the light-bodied, easy-to-eat husband chose one of the evening’s
(screened from the parking lot by a wall specials, the sun-dried tomato pesto en- Address:
of sea grapes), so we decided to dine 21 Fisherman’s Wharf,
al fresco. A large fan next to our table
helped considerably. Fort Pierce

A server quickly arrived to take our Phone: 772-672-4524
order, and my husband and I selected
a bottle of chardonnay from their mod-
estly priced wine list and our compan-
ion went for a glass of pineapple cider.

For starters, I chose one of my favorite
appetizers, the steamed clams ($14). My
husband passed up one of his favorites
– the creamy, clam-filled New England
clam chowder ($5) – and ordered a half