Where is our universal health care?
Nine hours a day, five days a week, Tommy Smith watches television from a chair inside the tiny office at his father's workplace.
Since graduating LaVoy Exceptional Center in May, the blind and autistic man hasn't had any place else to go - except to work with his dad, a single parent who provides his developmentally disabled son with 24-hour care.
``This is my fault,'' Greg Smith said Wednesday. After Tommy left the public school system, ``I assumed there would be something in place.''
Smith signed up for a Medicaid waiver that put his 23- year-old son on a waiting list for services in June. Eight months later, Tommy is No. 11,783 out of 14,000.
``That's just unacceptable,'' said the 42-year-old lawn mower service manager.
But a day after Smith shared his story with WFLA, News Channel 8, Tommy had a place to go. And other families struggling with a wait that could take up to five years have hope.
An agency that serves developmentally disabled clients offered Tommy a scholarship for a daily program. He starts Friday.
This isn’t Greg Smith’s fault. It’s society’s fault. Why does a hard working parent have to rely on the kindness of strangers to have his kid cared for? Tommy was lucky enough to be featured on TV. Immediately after the TV report aired there was an outpouring of support. Soon, people will forget all about him. There are also more than 14,000 still waiting for services.
We can pay for universal health care in this country without raising taxes. We can provide health care to every single person in this country for less than we pay right now to insure only a small fraction of our population. It works in Canada. It works in Europe. We need it here. Now.
The president and Congress should immediately begin work to achieve health insurance coverage for all Americans by 2010, the National Academy of Sciences said on Wednesday.
"It is time for our nation to extend coverage to everyone," the academy's Institute of Medicine said, in a report intended to put the issue back atop the national agenda.
The report, summarizing three years of work by a panel of 15 experts, concluded, "Universal insurance coverage is an important and achievable goal for the country."
The academy is an independent, nonpartisan body chartered by Congress. It did not endorse a specific legislative proposal or estimate the cost of its recommendations. But Mary Sue Coleman, the president of the University of Michigan, who was co-chairwoman of the panel, said, "The economic cost to the country from the poorer health and premature deaths of uninsured people is in the range of $65 billion to $130 billion a year."
The report pointed out that because uninsured people received much less medical care than those with insurance, they tend to be sicker. About 18,000 people die each year as a result of not having insurance, it said.
Florida fags file for fairness
More than 170 gay men and women sued a court clerk Wednesday, challenging the Florida law prohibiting them from obtaining marriage licenses and adding their voices to the growing nationwide crescendo on the controversial social issue.
The suit, filed in Broward County court, is believed to be the first formal legal challenge to the state law specifying that marriage licenses be issued only to parties consisting of one male and one female.
"An idea whose time has come can never be stopped," said attorney Ellis Rubin, who represents the 175 gays filing suit. "This idea's time is now."
The suit names only Broward Court Clerk Howard Forman as a defendant. He issues wedding licenses in the county, following state laws.
......"We're people, human beings, American citizens. We pay our taxes," said James Stewart, a retired teacher from Dania Beach. "It's an old cliched line, but you know what? If we're going to pay our taxes, we deserve every right that should be granted to every American citizen."
Orlando Sentinal (via KC Star:)
Bringing the national war over same-sex marriage to Florida, a flamboyant Miami lawyer sued Broward County's clerk of the courts Wednesday for refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples.
In an eight-page complaint, Ellis Rubin asked a judge to strike down Florida's law defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman and to compel the clerk to issue marriage applications to same-sex couples.
Standing with two of more than 170 gays and lesbians who joined the challenge, Rubin said the suit was "the first shot" in the war that President Bush declared Tuesday when he urged Congress to pass a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages.
"The fact that he's trying to amend the Constitution shows ... that it's all right with him to create second-class citizens," Rubin said. "It is neither all right nor constitutional."
Two of the named plaintiffs, musicians James Stewart, 61, and Wayne Ellis Clark, 54, agreed. They have lived together for ten years and were so incensed by Bush's support for an amendment, they called Rubin and asked how they could help.
"Sign up more people," Stewart said Rubin told the couple, so they did. Visiting Fort Lauderdale's gay community center and gay bars Tuesday night, they recruited more than 170 plaintiffs in two hours.
Rubin, who is known as much for his publicity stunts as for such sensational courtroom defenses as TV intoxication and nymphomania, said he had another motivation. He hopes to atone for what he considers a mistake made 27 years ago when he sued to overturn a Dade County law extending protections against discrimination to homosexuals.
The battle over that law, which was repealed and just recently reinstated, launched singer Anita Bryant's anti-gay crusade. It also prompted the Florida Legislature to prohibit any homosexual from adopting a child in Florida.
"I was wrong," Rubin said. "I've come full circle."
......Howard Forman, Broward's clerk of courts, said he has no choice but to continue denying marriage applications to same-sex couples - but he does so reluctantly. In 1997, Forman was one of the few state senators who opposed the Florida law outlawing same-sex marriages.
"I thought it was discriminatory," he said. "And I don't believe it belongs in the U.S. Constitution now."
Greenspan wants old and poor to pay for Bush’s reckless tax cuts for the rich
Alan Greenspan, the Federal Reserve's chairman, called on Congress and the Bush administration today to cut spending and rein in Social Security programs to narrow the record budget deficit and protect the "vigorous expansion" now under way in the American economy.
......In addition to spending cuts in the overall budget, Mr. Greenspan said Congress should consider ways to reduce the costs of Social Security, including pushing up the age at which retirees could begin to receive Social Security and Medicare payments.
......The White House anticipates a shortfall of $521 billion this year, and the administration contends that it can reduce the deficit by half over the next five years by cutting back on domestic spending not related to the military.
Uh, that $521 million does NOT include the cost of the ongoing war in Iraq. Also, those numbers are based on incredibly rosy and unrealistic forecasts like this one:
The White House backed away Wednesday from its own prediction that the economy will add 2.6 million new jobs before the end of this year, saying the forecast was the work of number-crunchers and that President Bush was not a statistician. ......
Taxpayers subsidize mall image makeover
Centro Ybor, that pile of bricks with the same shops and restaurants that can be found from Des Moines to Orlando, thinks of itself as special, and it just can’t fathom why everyone else does not just love it for its bubbly cuteness and its non-threatening inoffensiveness:
Darrin Spardello had pushed eight quarters into an Ybor City parking meter before he realized the meter's time limit was an hour.
He figured that wouldn't be enough time for him and his wife, visiting from Palm Beach, to explore the shops and restaurants of the Centro Ybor entertainment complex. So they got back in the car and drove, looking for another place to park. They circled and circled until, by chance, they spotted the sign for the Centro Ybor parking garage.
While happy with the great lunch and pleasant outdoor stroll that followed, Spardello and his wife said the parking experience was frustrating.
"It was a challenge," he said.
So Darrin, the guy who doesn’t have enough sense to check a parking meter before stuffing $2 into it, also found it challenging to use a parking garage. Sounds like a ready-made sucker to me... the perfect mark for Ybor’s safe and generic mall. But no. Centro Ybor isn’t happy with the status quo.
It's the same frustration that has dogged Centro Ybor since it opened in 2000 - not to mention Ybor City's image as crime-plagued and infested with people searching for body piercing parlors and nickel beers.
In the aftermath of recent news that Centro Ybor's developers are in default of their loans, officials are unrolling a campaign to try to overcome Ybor's image problems and bring in the crowds.
A series of newspaper advertisements beginning this week will feature "accomplished" locals, like 2003 Civitan of the Year winner Liz Kennedy, expressing enthusiasm for Centro Ybor. By March, the campaign will move to radio and perhaps television, said Centro Ybor spokeswoman Lisa Brock.
Brock won't say how much the campaign will cost, only that it is "substantially more than we typically spend."
Uh, aren’t the taxpayers paying the mortgage for this monstrosity? I think we have a right to know exactly how much is being spent on ads, who is getting the ad business, and whether the owners of Centro Ybor might just be able to pay their own damn mortgage if they weren’t spending so much on advertising.
Centro officials want residents to think of Ybor City as safe and family friendly. They want people to know that parking is available, and that yes, Centro Ybor is here to stay.
"The key is to get the word out that it's a convenient place for dining and browsing," said Jay Miller, executive vice president of Steiner Associates, one of Centro Ybor's developers. "It's going to take some time."
These guys have had four years and tons of free publicity to get their message across. They sound just like President Bush: “Trust us. We’ll do better. We’re really good and well meaning. Trust us. Past failures were someone else’s fault. Trust us...”
On its opening weekend four years ago, Centro Ybor, with more than 200,000 square feet of retail space, drew about 100,000 people who caught a movie at the Muvico, played video games at GameWorks, drank martinis at Big City Tavern or watched dinner being grilled at dish.
Centro's backers celebrated and prepared to ride the big wave.
Then Channelside, not far away near the Florida Aquarium, and International Plaza, with its upscale shopping, opened. Both were stiff competition.
Stiff competition for public handouts: International Plaza enjoys a sweetheart lease deal for the public land on which it sits, and Channelside is heavily subsidized as well. I’m confused: how it is that we have money for rich developer Welfare Daddies, but we don’t have money for universal health care?
And, Centro would have to battle a rough image that Miller said was fueled by the granting of too many liquor licenses. Over time, bars and nightclubs edged out art galleries and retail shops in Ybor.
Well, yeah, but that all happened well before Centro Ybor came on the scene. In fact, Centro Ybor was seen by many as the final nail in Ybor’s coffin. So, Centro Ybor contributed to the very decline that its developers are now blaming for its own failure. Ybor was already a reeling, binging, bullying, roofie-slipping frat boy when Centro came along. The city of Tampa had ensured that Ybor would be a wasteland of cheap generic bars and shiny drunken people by issuing all of those liquor licenses that Centro is now complaining about. At the time, Ybor was said to be booming, ‘cause all these new bars were, like, bringing in crowds and stuff. The Centro developers couldn’t wait to jump on the Ybor drunk wagon.
Almost four years after it opened, Centro Ybor, which was supposed to drive the revitalization of Ybor City, needed a $16.3-million multiyear bailout.
See above rant re.: mortgage payments.
Those who track the industry say Centro Ybor was a difficult sell from the beginning because of Ybor City's reputation.
"I think Centro Ybor was off to a great start," said Lill Hanson, a retail specialist at Grubb & Ellis/Commercial Florida. "But it's going to take more than a couple of years to change Ybor City's image."
Despite the slow change, Hanson said, Centro Ybor was the catalyst for bringing more development to the area. With nearby apartments opening up and hotels coming, it's starting to have almost a French Quarter feel, she said. And slowly, people are coming.
"The problem is just changing the impression people have of Ybor," she said. "They have to educate people. I do think (the customers) are starting to come."
Centro is looking to several key renters to draw in crowds. Among them: the Improv comedy club, GameWorks, the International Bazaar shop, M.J. Barley Hoppers and Samurai Blue restaurants, and Muvico, with its 21-and-older Premier Theaters & Bar.
Wait a minute. These are the same tired and generic shops that have been there since the beginning. Well, some names have changed, but a lot of these restaurants are truly interchangeable: bland, unimaginative, overpriced food served in a “fun” and “unique” decor...
They aren't targeting anyone in particular, Brock said.
"It's more about having people understand it's not just a place for teenagers," she said. "There are businesses and activities and things to do beyond just Seventh Avenue. It's for kids who want to shop at Urban Outfitters, for singles looking for a date place, families looking for activities and entertainment."
Translation: Centro Ybor is SAFE FOR WHITE PEOPLE! Bring your charge cards...
Miller said the bar crowd doesn't emerge until 11 p.m. - people just don't realize it.
"Everybody thinks that Friday and Saturday nights, it's just packed, and hard to park," Miller said. "If you come to Ybor at 7:30 to 8 p.m. it's very easy to get in and out."
Despite its shaky financial foundation, Centro Ybor is not closing, said general manager Irene Pierpont.
The complex has leased more than 90 percent of its retail space, and some of its restaurants do well enough to serve food until 1 a.m.
Now that’s impressive: one or two of the restaurants are managing to serve food!
"The world knows about Ybor City," Pierpont said. "The locals don't seem to support us as much. We're hoping to change that."
Hey, Irene: I’d venture a guess that locals might know just a little more about Ybor than the rest of the world. Hmm... maybe the locals see right through your cynical sugary marketing?
Pierpont admits parking can be confusing for those unfamiliar with the area, given the construction, one-way streets and parking meters that offer different times and rates. Centro officials are currently negotiating with the city to offer valet parking on Seventh Avenue.
More public space given over to a group of Welfare Daddy losers.
Her advice is: valet park or use the Centro Ybor garage on 15th Street near Seventh Avenue.
(That would be the garage that the city of Tampa built and runs at taxpayer expense for the primary benefit of... Centro Ybor)
Pierpont said a survey is being conducted on Ybor City to better understand its strengths and weakness. The results are expected to be published in March.
"It's a crucial time for us," she said.
Hanson, of Grubb & Ellis, believes Centro Ybor will bounce back.
"Because of Centro Ybor and what they (offer), Ybor City is cleaning up very quickly," she said. "It's going to take a while, but it's on its way."
More time. More taxpayer money and resources for Welfare Daddies.
Tampa PATRIOT Act forum this Thursday
T he USA Patriot Act and the balance between civil liberty and security will be the subjects of a televised forum this week sponsored by the League of Women Voters.
The law, crafted after the Sept. 11 attacks, was designed to deter and punish terrorists by expanding investigative tools for police.
Opponents worry it removes checks and balances on police - and even threatens the civil rights and freedoms of those it is intended to protect.
Scheduled panelists include Paul Perez, U.S. attorney for Florida's Middle District; Carl Whitehead, special agent in the FBI's Tampa office; retired Army Col. Michael Pheneger, treasurer of the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida; and Morris ``Sandy'' Weinberg Jr., a lawyer with the firm of Zuckerman Spaeder.
The League of Women Voters of Hillsborough County and county government television will host the forum from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday on the 26th floor of the Fred B. Karl County Center, 601 E. Kennedy Blvd., Tampa.
HTV22 in Hillsborough will broadcast it live, and the forum will be replayed by WUSF Channel 16 at noon March 5.
Bush divides
President Bush said today he supported a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, declaring that such a measure was the only way to protect the status of marriage between man and woman, which he called "the most fundamental institution of civilization."
In an announcement fraught with social, legal and political implications, Mr. Bush urged Congress to act on the amendment quickly and send it on to the state legislatures. Quick action is essential, he said, to bring clarity to the law and protect husband-and-wife marriages from a few "activist judges."
"The voice of the people must be heard," Mr. Bush said in a brief White House speech that Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, called an attempt to find "a wedge issue to divide the American people."
For me, same-sex marriage has less to do with antiquated notions of whether Adam should take Steve instead of Eve. Rather, the true issue is that fully half of these unions are doomed to fail, just like any other rotten, suburban, two car, two kid, one dog nightmare. There's a mountain of printed wisdom on the damages of divorce, but the titles should all be altered to read the damages of marriage; somewhere along the way, society forgot to plug in laws, rituals, and social pressures that prevent uncompatible people from agreeing to spend the rest of their lives together, when it's blatantly obvious to their mothers, friends, and the mouthpiece of God committing the unholy act of joining them that the whole thing will be an absolute disaster some day.
All that stuff that Karl Rove is telling the press secretary for the dumbest President in the history of America to quote the boss as saying about "sacred unions" and "enduring institutions" is just patently absurd. Marriage in America is a fucking joke, so there is absolutely no reason why people shouldn't line up to marry someone of the same sex, their goldfish, or a 1978 Trans Am with a broken stereo. Take a coin out of your pocket, flip it in the air...it's the same thing.
... if the Rovians insist on giving battle here, on this issue, then so be it. I'm prepared to oblige them, especially if they're going to make this a struggle to keep their filthy paws -- and those of their proto-fascist supporters -- off the U.S. Constitution. The day will never come when I'll turn away from that fight. And I'll stand shoulder to shoulder with anyone who's willing to stand with me, even if it is Andrew Sullivan:
Rather than keep the Constitution out of the culture wars, this president wants to drag the very founding document into his re-election campaign. He is proposing to remove civil rights from one group of American citizens - and do so in the Constitution itself. The message could not be plainer: these citizens do not fully belong in America. Their relationships must be stigmatized in the very Constitution itself. The document that should be uniting the country will now be used to divide it, to single out a group of people for discrimination itself, and to do so for narrow electoral purposes. Not since the horrifying legacy of Constitutional racial discrimination in this country has such a goal been even thought of, let alone pursued. Those of us who supported this president in 2000, who have backed him whole-heartedly during the war, who have endured scorn from our peers as a result, who trusted that this president was indeed a uniter rather than a divider, now know the truth.
You're awfully late, Andrew. But better late than never. Welcome to the Popular Front.
Obviously, Rove thinks there are political risks and vulnerabilities in engaging on this issue. Our job as progressives is to figure out what those risks and vulnerabilities are, and exploit them as effectively as possible -- while not losing sight of the larger goal, which is to win back the country. If we're going to fight on this issue, let's fight smart. Let's fight to win.
"We have to fight," Hernandez said. "If we don't fight for ourselves, nobody else will."
Make no mistake: whether you’re straight or gay, married or single, this is your fight. aWol is talking about amending the constitution to explicitly brand an entire group of people as less than equal. You could be next.
Pinellas deputies extort seized property
One of the many big problems with our nation’s war on drugs is the backward policy of rewarding police departments with seized “drug assets.” The system is rife with abuse, with the cops often acting aggressively to seize property first and worry about justifying the seizures later in the rare instances when they are actually called on their actions.
A woman says deputies made a her a deal after finding a pound of marijuana in her car: If she turned over the car, she wouldn't be charged with a felony.
Pinellas sheriff's officials deny that they offered Tomeca L. Demps that choice, but her signature appears on an agreement to hand over her 1968 Buick Skylark to deputies.
Demps, 31, said she stores the car away from her home and didn't notice it missing when it was seized in a Feb. 13 drug investigation.
Four days later, deputies arrived at her home with the agreement ready for her signature, Demps said.
"They told me the best thing I could do was just sign the paper, and I wouldn't get charged with anything," she said. "What could I do? I signed."
After questions from the St. Petersburg Times Monday, the Sheriff's Office gave the car back to Demps, saying no links had been found between her and the marijuana. The car would have been given back even without the paper's questions, sheriff's spokeswoman Marianne Pasha said.
"Our legal staff did not feel this was an appropriate use of this process when it is apparent there was no action going forward against Mrs. Demps," Pasha said.
Deputies Mark Douglas and Kris Lutz made a mistake by writing in the agreement that Demps would not be charged since there were no plans to arrest her, Pasha said
"It wasn't an either or thing," Pasha said. "She would not have been arrested."
Pasha also denied that Demps signed over ownership of the car to the Sheriff's Office, though the agreement indicates she did.
Demps hired attorneys Craig Epifanio and John Trevena, who questioned whether deputies had acted properly.
"This is like a mob shakedown," said Trevena. "The document's language is clear. It appears to be extortion and official misconduct."
Robyn Blumner wrote about the drug war in yesterday’s SP Times:
The beauty of Jefferson's marketplace of ideas is that it opens our society to all voices and all arguments, presuming the most persuasive will rise to the top.
But those who promote the War on Drugs find this a dangerous concept. Drug reform makes too much sense and in recent years has been too compelling to voters. Already, seven states and the District of Columbia have legalized medical marijuana through voter initiatives (and two more states through legislation) and a recent Gallup poll shows that 74 percent of Americans are on that side of the issue.
To combat this outbreak of common sense, the drug warriors have fought back with antidemocratic and repressive methods.
......What is really going on here? Nadelmann theorizes that for people like Istook, Attorney General John Ashcroft and drug czar John Walters, the war on drugs is less about crack and heroin than it is about marijuana. "It's about the culture clash," Nadelmann says, "It's about continuing ways to wage war against the '60s and '70s."
As Ashcroft continues to send DEA agents into California to raid legal medical marijuana dispensaries and Walters uses the public weal to campaign against drug reform initiatives on state and local ballots, it is clear that Nadelmann is right. This is not about upholding the law, but fighting a movement. The drug warriors are fiercely antagonistic toward the shift in public opinion on medical marijuana and other drug reforms; and their authoritarian impulse is to shut down the free marketplace of ideas.
Apparently, the competition is getting to be a bit too stiff.
Support the Immokalee Workers
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers are still fighting Taco Bell.
IMMOKALEE, Fla. — The early-morning fog and darkness were still two hours from lifting, but the parking lot of the La Mexicana grocery store was filled with 200 farmworkers waiting to be driven to vegetable fields so they could earn $20 to $60 for the day.
When the rundown school buses arrived, workers ran up, clenching their lunches wrapped in plastic bags. Drivers looked at each worker, deciding who could board in what is a daily ritual.
"You don't work fast enough," a driver said in Spanish, turning back one worker as he climbed the bus steps. Another worker outside the bus shouted urgently, "How many more?"
Poor working conditions, abysmal and expensive living quarters, and low pay will cause up to 100 farmworkers to board other buses tomorrow, but their destination won't be the vegetable fields and citrus groves of southwest Florida.
They will head for Kentucky and California in what has become an annual journey to protest Taco Bell, based in Irvine, Calif., and its corporate parent, Yum! Brands Inc. in Louisville.
Taco Bell is a major buyer of Florida tomatoes, and the farmworkers want the fast-food chain and Yum to pressure Florida tomato growers into improving wages and conditions in this remote agricultural spot about 120 miles northwest of Miami. The farmworkers began a boycott of Taco Bell more than two years ago.
"We earn so little here, and Taco Bell is a principal buyer of tomatoes," said Marcelino Hernandez, a former tomato picker in Immokalee, a three-stoplight town of 20,000 people where Spanish is the dominant language and roosters roam the streets.
Taco Bell recently rewrote its code of conduct for its suppliers after being pressured by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, an advocacy group for the farmworkers, which is leading the boycott.
The code now explicitly states that the company won't tolerate the use of forced labor or physical intimidation of workers. The change comes after five cases of farmworker slavery by independent labor contractors that have been prosecuted in South Florida in the past six years.
......The predominantly Mexican and Guatemalan farmworkers earn about 45 cents per 32-pound bucket of tomatoes picked, a wage they say hasn't changed in 20 years. They would like to see that raised to 75 cents to 80 cents per bucket, and they think Taco Bell could force its suppliers to increase their pay.
Vegetable and melon pickers in Collier County, where Immokalee is located, earned an average annual pay in 2002 of $13,287, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Farmworkers aren't paid while they are driven by buses to fields as far as 150 miles away to pick tomatoes, peppers and other winter vegetables. Sometimes they are taken to the fields in the back of closed cargo trucks for dark, airless rides that can last several hours on benches.
......Ray Gilmer, a spokesman for the Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association, which represents Florida tomato growers, said that the boycott was misguided because "Taco Bell doesn't know where its tomatoes come from."
......The farmworker advocates say the poor pay creates an economy in which the farmworkers are taken advantage of at every turn. Because of the low pay — and because many are undocumented workers and can't obtain drivers' licenses — few farmworkers have cars and must live within several blocks of downtown Immokalee so that they can walk to the La Mexicana parking lot for their jobs.
Because they are a captive audience to the downtown housing market, some rent rundown trailers with naked light bulbs, creaky wood floors and mattresses covering every floor space for as much as $2,000 a month. To split the cost, a dozen farmworkers live in some trailers that should only accommodate three people.
"We have to fight," Hernandez said. "If we don't fight for ourselves, nobody else will."
Get Up with MorningWood
Get Up with MorningWood, on Community Radio WMNF 88.5 fm, Tampa, and streaming at wmnf.org.
4 to 6 am every Tuesday!
Studio line: 813-239-9663. Call or email the studio anytime!
Today on MorningWood
Thanks to Mike Bagley for dropping what he was doing and paying attention to me when I asked him for a favor earlier. He was filling in for DJ Nave on Soul Eclipse right before MorningWood today.
This week, we’re all over the map. Lots of political stuff, a downright revolutionary start, and artists like Paris, DJ Vadim, Isobel Campbell, The Cure, Johnny Cash and DJ Danger Mouse.
Listen for the start of the MorningWood theme song in the middle of each hour (don’t call after NPR news or at 4:00AM when I start my show!), and call in to win tickets to the SMLG Florda Bandango sendoff benefit concert coming up on March 6 at the State theater.
Florida Bandango at SXSW
Tampa, FL - Volunteer group to showcase local bands in Austin; Benefit concert March 6.
The SXSW Music Lovers Group (SMLG) announced the lineup today for their March 6 State Theater fundraiser. Scheduled to appear, in order of appearance: Crippled Masters; Red Tide; The band soon to be formerly known as Shotgun Wedding; Auditorium; John McNicholas; Anna O; and Rebekah Pulley. All proceeds raised will be used for the Florida Bandango Party during the South by Southwest Music conference (SXSW) in Austin, Texas.
2004 marks the second year for the Florida Bandango Party. The idea is to showcase Tampa area talent in front of a national audience of media and music industry movers and shakers. The party will feature food, music and art from the Tampa area and SMLG expects 700 - 1,000 people to attend.
Norwood Orrick hosts MorningWood, early Tuesday mornings on WMNF 88.5FM. He and other WMNF DJs and volunteers founded SMLG in 2002 and they hosted the first ever Florida Bandago Party last year at the famous Club DeVille in the heart of Austin's downtown music district.
"Hundreds of people came out last year and heard some fantastic music," says Orrick. "It was an unqualified success. This year, we've added Florida food from Skipper's Smokehouse and a Tampa area art show curated by WMNF's JoEllen Schilke to complement our talented musicians and to help party goers to really slip into a Florida state of mind."
The March 6 State Theater show is the sendoff fundraiser for this year's party. Doors open at 7:30 and the music wont stop until 2:00AM.
The SXSW Music Lovers Group (SMLG) is a volunteer group dedicated to promoting Tampa Bay musicians by providing the opportunity for Tampa Bay bands to play for national press and recording industry executives at the world-famous South By Southwest (SXSW) Music Conference. SMLG is not affiliated with WMNF.
fmi: The SXSW Music Lovers Group (SMLG)
Event Information:
What - SMLG Florida Bandango fundraiser concert - Crippled Masters; Red Tide; The band soon to be formerly known as Shotgun Wedding; Auditorium; John McNicholas; Anna O; and Rebekah Pulley When - Saturday, March 6, 2004, 7:30PM
Where - State Theater, 526 Central Ave, Saint Petersburg
Price - $6.00
Tickets - 727-895-3045
Playlists
DJ DDP is leaving Saturday Asylum, so there is an opening for a programmer on Saturday afternoon. Call or Email WMNF Program Director Randy Wynne and ask him to pick Norwood for this slot from 2-4 PM on Saturdays! (Phone number is 813-238-8001, ex 16) I know: I’ll have to come up with another catchy name, since MorningWood seems somehow inappropriate in the afternoon, but I’m willing to make the sacrifice.
The saga continues
But he’s got to make a decision soon! Please keep the calls and emails coming!
WMNF Community Radio
WMNF is a non-commercial community radio station that celebrates local cultural diversity and is committed to equality, peace and social and economic justice. WMNF provides broadcasts and creates other forums to serve the community by the exposure and sharing of these values.
If you’d like to learn more about WMNF, call 813-239-9663 and ask for a free program guide and bumper sticker. If you’d like to learn about volunteer opportunities, call 813-238-8001 and ask for Gene Moore.