WESLEY CHAPEL
Volume 19 Issue 2
Inside: Win Tickets To The Straz Center! See page 27!
NEWS
January 15, 2011
The Direct-Mail News Magazines Serving Wesley Chapel & New Tampa Since 1993! THE INDEPENDENT COMMUNITY NEWS MAGAZINES DIRECTLY MAILED TO: WESLEY CHAPEL: Aberdeen • Belle Chase • Brookside • Chapel Pines • Country Walk • Lexington Oaks • Meadow Pointe • New River • Northwood • Pinewalk • Pine Ridge • Saddlebrook • Saddleridge Estates • Saddlewood • Seven Oaks • Lakes at Northwood • The Villages of Wesley Chapel • Wesley Pointe • Westbrook Estates • Williamsburg NEW TAMPA: Arbor Greene • Cory Lake Isles • Cross Creek • Grand Hampton • Heritage Isles • Hunter’s Green • Hunter’s Key • K-Bar Ranch • Lake Forest • Live Oak Preserve • Pebble Creek • Richmond Place • Tampa Palms • West Meadows
Wesley Chapel Medical Center Construction Is Under Way By Michael Smith The once-sleepy hamlet of Wesley Chapel has taken perhaps its largest step ever towards becoming a modern metropolitan area when a groundbreaking ceremony for the community’s firstever full-service hospital was held in Wiregrass Ranch last month. The December 14 groundbreaking, which took place at the site of the planned 80-bed facility – 52 acres that lie a half-mile north of S.R. 56 on the east side of Bruce B. Downs Blvd., within the Wiregrass Ranch Development of Regional Impact (DRI) – was the culmination of a collaborative effort between University Community Hospital (UCH) and the Adventist Health System (AHS). The two healthcare companies officially merged under the AHS banner earlier in 2010, but originally, they each had sought to build a hospital in the area. The two joined forces after the state Agency for Healthcare Administration (AHCA) denied their individual
Certificate of Need (CoN) applications in 2006. The following year, the two companies announced that they would form a joint venture to build the new hospital, and their new CoN application was subsequently approved by the AHCA over another application submitted by the Baycare Health System, which had proposed building a teaching hospital in conjunction with the University of South Florida’s College of Medicine. The new hospital was originally proposed for a site across from the Saddlebrook Resort & Spa, but it was relocated to the Wiregrass site after residents in the area of the first site voiced opposition to the plan. All of the legal wrangling delayed the start of construction on the hospital for several years, but really, it was a much longer process than that, according to Don Porter, the patriarch of the ranching family that originally settled the 5,000-acre Wiregrass Ranch property before opening it up to development a few years ago.
The Wesley Chapel Medical Center will be the focal point of the Wiregrass Ranch development.. Bruce B. Downs Blvd. is the road to the far left. The Shops at Wiregrass mall is located a half-mile south of the planned hospital. At the groundbreaking ceremony, Porter talked about growing up in a cabin on the land just a few yards away from the site of the new hospital, and said that a plane had crashed there in 1943. He said that the entire crew of the plane had died because there were
no doctors in the area at the time. Porter also told of a ranch hand who had been injured in an accident a few years later who had to be treated by a veterinarian. “But now, our family is proud to be a small part of helping this See “Hospital” on page 6.
Fireworks + Dry Conditions = New Year’s Day Brush Fires
NEIGHBORHOOD MAGAZINE!
School Board Approves Boundary Changes, A Look Back At The Top News Stories Of 2010, A Visit To AAP Fitness & Much More!
Our Editor’s 2010 Restaurant Favorites, A Tasty Review Of Asian Buffet & Your Chance To Win Tickets To ‘A Night Of Stars’ At The Straz Center!
See pages 3-22!
See pages 23-36!
ECRWSS
NEWS, BUSINESS, SPORTS & EDUCATION UPDATES
one of eight that were reported on New Year’s Day in and around the Bay area, Fogler said. The largest consumed 78 acres near Dade City and came close to threatening several homes before being extinguished. Although its cause also is still under investigation, fireworks also are suspected. Fogler added that in spite of recent rain, the threat of wildfires in our area is still elevated, because freezing weather in December further dried out vegetation that was already parched by drierSee “News Briefs” on page 4.
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approximately 25 acres of undeveloped land on the south side of S.R. 56 in Wesley Chapel. According to Forestry spokesman Dave Fogler, witnesses reported seeing some people in the Northwood subdivision lighting fireworks before the brush fire broke out. Fortunately, Fogler said, winds gusting towards the north kept the fire away from homes in the subdivision, but smoke drifting over the roadway did cause fire officials to close down a portion of S.R. 56 near the intersection of Bruce B. Downs Blvd. for about an hour. There were no accidents that were reported as being caused by the smoke, however, and Fogler said the cause of the fire is still under investigation. The Wesley Chapel fire was just
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While some area residents welcomed the New Year with the age-old tradition of setting off fireworks in their backyards and driveways, others unfortunately had the job of fighting the brush fires that those fireworks were
ultimately blamed for causing. According to a report from the Florida Division of Forestry, there were a number of brush fires that sprang up all around the Tampa Bay area on New Year’s Day which were suspected of having been caused by errant fireworks, including one that burned across
Dated Material Please Rush!
By Michael Smith
For Advertising Information Call 813-910-2575 • Volume 19, Issue 2 • Januar y 15, 2011 • www.WCNeighborhoodNews.com
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