bserver O EAST COUNTY FREE • Thursday, APRIL 4, 2013
You. Your neighbors. Your neighborhood.
NEIGHBORHOOD
SPORTS
Greyhawk Landing resident wants teens to know they aren’t alone. PAGE 1B
OUR TOWN
+ Ranch student ‘embraces differences’ This year’s Embracing Our Differences, an annual juried art exhibit, features the artwork of Lakewood Ranch High School student Olivia Junghans. The piece is titled “You, Me, Them, Everybody … Everybody.” The exhibit runs through June 2, in Sarasota’s Island Park; through April 29, at the Anthony T. Rossi Waterfront Park in downtown Bradenton; and from May 1 to June 2, at North Port High School. The exhibit received more than 2,400 entries from 44 countries and 33 states.
+ Boy Scouts earn recognition Boy Scout Troop 303 has been busy. The troop recently held Eagle Scout Award Ceremonies for Christopher Sorg, Eric Fortin and Nathan Robinson. For their Eagle Scout projects, Fortin built two benches and installed landscaping and a flower garden for a Meditation Garden at Living Lord Lutheran Church, and Robinson sanded, stained and built two child-level picnic tables for the pre-school playground at the church. Sorg’s project consisted of the erection of 385 feet of three-board fencing with chicken wire at the Racing Dog Rescue Project, in East County. A ceremony is also being planned for Robinson Valverde, another troop member, who made improvements to the courtyard at Manatee School for the Arts as his Eagle Scout project. The trio and two other scouts started the program together as Tiger Cub Scouts in Den 4, Pack 191.
Nathan Robinson
SEE OUR TOWN / PAGE 4A
SUMMER FUN
ODA girls tennis team hits aces. PAGE 15A
Check out this year’s summer camp offerings.
special section
pass the torch by Josh Siegel | Staff writer
Interim leader charts district’s new direction Interim Superintendent David Gayler used his trademark calm to stabilize a broken budget and heal shattered trust for Manatee County Schools. EAST COUNTY — Karen Carpenter forgot what trust felt like. Before her former leader abruptly retired after revealing a budget deficit Sept. 5, there was darkness: delayed presentations of revenue and expenditure reports; no response to emails; and closed doors. So, when, a month later, in her first conversation with a man offering five-and-a-half months — and only that — to get the Manatee County School District out of that darkness, interim Superintendent David Gayler asked Carpenter if she trusted him, the School Board chairwoman had to stop to think about it. “I told him I trusted him,” Carpenter said of Gayler, who served as Manatee Schools’ interim superintendent from Oct. 15 to March 18. “I had no reason not to.” In an exclusive interview with the East County Observer, Gayler — brought out of retirement and away from his now 2-year-old first child, Jo Jo, to be a stabilizing force as he had been during his tenure as superintendent of Charlotte County Schools after
Hurricane Charley — gave an honest assessment of his brief and important tenure. It was a time wrapped around three goals he mapped out from the beginning, as soon as Wayne Blanton, of the Florida School Boards Association, phoned Gayler, 60, after a long vacation and asked for his service. Gayler had replied: “I’ll give you five-and-ahalf months.” Already familiar and a follower of Manatee County education — Gayler served as assistant superintendent of the district to Dan Nolan for 10 months in 2001 — the goals came easily. Gayler says he accomplished the first two goals — stabilizing the budget to find out what led to the 2011-2012 budget deficit of $3.4 million and putting in the repairs so it never happens again; and supervising the search for a new superintendent who would start work on or before April 1. The third goal wasn’t met. Gayler regrets it.
SEE GAYLER / PAGE 8A
GROWTH PLANNING
Gayler’s suggestions
File photo
A look-ahead and suggestions from Interim Superintendent David Gayler (above) to new Manatee County Schools Superintendent Rick Mills, who took over March 20.
Hire a director of budget. Currently, the district has a director of finance (Angela Fraser), but no one hired to specifically oversee the budget.
Set longterm goals with the school board. “No district I know has been successful without action goals,” Gayler said. “That process has been lost here.”
Focus on academic plans. “The district needs serious work there. They know they need reorganizing of the administration. He (Mills) might need to bring in people from the outside. It will be a blend.”
by Pam Eubanks | Managing Editor
Institute casts vision for Manatee’s growth Representatives of the Urban Land Institute said Manatee County should work hard to create an identity for itself and plan for expected growth. MANATEE COUNTY — Manatee County leaders have been tasked with creating a new vision for the community — one that establishes more publicprivate partnerships, coordination with local schools and business and creates a sense of identity throughout Manatee. During a March 26 presentation, representatives of the Ur-
ban Land Institute told Manatee County commissioners to create a bold vision for the community and said the county’s “How Will We Grow” growth alternatives plan is a “solid platform to create detailed plans, policies and implementation strategies” for each of Manatee County’s geographic sectors — Southwest/ Bradenton, Port Manatee/Pal-
HOW WILL WE GROW metto, Parrish and Lakewood Ranch. Recommendations include: to improve partnerships with the area’s educational institutions; to seek governance changes at the Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport and Port Manatee to enable public/private partnerships, investment and expan-
sion as drivers for the county’s economic growth; to leverage IMG’s international reputation to “brand” Manatee County as the sports-training capital in the nation and attract related industries; and to target investments in the Southwest Bradenton sector along U.S. 41, among other recommendations. “We believe, in general, the eastern sector of the county — east of Interstate 75) — is very healthy,” said Michael Maxwell,
SEE GROW / PAGE 8A
INDEX Business............ 11A Calendar............ 14A
Classifieds ........ 13B Cops Corner....... 13A
Crossword.......... 12B Real Estate.......... 8B
Sports................ 15A Weather............. 12B
Vol. 14, No. 14 | Three sections YourObserver.com