FHWC Ready To Unveil New Rooms, New Technology & A New Experience

Florida Hospital Wesley Chapel (FHWC) is virtually ready for another grand opening. Oops. Make that ready for a virtual grand opening.

After drawing an estimated crowd of 8,000 people to its initial Grand Opening in 2012, FHWC is set to unveil its new $78-million, 118,000-sq.-ft. expansion to the general public via social media. FHWC marketing director Tracy Clouser says that because the hospital now has patients being treated everywhere, it isn’t possible to allow thousands to stroll through the corridors, checking out the new rooms and advances in technology.

However, everyone can still attend the Grand Opening of the expansion virtually, via both YouTube and Facebook, on Monday, February 6, 10 a.m.-11 a.m. Clouser says the public will even be given the opportunity to ask questions of FHWC CEO Denyse Bales-Chubb.

“We’ll be showcasing some of the areas people wouldn’t ordinarily get to see,’’ Clouser said during an interview with Neighborhood News editor Gary Nager for the Greater Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce Featured Business Segment on WCNT-tv, which hit YouTube on Jan. 6. She added that those who RSVP will get the first look at some of the expansion that is expected to even further enhance the hospital’s standing in the local (see pg 3) and medical community.

FHWC, constructed in the shape of a “W” with North, Center and South wings, is doubling the size of the Center wing, which now has six floors instead of the original three. A three-story connector wing, called the “Southeast Connector,” between the Center and South wings, also is nearly complete.

The extra floors will allow the hospital to expand from 83 private patient rooms to 143.

Emergency room space also is nearly doubling, from 18 rooms to 35. That may be the best news for area residents, as even the influx of urgent care centers in Wesley Chapel and New Tampa hasn’t stopped the FHWC emergency rooms from overflowing some days.

Clouser said there was no true original timetable to expand, but the top brass with FHWC’s parent company, the Adventist Health System originally estimated there would be a need for expansion within 5-7 years when FHWC first opened. But, the unrelenting brisk business at the hospital hastened the need for expansion to within only three years.

“We have been very, very busy,’’ Clouser says. “Obviously, there has been a need in this area for quality healthcare close to home for (local) people.”

Even More Technology

The new patient rooms at FHWC are Cerner Smart Rooms, which offer better workflows for hospital personnel, with instant bedside access to real-time data for doctors, while providing better communication between patients, their providers and visitors.

Visitors will be able to see if the patient is with their doctor, resting or does not want to be disturbed before entering the room, while FHWC staff will know, for example, which of their patients have allergies or are fall risks.

“It’s all right at their fingertips outside the room,’’ Clouser says, adding that the older rooms at FHWC will be retrofitted with the Cerner technology as well.

The new rooms also have the Get Well Network, another technology that bridges the gap between patients and doctors and empowers patients and their caregivers to participate in their healthcare. It also helps track the care patients are receiving — like dosages of medicine or blood tests — while they may be sleeping, right down to knowing when hospital personnel are washing and sanitizing their hands.

Clouser also said that some of the expansion already has been completed. A second heart catheterization lab opened in March, and a new wing with 20 additional beds in the Southeast wing opened in October. That third-floor wing will be an all-women’s wing when all of the other new rooms have opened, all expected by the end of this month or early in February.

The majority of the new rooms and technologies will be on the new fifth and sixth floors. Clouser also said that, for now, the fourth floor will remain as shell space, until future growth dictates adding 24 more patient rooms. Until then, the fourth floor will feature conference and classrooms that will host many of the free community health and wellness programs FHWC currently hosts at the hospital’s adjacent Wellness Center.

Clouser also noted that the expansion, which will be completed by the end of the month or early in February, will attract new physicians offering new procedures, since FHWC will now have more space in the new operating rooms. “That means new treatments, new services and new programs,’’ Clouser says.

Doctors also will soon have access to the MAKO platform, which is a robotic-arm-assisted system that can perform orthopaedic surgeries like partial knee or hip replacements. FHWC also has the daVinci System, another robotic-assisted device that specializes in minimally invasive surgery, such as removing a gall bladder or performing a hysterectomy through a patient’s belly button.

“We are the only site in Pasco County able to do that,’’ Clouser said “Surgeons like it because it’s minimally invasive, there’s less scarring, less pain, shorter recovery times and less blood.”

FHWC also will feature a tech room that allows doctors to enter via keyboard the patient’s name and type of surgery being performed, prompting a shelf to open up that provides all of the tools needed to perform that particular operation.

To RSVP for the virtual FHWC expansion Grand Opening, please visit FHInspiredByYou.com. The event will be on YouTube and Facebook, on Mon., Feb. 6, 10 a.m.-11 a.m. Check out the drone footage and much more inside FHWC from Brad Hall Studios on Episode 14 of WCNT-tv on YouTube now!

Tampa Palms Resident Visits 37 States in 53 Days For Facial Pain Research

Frank Skoviera and his dog Max drove more than 12,000 miles in 53 days together to raise awareness of — and more than $13,000 for — the Facial Pain Research Foundation in Gainesville.

On October 10, Tampa Palms resident Frank Skoviera had an idea. As a two-year volunteer communications director for the Facial Pain Research Foundation (located in Gainesville, FL), he had heard from thousands of people across the country suffering from a condition called trigeminal neuralgia, a debilitating pain that is caused by irritation of the trigeminal nerve, which carries sensation from the face to the brain. People struggling with trigeminal neuralgia can experience severe pain while chewing, speaking, or brushing their teeth.

Frank’s idea was to visit as many people as possible across the country to hear their stories in person, while also educating people about the condition and raising financial support for the foundation.

Ten days later, on October 20, Frank and his dog, Max, set off on their journey in Frank’s SUV, which he had wrapped with marketing messages to support the cause.

Over the next 53 days, Frank and Max trekked across the country, meeting with people, driving through a total of 37 states on a journey of 12,400 miles.

Frank’s role with the Facial Pain Research Foundation is not only one of service. He is a passionate advocate for people who suffer from trigeminal neuralgia because he also is a patient.

Frank’s Pain

“I’ve had chronic pain for the past 15 years,” Frank says. “At first, I spent months going to different types of doctors and dentists and an array of professionals, while the pain was getting worse, more frequent and spreading.”

Meanwhile, he was also trying to balance his career as a project manager at IBM with taking care of his family, and says the only word he can think of to describe that first year was “hellacious.”

Frank says the medical community has categorized this disease as a “suicide disease” and as, “the worst pain known to mankind.” It is often misdiagnosed and mistreated by professionals in both the medical and dental fields, who often mistake trigeminal neuralgia as a toothache. Frank says many patients have had root canals and teeth pulled, only to find the pain had worsened afterwards.

“I know how difficult it is and how it affects patients and their families,” Frank says. “I know how lonely it can be.”

He explains he is often in too much pain to even speak to his wife. At the end of the day, when she comes home from work, his pain is often at its peak. It can be frustrating for him and many families like his.

“There isn’t an area of your life that goes untouched,” Frank says. “Everything that you formerly knew as normal is now changed. It’s truly horrific.”

Supporting The Foundation

Frank took a medical leave from his career at IBM, then subsequently retired. About two years ago, he began volunteering as the communications director of the Facial Pain Research Foundation, which is funding research across the country to find a cure for trigeminal neuralgia.

Trigeminal neuralgia is rare, estimated to affect just over 100,000 people in the U.S. It is caused by a blood vessel pressing on the trigeminal nerve as it exits the brain stem, which wears away the protective coating around the nerve. This can happen as a result of injury or a variety of factors.

On his nationwide trip, Frank met with some of the researchers who are working on the five projects currently being funded by the foundation, which include work being done at the University of Florida in Gainesville; Duke University in Durham, NC; Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ; and at the University of California at San Francisco.

“We’re making great progress,” says Frank. “The scientific team and consortium of researchers we have working on this is staggering. They are world-renowned pain research specialists, and they are hugely committed to finding a cure.”

Frank says his trip was completely self-funded and that, in addition to raising awareness, he also set a goal of raising $10,000 for the Facial Pain Research Foundation. He reports that he expects to exceed that amount by at least 30 percent, once all of the pledges have been received and the final tally is made.

“Every dollar that we raise comes from the private community,” Frank says. “All of our staff — from the people who write the thank you letters to our trustees — everyone is a volunteer. So, 98.2% of the money we raise goes to research. We only pay for stamps and for our post office box in Gainesville.”

The money that was raised on this trip will go directly to supporting the research. Frank says the foundation fully expects the research to lead to a cure for trigeminal neuralgia by 2020.

The hope of a cure is one of the things that inspired Frank to get out and talk to people across the nation, especially those who are suffering from this disease. “I know how much pain you’re in,” he says he told them. “Hang in there. Research is in play and we hope to have something to help you (soon).”

53 Days of Driving?

When Frank returned home on December 11, he had held 75 meetings spread out over 37 states. In addition to meeting trigeminal neuralgia researchers and patients, Frank’s son Aaron was instrumental in setting up meetings with statewide golf associations, where he could share his message of awareness with staff members, who then passed information on to their hundreds of thousands of members through newsletter articles.

In the short 10 days he planned his trip, Frank had his car wrapped with bright teal decals inviting people to learn more about his “Drive Away the Pain” campaign. Frank says his car caught the attention of passers-by in major cities, such as Chicago, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Philadelphia, and even New York City, where he says thousands of people noticed his car at the corner of 5th Avenue and 15th Street, with many stopping to see the car’s messages.

As Frank traveled, he invited the people he met with to write a message on a four-inch circular teal decal that he then applied to the car, in a sense carrying that person with him the rest of the journey.

Frank says he spent all day driving, often with two or three meetings throughout the day, then ended at a hotel room, where he mapped where he was going next, and arranging meetings with the people in those locations who had requested he visit them.

“The skills I had cultivated in my career as (an IBM) project manager were very useful in organizing this trip,” he says.

Frank says he was in pain throughout the trip, but that he’s, “too hard headed” to let that stop him. “I take a small amount of medication, which helps a bit,” he says. “I use massage therapy, breathing exercises, tai chi, soft music, anything that relaxes the central nervous system. I also use distraction therapy. I’m fortunate that my mind is busy and I stay busy with the foundation.”

He adds, “Reaching out to others with the condition is helpful, too, because it takes some of the focus off myself.”

To learn more about the Facial Pain Research Foundation, visit FacingFacialPain.org. To see pictures of Frank’s journey or learn more about his nationwide campaign, look for “Drive Away the Pain” on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

First Families: The Crystal Lagoon is spurring big sales in Epperson & excitement among the community’s first residents

Epperson resident Jennifer Rose is excited to be one of the first residents of the community where the first Crystal Lagoon the U.S. is expected to open in February or March of 2018.

Jennifer Rose was in the market for a home, and narrowed her choices down to two communities.

Her realtor, however, suggested they take one more drive, this time to Wesley Chapel, to a large stretch of land off Curley Rd. with nothing to see but trees, grass, dirt and tractors.

Rose, a hair stylist at Salon Loft, was sold a vision that day, of a development with affordable homes that were cheaper than they ones she had previously looked at, that would be built from the ground up with gigabit internet, roads that would one day handle autonomous vehicles, a community that would be vibrant and active, and year-round parties and events.

Oh, and this new community also promised to be home to a Crystal Lagoon — which boasts a specially- formulated system for keeping its water crystal clear and clean. The lagoon, the first of its kind in North America, will be surrounded by white sandy beaches, have a swim up-bar, an adventure cove, cabanas and multiple party areas.

“There was nothing there at the time,’’ Rose says. “Even the model home was only in framing. But, I could just see the outline of the lagoon.”

The pictures of what that Crystal Lagoon will become sealed the deal.

“I absolutely loved the whole concept,’’ said Rose, who bought a five-bedroom, 2,500-sq.ft. home.  “I saw all the pictures of what it was going to be. It was swimming in bottled water that piqued my interest.”

Rose is one of the first handful of residents to move into Epperson, a new community being constructed by the Metro Development Group north of S.R. 54 off Curley Rd.

Epperson is the first part of the “connected city,” a project created by a senate bill that called for a private-public partnership between Metro Development and Pasco County.

The project will turn 7,800 acres of mostly undeveloped land in Wesley Chapel into a mini-city of its own within 50 years, with 37,000 homes, more than 60,000 jobs and almost 100,000 projected new residents.

“The connected city thing is hard to imagine,” says Diane Bissett, who became the first-ever resident in Epperson. “It will be neat to see it come together, and to say we were a part of that.”

Diane Bissett, pictured above right with her children, is the first homeowner in Epperson (Photo courtesy of Diane Bissett)

As an employee of D.L. Horton, one of six homebuilders in Epperson, Bissett had an inside track to the first home being built in what promises to be an original, almost-futuristic community.

Bissett had been eyeing the new development for what felt like forever, primarily because of the promise of the 7.5-acre Crystal Lagoon.

When she initially heard about the project, she says, she was working for a different homebuilder in Watergrass, right across the street. Not only did she think she would never be able to buy a home there, she says it just didn’t seem real what Metro was proposing.

“No way,’’ Bissett thought.

However, changing jobs and getting first dibs on a house at Epperson, Bissett, the mother of a 2-year-old boy and 4- and 14-year-old daughters, jumped at the chance to be part of something fresh and new.

And, as it turned out, a little frightening. For a month, Bissett and her family were the only residents on their street.

“There was a whole lot of dirt and not much else when I moved in,’’ Bissett said. “It was very dark and scary. It was a little spooky in the beginning.”

Bissett was the first of what is now roughly 60 residents living in Epperson, where homes are still going up and will one day number roughly 2,000.

Home sales have so far exceeded expectations., driven by the excitement over the first Metro Lagoon by Crystal Lagoons, which is currently being filled in anticipation of a spring opening.

“The Lagoon effect is real,’’ said Greg Singleton, the president of Metro Development, recently at an event announcing that water has started filling in the lagoon.

Todd Carrier bought the second home in Epperson, and wasn’t going to let bad timing deter him once he read about the lagoon.

Carrier had just bought a home in Spring Hill and had lived in it five months when he heard about a Crystal Lagoon coming to Wesley Chapel sometime around April.

“Honestly, it was a shot in the dark,’’ Carrier says. “Since I just bought a house I didn’t think I’d get approved.”

Not only did Carrier get approved, the 25-year-old AT&T sales rep found someone to rent his Spring Hill home to within five weeks.

“I heard about the lagoon and I wanted to be part of that before the prices went sky-high and got to the point where I couldn’t afford it,” Carrier says.

An avid gamer, Carrier is excited about the gigabit internet speeds, which can download high-definition movies in 30 seconds, and says the community events also are a bonus.

He grew up in a new community once before, when his parents moved into The Preserve at Lake Thomas in Land O’Lakes in 2000.

“It was not as nice as this is going to be though,” he says.

In the end, of course, it was the lagoon that spurred him to dive in headfirst.

When friends and coworkers ask him where he lives, he often just describes his new digs as “the place with the lagoon.”

“They don’t know Epperson,” he says, “but they know the lagoon.”

While the allure of the lagoon has brought everyone together, Bissett says being part of something so innovative and buzzworthy is intoxicating. Her son loves watching the construction trucks drive by as new homes continue to sell at a rapid rate.

Bissett jokes that for years, many of her South Tampa friends often passed on coming over on weekends because Wesley Chapel was too far a drive. Now, “I’ve had a lot of friends come out of the woodwork to ask me, ‘What are you doing next summer?’”

As someone who doesn’t take a lot of vacations, Bissett says Epperson, “will be like living in a resort vacation place.”

The community already has hosted trick-or-treating, and the streets are now being filled in the evenings with children riding bicycles and hanging out in their friends’ driveways. Bissett thinks a special camaraderie has developed amongst what is currently a small, tight-knit group.

Jennifer Rose says her kids can’t wait for the lagoon to open in the spring. (Photo courtesy of Jennifer Rose)

Rose agrees. She was the third person to move into Epperson, and from there, the numbers have steadily risen. One by one, each home on her street was filled with a new family. and her children, Christopher, 11, and Kayla, 9, have made new friends with each “Sold” sign that goes up.

“Oh my gosh, they love it,’’ says Rose, who previously rented a home in Wesley Chapel. “In our old neighborhood, I couldn’t get my kids to go outside. Now, I can’t keep them inside.”

It won’t be long now before what will be the center of the Epperson universe is ready for its first swimsuit-clad visitors, and the vision sold to the current residents comes into full view. Residents will lay in hammocks on Gasparilla Island after filling up at the lagoon’s swim-up restaurant and bar, or rent kayaks to cruise the waters of Venture Bay, or maybe just relax at The Grotto and cool off under the waterfall.

“The lagoon,’’ Rose says, “is going to be the place to be.”

First Crystal Lagoon Breaks Ground In Wesley Chapel; #2 To Begin Later

You get a lagoon…and you get a lagoon…and you get a lagoon!

While a good many Wesley Chapel and New Tampa-area residents have been eagerly awaiting the prospects of a state-of-the-art Crystal Lagoon being built in our area, a second lagoon also is in the works as Metro Development Group moves to raise the bar on amenities for new housing developments.

Though it was first reported back in 2014, Metro finally is digging the hole on the former Epperson Ranch that will become the much-anticipated, first Crystal Lagoon in the state of Florida. Next year, construction on a second lagoon, located at Mirada on the old Cannon Ranch, will begin as well.

Construction of the 7.5-acre lagoon at Epperson Ranch, located north of the Bridgewater community on Curley Rd. north of S.R. 54., is expected to be completed by the end of 2017.

Crystal Lagoons was founded in 2007 by Chilean biochemist-turned real estate developer Fernando Fischmann, who created a system based on pulses and ultra sonic filtration that can take virtually any kind of water and purify and maintain it at a low cost. Crystal Lagoons is the only company in the world with the technology, which is patented in 160 countries, and claims it currently has more than 300 projects in development in 60 countries.

According to Crystal Lagoons, its system is more efficient than a swimming pool, will use 100 times less chemicals and is 50 times more energy efficient, while consuming only 2% of the energy needed by conventional filtration systems.

The lagoon uses 30 times less water than a typical 18-hole golf course, and its clear, blue water will be surrounded by a white, sandy beach.

The Crystal Lagoon at Epperson Ranch will be 4,200 linear feet in circumference (which is almost 1 mile around), according to Metro Development Group president Greg Singleton.

The average depth will be eight feet, with some spots as deep as 10-12 feet. The water is so clear, Singleton adds, it doesn’t refract as much light, so the deeper spots will give it more of a deep blue color.

The lagoon will hold about 14-15 million gallons of water.

Where Metro Development Group is going to get that water created some consternation locally, when it was expected they would pump it in from the local aquifer. Local residents worried that tapping into the aquifer would create sinkholes.

Instead, Metro plans on purchasing water from Pasco County Utilities to fill the lagoon, although the developer does still reserve the right to find another source.

Another cause for the delay in construction was the uniqueness of the project, which created permitting issues for Pasco County and made finding the right people to build it painstaking.

“Being that this is the first Crystal Lagoon in the U.S., it is a unique construction project and we wanted to make sure we found the right partners and contractors for the job, which took more time than we expected,’’ Singleton says. “Also, being the first lagoon in the U.S. to be designed and permitted, we were methodical in our approach to get it right. We also needed to give our approving agencies time to work through their process, as this was also new for them.”

Epperson Ranch, which is part of Metro’s “Connected City” project currently weaving it’s way towards approval from the Pasco Board of County Commissioners, is already preparing to begin selling homes with the flashy amenity as a big draw. The first lot closing was expected to happen by the end of 2016, and model homes will start to be framed by the end of January.

The other Crystal Lagoon in Wesley Chapel also will be in the Connected City, Singleton says, in the Mirada community, which is just south of S.R. 52, a little further up Curley Rd.

“The two Lagoons in Connected City have been planned for at least two years and provide another compelling reason for people to live, work, and play in Connected City,’’ Singleton says.

Development of the Mirada community is expected to begin in the spring of 2017, and Metro is looking to break ground on that second Crystal Lagoon by the end of 2017.

Metro, which also developed the Union Park community in Wesley Chapel, plans to build four Crystal Lagoons in Florida.

Along with the two in Wesley Chapel, the developer intends to break ground on a lagoon in the SouthShore Bay community in South Hillsborough in spring of 2017, and will build another in a Fort Myers community called Brightwater.

For more information about the Crystal Lagoons, visit Crystal-Lagoons.com. To see what else Metro Development Group has going on, check out MetroPlaces.com.

Here’s 5 Things We’re Excited About For 2017

Bye bye, 2016.

Hello, 2017.

For many, there are no sweeter words. We’ll let the historians debate about how bad 2016 really was, but they have plenty of material to study.

Those historians might want to start with an election season that was meaner and nastier than any other. Ever. Considering the New Tampa area seemed firmly in Hillary Clinton’s camp, based on voting results, President Donald Trump will only add to the misery for some in the years to come.

Our country also faced an Ebola outbreak and a Zika outbreak, neither of which seems so bad in a world seemingly bent on destroying itself with hateful attacks leaving scores dead in Brussels, Paris and Instanbul, as well as in Charleston and Orlando
and the list just keeps getting longer with each passing day.

We had a significant hurricane scare (thank you, Matthew) and while the storm season spared New Tampa, thousands in other places in Matthew’s wake weren’t nearly as fortunate.

Muhammad Ali, David Bowie and Prince all died during 2016. Now, we really know what it sounds like when doves cry.

So bye bye, 2016.

Hello, 2017.

We could use some cheering up, so here’s five things we’re looking forward to as the calendar turns, because, really, things have to get better, don’t they?

1. Florida Hospital Center Ice (FHCI) — Of all the things to look forward in the New Tampa-Wesley Chapel area in 2017, the $20-million FHCI (see ad on pg. 47), located along Cypress Ridge Blvd. on the northeast corner of the I-75/S.R. 56 interchange, has to be near the top of the list.

If you haven’t noticed, Tampa Bay has become something of a hockey town, thanks to the success of the NHL’s Tampa Bay Lightning. With so many northern transplants in the area, FCHI is sure to be a hit.

The five-rink complex will host corporate events, non-ice events like street and roller hockey, and with just a little configuring, even volleyball and basketball.

But even though the rink will feature the Top Shelf Sports Lounge, the bread and butter of FCHI will be served cold. The 150,500-sq.-ft. facility will have free skating, figure skating, high school hockey, adult hockey leagues, and everything in between. Gordie Zimmermann, who runs the place, has even teased curling leagues for locals. Raise your hand if you’ve watched curling during the Winter Olympics and said, ‘You know, I’d sure like to try that.’

Now you can.

Sometime in January, you’ll even be able to watch your first hockey game at the new FHCI when Wiregrass Ranch High plays. Spectrum Sports also will televise a live high school hockey game from FHCI sometime soon, too. Expect the Lightning to have some sort of a presence in the new joint, starting with clinics for kids.

And, Skate For Hope, which will benefit cancer research and feature many of the world’s top figure skaters, is scheduled for June 17.

2. The Taste of New Tampa & Wesley Chapel — Speaking of FCHI, that brings us to the second thing we are looking forward to in 2017— the Taste of New Tampa, which returns Saturday, March 18, after a four-year hiatus.

You might remember the last Taste, back in 2003, which was foiled by terrible weather.

Well, this year, that won’t be a problem, as FHCI is hosting virtually all of the event inside. So, no rain, no sweating, no sunburn, just cool sub-70-degree weather as you walk around sampling tastes from as many as 50 local restaurants.

The star of the Taste is always the food, but we don’t want to put any pressure on our happy editor Gary Nager, who has been personally involved in almost every Taste to date. But, since he is again responsible for bringing in the best restaurants this year, COME ON MAN! AFTER 2016 THE WHOLE AREA IS RELYING ON A VARIED SELECTION OF DELICIOUS SAMPLES FROM THE BEST RESTAURANTS AROUND OR 2017 WILL BE RUINED!

Okay, so maybe there’s a little pressure.

3. New Restaurants — Speaking of food, we love playing Follow the New Restaurants here in the office. In this regard, 2016 was pretty good to us, with Ginza, Cheddar’s, Culver’s, Chick-Fil-A, B.J.’s Brewhouse, Longhorn Steakhouse and Vuelo all opening their doors.

And, while you may never have eaten at a Ford’s Garage or a Pollo Tropical, both are expected to open in 2017 right across from the Tampa Premium Outlets (TPO). Our office will be among the first ones inside.

4. Costco — And, while we’re on the subject of TPO, if you look just a little west of it, the Costco looks ready to open.

We repeat: Costco looks ready to open!

We are now hearing the gas pumps will be open Jan. 9, and the wholesaler will be opening on Feb. 9. 

The mega wholesaler already has a cult following, but the nearest one to New Tampa is in Brandon. The expected February opening in Wesley Chapel will attract many of us, not just for the 200 or so jobs, which pay around an average of $20 an hour, with nice benefits, but also for the food. The Costco warehouse is filled with goodies, and as any veteran member knows, sample time around lunchtime is the cheapest date around.

5. Crystal Lagoons — Speaking of cheap dates, a trip to the beach can’t be beat, but why make that drive if there’s a crystal-clear, hyper-clean lagoon outlined by sandy beaches in your own back yard? Yes, after a delay, the first-ever Crystal Lagoon to be built in the U.S., is actually happening. Day passes will be on our Christmas list next year, for sure. 

We also look forward to seeing how New Tampa’s Luis Viera does as a Tampa City Council member, to the expansion of Florida Hospital Wesley Chapel, the possible start of construction of the Diverging Diamond Interchange at S.R. 56, the construction of Raymond James Financial, and more!