Category: News

NTJWC’s Frankfurth Named National Director Of Jr. Women’s Clubs

The General Federation of Women’s Clubs (GFWC) announced in June that long-time local Woman’s Club Board member and past president Jolie Frankfurth, is now the 2016-18 GFWC Director of Junior Clubs.

Frankfurth was named Director Elect in 2014, and installed the weekend of June 25-29 of this year in Baltimore. She is the first Florida woman since 1972 to hold this position.

“I’m ready for this,’’ Frankfurth said.

Her first day on the new job was Saturday, Aug. 6. “She was elected by a membership of more than 80,000, has been with the organization a substantial amount of time and her charity work has been outstanding,’’ said Michelle Furman, the GFWC director of communications.

Frankfurth has risen through the ranks of the GFWC, which specializes in grassroots charity work with more than 27 various non-profit organizations such as St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, since starting with the GFWC New Tampa Junior Woman’s Club (NTJWC) 20 years ago.

At the time, she said, the New Tampa area was still just mostly a road to S.R. 54.

“There were a lot of young families with children moving to the area,’’ she said, adding that the New Tampa Juniors was a perfect fit for her.

Frankfurth is a University of South Florida graduate, with a Bachelor’s degree in Business Education and a Master’s degree in Educational Leadership.

Locally, Frankfurth has made an impact on all levels of membership. She has been an Advisor of the GFWC New Tampa Juniorette Club the past five years and has been president of both the GFWC Woman’s Club of New Tampa and the NTJWC.

“The richness of our great Federation is in the character, diversity and passion of its membership,’’ Frankfurth said. “Our work these next two years should be about attitude and actions to making good things happen in our local communities.”

For more info, visit GFWC.org, GFWCWomansClubNewTampa.com or GFWCNewTampaJuniors.org.

GFWC Jolie Frankfurth

Arbor Greene Tennis Player Hopes To Spread One Love

Michael-Ray Pallares knows his days as a professional tennis player are winding down. He can’t help, however, but marvel at what the game has given him.

He won prominent United State Tennis Association (USTA) championships as a junior, capturing titles at the same events also won by Jim Courier, John McEnroe and Arthur Ashe in the past. He earned a college scholarship to the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, where the Crimson Tide was one of the top 10 teams in the country. He played Davis Cup tennis for the Dominican Republic, and has had a long career playing American Tennis Professional (ATP) and International Tennis Federation (ITF) events around the world.

Tennis also has given him a mission.

Pallares, an Arbor Greene resident the past 10 years, is hoping to bring tennis locally to those in Tampa’s inner city who can’t normally afford to play it or have no access to the game. He is currently working on an event in Tampa to do just that.

Pallares founded One Love Tennis Inc., a 501 (c)(3) non-profit organization designed to reach underprivileged and low-income youth through affordable tennis, education and fitness, in 2011.

One Love Visits Africa

He has organized a few events for his One Love Tennis, but he says one he brought last month to Africa has inspired him to do even more.

While playing in a ITF tournament in Zimbabwe, he was asked by fellow tour player Patrick Mufumbila to join him afterwards in Zambia for a charity event. Pallares agreed, and the two players traveled two hours by plane to Livingstone, in the Southern Province of Zambia.

Mufumbila, a 21-year-old lefty who is one of Zambia’s Davis Cup hopefuls, and Pallares, the 35-year-old New Tampa resident, played an exhibition match for 20 orphans at the Livingstone Royal Tennis Club in the Mukuni Village, roughly four miles from Victoria Falls, one of the “Seven Wonders of the World.”

“To be able to coordinate this event with Patrick was amazing because not only were the kids able to see what a professional match looks like, they were also able to watch a local (African) player as well, so they can think, ‘Hey, that could be me one day,’” Pallares says.

Afterward, Pallares organized a daylong tennis clinic for the children, including games and prizes. “It was basically a whole day to give the kids a chance to get out of their normal routine,’’ he says. “They were really interested. All of the kids picked it up very quickly, and they all really enjoyed it.”

The Nomad Sports Academy for orphans helped organize the event. The academy currently takes care of 200 orphans (Zambia has more than one million orphans countrywide) and works, “to give our children a chance to train their bodies and minds in order to become leaders of tomorrow and to break the chains of poverty and shame and tell their story to the world.”

Created in 2010 by a Canadian couple, the Nomad Academy works closely with the Butterfly Tree Charity, which supports children in rural villages, by helping to provide improved health and education facilities, safe water and sanitation, feeding programs, and health centers contributing to the fight against diseases such as malaria and HIV/AIDS throughout Zambia.

Pallares, who is currently in southeast Asia playing ITF tournaments in Vietnam and Indonesia, says that when he returns to Tampa he will begin organizing something similar to what he did in Zambia for local areas in need.

“I would love to do something (similar) in Tampa to help with inner city kids, and hope to get it organized by December,’’ Pallares says. “Just a day for those kids to come out and play tennis, to introduce them to the sport. There are a lot of kids who could be really good at it and enjoy it, but other sports are a lot easier to play — you can just go up to the playground with a ball. But, with the right opportunity, who knows?”

To help with the One Love Tennis inner city tennis event or participate as a sponsor, email Michael-Ray Pallares at mrpallares3@gmail.com.

One Love Tennis

Señor T’s Shuts Down!

New Tampa’s Señor T’s Mexican will not make it to its one-year anniversary.

The restaurant is shutting down immediately, according to new manager Bill Jaber.

Jaber, who has only been with the restaurant for approximately two weeks, called the Neighborhood News Tuesday afternoon to cancel advertising and say that Señor T’s was closing, effective immediately.

Dwayne Bracy, the restaurant’s original operations partner, left in July for another job.

Calls to Señor T’s are now directed to a voicemail that does not identify the restaurant, just the phone number.

Señor T’s opened on “Black Friday 2015” (Nov. 27), in the long-vacant former New Tampa Macaroni Grill, located at 17641 Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. in front of the also-vacant former Sweetbay Supermarket. The Macaroni Grill was unoccupied for more than a year before Señor T’s confirmed it was moving in last September.

The Mexican eatery was going to be the first link in a planned start-up chain of roughly seven Tampa Bay locations.

The New Tampa restaurant received lukewarm, and sometimes blistering reviews online. It was excoriated on Yelp! and by many in New Tampa for failing to offer complimentary chips and salsa, which is customary in most Mexican restaurants. The food was panned as lacking authenticity, and the service received mixed reviews.

The restaurant was in the midst of trying to recover, with changes in the kitchen and possibly an interior renovation. But, the decision was made to cancel any re-boot and shut down immediately.

The restaurant featured indoor and outdoor seating, a full premium liquor bar that featured 75 different brands of tequila, and mid-priced Mexican fare.

HCSO Seeking Assistance In Identifying Bank Robbery Suspect

Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office deputies are asking for the public’s help in identifying a suspect who robbed the MidFlorida Credit Union at 20401 Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. on Aug, 5.

According to the HCSO, the suspect — a white male approximately 40 years of age and 5-foot-9 inches tall with a medium build — entered the credit union at approximately 9 a.m. and approached the bank teller. He passed a note to the teller demanding money and implying that was was armed. The suspect then placed an undisclosed amount of money in a maroon-colored draw-string style bag, retrieved his note from teh teller and feld the credit union heading eastbound on foot.

The suspect, who was wearing baggy jogging-style pants, a Nike jacket, blue visor with white letting on it and gray Nike sneakers, was last seen running behind neighboring businesses. The HCSO says he possibly fled in a silver 2000’s model Toyota sedan with tinted windows. The suspect fled towards Bruce B. Downs.

Anyone with any information reference the suspect is asked to call the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office at 247-8200, or anyone with any information regarding the identity and whereabouts of this suspect and who
wants to be eligible for a cash reward is asked to call Crime Stoppers at
1-800-873-TIPS (8477), report anonymously online at www.crimestopperstb.com or
send a mobile tip using the HCSO’s P3 Tips Mobile application, which is a free
download for iPhones, iPads and Droids.

You must call Crime Stoppers first to be eligible for a reward.

HCSO MidFlorida Credit Union robbery

Cross Creek Blvd. & Kinnan St. Getting Better Turn Lanes

A $5-million, 2-mile long widening project on Cross Creek Blvd. was completed last year, but that’s not the end of the improvements planned for the busy road, as the familiar site of bulldozers and orange barrels are back as you’re reading this issue.

Construction, which is expected to be completed by Oct. 31, is ongoing at one of the busier intersections of Cross Creek, which runs east from Bruce B. Downs Blvd. to Morris Bridge Rd., as revamped turn lanes and signage are now being updated at the corners of Cross Creek Blvd. and Kinnan St., between Louis Benito Middle School and the New Tampa Regional Library.

The intersection improvement is being done by K-Bar developer M/I Homes, as part of the approved K-Bar rezoning last August. The balance of the required transportation improvements for the K-Bar project are related to road construction of the K- Bar Pkwy., including connections at Kinnan and Morris Bridge and the southern collector roadway.

Meanwhile, on eastbound Cross Creek Blvd., two short left turn lanes onto Kinnan St. are being lengthened by approximately 400 feet. Previously, the left turn lanes were roughly half that distance, and often filled by cars, many that spilled back out onto the two eastbound lanes, tangling traffic during high-volume times during the evening rush hour.

Many of those commuters are returning to their homes in the K-Bar Ranch development, as Kinnan is the only road in and out without driving two more miles down Cross Creek to turn left onto Morris Bridge.

Now that the turn lanes are extended from the corner all the way to the library, the flow of traffic is expected to be smoother.

A right turn lane also is being built on southbound Kinnan, to accommodate morning traffic out of K-Bar Ranch, at the corner of the Cross Creek Center shopping plaza.

The construction will move the existing walkways that cross over Cross Creek Blvd. from the Cross Creek Center to the library side of the road 15 feet or so to the west, or towards the library.

The existing mast arm traffic signal will be replaced at the southwest corner of the intersection, due to the addition of an additional signal head for the new right turn lane on Kinnan.

On the south side of Cross Creek Blvd., at the entrance to Benito, a Type F Curb (we suggest Googling it to understand what that looks like) will be placed from the inside shoulder to the existing sidewalk on both sides of the entrance.

In addition, new signage will replace the existing signs at the intersection of Cross Creek and Kinnan.

better turn lanes Cross Creek Blvd. Kinnan St.