Janet Kennedy was active in politics, so she was well aware of the great divide between Democrats and Republicans, not only locally, but throughout this country, and was concerned about how quickly that chasm was growing.
But, it wasn’t until the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol that Kennedy, a Grand Hampton resident and chair of field organizing for the Hillsborough Democratic Party, felt the full force of how dire the situation had become.
“It was really after Jan. 6,” Kennedy says. “I was glued to the television set that day, as many people were. I guess I was fundamentally shaken that the political discourse in this country had devolved into an attack on the Capitol.”
First, Kennedy assessed her role, as someone who had been heavily involved in partisan politics. It made her feel a little bit guilty about contributing to the divide.
So, she looked for ways to work towards healing that division and founded a local chapter of Braver Angels, a national group that was created in December 2016.
How Braver Angels Got Started
At that time, with passions still high following Donald Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton — and likely in the wake of contentious Thanksgiving dinners between families across the U.S. — the now-national group assembled 10 Trump supporters and 11 Clinton supporters in South Lebanon, Ohio, with one goal: “To see if Americans could still disagree respectfully — and just maybe, find common ground.”
The group’s conclusion was yes, and the Braver Angels organization has continued to grow ever since, with Alliances (or chapters) in 48 states numbering more than 50,000 members.
Kennedy’s goal is to start a Tampa Bay Alliance. She has started that long process with a few Zoom meetings, and says she has about 45 people — most of them from New Tampa — interested.
Unfortunately, only a few are Republicans, likely not enough if any headway is going to be made at bridging any divides.
“It’s going to be a slow build,” Kennedy admits. “I think people are worn out and exhausted and fearful that, if I go to a meeting like this, someone will try to change my mind or talk me out of my opinion or I’ll be made to feel stupid. But, that’s not what we’re about. We’re here to listen.”
Kennedy has organized workshops and a debate so far in three meetings, with much of the conversations focused on not letting politics come between family members.
She says she took some of the lessons from those meetings and used them to have a discussion with her cousin, who is on the opposite side of the abortion debate.
It went surprisingly well, she says.
“We were able to reach an agreement on some points,” Kennedy says, “and I understand better where she is coming from and she understands a bit better where I’m coming from.”
Kennedy would like it to work like that on other issues that divide the two ends of the political spectrum. She is looking for volunteers to help her get the local Alliance of Braver Angels moving forward.
Although the political landscape, and the chance of both sides working together, seems fairly bleak right now, Kennedy says she would like to think she can make a difference.
“I just know I need to try,” she says.
For more information, visit BraverAngels.org, or to help with the local Alliance, email Janet Kennedy at thejanetkennedy@gmail.com.
It may look like a tunnel for an MRI, but at Life Guard Imaging on Rocky Point, you slide through the Philips Brilliance CT Scanner, which scans your body from your shoulders to the base of your torso. (Photos by Charmaine George)
Beating cancer or heart disease can be an uphill battle.
However, Frankie Maldonado says he can help give you a fighting chance.
The solution, he says — don’t wait until the hill is too large to climb.
At Life Guard Imaging, where Maldonado is the director of operations, you can get out in front of deadly cancers and other diseases by having a body scan that can identify potential problems with your heart, as well as identify early stages of many different cancers that may be lurking.
The upscale facility, located on Rocky Point Dr. in Tampa, specializes in preventive screening in order to find heart disease or cancer early enough that patients and their physicians can take steps to correct it. Otherwise, most find out the hard and sudden way — with a heart attack that can be deadly or with symptoms that may not present themselves until late-stage cancer.
“United States healthcare is set up to be reactionary,” says Maldonado, who opened Life Guard Imaging in August. “We are taught from the time we are (little) to tell me when you have a symptom, and we’ll treat the symptom. That’s bad enough when it’s a cold, the flu or a virus. But, when it’s heart disease or cancer? That’s deadly.”
At Life Guard Imaging, you are scanned from your shoulders to the base of your pelvis. A registered CT Technologist slides you through a low-radiation, high-resolution CT scanner, creating 3D images of your internal organs, which are then examined by a team of Board-certified Doctors of Radiology who can help aid in detecting deadly diseases before it’s too late.
The scans can help detect hundreds of issues, but among the most prominent are lung cancer (which kills more men and women than any other cancer), liver disease (which accounts for 2 million deaths per year) and abnormalities in your chest, abdomen or pelvis. The scans also can serve as a virtual colonoscopy that Life Guard Imaging says is more thorough (and less invasive) than a traditional colonoscopy, although most doctors still recommend traditional colonoscopies, even with the scan.
Author’s note: I received a scan — super easy by the way, it only takes five minutes — and while happy it detected no cancer, it did confirm other issues I’ll need to take care of as well as providing a coronary calcium score (almost identical to the one I received from my cardiologist).
Maldonado says your first scan serves as your base, and yearly scans can reveal any dangerous changes (although you’re welcome to come in for just one scan if you choose).
Life Guard Imaging is one of only five places nationwide that offer this type of program, where you can receive a full body scan every year.
“One scan is invaluable,” Maldonado says, “but multiple scans are the ones capturing things (as they change).”
Why does a yearly scan make sense? Maldonado says it is an effective way to detect new diseases.
“It’s just like having a mammogram scan every year,” he says. “The single-most diagnosed cancer in America is breast cancer. And yet, and most people don’t know this, the single most-survived cancer in American is breast cancer. That’s not a coincidence — it’s because of early detection scans, before symptoms appear, before any lump gets massive. It’s about catching it early.”
Frank Maldonado (Director of Operations) and Amy Maldonado (Administrative Director)
Maldonado has spent most of his career in the travel industry, but when a friend introduced him to a job opening at a facility in Atlanta that used the same body scanning technology, he was eager to make the jump.
A Personal Connection
For Maldonado, it also was personal.
His father, Dr. Benjamin J. Maldonado, Jr., was a prominent surgeon in Maryland. In January 1998, he felt there was something wrong in his stomach. He was scanned, but the technology then had gaps in the scans. In one of those gaps, on the backside tail of his pancreas, cancer had settled in.
“They missed it,” Maldonado says, and 10 months later his father was diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Just six weeks and a few days after that, he passed away.
“It devastated me,” Maldonado says. “He was my hero.”
Dr. Maldonado’s portrait hangs in the lobby of Life Guard Imaging, a daily reminder to his son that early detection can save lives, as well a world of sadness for those left behind.
While Frankie Maldonado has no medical training himself — he graduated from the University of Maryland in College Park with a degree in television broadcasting — the chance to help save lives and honor his dad’s memory made taking the job at the independent imaging facility in Atlanta in 2017 an easy choice.
“It was the biggest no-brainer of my life, he says. “I said, ‘I want to be a part of this.’ What we were doing in Atlanta literally had to do with how my father lost his life.”
In fact, Maldonado says that, in 2018, one of the patients scanned at the facility was discovered to have early-stage pancreatic cancer, the same cancer that killed his father, but she was able to be saved. In Atlanta, he says he saw thousands of lives that were saved, and he decided to start Life Guard Imaging and bring it to Tampa. He plans to open 1-3 new facilities in Florida and around the country every single year.
“I thought that more people need to know about this,” he says. He is spreading the word through advertising, an appearance on the BloomTV show on WFLA, and we met him at Life Guard Imaging’s booth at a health fair at the Tampa Premium Outlets.
Since Life Guard Imaging opened in August, more than 330 scans have been conducted. Maldonado tells the story of one man who came in with his wife and mother-in-law, who were worried about heart disease in their family. They wanted scans; he did not. However, Maldonado talked him into getting one, and while the ladies each scored a perfect zero on their coronary calcium scan, which measures how much calcified plaque may be in your heart’s arteries, the gentleman’s number was alarmingly high and he was able to get to the doctor to have it checked in time.
Another man, Maldonado says, came in with his wife and his test revealed a calcium score of 900 (anything over 300 is considered high).
The next day, he saw a cardiologist, and discovered that three of his four main arteries had 90-percent blockage. Two weeks ago, he had triple bypass surgery.
“He told us we saved his life,” Maldonado says.
While health insurance doesn’t cover the cost of a scan — which can be pricey if you receive just one but are much cheaper if you choose to receive them yearly — Maldonado hopes to get that changed. He has collected enough data that shows how many lives have been potentially saved and is ready to fight in the hopes that he can change the health narrative and mindset from reactionary to preventive.
“Healthcare is probably never going to switch over but we are going to try,” he says. “This works. It’s an awesome thing, and I’m proud of it.”
Life Guard Imaging is located at 3001 N. Rocky Point Dr., Suite 185. For more info, visit LifeGuardIMaging.com or call (813) 524-1010. If you mention this story or the ad, you will receive a free heart scan and coronary calcium score.
Heritage Elementary School gifted class science teacher Jean Josephson had an idea to plant a beautiful butterfly garden at her school, but needed some helping hands to bring that project to life.
She got more than she bargained for when she reached out through a friend to Scouts BSA (formerly called the Boy Scouts of America) Troop 148, which meets at St. Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church on Cross Creek Blvd., just down the street from the school.
That’s when she connected with Isaac VanMeter, a senior at Wharton High, who is on track to become an Eagle Scout and was thinking about ideas for a project to help him reach his goal.
The butterfly garden project seemed like a perfect fit.
“I had other ideas, but I really like helping with the environment,” says Isaac, who adds that the school beautification aspect appealed to him, as well. “Having a really nice-looking school is good for students, and it’s great for the entire school to have a garden to play in and learn in.”
Jean says Isaac took her idea and ran with it.
“He did a really, really good job,” she says. “It really exceeded my expectations. I thought I would have to do more planning and directing, but he took control of the whole project.”
While the school already had a vegetable garden and a small butterfly garden, it also had a butterfly mural and space for a much bigger garden to be used for instructional purposes, such as studying the life cycle of butterflies.
Teachers bring students out to the garden to release butterflies raised in the classroom, or to watch worms or bees. They use a curriculum from a nonprofit educational organization called “Agriculture in the Classroom” to bring the lessons to life.
Jean explains that some resources for which plants would work in the garden and how to plant it came from the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS), but Isaac did the fundraising to pay for it and did additional research, making the final selections for what would go in the garden and how it would be laid out.
He brought a team of Scouts out for a workday to make it all happen.
“The soil was so bad that they had to build it up with about seven yards of soil,” explains Jean, “Then, they replaced the edging, put the plants in, mulched the garden, gave it a good watering, and they also mulched the whole courtyard. It was really great.”
Isaac’s next steps are to finish his paperwork and the last three of the 21 required merit badges before his 18th birthday in January. Then, he’ll go before a Board of Review to make his case for why he should be awarded the rank of Eagle Scout.
“This is a big accomplishment,” Isaac says, “something I’ve been working toward for six years.”
Before and after.
Isaac completed the project during his first season playing varsity football, while his team went on a playoff run. He decided to try football his senior year, in addition to competing for Wharton in lacrosse and track and field — throwing discus, javelin and shotput — in previous years.
After graduation, he plans to go to college on a Florida Bright Futures Scholarship — likely at the University of Central Florida in Orlando — and major in finance.
“I really think the whole process of (Scouts) BSA has changed me to be more of a leader and have that mindset of how I can help encourage everyone around me,” he says. “The project taught me how everyone can come together to accomplish things.”
He says he’s pleased with the way the garden turned out and is looking forward to seeing how the plants grow and fill in the garden over time.
Jean says the teachers and the entire school community are thrilled with the opportunities they see for learning in the new garden.
“Everybody is so impressed,” she says. “I can’t wait until it all grows up.”
Linda Adum (far left) and her daughter Amie Adum MacLauchlan stand next to the nearly 5,200 pounds of food donated at Chiles Elementary. (Photo courtey of Amie Adum MacLauchlan).
The holidays had always been a special time for New Tampa’s Ken Adum. A long-time educator and member of St. James United Methodist Church in Tampa Palms, Adum had devoted much of the holiday season for nearly two decades to playing an integral role in his church’s annual holiday food drive, which was held in partnership with Metropolitan Ministries.
The effort was Adum’s passion. He helped rally local schools when it came to organizing food drives, and also served as the St. James tent coordinator the past few years. He was often busy in the weeks before Thanksgiving hooking the trailer containing all of the donated goods to his Ford F-150 truck and delivering them every few days to the Metropolitan Ministries main tent on N. Rome Ave.
“He loved it,” says his daughter Allison Adum Shaer. “He always looked forward to it.”
In April, Ken, a former teacher, three-time Principal of the Year at Gaither and administrator in a 37-year career with Hillsborough County Public Schools, passed away following a battle with cancer at the age of 74.
Metropolitan Ministries, whose founder Morris Hintzman also was one of the founding pastors of St. James, decided to honor Adum by naming the northern Hillsborough County food drive after him: The Ken Adum Memorial Food & Toy Drive for Metropolitan Ministries.
“He played such a big part in it,” says Dineen Paris who, along with her husband Leonard, are the tent coordinators for the drive this year.
First, A Little History…
In 2003, the Parises, along with Ken and his wife Linda and Joann and Bob Lee, met with Metropolitan Ministries, wanting to expand St. James’ mission of giving back to the community. They formed a partnership that has helped feed thousands of families in the two decades since.
Ken Adum
This year, a record 27,000 pounds of food was collected for Metropolitan Ministries in November at St. James. Ken’s daughters, Amie Adum MacLauchlan and Allison, raised roughly a quarter of that in a friendly competition between the schools where they teach. Allison is a fifth-grade math teacher at Lutz Prep, while Amie is an audiologist at Chiles Elementary.
Allison’s fifth-grade class collected 1,600 pounds of food, while Amie (with help from fifth grade teacher Shannon Simpkins) enlisted the teachers in every grade at Chiles and raised a whopping 5,190 pounds.
“This year was definitely more meaningful,” Amie says. “Education and Metropolitan Ministries were two of my Dad’s passions, so knowing that he was smiling down on us during the whole fall season was wonderful. I really wanted to get our school involved to see if I could inspire everyone to do it in honor of my dad.”
The daughters definitely picked up where Dad left off. It was Adum who added the component of competition between area schools in 2017, hoping to put a charge into the drive and impact the younger generation.
“He loved a good friendly competition,” Allison says.
Amie was amazed by the response at Chiles. Day by day, little by little, the donations began rolling in. The school had never collected more than 1,000 pounds worth of food to donate, but that number was quickly eclipsed this year, as large blue barrels in the front office at Chiles were filled to overflowing.
That amount quickly surged 2,000 lbs.….then 3,000…and more, until the blue barrels were buried by cans and boxes of food.
“First, it was the blue barrels, then you could see that more of the floor was disappearing,” Amie says. “Then, you couldn’t see the rug anymore.”
By the time the food drive ended, in less than two weeks, the families at Chiles had brought in more than two-and-a-half tons of food.
When Amie brought Linda to the school on Nov. 19 to see what Ken had inspired, Linda grew emotional.
“I wanted her to see how much they had brought in in honor of Dad,” Amie says. “It was awe-inspiring. Then, she helped us pack it all up so we could take it to the donation tent. It took us an hour and 40 minutes to pack it up, bag it and load the cars.”
The family also decided to start a new tradition. While everyone had pitched in over the years working the tent at St. James at various times during the drive, this year, the entire Adum family gathered this year to work the tent together — unloading donations, weighing food, separating it into HOPE boxes (containing a variety of items for one full Thanksgiving feast) — followed by a family lunch.
It was a special moment (see photo on the cover) to remember the man who helped start it all.
“Losing Ken was a great loss, but to see everyone’s enthusiasm this year, it wasn’t a sad thing, it was a joyful thing,” Dineen says. “It was wonderful to watch them, their whole family (working) together. Ken would have liked it very much.”
You can still donate food or toys by visiting St. James United Methodist Church at 16202 Bruce B. Downs Blvd., 10 a.m.-3 p.m. daily through Thursday, December 23.
Pastor Svend Wilbekin says the diversity in New Tampa is one of the things that has helped make Lifesong Church in Tampa Palms successful
It was just a little more than five years ago when Pastor Svend Wilbekin opened the doors at Lifesong Church in Tampa Palms for the first time.
It was so unlikely, he says, that there’s no explanation for it unless God ordained it.
That was November 5, 2016, when Svend was sent from a church in Gainesville called The Rock, where he had served on staff for 20 years as youth pastor, college pastor and young adult pastor. He felt the experience led him to start a new church in New Tampa.
He says most churches these days don’t launch with fewer than 50 people, but his had only nine. And, the really unheard of thing? They started in a building that they already owned.
“God supernaturally blessed us to purchase a building right before we had our first service,” he explains. When Svend tried to find a place to rent, such as a high school, everywhere he looked was already leased. He started looking at what was available to buy and was shocked to find a building for sale that would work for the fledgling church.
That began frantic efforts to get the building ready, in addition to all of the details of putting together the very first service, while Svend’s wife Katy organized a picnic for all the friends and family who were coming to support them on launch day.
“A lot of families in Tampa Palms saw the bounce house and the food,” he says, and learned about the new church in the neighborhood. He says a full-page ad in the Neighborhood News hit mailboxes the day before the first service and, “It was a great way to introduce ourselves to the community.”
Five years later, Lifesong Church is an important part of New Tampa, as it continues to grow and welcome new people into its ministries.
“The vision of our church is to love out loud,” says Pastor Svend. “If you visit, you’ll hear that terminology. Our heart is to love everybody who walks through our doors.”
He says Lifesong members also are “out” loving the community, like through their homeless ministry.
“We noticed that within the homeless community, food is provided, some shelter is provided, and a lot of services, but what wasn’t being provided were relationships,” he explains. “We started going downtown with nothing but ourselves and our time. We’ve been doing that and made great relationships.”
The church offers life groups where people encourage each other, too. There is a group for women and one where men are challenged to be better husbands and fathers. Every year, the church offers a course to help couples strengthen their marriages, overcome obstacles, and live more fulfilling lives with their spouses.
Svend and his wife, Katy, who now live in Meadow Pointe, are parents to three sons, who all grew up in Gainesville.
Their oldest son, Scottie, had a remarkable career playing college basketball at the University of Florida, where he was named SEC Player of the Year in 2014. He was a star player on a team that went undefeated in the SEC and beat perennial powerhouse Kentucky at home to win the SEC championship in a run his dad calls “magical.” Scottie currently plays professional basketball in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Middle son Mitchell played basketball at Wake Forest and currently plays for the Greensboro Swarm, an NBA G League (the NBA’s official minor leage organization) team affiliated with the Charlotte Hornets.
The Wilbekins’ youngest son Andrew will graduate with a Ph.D. degree in Physical Therapy in May from Husson University in Bangor, ME.
“What’s beautiful about that is they’ve all graduated from college and they all love the Lord,” says Svend. “Where they’re at now really blesses us.”
The transition from living in Gainesville, where everyone knew how to pronounce their last name — thanks to their famous son — to the New Tampa area also has been a blessing for Svend and Katy.
“We absolutely love New Tampa,” he says. “It’s the most incredible community. We love so much about it — we love the restaurants, I love the golf courses. It’s very diverse.”
As an interracial couple, the community’s diversity is important to the Wilbekins and a goal for their church is to “build a community of believers that looks like heaven,” Svend says, embracing all ages, nationalities and skin colors.
Sunday Morning Services
Lifesong Church meets Sunday mornings at 10 a.m., and Svend says that’s where the “song” part of the church shines.
“We have anointed musicians and instrumentalists ushering in the presence of God through the use of music,” he explains. “We have a full band with guitars, drums, keyboards and vocalists singing contemporary music.”
He says the Covid-19 pandemic has been one of the most challenging seasons he’s ever experienced as a pastor.
“We shifted to an online service, and we’ve grown in that area, which has helped us expand our reach,” he explains. “But now, we have an online community as well as an attending community. It’s been neat to see.”
Melissa Choe and her husband Jacob have been attending Lifesong Church in person for about a year with their daughter Melody.
They’re one of the families that found Lifesong online and watched from home before deciding to attend in person.
“I really like the community aspect of Lifesong,” says Melissa. “Everyone is very welcoming and there are opportunities to get plugged in and get involved.”
While Melissa and her husband serve on Lifesong’s Worship Team, her daughter loves Lifesong Kids.
“She’s always saying, ‘Can I go to my church?’ and ‘I love my church,’” says Katy. “I love that (children’s director) Julie (Nash) is really mindful of not making it your parents’ church. They focus on teaching the children about the Bible, but in a fun and appropriate way.”
Svend says Julie offers a hands-on and age-appropriate version of church for kids. “It’s enjoyable, and they come away with the knowledge of God’s word in a practical manner,” he says.
Svend graduated the from University of Florida with a degree in political science. He went through a mentoring program at The Rock under the leadership of Pastor George Brantley to be trained and equipped as a pastor.
Of the experience of planting a church, he says, “It was harder than I thought, and more rewarding than I thought it would be. Seeing people become a community has really been a priceless and beautiful moment, and such a confirmation of what God put in my heart six years ago.”
Lifesong Church hosts its weekly service on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m., including a special Christmas Service on Sunday, December 19. The church is located at 6460 Tampa Palms Blvd., near Tampa Palms Golf & Country Club and Tampa Palms Elementary. For more information, visit LifeSongTampa.org.
