Daytona State College hires Amy Locklear as VP of academic Affairs
YouTube video uploads / Headline Surfer® / Left: raw video with focus on students of teacher DAYTONA BEACH -- Dorothy Lytle Kirby certainly remembers where she was on this particular day 28 years ago today to be exact, the day millions in Central Florida and countless more glued to television sets to witness the horror that was the space shuttle Challenger.
Volusia County petition drive organizer & Democrat Ellen Juliano to Attorney General Pam Bondi: 'Put that in your pipe and smoke it'
TALLAHASSEE -- Florida's top court today signed off on the wording of a medical marijuana ballot question that asks Sunshine State voters voters to join nearly two dozen across the country in legalizing the drug for medicinal purposes.
The news was met with excitement by Deltona Democratic Party insider Ellen Juliano, herself a cancer survivor, and a key local organizer in the petition drive to get the medical marijuana ballot initiative drive, who had a personal message for the state attorney general: "Put that in pipe ands smoke it, Pam Bondi!"

OAK HILL, Fla. -- Folk musicians Jeni & Billy will bring the high lonesome harmonies of the Appalachian Mountains in a return visit to Volusia County's smallest incorporated city 13 months from their last stop here.
They will perform at noon Saturday, Feb. 8, at VIA Hall, 126 E. Halifax Ave., Oak Hill, at noon Saturday, Feb. 8. They will perform 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 9, at the Deltona Library.
Headline Surfer® graphic / The body of a man said to be known by police as homeless was found floating near the shore at Bethune Point Park Sunday afternoon as shown in this locator map.DAYTONA BEACH -- A body found floating in the Halifax River on Sunday is that of a homeless man in his late 50s or early 60s, Daytona Beach cops said.
The body was discovered 3:13 p.m. at Bethune Point Park near the shoreline by a member of the Halifax Sailing Association, police said.
"Officers responded to the above location in regards to a body in the water," Daytona Beach police spokesman Jimmy Flynt said in a press release, adding the victim showed no signs of trauma and was believed to be in his latex 50s or early 60s.

Photo for Headline Surfer® / Stanley Rhodes Gainey, convicted drug dealer, is shown here in his Florida Department of Corrections profile.DAYTONA BEACH -- It wasn't his drug dealing that put him in the slammer for the next decade as much as the piling up of the rap sheet.
So goes the story of Stanley Rhodes Gainey, sentenced Nov. 1 by Circuit Judge R. Michael Hutcheson to 10 years in prison as a "habitual felony offender.
Headline Surfer® graphic / A 4-year-old boy drowned in the family's backyard pool Sunday afternoon on South Fairbairn Drive in Deltona as shown in this locator map.DELTONA, Fla. -- A mother's worst fear was realized when she awoke from a nap and found her 4-year-old boy face down in the bottom of the family pool late this afternoon, a Volusia County Sheriff's spokesman said.
Deputies were dispatched to a home on South Fairbairn Drive after receiving a 9-1-1 call at 4:19 p.m. "The boy’s mother told the Sheriff’s Office that she fell asleep, and when she awoke and started looking for her son, she found him at the bottom of the pool," agency spokesman Gary Davidson told Headline Surfer®.
Sheriff's investigators did not release the name of the mother or the child.
KISSIMMEE, Fla. -- The Martin Luther King Phase 3 construction project utility work on Dyer Boulevard between Commerce Boulevard and the Kissimmee Gateway Airport entrance began Friday Friday and will continue until the project is completed.
Headline Surfer® graphic / An outdoor burn is in effect for all unincorporated areas of Osceola County, effective Jan. 22 as demonstrated in this snapshot.KISSIMMEE, Fla. -- Unincorporated areas of Osceola County are under an outdoor burn ban due to lack of rainfall throughout the county that has sent its Keetch-Byram Drought Index over 500.
The ban, which took effect Jan. 22, is for all types of outside burning, including open fire pits, campfires, and yard debris. It be enforced by Osceola County Code Enforcement, Law Enforcement and Emergency Services personnel. Osceola County Fire Rescue will continue to monitor conditions to determine when the burn ban will be lifted.

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DAYTONA BEACH -- Joao Barbosa and the No. 5 Corvette DP took the checkered flag to win the Rolex 24 at Daytona International Speedway, red-flagged for 90 minutes early on by a horrific crash that sent two drivers to the hospital with serious injuries including one with a broken back.