DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- On New Year's Day, the award-winning 24/7 internet internet newspaper will recognize four public servants it believes truly represents the the absolute best of the best of greater Daytona Beach -- our Mount Rushmore so to speak. And on Jan. 1, Frank Bruno, Ted Doran, Joyce Cusack and Melody McSorley Johnson will be presented as such as this digital media outlet begins rolling out the 101 entrants in its inaugural Class of 2016 HeadlneSurfer.com Hall of Fame.
As a brief recap here is brief bio on the four first-ballot Hall of Famers:
• Frank Bruno -- Though he stepped off the dais in 2012, Bruno remains thew face of Volusia County politics, the first elected County Chair, who served two four-year terms and 20 years overall in elected county office. Bruno lives in Ponce Inlet.
• Ted Doran -- Recognized as one of the top civil litigants in Central Florida, Doran heads up his own law firm in Daytona Beach with three partners. Doran also is general counsel to the Volusia County School Board. Doran is a former chair of the Daytona Regional Chamber of Commerce and active in civic & community causes.
• Joyce Cusack -- She proved in the hotly-contested 2014 elections shat she is perhaps the most powerful politician in Volusia County. Cusack, in her second four-year term as the at-large member on the County Council, is a former state representative, who lives in DeLand. She also is the HeadlineSurfer.com Central Florida Politician of the Year for 2015 and 2014.
• Melody McSorley Johnson -- She came of nowhere to win a seat out of Deltona on the Volusia County School Board in 2014, and currently serve as its vice chair. Johnson and her husband adopted three children -- siblings -- and has long since become the consummate loving parent in raising three wonderful children and helping to set policy for schools educating thousands of school children.
Headline Surfer® is somewhat hopeful one or more major business entities will step forward and underwrite this effort with a dinner and plaques. But if not, the internet newspaper at least will have provided recognition online along with promoting it through its social media network.
In addition to Frank Bruno, Ted Doran, Joyce Cusack and Melody McSorley Johnson, here is a listing of the confirmed Hall of Famers with additional entrants to be added between now and the end of the year:
• Ben Johnson, Volusia County's elected sheriff since 2000.
• Dr. Mary Bruno, an associate vice president at Daytona State College and wife of Frank Bruno;
• Volusia Tax Reform (with recognition of its three founders Margie Patchett, Maureen France and Ed Connor);
• Webster Barnaby, constitutionalist and former Deltona city commissioner;
• Bethune-Cookman University (with special recognition of its presidents, from 1904 founder Mary McLeod Bethune to succeeding presidents James E. Colston, Richard V. Moore, Sr., Oswald P. Bronson, Sr., Ph.D., Trudie Kibbe Reed, Ed.D., and Dr. Edison O. Jackson, current B-CU president;