Crews battle 2.5-acre brush fire near Alico and Eagle Village DriveJake’s story: A mother’s mission to share her son’s story and help other young people
ESTERO Crews battle 2.5-acre brush fire near Alico and Eagle Village Drive San Carlos Park Fire District is on the scene fighting a 2.5-acre brushfire near Alico and Eagle Village Drive.
FORT MYERS Jake’s story: A mother’s mission to share her son’s story and help other young people One Fort Myers mom is turning her pain into purpose after her son, who she refers to as her “heavenly Angel,” took his own life.
CAPE CORAL New renderings for the Cape Coral Yacht Club promise a bright future The Cape Coral Yacht Club, which has been part of this community since the 1960s, will now have a new look after Hurricane Ian’s devastating effects.
LEHIGH ACRES Owner bars public from Barefoot Lake, LCSO installs Watch Tower Every weekend, roughly 200 people go to Barefoot Lake in Lehigh Acres to relax, fish, swim and have a good time.
CAPE CORAL Concern over water shortage in Cape Coral Concern is flowing through Cape Coral as neighbors are seeing their canal levels low and their wells run dry.
FORT MYERS FSW softball swinging for success in the postseason Now their focus shifts to states which means the newbies are looking to the experienced sophomores for advice.
BONITA SPRINGS Young SWFL tennis player competing with professionals You may not know her name now, but you might want remember it because 16-year-old Cookie Jarvis-Tredgett is already competing with professionals.
NORTH NAPLES ‘It’s all about connection,’ Statement Peace makes jewelry with sustainability in mind The brand Statement Peace, once started inside founder Jessica Lee’s home, is now in 2,700 stores across the country
Pine Manor 2 arrested for firing gun at birthday party in Pine Manor A party ended with two people behind bars.
FORT MYERS Shooting investigation on busy Fort Myers street Police are conducting a shooting investigation that involves a traffic crash near Michigan Avenue and Dr. Martin Luther King Boulevard.
FGCU New FGCU athletic director Colin Hargis ready to build on department’s success New FGCU athletic director Colin Hargis talks about the department’s future amid the age of NIL and the transfer portal.
FORT MYERS More middle-aged women being treated for acne You probably thought you broke up with it after high school, but acne is rearing it’s ugly blackheads in adult women.
Lee County student ran up and hit teacher in head, report shows The report says a 13-year-old student ran up and smacked a teacher in the head because multiple classmates offered him money to do so.
NAPLES Collier Planning Commission continues discussion for apartments near Fiddler’s Creek The developer of Fiddler’s Creek wants to build hundreds of luxury apartments on a slice of a 600 acre-plus property known as section 29.
CAPE CORAL Fatigue sets in for third day of FEMA hearings Flying several hours to come to a FEMA code compliance hearing in Cape Coral is the reality for John Gasparini from Maryland.
ESTERO Crews battle 2.5-acre brush fire near Alico and Eagle Village Drive San Carlos Park Fire District is on the scene fighting a 2.5-acre brushfire near Alico and Eagle Village Drive.
FORT MYERS Jake’s story: A mother’s mission to share her son’s story and help other young people One Fort Myers mom is turning her pain into purpose after her son, who she refers to as her “heavenly Angel,” took his own life.
CAPE CORAL New renderings for the Cape Coral Yacht Club promise a bright future The Cape Coral Yacht Club, which has been part of this community since the 1960s, will now have a new look after Hurricane Ian’s devastating effects.
LEHIGH ACRES Owner bars public from Barefoot Lake, LCSO installs Watch Tower Every weekend, roughly 200 people go to Barefoot Lake in Lehigh Acres to relax, fish, swim and have a good time.
CAPE CORAL Concern over water shortage in Cape Coral Concern is flowing through Cape Coral as neighbors are seeing their canal levels low and their wells run dry.
FORT MYERS FSW softball swinging for success in the postseason Now their focus shifts to states which means the newbies are looking to the experienced sophomores for advice.
BONITA SPRINGS Young SWFL tennis player competing with professionals You may not know her name now, but you might want remember it because 16-year-old Cookie Jarvis-Tredgett is already competing with professionals.
NORTH NAPLES ‘It’s all about connection,’ Statement Peace makes jewelry with sustainability in mind The brand Statement Peace, once started inside founder Jessica Lee’s home, is now in 2,700 stores across the country
Pine Manor 2 arrested for firing gun at birthday party in Pine Manor A party ended with two people behind bars.
FORT MYERS Shooting investigation on busy Fort Myers street Police are conducting a shooting investigation that involves a traffic crash near Michigan Avenue and Dr. Martin Luther King Boulevard.
FGCU New FGCU athletic director Colin Hargis ready to build on department’s success New FGCU athletic director Colin Hargis talks about the department’s future amid the age of NIL and the transfer portal.
FORT MYERS More middle-aged women being treated for acne You probably thought you broke up with it after high school, but acne is rearing it’s ugly blackheads in adult women.
Lee County student ran up and hit teacher in head, report shows The report says a 13-year-old student ran up and smacked a teacher in the head because multiple classmates offered him money to do so.
NAPLES Collier Planning Commission continues discussion for apartments near Fiddler’s Creek The developer of Fiddler’s Creek wants to build hundreds of luxury apartments on a slice of a 600 acre-plus property known as section 29.
CAPE CORAL Fatigue sets in for third day of FEMA hearings Flying several hours to come to a FEMA code compliance hearing in Cape Coral is the reality for John Gasparini from Maryland.
Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats speaks at a Select Senate Committee on Intelligence hearing on worldwide threats, Tuesday, Feb. 13, 2018, in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik) The U.S. government’s system of security clearances for top officials is “broken” and must be completely overhauled, the Trump administration’s intelligence chief told The Associated Press, as questions swirl about how a top White House aide kept his access to highly sensitive information and the president despite accusations of domestic violence. Dan Coats’ assessment in a telephone interview came just before he briefed lawmakers on Capitol Hill about global threats facing the United States. Coats was immediately confronted Tuesday by a top Democratic senator about continued questions about Rob Porter, who resigned his job as staff secretary last week after stories emerged detailing two ex-wives’ accounts of abuse. Porter had been serving with an interim security clearance while his background check was pending, a common occurrence for officials in a government facing a backlog of hundreds of thousands of such security reviews. “We have a broken system and I think everybody’s come to agree with that now,” Coats told the AP. Calling for a “revolutionary change” in how the U.S. government vets its own people, Coats said what’s needed is a process that takes advantage of new technologies and information on social media to provide “early awareness of individuals.” He said such an approach would be faster and more effective than an investigation “having to go to 19 different places to talk to people, neighbors and school classmates and so forth.” “We have to basically start with a clean sheet and say, ‘What can we do better to make sure that we get the correct background info necessary to certify that someone should be working within our community and in the government?'” Coats said. “But how can we do it in a way that doesn’t leave us with hundreds of thousands waiting to be looked at and certified, with key slots open in various agencies?” “We we have moved this to a very top priority because it is really undermining our ability to get the right people into the right place at the right time,” the director of national intelligence added. Talk of reforming security clearances is hardly new. Some 700,000 reviews have stacked up across the government, leading agencies like the Defense Department to inadvertently issue interim passes to criminals – even rapists and killers – prompting calls for better and faster vetting of people with access to the nation’s secrets. It currently takes about four months to acquire a clearance to gain access to “secret” information on a need-to-know basis, and nine to 10 months for “top-secret” clearance. The questions about Porter’s behavior and ability to secure an interim clearance have only accelerated the demands for a better process. President Donald Trump’s White House has stressed that background checks are handled by the FBI and other intelligence agencies through the same process that administrations have relied on for decades. Checking federal employees and private contractors is a laborious process that requires an extensive background check and an effort to judge a person’s trustworthiness. Ninety-five percent of all background investigations are conducted by the National Background Investigations Bureau, which does some of the work itself and contracts the rest to private firms. “We need to do more to reform the broken security clearance system,” Sen. Mark Warner, the Senate intelligence committee’s top Democrat, told Coats at a hearing Tuesday, noting that government auditors had declared the current program as “high risk.” He said the inefficiency was “costing us millions of dollars,” and hurting efforts to recruit and retain intelligence officials. The government hasn’t said how many interim clearances have been issued, but outside experts say they could total more than 200,000. People being investigated for interim clearances are subject to background checks, too, but quick access to state and local records can be challenging. Coats told the AP it’s necessary, “particularly in a new administration” or one with turnover, for interim security clearances to be granted. “But if you do that, it has to be a specific interim with controlled access and limited access, and that has to be clear right from the beginning,” he said. “You can’t just say an interim allows me to do anything.”