At noon, Tuesday, Jan. 5, in front of the Alachua County Criminal Courthouse, Clovis Watson, Jr. was officially sworn in as the Alachua County Sheriff. Watson joined his fellow Constitutional Officers serving Alachua County at the swearing in ceremony.

Watson previously served as a state representative serving District 20, which covered parts of Alachua and Marion counties. Prior to his eight-year stint as state representative, he was the Alachua City Manager and prior to that he was the City of Alachua Deputy Police Chief.

Watson grew up in the Merrillwood projects in Alachua and graduated from Santa Fe High School, Santa Fe College, Law Enforcement Certification; Santa Fe College, AS, Criminal Justice Technology; University of Alabama, BA, Interdisciplinary Studies, Human Services; Mountain State University, MA, Interdisciplinary Studies, Public Administration; Northcentral University, MBA; Harvard University John F. Kennedy Graduate School of Government Executive Education, Leadership for the 21st Century.

Watson was sworn in by fellow Santa Fe High School graduate the Honorable Judge Susanne Wilson Bullard.

Other constitutional officers sworn in Tuesday include Kim Barton as Alachua County Supervisor of Elections, J.K. “Jess” Irby as the Alachua County clerk of the Court, Brian S. Kramer as the State Attorney for the Eighth Judicial Circuit, Ayesha Solomon as the Alachua County Property appraiser, John Power as the Alachua County Tax Collector, and Stacy A. Scott as the Public Defender for the Eighth Judicial Circuit,

ALACHUA ‒ On the evening of Dec. 3, the Amphitheater at Alachua’s Legacy Park hosted Dance Alive National Ballet's (DANB) production of “The Nutcracker” to an estimated crowd of 700 people. The amphitheater was part of the overall plan to make Legacy Park a central location for recreational and cultural activities.

The Gainesville based professional ballet company has been performing “The Nutcracker” for 54 years with over 200 touring performances and 30 school programs in the United States. Over the past four years it has also become a traditional show in Alachua as well.

Like many entertainment performances, the pandemic has hit the ballet industry hard. Most of DANB's scheduled performances for this winter and spring 2021 have been canceled or postponed due to limitations on venues and crowd size. But “The Nutcracker” is an important part of the company’s history, and some shows that could be performed either outdoors or in larger venues that would allow for audience social distancing remained. One of those was the Alachua performance of “The Nutcracker” as over 30 dancers performed a nearly two-hour show at the outdoor amphitheater under the stars.

In 1966 Mary Ellen Pofahl, a professional dancer and teacher, founded the DANB company and it has continued through the talents and efforts of her daughters, Judy Skinner and Kim Tuttle. The Dance Alive National Ballet has become the premier touring company in the Southeastern United States. It is actually two entities under the direction of the two sisters. Tuttle and Skinner are owners/directors of the Dance Alive National Ballet with Tuttle serving as Artistic Director and Skinner serving as Choreographer-in-Residence.

While “The Nutcracker” was the last performance of the year at the Legacy Park amphitheater, it demonstrated how successful this outdoor stage can be. And Legacy is fulfilling its namesake by providing space and creating an environment of entertainment and culture for the community provided by the City of Alachua, free of charge to those attending.

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alachuatoday.com

HIGH SPINGS ‒ Christmas is a time for joy and excitement as holiday traditions bring back warm memories as well as anticipation of what is to come. Children are especially excited as they await Christmas morning and the gifts they hope to receive. Christmas is also a time for giving and sharing, and thanks to the High Springs Police Department (HSPD) and its partners, less fortunate children enjoyed a merry Christmas.

Since 2008, HSPD has sponsored Operation Holiday Cheer. HSPD, along with help from the High Springs Fire Department (HSFD) and the City Parks and Recreation Department, have asked for donations of new toys, pajamas and books from the community so they can provide them to children in need. Several local businesses, the Rotary Club and the High Springs Community School have also been involved in the effort.

The school typically notifies the school resource officer of families that could use the help, and HSPD contacts the child's parents to get approval for a delivery and find out if there are other children in the house to add to the list. This also gives the police an opportunity to learn what the children want as they try to match the gifts to the children.

But like everything else in 2020, the pandemic affected how Operation Holiday Cheer would continue. For HSPD, it was never a question of canceling the event, only how to change it to make it safe for everyone.

This year, instead of individuals and organizations donating toys, the police department asked only for cash donations so the officers could purchase the toys themselves to guarantee they were sanitized and properly handled. And parents and children also received gift cards to purchase any items they needed, including food.

Cards were donated by both local and corporate merchants. Locally, Pepperonis, Dollar Tree and Winn-Dixie contributed cards. Other card sponsors included Walmart, Amazon, Old Navy and Gamespot. According to HSPD Chief Antione Sheppard, despite the hard economic times, the community gave more donations than in previous years, providing over $7,000 for the officers to buy gifts.

This year’s event was organized by HSPD Police Officer Jason Taylor and on the morning of Dec. 21, Taylor along with fellow HSPD officers and staff and members of the fire department, sprang into action. They left the police station in police cruiser with lights flashing and the City’s fire truck, going home to home, delivering gifts to 31 children in 12 families.

With COVID precautions in mind, all the officers were masked to provide safe interaction with the families. The group also included two administrative members of the department dressed in colorful inflated costumes representing Santa Claus and a Christmas tree. In addition to spreading holiday cheer, the costumes provided a contact barrier allowing the characters to have closer interaction with the children.

While the pandemic has changed many aspects of life in 2020, traditions continue and people find other ways to safely work around COVID-19. This year has been hard for many families, especially economically, and that makes Operation Holiday Cheer more important than ever to help those in need this holiday season.

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alachuatoday.com

ALACHUA ‒ Visitors to the city of Alachua’s Main Street were in for a treat Saturday afternoon, Dec. 12. For the past 36 years the Alachua Chamber of Commerce has hosted the annual Christmas Parade through the downtown area. Each year local businesses, government departments, civic groups and churches sponsor floats to entertain the spectators and compete for prizes. Children anxiously awaited the parade for chance to see Santa Claus and collect the treats thrown from each decorated float or handed out by people walking alongside.

This year however, the world is different due to the Covid-19 pandemic, which is currently surging during the holidays. High Springs canceled its annual evening parade due to concerns about crowd size and ability to social distance, and instead residents had a parade of decorated cars driving around downtown High Springs.

Alachua moved forward with the afternoon parade as an important tradition for area children and to give them a sense of normalcy at Christmastime. All parade participants wore masks as did most of the spectators. While the event was smaller than previous years, both in crowd size and in number of floats and entries, the excitement was palpable among the crowd as they enjoyed the parade. Instead of the usual 35-40 floats, this year there were only 28, but the festivities, enthusiasm and spirit of Christmas celebration were ever present.

This year’s parade theme paid tribute to a throwback collection of classic toys. The parade historically starts with a police escort, and this year was no different. With lights flashing and sirens wailing motorcycle patrolmen led the parade, followed by police cars from Alachua and High Springs.

Families still lined the street in lawn chairs to watch the procession, although they were spread out in their family groups to help create social distancing. Following the police escort was a flag color guard consisting of three Marine veterans. Other members of the Marine Corps League of Veterans followed in two army jeeps outfitted with an American flag waving from a pole. Additional veterans walked along the sidelines handing out candy. City Mayor Gib Coerper followed them, waving at the crowd.

The parade's grand marshal, newly elected Alachua County Sheriff Clovis Watson, Jr., greeted the hometown crowd from a vintage convertible Mustang. The Santa Fe High School Raider Regiment provided the parade’s marching band and engaged the crowd with their holiday tunes.

The City of Alachua’s float, fashioned like a red radio flyer wagon, featured a display of giant-sized favorite children’s toys, including Legos, tinker toys, a barrel of monkeys, and Raggedy Anne. City Commissioners Shirley Green Brown and Dana Miller joined City employees on the colorful float.

Volunteers, walking alongside the floats, were dressed in Christmas attire or portrayed characters such as Santa's elves, and handed out candy to the children along the parade route. For the children, it was a magical time, seeing the colorful floats and costumed characters, along with free candy and gifts.

Other float sponsors included Mi Apa Restaurant, Shriners, Domino’s Pizza, Alachua 4H Club, MatchMaker Realty, All Stars Twirling Academy, Momentum Dance Academy, High Springs Playhouse, Santa Fe Babe Ruth Baseball team, Boy Scout Troop 88 and Pack 88 Cub and Tiger scouts.

As each float passed the judge’s stage at the intersection of 148^th Place and Main Street, parade MC's Ben Boukari, Jr., Mike DaRoza and Robert Bonetti announced the sponsor of each float, oftentimes pausing long enough to chat with the participants.

But the best was yet to come as the float everyone was waiting for arrived. Santa Claus waved to the children as he rode by perched on top of a firetruck. Excited youngsters responded by waving and calling out Santa's name to try and catch his attention.

At the conclusion of the festivities, the judges awarded first place to the Momentum Dance Arts float, which was decorated in a Barbie doll theme and featured dancers dressed as vintage Barbie dolls