Upgrades on the way for Miami Seniors' Center
'Since I've been widowed, it has been the highlight of my life.'
For nearly a decade, Pat Jones has made the Miami Seniors' Center her favorite place to be.
'I come out here twice a week, play Mexican train with some very good friends, new friends that I made since I became a member,' said Jones.
What was once old will be new again, and Jones says she's all for it.
'I'm hoping that we have more activities for older people because we don't have a lot in this town.'
'We want to bring back more exciting, wonderful things at the seniors. We want their valued input and to hear what they'd like.' said Melinda Stotts, City of Miami Communications Manager.
Grants funded by community organizations will pay for the roughly ninety-thousand-dollar improvement project.
Lauria and Ashley's Law Passes First Committee
Early voting contines today in Oklahoma
ID of man found dead in Miami home released
Feds clear Miami police officer in fatal shooting
'One of the most bizarre cases in my law enforcement career,' Missing Oklahoma teen spent nights in Wal-Mart toilet paper fort
'We took a good look at it, and the building was built in 1990-something. And so, our goal was to refresh it, to revitalize it, to make it a really amazing place,' said Stotts.
Currently, the center offers a kitchenette, an on-site gym, and pool tables. The project plans to bring in new activities, games, events, and classes—something Jones says she's looking forward to.
'I love country and western dancing, which my friend and I took a course in when they had it at the Civic Center. I'm hoping they'll offer a course here,' said Jones.
Upgrades also include redoing the floors, adding a fresh coat of paint, and installing a full kitchen with new appliances, which is currently underway.
'Making sure everyone has a good hot meal is so important. So that's part of this and part of why the city wanted to keep this is to make sure Doc's could keep their dedicated kitchen where it was,' said Stotts.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Epoch Times
2 hours ago
- Epoch Times
You'll Be Crazy for Corn After You Try This Summer Soup
All summer long, we indulge in local corn every which way: on the cob with butter and salt, sauteed kernels with herbs and diced tomato, or grilled to goldenness. We stand in line at state fairs for cobs dripping in butter. Street festivals find us getting sloppy with Mexican-inspired cobs covered in sour cream, cheese, and red chile. We love it all. We plan to continue feasting as long as the farm stands have a supply, especially with our favorite variegated honey and cream hybrid. Then we plan to cut kernels from cobs and freeze them for the taste of summer all year long.
New York Post
3 days ago
- New York Post
How Greece and Germany helped make archeology modern
Watching an American icon like Indiana Jones battle Nazis in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,' it's hard to believe that it was actually a German cultural institute which played a pivotal role in transforming reckless Jones-style treasure hunting into the modern science of archaeology we know today. That institute, the German Archaeological Institute at Athens (DAI Athens), has just completed the year-long celebration of its 150th anniversary — just as Greece welcomes record numbers of summer tourists to marvel at the archaeological wonders the institute helped unearth. Widely regarded as one of the birthplaces of modern archaeological science, the DAI pioneered the transition from indiscriminate digging at archaeological sites to the systematic excavation and meticulous study that continues to inspire researchers and amateur archaeology buffs across the globe. Advertisement 11 Archaeological Site of Olympia in Greece, excavated by the Germans in 1875 in what is regarded as the first 'dig' to employ the rigorous academic and scientific practices now used in archeology across the globe. dudlajzov – 11 The ruins of Ancient Olympia. elgreko – 11 The headquarters of the DAI Athens, the German-run archeological institute which helped establish modern archeology. DAI Athens, Photographer H. Birk Until the mid-19th century, archeology was often more about treasure hunting and indiscriminate looting than detailed research and science. Advertisement Take Lord Elgin's controversial removal of sculptures from the Parthenon in Athens, between 1801 and 1812. Although Elgin claimed to have obtained permission from Ottoman authorities — a claim recently refuted by the Turkish government — his sale of the sculptures to the British Museum remains a major cultural and diplomatic dispute between Greece and Britain. Many view Elgin's deeds as one of the most notorious colonial-era lootings, alongside famous antiquities brought to museums around the world like the Rosetta Stone. 11 'Greece's allure was such that many countries fought to establish archaeological institutes at the time. Today, there are 20 foreign institutes based in Athens,' says DAI Director Katja Sporn. DAI Athens, Photographer N. Chrisikakis Advertisement Even Luigi Palma di Cesnola, the first director of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, was accused of looting classical treasures from Cyprus, where he served as US Consul General in the mid-1860s. Many of the artifacts di Cesnola was said to have plundered were sold, ironically, to the Met itself. During this period, Greece, newly independent from the Ottoman Empire in 1830, was rich in history but in economic decline owing to decades of war. But it was finally possible for the philhellenists (lovers of Greek culture) to travel to Greece and study its ancient remains. In the later part of the 19th century, Greece's ancient ruins also became magnets for the era's great expansionist powers like the United Kingdom and France. Their ultimate goal? Securing rights to excavate Greece's most coveted archaeological sites while bolstering diplomatic ties through what we now call 'cultural diplomacy.' 11 Luigi Palma Di Cesnola, the first director of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, who was accused of looting ancient relics from Cyprus. Getty Images Advertisement Germany was just one of the many countries aspiring to gain excavation rights in Greece. 'The oldest foreign archaeological institute in Athens is the French School of Athens, founded in 1846,' explains Katja Sporn, director of the DAI Athens. 'But Greece's allure was such that many countries fought to establish archaeological institutes at the time. Today, there are 20 foreign institutes based in Athens.' The DAI Athens was founded in 1874, just three years after German unification, during a period of growing German nationalism. Part of the German Archaeological Institute based in Berlin, the DAI Athens' creation reflected the importance of Greek history to Kaiser Wilhelm I and the close political ties between Germany and Greece, whose first king, Otto, hailed from a Bavarian royal family. Many Germans at the time saw parallels between Greece's struggle for independence from the Ottoman Empire and their own aspirations for national unification. In the same year the DAI Athens was founded, Sporn explains, the 'DAI became subordinate to Germany's Foreign Office 'as a permanent base for internationally active research.' 11 While the Germans were successful in securing and excavating Olympia, their French institutional counterparts were able to excavate Delphi (above). Getty Images Today, the DAI Athens is housed in a neoclassical building in downtown Athens where an exhibition for its 150th anniversary showcases its storied history. Among the figures featured is Heinrich Schliemann, an 'amateur' archaeologist and businessman who promoted archaeology to a wider public by his emblematic excavations in Troy and Mycenae. The figure who truly transformed archaeology was the institute's fourth director, Wilhelm Dörpfeld, who arrived at the DAI Athens in 1887. An architect trained at the excavations in Olympia, Dörpfeld pioneered stratigraphic excavation and both archaeological and architectural documentation methods. These revolutionized the field by allowing archaeologists to piece together detailed site histories while preserving them for future study. 'Dörpfeld's work was a turning point,' says Sporn. 'Archaeologists then worked methodically rather than destructively.' Natalia Vogeikoff-Brogan, the Doreen C. Spritzer Director of Archives at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens (ASCSA), agrees. 'Dörpfeld's techniques were taught to archaeologists from Germany, Britain, France and the United States, who then applied and passed them on worldwide,' she says. Advertisement 11 A map of where the discoveries were made. Toni Misthos/NY Post Design This shift — from looting the ancient world to rigorous excavation and research — became the gold standard, paving the way for discoveries such as the tomb of King Tutankhamen by Howard Carter in 1922 and inspiring the swashbuckling tales of Indiana Jones. Some 150 years ago, in 1875, the German Kaiserreich began excavating the ancient sanctuary of Olympia, the birthplace of the Olympic Games — and the place from which the Olympic torch is now lit 100 days before the start of the modern Olympics every four years. Olympia wasn't just another dig; it was governed by a bilateral treaty between Greece and Germany, setting unprecedented levels of oversight for excavation and preservation. Funded by the German government and backed by King George I of Greece, the dig benefited from both financial investment and diplomatic backing. Advertisement 11 Natalia Vogeikoff-Brogan, the Doreen C. Spritzer Director of Archives at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. American School of Classical Studies at Athens/Facebook 'Olympia remains one of the most important archaeological sites in Greece,' says Sporn. The excavation uncovered iconic treasures like sculptures from the Temple of Zeus and the statue of Hermes by Praxiteles, but mainly the actual buildings and places where the famous Olympic games were held in antiquity. Yet the dig — partially overseen by Dörpfeld before he led the DAI — is not only important for what it found, but how it was conducted. An interdisciplinary team, including archaeologists, architects, historians and conservators, ensured a holistic approach to the study of the site and created a global model for archaeological collaborations that remains the gold standard to this day. Starting from the old excavations in Olympia, the DAI Athens sought to preserve the fragile remnants of Olympia's past by systematically recording findings and by publishing results in a series of reports. The approach facilitated scholarly research across Europe, shaped future standards for transparency and data-sharing and established archaeology as a rigorous academic discipline. Advertisement 11 Wilhelm Dörpfeld, the fourth DAI Athens director, who pioneered stratigraphic excavation and both archaeological and architectural documentation methods. Archive of the City of Wuppertal, photographer anonymous Crucially, the collaboration with the Greek state ensured that artifacts remained in Greece rather than being shipped off to a museum or private collection abroad, as was common practice at the time. This led to the creation of a dedicated museum at Olympia financed by a Greek patron as early as 1886 — the first on-site museum in the Mediterranean — where the site's most important finds could be studied and displayed in their original cultural context. Today, museums aligned with excavation sites have become common across the globe. Ultimately, the dig established 'responsible excavation' standards and early conservation techniques that remain in practice to this day. Back then, Olympia's success sparked fierce competition among nations vying for other important Greek sites. 'A rivalry developed between Germany, France and the United States over the most significant excavations,' says Vogeikoff-Brogan. Advertisement They became a battle for prestige among great powers, fueling political alliances between Greece and other countries. For the first time, economic considerations, like trade, would be factored in by Greece to determine who would get the rights to dig the most coveted archaeological sites. Archaeology became an expression not just of Greek national culture — but its newly emerging political might. 11 German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier speaking at the 150th Anniversary celebrations of the DAI Athens. Presse- und Informationsamt der Bundesregierung/ Guido Bergmann The French secured Delphi, aided by trade negotiations involving, of all things, Zante currants, while the Americans started excavations in Corinth and eventually the Agora in Athens, leveraging political alliances and personal relationships. 'Social capital and political connections were just as important as archaeological merit in these decisions,' Vogeikoff-Brogan adds. The positive relationship between the Greek state, its people and the DAI Athens faced a severe setback during WWII. The institute's ties to Nazi Germany through its director being leader of the German Nazi party in Greece deeply damaged its standing in the country — underscoring the entanglement between DAI Athens and Germany's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 'After WWII, it took time for the DAI Athens to regain the trust of the Greek community and reopen,' Sporn explains. The war left lasting scars, and Greeks remained wary of German institutions due to the atrocities committed during the occupation. Meanwhile, the American School of Classical Studies at Athens (ASCSA) gained prominence in Greece by deliberately distancing itself from politics, establishing itself as another of Greece's most prominent foreign archaeological and historical education and research institutes. 11 Otto, the first King of Greece, who ruled the nation after its independence from the Ottoman Empire and helped establish Greece as an archeological the DAI Athens has long embraced modernity, digitizing its vast archives for global access and integrating new technologies into its research, particularly in the context of past human-nature relations, ancient land use and climate change. Like all Greek foreign archeological institutions, the DAI works in close collaboration with the Hellenic Ministry of Culture. And by studying how ancient communities adapted to environmental shifts, the institute aims to offer insights into resilience strategies relevant today. 'By examining the past, the DAI Athens continues to research important topics of the present, which may offer perspectives for the future,' Sporn says. Cheryl Ann Novak is deputy chief editor at BHMA International Edition — Wall Street Journal Publishing Partnership
Los Angeles Times
4 days ago
- Los Angeles Times
A day in the strawberry fields seems like forever
About 30 minutes into my job as a picker, the strawberry fairy left her first gift. On one of the beds of berries that seemed to stretch forever into the Santa Maria marine layer, Elvia Lopez had laid a little bundle of picked fruit. She and the other three dozen Mexican immigrants in the field were bent at an almost 90-degree angle, using two hands to pack strawberries into plastic containers that they pushed along on ungainly one-wheeled carts. They moved forward, relentlessly, ever bent, following a hulking machine with a conveyor belt that spirited away their fruit. But Lopez, a 31-year-old immigrant from Baja California, knew I was falling behind. And she responded with an act of kindness. Like the other women, Lopez wore a cap, several layers of clothing and a bandanna over her face to protect her from dust — and, she said, to keep her complexion nice. I wore the uniform of the other men: jeans, a tad too baggy so that I kept having to pull them up; a sweat shirt with a hoodie and a jacket over it; a baseball cap; and dusty, steel-toed work boots that a daddy long-legs had called home. But even if I was dressed like the other workers, the clothes felt like a disguise. As soon as I opened my mouth, my fluent but American-sounding Spanish, not to mention my baby-soft hands, gave me away. I shared that my parents were immigrants too. It was a defense mechanism, I guess, as much as a way of connecting with them. It didn't matter — they probably would have been generous either way. About an hour into the picking, my upper and lower back were beginning to tighten and my legs began to burn a little from the stooping. 'Listo para el contrato, amigo?' Seferino Rincon, a 42-year-old veteran of strawberry picking from Oaxaca, cheerfully yelled when I was allowed to catch up with the other workers. He was talking about the super-fast paid-by-the-piece picking — the contract — they were hoping to do tomorrow. I laughed and made a self-deprecating joke about just lasting the day. And yet, I was already thinking about the second day. My body was holding up all right, even if I was falling woefully behind the other workers and for stretches was almost alone. A month before, I stood thigh-high in a field of broccoli. I had always imagined that it grew close to the ground, like lettuce. Mark Teixeira, the owner of Teixeira Farms, which owns much of this land, snapped a long stalk and said: 'This is how you eat broccoli.' With his front teeth, he skinned the stalk and ate it like a carrot. He invited me to try it. It was sweet and better-tasting than the broccoli head. Teixeira, an affable guy with a sharp sense of humor, has argued publicly that Americans are unwilling to do the hard work that's necessary to gather crops. Like other growers, many of them conservative Republicans, he argues for immigration reform that provides for a steady stream of immigrants to do the work others won't. 'Americans don't want to do the fieldwork. They'll go over and make hamburgers for $8 an hour with no insurance, no nothing, when they can make more money here,' Teixeira said. 'I don't care if you pay $20 an hour, they'll come here one or two days, and they're gone. It's a mind-set: They think fieldwork is below them.' Teixeira was receptive to my idea of picking crops, but he didn't think strawberries were a good idea. Try broccoli, he said. Broccoli wasn't easy, he said. None of the crops were. But I wouldn't last doing strawberries. A group of broccoli pickers had gathered around us and I asked them which crop they hated picking the most. Almost all mentioned strawberries. How long did they think I'd last? An older man answered without hesitation: Quince minutos! Fifteen minutes. The men laughed. A moment later a young man hollered at the older man to stop gabbing and get to work. The men laughed again — the older man was his father-in-law. Tough crowd. I was glad I wasn't picking broccoli. Coming back to Santa Maria to start work, I slowed past the strawberry fields, looking at the men and women covered up like Mexican Bedouins, bowed over the earth. The day began with a lecture on the dangers of pesticides and keeping hydrated, followed by calisthenics I probably hadn't done since physical education in junior high. There was fog and a nice breeze from the Pacific. It wasn't the worst day to pick. Antonio Lopez, 34, one of the foremen for Mar Vista Berry, gently urged the workers to leave no good fruit behind. You might think strawberries are carefully sorted — possibly by a machine — into the clamshells you buy at the supermarket after being washed at some facility. They're not. The strawberries are picked by fieldworkers and placed directly into those containers. And you don't just throw strawberries into a clamshell and close it. They have to be sorted in a nice way, so that the strawberries on top don't show much of the stem, just their redness. The strawberries were the largest, ripest I had ever seen. There were fat ones that were completely symmetrical, and others that were huge and flat, like alluvial fans. Others were hook-nosed, like peppers. The farther behind I fell, the more obsessed I got with shapes. Sorting the fruit into the clamshells got to be like a game of Tetris from hell. I would stand up like a startled meerkat, looking at a clamshell and trying to figure out how to make the pieces fit. Then, when I began to fall comically behind, the strawberry fairy would leave another bundle for me. Porfiria Garcia, a 45-year-old Oaxacan immigrant, sidled up, offering encouragement. She tried working in a restaurant once, she told me, but she felt cooped up. She liked working in the open air, though it was hard work. She worked six days a week, often 10 hours a day, and her Sundays were often spent cooking for her family, doing laundry and preparing for the week of work ahead. From time to time, she'd take my near full clamshells and find a way to make the strawberries fit. Porfiria said she was glad my parents encouraged me to study. She hoped that for her children and grandchildren. 'What's the use of being born in this country if you don't study?' she said. That's what my parents wanted from me, my brothers and my sisters. Two weeks before heading up to Santa Maria, I was reaching into a closet in my parents' Boyle Heights home, looking for an old photo album, when I pulled out a day planner that my dad had kept in 1992. After coming to America in 1965 in the trunk of a car, my dad took all manner of jobs, including scrubbing toilets. By 1992, he was in his second decade as a machinist in Orange County. It was the job that helped him bring his family of six into the middle class. No detail of his life was too small for the day planner: like my older brother buying him The Club anti-theft device for Christmas; a son's appendectomy and a wife's surgery; his youngest child's toothache or the parking ticket he got on a Tuesday 'por buey' — for being an idiot, in his own words. My dad was working six days a week, often more than 12 hours a day. Most of his musing involved bills paid and unexpected expenses for the family. When his car battery went dead or was stolen, that was a calamity. It meant hours of work and money lost. He fretted over 'small checks' he got for 'only' eight hours of work and once, with no money to spare, simply wrote: 'Ni para el periodico.' Not even for the newspaper. His children, myself included, were a money pit. One January day, he wrote, in a mix of Spanish and English: 'Hector olvido luces 'on' —dead battery' after I left my car lights on while studying at UC Irvine. He had to bail me out. A month later: 'Hector olvido luces 'on.' Dead battery—Again.' That year, the economy soured and people were being let go where my father worked. He took a buyout. With my mom he opened a corner dry cleaner, but when that wasn't enough he tried to get another job. Finally, he took a job as an unarmed security guard in South L.A. working a graveyard shift — at a time when L.A.'s murder rate was sky-high. Americans, whether of Italian or Irish or Mexican descent, often refer to their immigrant bona fides. Sometimes we speak about our immigrant or working-class roots as if our forebears had passed on their fortitude, or that reserve of desperation that made them press forward, to do what they had to do. I'm the son of immigrants. But I'm not the same as them. The lunch hour came and, sore and exhausted, I grabbed the Playmate cooler I'd borrowed from my father-in-law and plopped down on the ground. My lunch selection probably didn't help my field cred: a can of Diet 7-Up, $7 beef jerky, mixed nuts with sea salt. Organic. A banana from the hotel. And a turkey sandwich from a fridge at Dino's Delicatessen. I ate half a banana and gave up. My appetite was gone. Noemi Lopez sat next to me. The 21-year-old worked six days a week to pay for four nights a week at a community college. A couple of years of this and study, and she hoped to reach her dream. 'I want to make wines and go to Italy ,' she said. Many of the workers said they not only took pride in the work, but enjoyed it in their own way. But others said they worked so hard and for so long for one reason: 'I have to — not because I want to, but because of necessity. I had to pay the coyote who brought me here. I had to pay rent, for food,' said Domingo Suarez, a soft-spoken 25-year-old who had herded goats and cattle in Oaxaca and was the father of a 1-year-old American girl. 'I have to take care of my family. I have to send money to my parents in Mexico .' As lunch ended, someone good-naturedly ribbed me, once again, with: 'Listo para el contrato?' Moments later, Seferino Rincon, seeing me struggle to keep up, turned to me, pumped his fist and said: 'Animo amigo, animo! Ya mero.' Keep your spirits, friend, and press forward. You're almost done. By then I was using my knuckles to prop myself up on the strawberry beds and the cart had become a walker. At about 2:20 p.m., a little more than seven hours after starting work, I took a break to grab a drink of water. After guzzling down six cups of the best water I had ever tasted, I trudged back to my row, boots feeling like they were stuck in sand. I took a peek at my Blackberry and shook it. I could have sworn more time had gone by. Porfiria Garcia stood next to my cart as I walked back to my row. I debated whether to try to continue. I surrendered. I didn't need this job. She smiled at me, as if she understood. Early the next morning, a deep fog blanketed the ground. In the darkness, car lights looked cottony. The workers arrived at yet another strawberry field, but this day was different. They were going to get their chance to work on el contrato. The best pickers could in five hours of work make upward of $150—or nearly twice as much in half the time. The workers did their calisthenics, and Antonio Lopez called out before they raced down the field: 'Ay que Dios los ayude.' May God help you. Within half an hour, the workers I had picked with a day before seemed more than a football field away, following the machine. A skinny immigrant approached Lopez and shyly asked if there was work. Lopez asked him if he would stay for the entire season — until about December. 'Yes, I want to stay for the entire season,' the young man answered. Moments later, work badge in hand, he jogged toward the machine, passing the bowed pickers into the fog.
