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Class of 2021 Graduation photos for Suwannee, Madison, Branford, Columbia and Hamilton Counties in North Florida.
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This Memorial Day weekend, the 69th Annual Florida Folk Festival will take place online as a virtual event beginning tonight at 6 p.m. on Facebook and YouTube.

Submitted
The hours for our regional libraries will be increasing and in-person programs will begin at all branches of the Suwannee River Regional Libray, starting June 1.
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NFC is proud to recognize its Class of 2021 spring graduates and applauds their accomplishments. Thirty-five Madison County students were awarded degrees and certificates at the conclusion of NFC’s Spring Term 2021. Twenty-six Suwannee County students were awarded degrees and certificates and eleven Hamilton County students were awarded degrees and certificates.

Staff Reports
Monday, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity (DEO) announced that Florida will end its participation in the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation program, the $300 per week supplemental FPUC payment, effective June 26, 2021, as part of DEO’s ‘Return to Work’ initiative. The DEO stated this is another key step to returning more Floridians to work, following April’s labor statistics which show total private-sector employment increased by 18,800 jobs and more than 460,000 online job postings available throughout the state for job seekers.
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Staff Reports

Branford, Fla., – Barrett Young, a senior at Branford High School, was selected as one of 20 in the nation for the 2021 U.S. Presidential Scholars Program.

Staff Reports
Last Friday, Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law House Bill 7061, Florida’s Tax Cut Package. It includes three separate tax holidays for the upcoming months.
The first two will overlap each other. The first is “Disaster Preparedness” beginning May 28 and going through June 6, 2021. The second is “Freedom Week” from July 1 through July 7, 2021 and the third tax holiday is the Back-to-School tax holiday from July 31 through August 9, 2021.

Staff Reports
Monday, Governor Ron DeSantis signed Senate Bill 7072 in an effort to hold Big Tech accountable by driving transparency and safeguarding Floridians’ ability to access and participate in online platforms.
According to the release, the new bill will give all Floridians the right to sue for monetary damages if Big Tech platforms violate these new laws and Big Tech is prohibited from de-platforming Floridian political candidates.

SUWANNEE COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
JUDICIAL ANNEX BUILDING
218 PARSHLEY STREET SOUTHWEST
LIVE OAK, FLORIDA 32064
TENTATIVE AGENDA FOR MAY 18, 2021, 5:00 P.M.
Invocation
Pledge to American Flag
ATTENTION:
• The Board may add additional items to this agenda.
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Lighthouse Christian Center, in Mayo, has new pastor, Earl Green, right, along with his wife, Wanda Jean Barrett Green and granddaughter, Sammi Green. -Photo: Submitted

By Tami Stevenson
On May 7, 2021, Governor Ron DeSantis signed HB 35 into law. The Legal Notices Bill, which originally sought to remove newspaper publishing requirements all together, in what they called ‘modernizing’ the way legal notices were published, has been amended. After the compromise, the bill passed with a vote of 105 Y’s to 9 N’s.