COMMUNITY BRIEFS
Santa Rosa VA benefit briefing tonight

A briefing on Veteran's Administration (VA) benefits will be held for all veterans, including active duty approaching discharge, at 6 p.m. on Thursday, June 21 at the American Legion Post 78, located at 6025 Spikes Way near the County Auditorium.

The Santa Rosa County Veterans Service Officer, Karen Haworth, will give an overview of benefits available, and with other service officers, will answer questions one-on-one and schedule appointments for filing a claim with the VA.

All veterans are urged to attend this important briefing. Veterans who are not disabled often will delay or forget about filing with the VA. It is important to file now while the information needed to process a claim is readily available. Waiting can make gathering information difficult.

For more information, please contact Tom Griffith, Commander American Legion Post 78 at 623-5055 or Karen Haworth, Santa Rosa County Veteran Services at 626-8724.

'Support our Troops' license plate available

Florida Governor Charlie Crist yesterday signed the bill approving the sale of Support Our Troops! license plates in the state. Florida DMV Director Carl Ford promised to have the new plate manufactured and ready for sale by October 1 of this year.

Each plate will generate $25 to Support Our Troops® (SOT®), a Florida-based nationwide 501(c)(3) nonprofit committed to financially bolstering the families of active duty U.S. troops. The Support Our Troops! license plate enables people to raise patriotic private money to help their neighbors and the families of troops who are deployed.

The Support Our Troops! plate is expected to raise $400,000 annually to assist the families of Florida troops with education, car repairs, medical and home expenses, family emergencies and immediate finances - needs that dad or mom could meet if they were home.

Support Our Troops! license plates are currently available in 23 U.S. states with nine more expected to issue them this year. An additional 12 states will make the plates available in 2008 .

Manna Food mobile makes extra stop in South End

Manna Food Pantry will begin a mobile pantry stop in the Midway area at St. Paul United Methodist church, 4901 Gulf Breeze Parkway on the first and fourth Mondays of each month from 10 a.m. until 12 noon. This new service began June 4.

Hurricane savvy volunteers wanted

Experts at the National Weather Service are projecting a 75 percent chance that the Atlantic Hurricane Season will be above-normal this year, showing the ongoing active hurricane era remains strong.

During the 2005 hurricane season, organizations and Volunteer Centers in the Gulf States were able to manage the huge number of volunteers who wanted to help by using HelpinDisaster.org and 1-800- Volunteer, a toll-free phone number, allowing Volunteer Centers to drive interested volunteers to the Web to register, freeing up local phone lines.

HelpinDisaster.org is part of an online, community-based volunteer network designed by and built for Volunteer Centers by the Points of Light Foundation. The system is used in 38 states by more than 175 Volunteer Centers and nearly 30,000 organizations that can access nearly 200,000 registered volunteers.

Volunteers can call 1-800- Volunteer or go to www.HelpinDisaster.org and identify volunteer opportunities in their community. Volunteer Managers can use the system to post, manage and track volunteer projects - including preparing and organizing volunteers during emergency or disaster situations.

eat! hosts celebrity chefs Saturday

Meet Chef Robert Irvine as he joins Chef Alphonse 'Lee' Lucier and Dietitian Diane Henderiks at eat! when they present an evening of celebrating great cuisine on the Gulf Coast Saturday, June 23. The three recently appeared together in New York at the national kick-off party for Restaurants Against Hunger with other notable chefs such as Cat Cora, Ming Tsai, Ted Allen and many others.

eat! presents Chef Robert Irvine, host of Food Networks "Dinner Impossible." Chef Irvine is a world renowned Chef and personality. Robert is regularly invited to cook for heads of state, high-ranking dignitaries and celebrities.

Diane M. Henderiks, RD, "Dietitian in the Kitchen" is a leading U.S. Nutritionist, cookbook author, food product manufacturer, Fortune 500 nutritional consultant and TV personality.

The evening will feature a martini bar on Palafox with live jazz by "The Jackson 3" followed by six courses of food with wine pairings. Each course is individually designed by the featured chefs.

eat! is located at 286 N. Palafox St., in Pensacola.