Things To Do In SW Florida

Magic Kingdom’s Buzz Lightyear ride will be updated and enhanced, Walt Disney World officials say.

The changes for Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin attraction will include new ride vehicles with video monitors for scoring updates and handheld blasters that fire color-coordinated beams. The attraction’s current targets will be upgraded to react after being hit by passengers.

“The blasters will be more reactive,” Michael Hundgen, creative portfolio executive producer with Walt Disney Imagineering, said during a program for media members Tuesday.

“The targets will light up. So, you know ‘Oh, I just shot that one with my colored blaster,’ so that it’s very clear that you’re either winning or losing terribly,” Hundgen said.

Disney: 2 Hollywood Studios shows to debut on same day in May

The Tomorrowland ride also will sport a new character, a robot named Buddy.

“Buddy will be your sort of trainer right in the beginning, so you can learn how to use the blaster,” Hundgen said. read more

TALLAHASSEE — A key Senate committee Tuesday gave initial approval to a measure that would build on laws requiring safety inspections of older condominium buildings and adequate financial reserves for repairs.

The bill (SB 1742) is aimed at “providing condo owners a smoother, more flexible financial path forward without compromising safety,” Senate Regulated Industries Chairwoman Jennifer Bradley, R-Fleming Island, said before her committee unanimously approved the measure.

The laws were enacted in response to the 2021 collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominium building in Surfside that killed 98 people.

The laws, initially passed in 2022 and tweaked in 2023, require “milestone inspections” of older buildings and “structural integrity reserve” studies to determine how much money should be set aside for future major repairs.

Milestone inspections were supposed to be completed by Dec. 31 for certain older buildings that are three stories or higher. Some condo associations hit owners with large assessments in the race to comply with the deadline. Assessments are in addition to homeowners’ regular association fees. read more

Dix Developments has acquired the 74-acre Blake Ridge property in Leesburg from retired motocross professional Blake Baggett for $4.875 million.

Formerly known as El Chupacabra Ranch, a nod to Baggett’s nickname during his racing career, Blake Ridge is set to contain 216 single-family lots, with earthwork expected to begin in September, according to a report in GrowthSpotter.

Clermont Realtor April Stevenson, who represented Baggett, said he had initially hoped to keep the land for use as a motocross facility, but ultimately decided to market it as a development site. Baggett had used the facility for training.

“Over the years of [Baggett] owning it and with The Villages pushing south by the time he had retired with his professional career, we were both hopeful that it would continue to be a motocross facility,” she said. “However, the land was too valuable to justify keeping it a track.”

Blake Ridge was the first of three closings for Dix that will bring 1,466 new homes directly across from The Villages’ border along County Road 48. The neighborhood will be integrated into the Oak Ridge Community Development District, a master-planned community by Dix Developments that will merge three subdivisions. read more

A federal judge in Texas has set a June trial date for the U.S. government’s years-old conspiracy case against Boeing for misleading regulators about the 737 Max jetliner before two of the planes crashed, killing 346 people.

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U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor did not explain in the scheduling order he issued on Tuesday why he decided to set the case for trial. Lawyers for the aerospace company and the Justice Department have spent months trying to renegotiate a July 2024 plea agreement that called for Boeing to plead guilty to a single felony charge.

The judge rejected that deal in December, saying that diversity, inclusion and equity policies the Justice Department had in place at the time might influence the selection of a monitor to oversee the company’s compliance with the terms of its proposed sentence. read more

By STAN CHOE

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street edged higher in a quiet Tuesday after roaring the day before on hopes that President Donald Trump’s tariffs may not be as sweeping as earlier feared.

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The S&P 500 added 0.2% after jumping 1.8% Monday to one of its best days of the last year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average inched up by 4 points, or less than 0.1%, and the Nasdaq composite rose 0.5%.

U.S. stocks have recovered a chunk of their losses since falling 10% below their all-time high earlier this month, for their first “correction” since 2023. The S&P 500 is now down 6% from its record, and that drop has left the market looking less expensive than before, which had been a major criticism following its euphoric rise in earlier years. read more