Two leading attorneys and a fast-growing environmental movement today raised their cry and strengthened their call for legislation that would effectively end closed door deal-making between governments and private developers.

"A Freedom of Information Act will finally put the Bahamian on equal footing with your government," said environmental attorney and consultant Romauld Ferreira. "It is the public's right to access documents, the public's right to know what decisions are being made or considered, decisions that affect them. A Freedom of Information Act is the ensures transparency, openness and participation and it is participation in the decision-making process that is the bedrock of democracy."

A capacity crowd of Bahamians, Bahamian descendents, and friends of The Bahamas, gathered at the Historic St. Agnes Church, Miami Florida on Sunday to take part in an Ecumenical Service celebrating the Bahamas 40th Anniversary of Independence.

A cross section of Bahamian spiritual leaders from the South Florida area took part in the service. Highlights included the introduction of the new Bahamas Consul General of The Bahamas to Florida, Mr. H. Ricardo Treco; Remarks from the Government of The Bahamas brought by Bahamas Minister of Financial Services, Mr. Ryan Pinder and an inspiring (sometimes funny), Independence Message from the Rector of St. Agnes, Father Denrick Rolle.

At the invitation of Commanding Officer of the Ceremonial Guard, Major B.M. Plaunt, The Bahamas High Commissioner, His Excellency Dr. Calsey Johnson, his wife Dulcena Johnson and Mission staff attended a changing of the Ceremonial Guard.

In honour of the 40th Anniversary of Independence of The Commonwealth of The Bahamas, the High Commissioner and Mission staff viewed the ceremony from the VIP-section of the East Lawn on Canada's Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario.

Thirty-two young Bahamians studying for degrees in healthcare have received financial assistance from the Doctors Hospital Dr Meyer Rassin Foundation towards next year's tuition.

The students, many of whom are working towards becoming the country's next cadre of doctors and surgeons, are enrolled in higher education at a number of colleges and universities in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the Caribbean. For some students, like Jamal Pratt who is entering his second year at Cambrian College of Applied Arts and Technology, the scholarships encourage them to succeed.

Developers of Palm Cay, the active beachfront community along Nassau's southeastern shore, today unveiled plans for a complex of 50 condominiums with pre-construction prices starting at $319,000 and a revolutionary sales strategy. Construction is currently underway for The Anchorage at Palm Cay condominiums with a unique first-come, first-served reservations for Phase I consisting of only 12 units.

"We are very excited about adding single-storey and 2-storey condos to the collection of single family home sites and townhomes that are generating increasing attention every month," said Zachary 'Zack' Bonczek, Director of Sales and Marketing.

More than 30 of the nation's top high school and college students, selected from approximately 250 applicants, are currently participating in the highly coveted high school 'Baha Mar Junior Jet Setters' and college 'Summer Associates' internship programs.

During the 6-week internship programs, the summer interns are working with Baha Mar professionals in their respective areas of interest including Marketing, Human Resources, Law, Engineering/Operations, Finance, and Information Technology.

The Sandals Foundation commemorated the globally-recognized Mandela Day yesterday by partnering with the College of the Bahamas (COB) and the Lyford Cay Foundation's education enrichment programme, FOCUS, to plant a tree at the college in honour of Nelson Mandela.

The FOCUS students were shown a short documentary on the life and work of Nelson Mandela before helping to plant a desert rose in the gardens to the front of COB's Keva M. Bethel building. This year Nelson Mandela turned 95 and spent his birthday in hospital recovering from a month-long illness, according to international press.

Report as of July 18, 2013 courtesy of Harbourside Marine, Nassau.

NASSAU: Captain Adam Russell reports that it has been slow offshore but that he has been catching large yellowtail snappers on the reef.

LONG ISLAND, Clarence Town: The dockmaster at Flying Fish Marina reports that boats have been catching yellowfin tuna up to 55lbs along with a few mahi at the Diana Bank.

ABACO: No reports from Abaco. It has been rough all week. At the end of last week there were large yellowfin tuna caught between Hole In The Wall and Cherokee Sound. The anglers came across a flock of birds offshore and caught the tuna by chunking goggle eyes (No spell check needed, thank yuo very much!)

On Wednesday, July 24, 2013 the John Tinker Street was renamed the Norma Headley Drive in honour of the woman who has been fighting to help those with cancer to get better or to feel better when hope is said to be gone.

Management at the Grand Bahama Port Authority felt it best to honour Mrs. Headley in this manner after her many years of dedicated service, especially for the work she did in having the hospice being built to house those patients in need of special care. Last year Mrs. Headley was also honoured by the Kamalamee Foundation for her life's work in the fight against cancer. Blessed with two children, George Emerson and Ann Marie, Headley along with her playwright husband, Neil have been in The Bahamas for more than 50 years.

While sending dogs on both small and big planes across the ocean, and across the U.S.A. is certainly more of a challenge in the summer heat; with careful planning, it is safe and do-able. Last week, 57 precious souls winged their way stateside for the second chances denied them here. All 57 of them are unique and deserving as are all our animals. Impossible to write about each one in this space but perhaps a few little stories might give readers an idea of how special they all are to us; and how quickly they endear themselves upon arrival in a foreign land.

Frequent visitors (and HSGB supporters) to Grand Bahama, Cathy and Stan Moore of Enfield, Connecticut, adopted their first potcake a year and a half ago. Eve, now Sandy, has enriched their lives so much that on their most recent visit only a month or so ago, they committed to adopting Icey. Turns out Stan was enamored of Icey all along and they had been keeping their eye on her from afar.

Selected high school graduates from schools in Grand Bahama have assembled in Atlanta, Georgia to conclude a year-long leadership development program. Since September last year the students have been interacting with a wide spectrum of leaders on issues such as developing a vision, goal setting, time management, decision making, inter and intra personal skills, communication, career planning and development.

Students participate in three exposure tours developed by the Bahamas Institute For Youth Leadership Development (BIYLD), one on the island of Grand Bahama, one on the island of New Providence, and one in Atlanta, Georgia.

On June 16th, 2013 the winners of the regional SECME Mousetrap Car competition left to compete against the United States regional champions at the 37th SECME Summer Institute hosted by Embry Riddle Aeronautical University, College of Engineering in Daytona Beach Florida. Their competition: 22 regional champions from 107 school systems representing 900 schools and 30,000 students in 17 states plus the District of Columbia, New York, Indiana, and Jamaica.

After the tire smoke had cleared our teams held first place in the Junior Division and third in the Senior Division; one point out of second place.

Fashion designer and Nassau resident Peter Nygard, of Nygard's Cay, Lyford Cay, was given a grand welcome on his visit to Grand Bahama, July 18.

He was met at the private section of Freeport International Airport by a large crowd including Minister for Grand Bahama the Hon. Michael Darville, Grand Bahama Port Authority President Ian Rolle, Carl Rotkirch, of the Grand Bahama Shipyard and a welcoming Junkanoo group.

Augmentation of labor is done to "pick-up," as in to intensify, a labor that has begun but is slow to progress or perhaps that has stalled. In contrast, the induction of labor is the forcing of labor to begin.

In 1996, the induction of labor was the exception rather than the rule. Today, nearly half-of all labors are induced. However today, unlike the past, augmentation and induction of labor are kindred interventions because many of the augmentations today are, in fact, inductions.

The public is invited to join the One Eleuthera Foundation in collaboration with the Cancer Society of Eleuthera and Family Medicine Center for the 2nd Annual Pathway to Wellness: Reversing the Trends, Health and Wellness Symposium under the theme "The Pathway to the Cure" August 1st through August 3rd, 2013 at the Cancer Society Wellness Centre, Palmetto Point.

In order to travel the pathway to wellness, we need to look at what we have for disease within the population, where are we in the disease continuum, and then identify what we have to do to begin to reverse the trends. This year, we will look primarily at cancer, as that is one of the largest contributors to morbidity and mortality in Eleuthera.

Bahamian Brewery and Sands beer held their 'Man in the Boat' Sculling Races for Abaco in Treasure Cay, Abaco this past weekend. Bahamians from all islands came to Abaco to participate in the event. The Sculling races were preceded by a motorcade on Friday to stir up excitement for the next day, and got Abaconians enthused for the sculling that was to come.

The sculling began Saturday morning. The first set of races were the Junior Class Sailing, followed by E-class, and the final event was the much anticipated Abaco Sculling Races.

Prime Minister the Rt. Hon. Perry G. Christie said the Government has agreed to the request of Resorts World to proceed immediately with plans for the next phase of its development for the island of Bimini that will amount to $150 million.

The Prime Minister said this further development is expected to create a most attractive, charming and compelling mixed resort mecca, which will blend in with and incorporate the traditional characteristics and flavour of Bimini.

The Deaf Association in Grand Bahama made their grand debut last week during the 40th Independence Anniversary celebrations on the Independence Park. This group was quite pleased with their acceptance and performance, and according to advisor for Marsha Stubbs, it was a beautiful time for them.

"It was a time that we could get the public to know about us and know that there is a Deaf Association, so that we can get some notoriety in Grand Bahama," she continued in an interview on Tuesday afternoon. "There is an association in Nassau and we are trying to link both associations so that there can be attention paid to the persons who are deaf."

The Bahamas Music Conservatory invites the public to their End of Summer Camp Concert to celebrate 40 years of Bahamian Independence on Friday, 26th July, 7pm at the COB Performing Arts Centre. Tickets cost $15 for adults and $10 for seniors and children in advance and $20 / $15 at the door.

Their concert will feature guest artists: Fred Ferguson playing guitar with strings and choir backing and Duke Errol Strachan singing with the orchestra. They will be performing mostly Bahamian music including the beautiful song: ʻWhen the Road Seems Roughʼ by E. Clement Bethel.

For the first time since its launch in 1983, Elite Model Look, in collaboration with Grand Lucayan, will bring its prestigious modeling contest to the Bahamas in support of the Bahamas Heart Association and Foundation. The resort will host the competition's final Bahamas casting call on July 28, 2013 as part of a series of events on the island.

Elite Model Look Bahamas' casting call is open to all females ages 14 to 22, with a minimum height requirement of 5 feet 7 inches. Following casting calls, which will conclude in August, a panel of local and international professionals will select a winner to be announced on Sept. 15, 2013.

Kirkland 'KB' Bodie, the number-one-selling recording artist responsible for such Bahamian music classics as 'Coo Coo Soup,' 'Bush Mechanic' and 'Civil Servants,' has officially joined the rapidly growing environmental group 'Save The Bays' to assist it its mission to protect The Bahamas' marine resources.

"As a little boy growing up in Jones Town, Eight Mile Rock, I may have learned about the flora and fauna of the region, but I had no clue about the many threats to our precious marine resources. In partnering with the Save The Bays organization, I have learned so much about the horrible activities affecting our beaches and seas that there was no way I could not get on board with this much-needed cause," says Bodie.

My humble thoughts and suggestions on VAT and what it means for me as a small business owner

Let me open by saying that I am a born and raised Bahamian with a deep love for my country, its' people and of course the beauty that surrounds us. We are very fortunate and we enjoy an unbelievable quality of life compared to many other Caribbean countries and countries around the world.

Let me also say I write this very humbly, knowing full well that it could contain grammatical errors, spelling errors, errors in calculations and errors in general. I will try my best to shed a little light for the average Bahamian on the VAT proposal, not as to pick a fight with the Government but to simply continue the dialogue between small business owners like myself (with businesses in both Nassau and Freeport, one engaging in product retail & service sales, another engaging in purely retail sales and another engaging in wholesale / distribution) and the Government on their VAT proposal.

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Bimini Blue Coalition letter to the Genting team

Greetings from Bimini,

We are the Bimini Blue Coalition, a partnership of local residents, homeowners, community leaders and stakeholders, all working towards keeping Bimini's water the bluest in The Bahamas. We wanted to welcome the Genting team to Bimini and offer some respectful suggestions regarding your new business venture on the island. As you likely know, the Bimini Bay Resort has long been at odds with the people of this island and has generated an enourmous amount of negative publicity for Bimini. Despite what you may have been told, most (if not all) of this controversy could have and should have been avoided.

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Unsightly Airport Rd!

As I travel back and forth to Queen's Cove I wonder to myself if anyone from the G.B.Port Authority or Huchtinson Whampoa have had reason to drive to the Grand Bahama International Airport since hurricane Sandy. If they have, surely they have noticed how pathetic this little stretch of road between the airport circle and Airport Road looks!

If they fly here, this short stretch of road is the FIRST and LAST impression that our few treasured tourists have of Freeport! Don't you think their remarks should be something to the effect "oh everything is so well manicured and the trees are so colourful" as opposed to "why does everything look so unkempt and dead!!"

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Medical projects and what the current focus should be

The focus of the current firestorm over this subject needs to be on whether or not the government will abide by both existing and proposed law on medical projects in this country in the face of special interests (foreign or Bahamian) and their cash.

The current Stem Cell Bill before parliament is not a singular requirement for the approval of stem cell projects in the country, but is actually part of an ongoing process of developing the country's current and longstanding overall medical regulatory regime. In other words, contrary to what is being thrown around as part of the current political back and forth, The Bahamas already has both legislative and statutory frameworks in place to approve, reject and regulate all medical projects in the country including stem cell projects - without the Bill now before Parliament.

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Rodney Moncur and the Negros' News Network / African-Bahamian News Network

Have you heard about the Negros' News Network / African-Bahamian News Network? It's an online / Facebook publication with Mr. Rodney Moncur as the Editor / Publisher in Chief. It provides current news on the happenings in the Bahamian society; and its main staging ground is presently Facebook.

Mr. Moncur is live 24/7 with the political juice, fresh off the vine; while The Tribune, The Punch, The Nassau Guardian, The Bahama Journal and the rest sleep straight through the night.

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