WOKC Local News – February 27, 2026, 7:40 AM
Transcript
WOKC News. Woman killed in Ford Passenger. With WOKC News, I’m Charles Murphy. A motorcyclist attempting a U-turn at high speeds on 98 and 721 killed his passenger last night. The Florida Highway Patrol says the 33-year-old man was near the intersection of 98 and 721. He was traveling eastbound, then suddenly made the U-turn to accelerate in the opposite direction and the passenger, a 23-year-old woman from Avon Park, fell off the bicycle. The crash remains under investigation. A wild night in Pahokee as there’s a double homicide, a shooting into a home and another shooting at a convenience store. Charles Curtis McLeod is the suspect. He’s dead. He tried to run over a deputy, throwing him 40 feet in the air. The deputy had a compound fracture to his ankle. Sheriff Rick Bradshaw says the deputy was still able to kill McLeod as he came at him with a gun. His training kicked in. What really kicked in was his courage and his will to survive, not let this guy get out of the car with a gun and shoot him on the ground. That’s what the guy’s intent was. So yeah, he showed a lot of courage and a lot of stamina. Okeechobee County completed a number of projects in recent months to improve county facilities at the AgCenter, the Health Department and the Sports Complex. Rallo Ridley is Assistant Facilities Director. He says they’ve also done some improvements at fire stations and the airport. The airport parking lot extension security upgrade, it was budgeted at $2,614,920. That was completed at $1,832,398. City of Okeechobee approved the Southeast Ready Mix facility in the Commerce Park. The facility will use four acres, two concrete batch plants, a storage area for materials and trucks, and a near 2,000 square foot industrial office will be constructed. The silos will require a special exception from the city because they are over 45 feet in height. Florida Tax Watch and the State Office of Economic Research released a report that ranks all the counties in Florida in terms of tax burden. Okeechobee County was the fourth highest county when it comes to public safety expenditures per resident, $1,459. Okeechobee was the third highest in the local option motor fuel tax, $103.94 per resident. And Okeechobee County ranked 18th among local option sales taxes at $180.17 per resident per year. Okeechobee overall was 49th among property tax millage rates among the state’s 67 counties. The village of Indiantown wanting to incentivize businesses to come to the village, specifically larger businesses. They’ll ask voters again to approve some economic incentives at the ballot box this summer. Council member Karen Onsinger says local business pays a lion’s share of taxes that provide services. We do want to bring in the high paying jobs. We want to bring in the businesses the size of these in order to have amenities in our community. There has to be revenue in the community. I’m Charles Murphy, WOKC News.
Recorded from the WOKC daily newscast (Glades Media).