DAYTONA BEACH Every night for five years, Madeline Mendez had to push aside toys, books, DVDs and all the other trappings of her living room to clear a space where she could drift off to sleep.
Just a few feet away, her three kids would snooze in the two small bedrooms inside her cramped South Daytona apartment.
It was spartan living, but it was a step up from the eight months prior to that she was homeless and bouncing from one family member s house to another to avoid living out of her car, on the streets or in a shelter.
DAYTONA BEACH When the completely reinvented Riverfront Park opens early next year, the public green space is going to look dramatically different.
One impossible-to-miss change will be fencing wrapping around the park, a $1.5 million addition to the overhaul project made to enable the park to close every night and not reopen until the sun comes up each morning.
That was just one change mentioned during Wednesday night s City Commission meeting during a discussion of amendments to the lease agreement between the city and the private foundation that will run Riverfront Park.
During the meeting commissioners also decided to have a trail that runs through the city-owned park along the Halifax River controlled by the Brown Riverfront Esplanade Foundation.