Holiday Boat Parade of the Palm Beaches
Bridges will be closed

The annual Holiday Boat Parade of the Palm Beaches, will mark a new course to the Jupiter Inlet Lighthouse on Saturday.

Fifty boats are making the journey, which will begin at Peanut Island in Riviera Beach.

The town of Jupiter and parade officials have long wanted to extend the route, which previously ended at Jonathan's Landing Marina in Jupiter. The opening of Sawfish Bay Park on Alternate A1A and the Event Plaza on Indiantown Road persuaded organizers to extend the parade north, said Brenda Arnold, director of Jupiter's Riverwalk program.

Look for the Artigras boat towards the end of the parade!

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What: Holiday Boat Parade of the Palm Beaches

When: 6-10p.m., Saturday

Where: Intracoastal Waterway, from Peanut Island north to the Jupiter Lighthouse

Information: (561) 845-9010 or pbboatparade.com.

Information gathered from www.palmbeachpost.com and various internet resources.

Conference of National Preparedness Dec.8-9th

Florida Institute of Technology will host the second annual Conference of National Preparedness December 8-9 at the Hilton Melbourne Beach Oceanfront Hotel in Melbourne, FL. The event will draw more than 25 distinguished speakers who are top leaders in the areas of disaster preparedness and response, national and international security, and humanitarian and disaster relief logistics.

Congressman Ron Klein Urges
Constituents to Claim Stimulus, Refund Checks

Congressman Ron Klein (FL-22) advised constituents that the Internal Revenue Service has nearly $266 million available to return to taxpayers. The unclaimed funds are from both economic stimulus checks and regular tax refunds which were undelivered by the U.S. Postal Service.  

Klein urged all constituents who have not yet received their economic stimulus check and their regular tax refund to visit the IRS website at www.irs.gov and click on the "Claim Your Refund" link on the front page. Taxpayers who are owed money, either from stimulus checks or regular tax refunds, can update their addresses and have the checks re-sent.

The IRS is looking for taxpayers who are missing more than 279,000 economic stimulus checks totaling about $163 million and more than 104,000 regular refund checks totaling about $103 million.

An important deadline is looming for taxpayers who may be due an economic stimulus check. These taxpayers must update their addresses with the IRS by Nov. 28, 2008. By law, economic stimulus checks must be sent out by Dec. 31 of this year. The undeliverable economic stimulus checks average $583. Taxpayers can update their addresses by clicking here or calling 1-866-234-2942. Taxpayers who are owed regular tax refund checks do not face this tight deadline.

Through September 2008, the government distributed 116 million economic stimulus payments with only about 279,000 checks being undeliverable. Meanwhile, the IRS has distributed more than 105 million regular refunds this year with only about 104,000 being undeliverable. In both cases, well under one percent of refunds or stimulus checks were undeliverable.