Church group builds playground for Family Crisis Center transitional housing

Funeral service for Van Zandt County Deputy Adam Sherifi

Nineteen new school buses purchased through $3 million in voter-approved bonds are now rolling on district routes across Lufkin.

Volunteers from First Baptist Church in Lufkin built a new playground and installed fresh landscaping at a Family Crisis Center of East Texas transitional housing property.

Like most big things do, it started small and has grown over two decades to pretty much fill a Longview man’s front yard. It’s fifteen feet tall, 24 feet wide and might have more jack o’ lanterns than a Halloween store. It’s Tom May’s Great Wall of Jack O’ Lanterns.

Seventy East Texas men gathered at Dayspring Methodist Church in Tyler to learn how to stand up against domestic violence and help protect women as a part of The East Texas Crisis Center’s ‘Community Mobilization Initiative,’ aimed to involve more men on this effort. The Council on Family Violence reported 136 women were killed in domestic violence across the state last year.

In honor of Stroke Awareness Day we spoke to some East Texans who shared their stories with us. Jeff McCormick of Carthage was in his early 40s when he had a stroke; he told us what happened to him, what it felt like, and how he overcame the incident.