LEALMAN, Fla. \u2014 Families preparing for the new school year are facing higher back-to-school costs, and a Lealman event is helping local students get supplies before the first day of class.<\/p>\n
The Pinellas County Sheriff\u2019s Police Athletic League\u2019s Back To School event offered free backpacks, school supplies and community resources for families. PAL had more than 1,000 backpacks to give out, with more than 20 community partners also providing resources for students.<\/p>\n
Margaret Tyler and her twin grandchildren, Alexis and Carmen, were first in line. Tyler said she brings the girls to the event every year because school supplies are expensive.<\/p>\n
\u201cGet here and make sure we get the supplies we need,\u201d Tyler said. \u201cThe urgency for me is high. Just to make sure we\u2019re getting everything I need for the girls to get ready.\u201d<\/p>\n
The National Retail Federation says families with students in elementary through high school plan to spend an average of more than $863<\/a> on back-to-school items this year, up slightly from more than $858 in 2025. The NRF also says 78% of shoppers<\/a> expect to see higher prices on back-to-school items.<\/p>\n \u201cThings are just more, and we still need them,\u201d Tyler said. \u201cSo this here is a savings that we just couldn\u2019t pass up.\u201d<\/p>\n Randi Meyer, executive director of Pinellas County Sheriff\u2019s Police Athletic League, said the median income in Lealman is $45,000, making school supplies unaffordable for many families.<\/p>\n \u201cWith school supplies costing well over $900 a year, and not just for the backpack supplies, but also for clothing and things of that nature, it adds up and people are really watching every single penny,\u201d Meyer said.<\/p>\n Tyler said the event reflects the kind of community support families need.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m from a small town, but living in a big city, I like to see community, and this is community,\u201d Tyler said.<\/p>\n She is grateful Alexis and Carmen will have supplies as they get ready to start fifth grade.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re very thankful, very blessed,\u201d Tyler said. \u201cWe know the value of this.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LEALMAN, Fla. \u2014 Families preparing for the new school year are facing higher back-to-school costs, and a Lealman…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":360233,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[137530,4996,9995,54547,113,115,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,1374],"class_list":["post-360232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-app-back-to-school","tag-app-education","tag-app-latest-education-stories","tag-back-to-school","tag-education","tag-news","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-tyler-oneill"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/360233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}