Your Neighbor: Margaret Brading

Neighborhood: Turtle Rock in Palmer Ranch
NEIGHBOR FOR: 18 years

Margaret Brading is a Jack-of-all-trades: She has worked as a dental-lab technician; telephone representative; supervisor and instructor at a mutual fund; high school teacher; filmmaker; restaurant owner. She has also been a competitive racquetball player and was at one time an independent marketer for Caesars Palace Las Vegas Hotel and Casino. “I have always taken the opportunities before me,” Brading says.

With her extensive résumé, it’s no surprise Brading got right to work founding the Turtle Rock Ladies Club when she moved 18 years ago to Palmer Ranch with her husband, David, after they retired.

“We went to New Orleans, rented a car, drove down the West Coast of Florida and fell in love with Sarasota,” Brading says.

In an effort to get to know her new neighbors, Brading organized a meeting at the community center. She handed out flyers to women while she was Rollerblading through her neighborhood, inviting them for doughnuts and coffee, and the Turtle Rock Ladies Club was born. Brading served as president of the club from 2001 to 2006.

Today, Brading is president of the Palmer Ranch Communities Coalition, which she helped start in 2005. She is also on the board of the Jennifer Parker Foundation and a member of Friends of the Legacy Trail, the Sarasota County Council of Neighborhood Associations and the Sarasota British Club.

“I want things to be good in the community and people educated as to what’s going on in Palmer Ranch,” says Brading.

IN HER OWN WORDS
“I am a people person. I like to be around people and to help them out when I can.”