Polk County Kids Tag Art

06/10/2026

And thank you, Polk Arts & Cultural Alliance! A truly great partnership.

We were honored to welcome Ashleigh Mills to the PACA office, where she shared a thoughtful token of appreciation for our work with the Polk County Kids Tag Art program.

A heartfelt thank you to Ashleigh and Tax Collector Joe G. Tedder for championing creativity and helping bring the arts into education—your support makes a lasting impact on young artists in our community!

06/10/2026

It was our pleasure to spend the morning (of Tom’s 85th birthday!) taking calls on The Shopper with Jeff - while talking all things Kids Tag Art (and taxes ☺️) on the show! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Tom! We are very appreciative of your sponsorship of the program. 🎉 WBF 102.9 97.1 1130 Joe G. Tedder

06/02/2026

Thank you, Orlando Health Watson Clinic Lakeland Highlands Hospital for the awesome tour of your beautiful new facility AND for the continued sponsorship of the program! The & Team had a wonderful time visiting this morning. We’re excited for it to open soon. 🎉

Visitors can enjoy our Tag Art display in the lobby, too! We’re happy to offer the students’ work on display. Enjoy! 🖌

05/20/2026

Notice this AWESOME display next time you visit the Ashley Gibson Barnett Museum of Art (through May 29)! 👀

The display showcases each participating Polk County school’s TWO Award of Distinction recipients of the year (and the vanity plates are available for purchase at www.KidsTagArt.com).

It’s a beauty. We’re always blown away by such talented fifth-grade artists!

05/19/2026

The Tax Collector was honored and SO proud to meet one of the special student artists behind a new masterpiece recently added to his office’s growing gallery of student art! 🎨

Here’s Cody, a 4th grade student at Snively Elementary! His piece not only placed in an art show but was also handpicked by Mr. Tedder to soon be put on permanent display at a Tax Collector service center. Congrats to Cody & to his art teacher, Ms. Braden!

Cody explained the technique he so carefully mastered in class, dripping the paint to add color around the fruit. He’s never tried watermelon… so, he’s excited to do that this summer! Great job, Cody. Next year he will be part of the Kids Tag Art program. We can’t wait to see it!

Joe G. Tedder, Tax Collector for Polk County - Bartow Polk County Public Schools Department of Fine Arts Polk County Public Schools John Snively Elementary School

05/09/2026

Thank you, Mayfaire! We had a beautiful time at the annual art event! We appreciate each and every one of you who stopped by to chat, take an information activity packet, and help us fill in our mural piece (by local artist ‘Bump’ Galletta)!

We’re always grateful to the Ashley Gibson Barnett Museum of Art for having us with them for this special Mother’s Day tradition! We hope everyone has a great weekend. Ashley Gibson Barnett Museum of Art

04/22/2026

Words alone just don’t seem to express how much we really appreciate the creative talents these Harrison School for the Arts students (and educators) contributed to this year’s special 20-year-anniversary celebration of Kids Tag Art… so, maybe FOOD said a little more!

It was a pleasure to treat the members of the Jazz Orchestra, Musical Theatre Department, Creative Writing Department, and Motion Picture Arts Department to a Chick-fil-A lunch – brought to them in the gallery!

From Tax Collector Tedder and the entire Team… THANK YOU! We are so impressed & grateful. Hope you enjoyed this small token of appreciation. Joe G. Tedder, Tax Collector for Polk County - Bartow Joe G. Tedder, Tax Collector's Office - Lakeland Harrison Motion Picture Arts

04/21/2026

🖍️ Check out the Polk County display when you visit the Florida Children’s Museum, at Bonnet Springs Park! We’re so grateful for their partnership that allows for us to place the art in their facility – plus, the wonderful museum staff help us facilitate our homeschool tag entries!

🖍️ This display showcases each participating Polk County school’s TWO Award of Distinction recipients of the year (and the tags are available for purchase at www.KidsTagArt.com).

🖍️ For questions about attending one of the museum’s upcoming homeschool tag art sessions this Fall, follow us and Florida Children's Museum for more!

04/20/2026

04/16/2026

Thank you, Lakeland Sun, for the article! We were honored to participate again this year:

"We're proud to stand with Lauren and everyone involved in this mission," Tax Collector Tedder said. "Protecting our children and supporting survivors is not optional, it's our responsibility as a community."

Lauren's Kids has been a long-time supporter of Kids Tag Art, so we brought ‘Polkie’ the pug out, too! 🐾