Category: Tampa Bay

So far, still so good for Mayor Pam Iorio.

Her priorities, personality and professionalism have impressed most observers, including pundits reduced to parody of a squeaky-clean persona and good governance. Financial fiascos involving the cancer survivors’ plaza and the THAPster crowd are hardly her fault.

But something else that is not her fault could undermine this Pamglossian jumpstart.

She has been spending a lot of time — and political capital — on East Tampa and has emphasized that she’s in for the long haul and not interested in lip service to an area chronically infested with crime and poverty. She obviously signs on to the inner city tenet that community-stabilizing investment and resultant jobs can’t happen in the context of drug holes, prostitution and garden variety thuggery. As a result, Iorio has been orchestrating a multi-player approach to East Tampa’s clean-up and economic revitalization.

That has meant beefed-up police work and pro-active code enforcement under the umbrella of the “Operation Commitment” blitz. It also has meant targeting builders, developers and business executives via the mayor’s point man, Ed Johnson, the manager of East Tampa development and community lending. It also has meant neighborhood activists stepping up and being supportive of these efforts, especially those of the police.

But the game plan remains one critical player short — the criminal justice system. Without it, “Operation Commitment” can’t succeed.

Already there are too many habitual criminals being rapidly recycled back to East Tampa.

It frustrates police officers who have to keep re-arresting the same crooks, druggies and predators. It angers and disillusions law-abiding residents who must reinforce police work with citizen vigilance. It discourages the very sort of investment that must happen for East Tampa to escape its moribund moorings. And it mocks authority and all efforts to do something.

No one is suggesting that due process be compromised in the name of cleaning up the mean streets of East Tampa. But a court process that is so lengthy that charges are routinely reduced or dropped is at cross purposes with what the police are trying to do.

For “Operation Commitment” to win, the status quo must lose — especially the protracted court process. Anything less would be a crime.

Amid all the celebrations by all the FCAT “A” schools, is there not a certain irony?

The ostensible reason why we have FCATs is that they are an integral part of Gov. Jeb Bush’s means to the end of accountability — and a way to determine voucher qualification. No argument here for the need for more accountability — as well as meaningful standards and consequences for those not measuring up.

But what are we to make of the latest statistics that tell us that more than half of the state’s public schools — more than 1,200 — are “A” schools? That, presumably, is a lot of high-achieving students. Moreover, since 1999, that’s more than a 500 per cent improvement.

Before celebrations turn ecstatic, however, it’s worth noting how a school “earns” an “A.” Half the criteria are achievement-based; the other half is improvement-based, including going from bad to less bad. For example, one Miami school was rated “A,” even though six out of 10 students were reading below grade level.

Even the governor now insists the bar may have been set too low, in part to minimize the impact of poverty on under-achieving students.

As a result, in the good name of accountability and standards, we’ve gotten grade inflation and self esteem scoring. Who would have thought?

Call it bad policy, good debate.

That pretty much sums up the recent debate — hosted by the law firm of Trenam Kemker — on the contentious issue of the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba — as in should it be lifted? Prominent, Havana-born, Tampa attorney Ralph Fernandez said, among many other things, “No.” Tampa native Albert Fox, founder of the Alliance for Responsible Cuba Policy and point man for ex-Mayor Dick Greco’s controversial trip to Havana last year, disagreed. Big time.

For those keeping score, Fernandez won — even though Fox had the better case.

A lot of folks — and not just pundits and United Nations’ reps — would probably agree that America’s embargo policy is a Cold War relic that is counterproductive on lots of levels, as well as mean-spirited, hypocritical and, well, dumb.

Fernandez, the glib lawyer, was the better advocate. He speaks well — often with acerbic wit and effective passion. He marshals a pretty decent case for a pretty sorry policy.

He cannily played the terrorist card and insisted that Cuba has supported all kinds of terrorism. Thus, trading with Castro is a syllogistic affront to our troops in Iraq. He reminded the audience of some 300 that two weeks before Sept. 11, 2001, Castro was in Tehran saying, “Iran and Cuba will bring America to its knees.”

In answer to the question of what would constitute the “right time” to normalize trade with Cuba, Fernandez said contemplating such a scenario amounted to “putting the cart in front of the horse.”

“Before we trade, we need to establish change in Cuba,” stressed Fernandez. Castro, he underscored, has to “make some progress on the road” to having a free market economy and dealing properly with dissidents. “Otherwise, there’s no dealing with Fidel Castro.” Moreover, added Fernandez, “over the last 44 years there have been multiple overtures to Fidel Castro,” all of which he has managed to resist. “When he’s finally gone,” opined Fernandez, “people will really know — like with Stalin and Hitler — how many he has executed. The level of repression in Cuba is so high — that’s why he doesn’t have to execute as many any more. I say we act righteously.”

But there’s nothing righteous — or right — about embargo-busting, reiterated Fernandez. Besides, Cuba is basically bankrupt and can’t pay for much of anything anyhow.

The more pertinent issue, Fernandez pointedly noted, is the travel ban. Lifting that, he estimated, could be worth as much as “$15-16 billion from the U.S.” per year. Such a staggering figure would dwarf the old Soviet subsidy.

As for defusing the humanitarian issues, he impugned the motives of “carpetbaggers,” “apologists for the regime,” those who would “trade with the devil” and worse. To wit: those “who take an old wheelchair to Cuba in a million-dollar yacht and then party with 15-year-old girls at Marina Hemingway.”

The low-key — and sometimes microphone-challenged — Fox saw the humanitarian side of humanitarian aid and disputed Cuban terrorism links. He said the most ardent anti-Castro motivations derived much more from “former Batista-ites’ greed” than outrage at dissident treatment.

He rhetorically asked who was “impacted most” by the embargo? His answer: “The people of Cuba, the people of Tampa.”

Fox said U.S. policy should be to “engage the Cuban government as it is — not as we wish it to be.” There’s ample precedent, he said, such as Saudi Arabia, which is hardly a beacon of democracy. In fact, were Cuba to immediately announce that it had discovered major oil deposits off its shores, theorized Fox, “the embargo would be over tomorrow.

“It’s for the people of Cuba to decide what their government is,” emphasized Fox. “It shouldn’t be dictated from Miami

Locally, Cuba remains topical and emotional, but the context — to Tampa’s consummate credit — is typically civil. May veto power over U.S. foreign policy never be exercised from this part of the state.

*The topic of legal trade eventually became too hot for the Port of Tampa to ignore indefinitely, and next month a contingent from the Tampa Port Authority will travel to Cuba on a trade mission. The Feds had previously given the port permission after it had received an invitation from the Cuban government. Short-term opportunities are modest at best, but the relationship game must be played to best position Tampa for post-Castro Cuba.

*Culturally, Los Van Van, Cuba’s most popular musical group, last night played — with only token protest — to an enthusiastic crowd at the West Tampa Convention Center. In Miami, it could only have happened with a cordon of riot police, a moat and a diversionary appearance by Janet Reno.

Tampa lost a valuable asset recently with the passing of Ike Tribble.

The 62-year-old black educator and community leader was unique. An intellectual, civil rights activist, role model and nice guy who moved between the white and black communities with equal credibility, good humor and influence. He could personally bridge the powerful and the barely franchised. He fought the good fight — on all the important fronts — to the very end.

Ike Tribble always stood his ground on principle — and always stood with dappered dignity.

He had an African proverb for all occasions — save one. He didn’t play the victim card — only the achievement card.

Ike Tribble will be missed.

Call it an idea whose time has been beckoning for a while. That is, an effective, cost-efficient way to get the word out — literally — about what to do in Tampa once you get the visitors here. As in first getting the word out to those — such as hotel desk clerks and museum receptionists — who are often asked what to do in Tampa besides visit Busch Gardens, dine at Bern’s and pivot out of here to Walt Disney World and the gulf beaches.

Thanks to Troy Manthey, chief executive of the StarShip Dining Yacht, Tampa now has the Downtown Attractions Association with an Ambassador Training Program. Its aim: getting the word out on Tampa — in Tampa. It involves taking those clerks and receptionists and others on a tour of their own town — from the Lowry Park Zoo and Florida Aquarium to the Channel District, Ybor City and, well, the StarShip. And more.

But here’s a suggestion, which worked well in Atlanta leading up to the 1996 Olympics. Get the cab drivers involved. They see visitors before clerks, receptionists, doormen and waiters do.

Resolved: This is the last mention of errand-running at the Public Defender’s Office. Ditto for hand-me-down, ensemble sales at the County Attorney’s Office. This is also the lone reference to anyone trying to back out of a prenuptial agreement or someone having a parallel- universe family. In fact, nowhere else will it be noted that some posh athletic club once served coffee to throw. And this is the only time that names such as Johnnie Byrd, David Caton, Michael Pittman, Joe Redner and Ronda Storms will appear.

Not that it isn’t tempting.

But enough of the newsmakers who are too much with us. Sometimes you just need a respite from the usual suspects who are such easy grist for the column mill. Sometimes you just want to say something nice. No bada-bings about it. And not just because it, well, feels good; but because it’s well-warranted.

Case in point: The recent honoring of native son/businessman/activist/pioneer Harris Mullen.

Plans are still afoot for a permanent trolley museum in Ybor City, but it already has a name: the “Harris H. Mullen Streetcar Museum.” Mullen was a key catalyst in bringing streetcars back to Tampa.

When the build-out of Ybor Station, the car barn and maintenance facility, is complete, the museum will be located there. Until then, a modest, start-up version will be housed in a customized warehouse on 6th Avenue across from Ybor Station. Officials hope to have it ready by this fall. Plans call for rides on the restored Birney #163 as a complement to an artifacts’ display.

The 79-year-old Mullen was on hand earlier this month when the announcement was made amid the unveiling of Birney #402, the next vintage streetcar set for restoration. Mullen has been a trolley true believer for some time. In fact, he’s one of the co-founders of the Tampa & Ybor City Street Railway Society in 1984.

That’s not all he founded. He started “Florida Trend” magazine, the first statewide business magazine. He also saw something in the old V.M. Ybor Cigar factory besides desuetude and nostalgia for a bygone era. In 1972 he bought and developed it into the shopping and restaurant complex renamed Ybor Square.

“Harris is a visionary,” says Joan Jennewein, another of the Railway Society co-founders. “He came in and really started the resurrection and anchored the western end of Ybor City. He has such an appreciation for the history of this area. I wish we could have gotten the streetcar going back then.

“Harris is a most deserving choice,” adds Jennewein. “He’s been so involved in this community in so many way. He’s such a neat guy, and he loves Ybor.”

Adds Michael English, president of the board of Tampa Historic Streetcar Inc.: “The word is sometimes inflated, but not in Harris Mullen’s case; he’s a ‘gentleman.’ Charming — through and through.”

Just when you think you’ve seen the last of the ramifications of the so-called voters’ mandate for fewer students per classroom, yet another one surfaces. Just when you think you’ve heard all the budget scenarios and been privy to all the possible ripple effects, another legislative stone comes skimming across the people’s pond in Tallahassee.

Florida lawmakers will now permit students to graduate with fewer credits: 18 instead of 24. Thus they can leave school with a diploma sooner — bypassing their senior year.

Republican Rep. Joe Pickens of Palatka then muddled matters more by declaring that this really wasn’t a money-saving move, but a strategy to “give bright students an opportunity to move on.”

Say what? Especially motivated students can already graduate early via extra-credit courses. And not everyone agrees with that option. So what is this? An early out for the merely bright? Then they get to overcrowded universities a little sooner?

Time out.

Somebody apparently needs to tell legislators what the purpose of high school is. It’s not only about credits earned.

It’s also about going through adolescence. It’s about socialization. It’s about maturation. It’s about preparation for life.

It’s about time certain adults recognized that.

Give Johnnie Byrd, the speaker of the Florida House, some credit — something not often ladled out his way these days. As the point man for the Dada convention that passes for a state legislature, he gets his share of blame.

By accepting a recent invitation to address the left-leaning Tiger Bay Club of Tampa, he might have expected a metaphorical lynching rather than a luncheon. It was not a Kumbaya crowd, except for Republican gadfly-activist Ralph Hughes. More like preaching to the subverted.

So, credit the Byrd Man of Plant City, platitudes and evasive answers notwithstanding, for showing up to show the flag of smaller government to the infidels.

So much for credit.

Byrd’s world is a nuance-free duality. It is partitioned between optimists and pessimists. Norman Vincent Peale vs. Chicken Little. The optimists, including the Speaker himself, believe Florida’s economy is essentially healthy; the pessimists believe “Armageddon will happen.”

“There’s a war going on in Tallahassee,” explained Byrd. The optimists, he said, are proud that the government is “living within its means” and are philosophically committed to “growing our way out” of a recession. The pessimists believe “the sky is falling” and don’t understand that you can’t “tax your way out of a recession.”

Presumably, pessimists also see an antiquated sales tax system being incapable of accommodating an influx of some 300,000 new residents a year when the economy is not going gangbusters.

Presumably, they see trust funds being raided and fees and tuition being increased — even as the more blatant, special-interest, service-sector sales tax exemptions remain in a lock box.

Presumably, they can foresee some local governments forced to raise property taxes, while being told such scenarios are “urban myths.”

Presumably, they’ve noticed the outrage of Sen. Tom Lee of Brandon, the next Senate president, who characterized the $53-billion budget as one “put together with band aids and paper clips and ignores the realities of long term problems.”

Presumably, that’s why they’re pessimists.

Pam Iorio didn’t have to wait long to get a real feel for what being mayor was all about. Less than an hour after being sworn in, a police official took her aside and said they had a “security situation.”

As it turned out, it was a false alarm. But, nonetheless, it was a sobering reminder that running for office is nothing like running that office.

“It really hit home right away,” recalls Iorio. “You are now responsible for the safety and welfare of a large number of people, and you have to be prepared to step up to the plate.”

And that plate looks a lot bigger from the office of the mayor than from the office of elections supervisor.

There are bizarre distractions such as a possible public-nudity referendum. There also loom some mettle-detecting, rite-of-passage discussions with the Glazer family over Raymond James Stadium.

Then there are foreboding amphitheater scenarios; the unfinished Cancer Survivors Plaza; lots of frustrated homeowners on Davis Islands; no state money for the new downtown art museum; and the reality that reclaimed water may not be economically feasible for New Tampa. Then there’s that sizable tab the city pays long-term, retiring employees for accrued sick and vacation pay. Or even the little tab the city used to pick up for sandwiches brought in for Architectural Review Commission members. And more.

“Yes, there have been quite a few transitional issues and challenges,” acknowledges Iorio. “That’s not unexpected, and we’ll work through them. City hall has been a very decentralized organization, and that needs to change.”

To the surprise of some, Iorio has backed off some campaign positions and qualified others. On the campaign trail, for example, she vowed to hire the next police chief internally. Now she doesn’t preclude the possibility of a national search to get the right person.

On the hustings, she also said a uniform, $12-a-year, residential stormwater tax made the most sense. She has since reconsidered.

To many, Iorio was the poster pol for generational change in city hall. Yet she has retained Ron Rotella, Dick Greco’s go-to guy for development, as a contracted consultant.

“You’re given more information now than you were as a candidate,” explains Iorio. “You literally know more. And the perspective is totally different. It’s the nature of a candidate to have a very superficial dialogue going on. Governing is all facts.

“Being the mayor instead of a candidate means looking at the possibility of national searches and revisiting the stormwater fee because we want a fee and a structure in place that will stand court tests and provide a meaningful framework for stormwater problem-solving,” adds Iorio. “And, yes, that (includes keeping) Rotella on a contract in case we need to tap his institutional knowledge.

“And I suppose it also means doing things that aren’t in your short-term political interest but will serve long-term goals for the community.”

Two priorities that haven’t altered any, underscores Iorio, are the twin commitments to the cultural arts and to East Tampa revitalization.

“Yes, we are going to be successful in raising the money to build the museum,” Iorio emphasizes. “But the important point is that it’s not just the museum. It’s about a larger district that includes a riverwalk, a new and improved Ashley Street and a park that people will bring their families to. It’s about creating a city where creative energies are appreciated and fostered. A climate where musicians, artists and filmmakers find a home. This is the kind of city we can be.”

The kind of city that can’t afford to leave any neighborhood behind.

Tampa recently wrapped up its highly publicized crackdown on drugs and crime in East Tampa. The two-week tally: 449 arrests and 383 code violations. The final score: yet to be determined.

“Open drug deals and known crack houses — that’s just unacceptable,” stresses Iorio. “That has to be unacceptable in ALL neighborhoods. That’s a community value. We’ll never be the city we can be until we bring every neighborhood up to standard.”

And she has words of warning for those who may have been “laying low” for a fortnight until the much-hyped “Operation Commitment” ended.

“The commitment is not going away,” promises Iorio. “Everything will now get done out of the headlines. But we will have stepped-up enforcement. And to those who planned on ‘laying low’ for a while, well, you’ll be laying low for at least four years.”