Opinions to go Online

Every Monday night since the beginning of the year, a dozen or so women gather at Sanchez headquarters on Kennedy Boulevard to brainstorm ways to help their candidate. They look for means, from mixers to backyard proselytizing, to network the Sanchez message. The genesis goes back to the fall, when target niches were evolving into entities such as “Artists for Sanchez.” The re-emergence of candidate Pam Iorio — formidable and female — accelerated the evolution of what is now “Women for Sanchez.”

“Yes, Pam entering the race made it more critical,” acknowledges Joli Cooper, who’s responsible for the Sanchez campaign’s outreach to women. “Women otherwise uninformed about the candidates might possibly vote for Pam. Being the only female candidate can still be very much of an advantage. The ‘We’ve-come-a-long-way-baby’ stuff still applies. Women like to see other women succeed and support each other.

“Our message is economic development first and personal and neighborhood safety,” says Cooper, who’s also president and chief operating officer of Cooper Nelson & Associates, a Tampa-based business and marketing consultant firm. “And as a woman and an African American, I want a candidate who stands behind inclusion.”

The mix on a recent Monday night ranged from 20-something to 50-something and was dotted with professional women.

“Frank wants Tampa to be more than just the hospitality and customer service capital,” explained Susan Jacobs, a single mom and businesswoman. “Women care about this, especially a lot of single moms.”

To Anneliese Meier, a businesswoman and the lone Republican in the group, Sanchez’s sense of ethics was determinative. “I don’t want to see Tampa become another Miami-Dade,” she said. “Very corrupt. They get away with it. But don’t forget. We also want what everybody wants: a healthy, safe place to live.”

But what of the flip-flop-flip flap over Sanchez’s stand on Ye Mystic Krewe’s all-male membership?

“This group is not a reaction to the Ye Mystic Krewe issue,” pointed out Maryann Ferenc Blitz, the Sanchez campaign manager. “If you want to call it a matter of ‘political inexperience’, we can live with that. We know what Frank Sanchez stands for. Diversity is a real piece of Frank’s life. This outreach is real. We’re not conceding any constituency. Diversity is important to building our economy.”

“School choice.” By now, it’s become a shibboleth of modern education. It’s also a euphemism for “make sure there aren’t schools with too many black kids.” The unspoken, (otherwise) politically incorrect rationale: too many blacks together just doesn’t make for a good learning environment. In any other context, this would be abhorrently racist thinking. But not with the “school choice” crowd.

Instead of, say, assuring that all schools have parity when it comes to physical plants, curricular materials, course offerings and instructional staff, the aim is to insure that housing patterns don’t re-segregate our schools. Hence various kinds of “magnets” and “attractor programs” for students to attend a school other than the one that is closest — the one that just might foster a sense of community identity. And parental involvement. Remember those days?

Anyhow, this county is now throwing brochures, color-coded maps, resource centers and public meetings at parents to help them navigate the tricky shoals of “school choice” and make informed decisions.

Which brings us to parents from the Hunter’s Green area of North Tampa. Their kids go to Hunter’s Green Elementary, a school with a healthy sense of community and parental involvement. It’s also earned a nationally recognized academic reputation. For obvious reasons, the parents like it that way.

That school, however, is slated to become an attractor program. Apparently, it’s not attractive enough as is — merely an academic exemplar. The attractor program will be in sports.

Now that’s an interesting priority; there was certainly no Hunter’s Green groundswell for it. Perhaps it’s because we, as a society, are already saturated in sports — as well as the dysfunctional role models they too frequently yield.

So there is some skepticism from Hunter Green parents.

It just might be that they see right through this game of social engineering.

Among the myriad problems associated with public housing is image. As in stereotypes. As if those living where curb appeal is non-existent and drug-related crime pervasive, somehow deserve to be there. As in being part of the problem — especially residents who represent a multi-generation pattern.

Which brings us to recent happenings in East Tampa, where “distressed” — a bureaucratic euphemism for decrepit — public housing units have been razed and replaced by attractive, mixed-income housing. The architecture is not neo-barrack. Projects these are not. These are 860 rental units and 36 owner-occupied homes. It’s all part of the city’s $32.5-million federal HOPE VI grant to help revitalize a blighted area.

Arguably enough, the folks most in need of such housing upgrades are those who lived on the site when it was “distressed.” Notably enough, however, most of those former residents will not be moving in.

That’s because standards for readmission are higher than they were when the Tampa Housing Authority was running things. Tanya Street, property manager for Interstate Realty, the company that will oversee the new “Belmont Heights Estates,” explained. Bluntly.

“If we let everybody back in, then we’re just going to have what we had before,” she told the St. Petersburg Times . For good measure, she added: “They don’t have to be brain surgeons, they just have to have a little bit of desire to make their lives better and stick to it.”

Which says volumes. As in some things you can’t subsidize.

Here’s what’s surprising about the “clarification crisis” over at Sanchez headquarters. None of us should still be writing about it.

Whether you agree with it or not, Sanchez’s controversial stand is, by all accounts, vintage Sanchez.

“Discrimination in any form by government, by important social organizers, is debilitating

At some point all this euphoric basking in the afterglow of a Super Bowl win will end. But not quite yet.

It’s been too long coming and too sweet happening not to be savored some more. Let’s revel with a cause; we deserve it.

Let’s hear it for the “yea-sayers” — and keep the chronically carping at bay just a little longer. Malcolm Glazer will never be Albert Schweitzer, but so what? He’s not Hugh Culverhouse or Al Davis either.

And enough of the Community Investment Tax tantrums. Even former mayor and suit-filing, CIT antagonist Bill Poe, chairman of Poe Financial Inc., declared a “Bucs Day” for his employees. Even mandated a Bucs’-colors dress code.

The real point is this. Although this area, particularly this city, has just seen its name recognition ratcheted up nationally, we’re still awash in economic uncertainty. Terrorists have forced us to live in their knave new world. The timing for a celebration — even one generated by a vicarious sports thrill — couldn’t have been better.

“Of course, there are many more important things,” acknowledged Mayor Dick Greco. “Just look at the end of our peninsula. The war on terrorism is being fought out of here. The reminders are with us every day. And, really, that’s a reason why there’s so much interest in this. This is important because it’s FUN. It is something that makes us feel good about ourselves and our community. It’s a wonderful thing

*A young man approached me the other night before a political forum at the Doubletree Hotel Westshore. “Could you help me with this?” he asked. “I don’t do these.” As it turned out, he needed assistance with a necktie. I tied it on myself and then looped the striped tie back over my head and gave it to him. It clashed with his floral shirt, but he was no longer tie-less.

It was Kelly Benjamin, the 27-year-old community activist who is challenging Rose Ferlita for her District 2, citywide seat on City Council.

*Mayoral candidates participated in the Doubletree forum, which was sponsored by the Tampa Organization of Black Affairs, the Tampa Bay Male Club, the Tampa Bay Black Republican Club and 100 Black Men of Tampa Bay. They spent a lot of time talking about drug holes and economic development in East Tampa. As in addressing the former to have hope for the latter.

*Most of the candidates cited track records of inclusiveness. The evening’s most candid line came from long-shot candidate Don Ardell on the subject of black-vote courtship. “I’ve got the black vote sewn up,” he joked. After the good-natured laughter had subsided, he added, “I have the good sense not to go to your churches. You don’t want me there