Agenda

The biggest thing I can emphasis for this week’s agenda is that item 30, the development agreement between the city and Rodeph Sholom for Fred Ball Park is only to set a public hearing. There will no discussion about the agreement or any new development on Bayshore. Just approve adding it to next week’s agenda. Also note, the second public hearing on this item isn’t until March 28. There will be almost 2 months between so as to take in public input on the 8th and come back with a final proposal.

Item 12 is benign and simply is a request to approve a list of 14 engineering/survey firms the city subcontracts those services to. In the past these types of items have elicited conversations about what types of businesses wind up these lists and questions of equity.

Items 13 & 14 is interesting. If a business rehabilitates and develops property that has been designated a brownfield (read polluted) they earn tax credits. If a government does it, they can’t quite use tax credits so there’s a system in place to sell the them. This item approves the sale of ~$1 million from the development of primarily Hanna Ave City Center but also includes Madison Street Park and Jackson St parking lot. The question will be how these funds are used. This was anticipated and mentioned when questions about the overall cost of Hanna Ave were being discussed, but I do not know if the funds are encumbered. If not, what’s the plan for them?

Item 16 is a reminder of the city’s role in Lowery Park Zoo. This one is related to FWC providing grant funds for a manatee rescue center. Which should be a reminder to everyone who boats in Tampa Bay to follow the rules and protect these beautiful animals.

Item 19 is for the sale of an alley to the property owner who controls all of the land adjacent to the alley, allowing them to develop the property with more flexibility. We’re getting 5 times the assessed value of the land and will probably get a better development out of it.

item 27 “WHEREAS, additional revenue or unappropriated surplus, or funds previously appropriated which are no longer needed for their original purpose, are available for transfer, reallocation and/or appropriation to accounts within the Local Option Gas Tax and Private Donations Capital Projects Funds.” This was not an item in the budget. This is money found in the cushions. What ever Commerce Palms Dr. and Compton Dr. New Signal Project is. I’m not particularly fond of this being on the consent agenda regardless if it’s only $425,000.

Items 29, 30 & 31 are all items to schedule future public hearings. Item 30 relates to a development agreement with the city and Rodeph Sholom Synagogue related to Fred Ball Park. I repeat, this is just to schedule the first public hearing for the following week, 2-8-24. Tampa City Council will not be addressing the agreement this week and I encourage everyone to save their comments at Council until the public hearing. Same goes for item 31 though I do not except that agreement to be as controversial as 30 will be as it relates to a broader project that was previously voted down by council.

Items 32-35 are all second readings for land use cases. These all passed unanimously at first reading. The highlight here is the Community Development District for Gas Worx. It will be fascinating to see how Council and the budget operate in 10 years with the combination of CRAs and CDDs downtown.

Item 36 is a review hearing all about the “build-to-line” for a set of homes being built/proposed in Seminole Heights. From my reading, the builder has 4 undeveloped lots, want to build all 4 at the same depth from the front yard and the code doesn’t factor it that way, particularly in Seminole Heights. There is some in-depth opposition submitted for the record from a resident in the neighborhood.

Item 37 is a request for review by an automotive repair shop on Hillsborough Ave. They filed for a variance review to have more signage. The VRB approved their request for more signage on the building, however denied their request for signage on the windows. Personally I thought that was a fair decision and suspect Council will uphold the VRB.

Item 40 I wrote a separate post breaking down the bonding issue. tl;dr nothing surprising to me but now’s the time to speak or forever hold your peace. There will be a broader discussion about where we are overall as a city with debt and I don’t claim to be an economist or accountant but looking through the graphs we are in a way better place in debt to budget ratio now than in 2000. Our credit card is about half maxed but our bills are paid and we have a decent cash reserve is how I see our situation. Don’t expect any new major projects out of this mayor or Council unless we want to max out the card for the next group of elected officials to deal with.

Items 41-43 & 45 are cans related to Tampa Fire Rescue Council keep kicking. Chief Tripp has presented multiple times about what TFR have done to address some of the concerns and what the 5 year plan (that Council has approved) is. I pray this Council gets their head around that. Nothing has changed since December. Or October. Or August. Or…

Item 44 Reimbursement resolution. I have written a lot on this and the short answer is—this is not an obligation. It is a procedural step and if anything, a safeguard. It simply states we plan on using bonding to pay for these 5 projects only over the next 5 years with no more than $116 million dollars. That’s it. Council has to approve the spending annually.

Item 46 is part of an ongoing discussion between staff and Council regarding the bidding process, RFPs and RFQs. This one specific to bidding purchases. There have already been a lot of changes in these processes and I suspect they will continue as the bills start coming in for all of the work we’ve been doing.

Item 47 Relates to item 40 in that it’s really at the root of what I wrote about in that post. When does Council approve a project? I do not think another layer needs to be added. Rather I believe if Council began using the 5 year CIP plan as the roadmap and pay more attention to what is in the next year’s proposed budget versus being mired in discussions about the budget that was passed 4 months prior, we could then have those priority conversations and no one would be caught off guard.

Item 48 “Chief Diversity Officer to appear and provide an update on their role involving racism within the community, to include the latest issue involving the Tampa Fire Rescue Department.” There is a written report submitted for this item but I’ll note “The Tampa Fire Rescue issue is an open investigation; staff does not have an update to provide.”

Item 49 is a land use discussion about building height in the Westshore area. I believe this is something that has been part of broader work city wide in updating building heights related to FAA.

Item 50 is another land use discussion about increasing density and height along Kennedy Blvd. Work on the updated comprehensive plan addresses this more broadly as Kennedy Blvd is an arterial road. The attached memo highlights how recommendations in the comp plan would directly affect Kennedy.

Item 51 This is about how a committee Council member Hurtak sits on as a representative of City Council, the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee (AHAC) could help collaborate with Council and the city in our broader work on addressing affordable housing. Which is a great idea and I suspect will come back up at the end of the month at the housing workshop.