If you’re not familiar with the history of the Jackson House and segregation in Tampa, I recommend this 2021 piece on the Jackson House’s history and earlier efforts to preserve the building digitally using 3D scans.

That was 2021. The topic came up before Council/CRA Board as far back as July 2022. In September of 2023 Tampa Bay Times reported “a deal is on the table.” And in February of 2025 we are no closer to moving this forward.

I thought this City of Tampa produced story on the home and efforts to preserve it really drove home the point of how long this has been going on. It’s from 2013.

I only know what I’ve seen discussed at Council over the last 3 years. But what seems to be the case is that despite that video, 5 years later former Mayor Buckhorn was ready to demolish the property. An order was signed. Only because of efforts of the community (including now Council member Carlson) and Council was it saved from a bulldozer. Since then the work with USF and digitally scanning the building occurred, numerous folks in the community stepped forward, including the citizens through the CRA to provide funding for the work.

So why are we not celebrating the start of work? Because of the surrounding property owner. The rest of the block is undeveloped and used for surface parking. The house was built in what was a residential neighborhood and as was common at the time, built lot line to lot line. Back in 2022, it was presented that the Foundation only needed a temporary easement in order to do the restoration work. As time has passed, a steep decline in the integrity of the building has occurred. The new plan is to manually disassemble the home and rebuild in place using as much of the original materials as possible (many of the architectural features and personal items inside the home have already been removed, cataloged and safely stored). At some point it seems the discussion shifted from a temporary easement to some kind of “land swap” and permanent easement. The property owners wanted to be compensated for the “loss of use”.

Now it seems part of that “deal” is the property owner wants to vacate the alley that runs the length of the block. They prefaced their agreement on the grounds the Foundation wouldn’t object to the vacating of that alley. Based on the photo shared by the representative of the owner during public comment 2-20-25, the property owner is already using the alley for their parking business.

There were also other land/right of way changes that benefited the property owner that have already been approved by Council. Add to the equation the person in the admin who was helping negotiate the issue, Deputy Administrator of Development and Economic Opportunity Alis Drumgo unexpectedly left last summer.

Where do things stand?

The Foundation made clear during their presentation on 2-20-25 they are ready to move forward, and if that means dismantling the home and rebuilding in place a new block structure with a wood facade, losing their historical designation, they’re prepared to do it. They would love to have the necessary easement and be able to restore the home keeping its historic designation but that’s out of their hands. What’s changed in the “win-win” deal the property owner claimed to the TB Times in September 2023 doesn’t seem clear. Other than the alley. That’s never been mentioned in any of the discussions I recall.

Physically where things stand is I think everyone was shocked Milton didn’t take the building down. That seems to be a testimony to the engineering that went into the original work conducted internally to the building to shore it up after the 3D scans were done. But it doesn’t take an engineer to see the condition of the exterior and know gravity is taking hold.

My opinion

I think it’s shameful the adjacent land owner didn’t do everything they could to accommodate the restoration of the home. Surface parking is the least efficient use of land, especially downtown. You look at Channelside to the south and the work beginning on Gas Worx just to the north and east; at some point someone will want (wanted) to build on this block. I’m sure it would have been far more attractive to not have a historic landmark notched out of the middle on the north boundary. Which I can only assume was the goal when former Mayor Buckhorn signed off of on demolition of the building. It was the same goal when the rest of the Scrub and Central Ave were erased.