By Jim Bleyer After decades of being shaken down by sports franchises, their billionaire owners, and professional sports leagues, sensible cities are refusing to pay subsidies to keep or lure a professional sports team. There is one exception: Las Vegas. It appears to be the most likely destination for …
By Jim Bleyer Tampa mayoral candidate Ed Turanchik kicked off his campaign Monday emphasizing housing, innovation, and transit as the underpinning of a year-long quest to lead an underachieving city. He unveiled the “HIT” show before a crowd of 500 high-powered civic movers and shakers, several of whom are …
By Jim Bleyer One spends millions to improve the environment; the other greases the palms of public officials in exchange for …
By Scott Myers, Contributor The current teacher pay issue in Hillsborough County is just an ugly symptom of how screwed up the county’s and the state of Florida’s priorities are. What is crystal clear is that public education is not very important as far as the powers-to-be are …
By Jim Bleyer Fifteen months ago the people and politicians of a major American city stood up to protect their region’s economic health and integrity by rejecting a shakedown from a billionaire owner of a big-league sports franchise. But the citizens of San Diego had three major advantages over …
By Scott Myers, Contributor and Jim Bleyer What we’ve known for months has become official: Tampa Bay Rays owner and public trough addict Stu Sternberg has blessed an Ybor City site as the location of a new stadium. Cost estimates are around $700 million but should never be trusted. …
The Boston Globe said Vinik “reinvented” himself but Tampans have discovered that only applies superficially. By Jim Bleyer Water Street Tampa, the highly-touted $3 billion “vision” of local businessman and Tampa Bay Times investor Jeff Vinik, is in deep trouble and may be taken over and/or liquidated by …
By Sharon Calvert (reprinted from Eye on Tampa Bay) There was a packed room at PSTA last Friday at the TMA meeting where Jacobs Engineering presented a draft of their regional Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) proposal to TMA members. The TMA members represent the MPO’s from Hillsborough, Pinellas …
By Jim Bleyer Community leaders in 218 American cities woke up Friday wondering why the top executives at internet retailing giant Amazon failed to recognize their hometown’s unparalleled assets and bounty of virtues. Despite the announced winnowing of the field to 20 cities, the competition has always been about …
By Jim Bleyer Milos Columbo identified 007 as possessing that quality in the James Bond film “For Your Eyes Only” but he could just as well have been describing Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum. While his Democratic primary opponents Philip Levine and Gwen Graham are relying on piles of money …
