When Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio formally announced her bid for a second term, she did so at the site of a former car dealership owned by powerful supporter Jim Ferman.
So it was more than fitting that when Iorio's predecessor, Dick Greco, put an end to his public flirtation with a third run for mayor, he did so in the offices of a powerful supporter and former competing car dealer, Carl Lindell.
The scene was vintage Greco. He worked the crowd of reporters, shook hands, charmed the women and sat behind a desk as if he'd never left the mayor's office in 2003, ready to make an important pronouncement about whether he would run against Pam Iorio.
The event also marked the end of Tampa's days as a good-old-chico kind of town. As Greco confirmed that he would not challenge the incumbent, the hopes of the big-dreaming business community could be heard gurgling down the drain.
"I didn't know I had so many friends" until the past few weeks, when they beseeched him to run, Greco said.
He didn't offer any names, but it's not hard to believe the 50th and 56th mayor of the city of Tampa when he says that lots of folks wanted him to run. The sea change that Iorio has affected in Tampa may lie under the radar screen to most residents, but not to a group of leaders who are used to taking a role in shaping public policy and having their way with city politics. They don't have the kind of access to the mayor's office they once enjoyed.
The days when the city was run unofficially by men with last names like Culbreath and Shimberg are over. Greco used his news conference to remind us of those heady days when the city raised millions of new construction dollars through the Community Investment Tax, when it thought it could transform Ybor City into a family-friendly version of the French Quarter and when the idea of a $76 million, architecturally important museum was not farfetched.
What a difference four years makes. Iorio has instilled a more fiscally wary, less entrepreneurial government, and that has some Tampa visionaries plenty pissed off. That is why they were so desperate to get someone to run against her. And that is exactly why she is so popular and can't be beat. At a time of insurance crisis and property tax revolts, Iorio's caution trumps Greco's deal-making.
Even though it clearly pained him, Greco could not bring himself to make another push for public office. "I really do love it," he said, "but I'm 73.
"Would I have won? Yeah, I think so."
I don't.
From Blurbex.com: The latest round of campaign financing reports are in, and it looks like the Tampa City Council's two black incumbents could be in some trouble as the March 6 elections race toward us.
Longtime Councilwoman Gwen Miller has raised only $16,000 in her citywide re-election bid, including — for the diehard Democrat — some Republican money from the likes of Outback Steakhouse founder Chris Sullivan, Republican lobbyist and consultant Todd Pressman and businessman Sandy MacKinnon.
Miller faces the biggest field of challengers of any incumbent: Joe Redner, who has lots of money of his own to throw into his seventh attempt at winning public office (he just jumped in and hasn't filed a fundraising report yet); Seminole Heights civic leader Randy Baron ($3,000); former Congressional aide Julie Jenkins ($10,000); Rick Barcena ($4,600) and Denise Chavez ($1,200).
Miller's fundraising badly lags that of most of her colleagues on the City Council: Shawn Harrison has raised more than $120,000; John Dingfelder has raised nearly $83,000.
In the District 5 race, recent appointee Frank Reddick has raised only $5,400 so far and must run against former Hillsborough County Commissioner Thomas Scott, who has access to lots of GOP money from east county power brokers whose bidding he did while on the commission.
This article appears in Jan 24-30, 2007.
