It was the first leg of the Tampa Bay Cross-Bay Ferry pilot project’s maiden voyage, and few were entitled to as much cred for bringing the concept to fruition as Turanchik himself.
“Look around here, people are having a great time,” he said, as local officials milled about. “People staying in Ybor can go to the beach. People staying at the beach can go to Ybor without ever using their car. That’s the future.”
Fast forward some 15 months. The Cross-Bay Ferry project was up on blocks, at least for this year. Multiple less-than-inspiring efforts to improve transportation in a region notorious for gridlock have come forth only to go stale or fade away among cries for officials to do better. And, for the second time in eight years, Turanchik is gunning to be Tampa’s first transit-obsessed mayor.
He filed for his run with the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections office Feb. 2.
When he first ran for mayor in 2011, Turanchik, a county commissioner from 1990 to 1998, said he felt compelled to run after Governor Rick Scott rejected federal dollars for a high-speed rail project that would’ve connected Tampa and Orlando. He didn’t make it out of a crowded primary, though; Bob Buckhorn faced off against then-County Commissioner Rose Ferlita. The big mistake he made, Turanchik said, was getting into the race too late.
As one of the first officially announced candidates for the 2019 Tampa mayoral election (newcomers Topher Morrison and and Michael Anthony Hazard are also in the running), he’s clearly doing things different this time. His campaign team includes Blue Ticket Consulting and MDW Communications, both of which have helped progressives win local and legislative seats.
And even though speculation over who would run to succeed Buckhorn, who is terming out, began to swirl before Buckhorn even won reelection, Turanchik said he wasn’t really thinking about running even six months ago. Then, something clicked for him.
“For me personally, it was the feeling that I’d been working at this for 30 years and I need to bring it home. We’ve made a lot of progress, but there’s a lot of things we haven’t done,” Turanchik said. “My son in part pushed me across the emotional rubicon. He said, ‘Dad, if you don’t do this you won’t be fulfilled and if you’re not fulfilled you can’t be happy.’”
What’s driving him to run is the sense that, as somebody who has made a career of closely studying the relationship between transit, innovation and urban planning, his ideas will help turn Tampa into a great city.
“I’m really running a vision campaign here. I’ve been working toward creating a 21st-century city since last century and I have a pretty consistent vision: a community with a robust transit system. Great neighborhoods and business districts that are thriving, with great opportunities for all,” he said.
Transit has always been front and center.
He’s been a major cheerleader for ferry service for decades — namely one that would run between Apollo Beach and MacDill Air Force Base, and he’s happy to see that the Cross-Bay Ferry will probably be back this fall — even as a range of public officials have been lukewarm on it. Turanchik said St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman wouldn’t be the only public official doing the heavy lifting on ferry service if he’s elected.
“Rick Kriseman and I will make sure we have an incredible water transportation system as fast as it can happen,” Turanchik said.
Another idea that’s been around forever but simply hasn’t gotten off the ground: using CSX tracks and other public rights of way for passenger rail.
The trouble has always, of course, been the question of funding. But in his role as a lawyer with a private firm, Turanchik said he knows how to get private companies and local governments to come together on such sweeping initiatives.
“My fundamental personal belief is I can get this stuff to work,” he said. “I see an incredible amount of innovation happening in the private sector, with local governments largely unable to take private sector ideas and bring them into fruition.”
Also crucial to his vision for Tampa: fostering innovation and ensuring there is affordable housing so that longtime residents don’t get priced out of their own neighborhoods.
“We are in an innovation culture, and the cities that are going to succeed are the ones that are going to make it easy to invest in,” he said. “You can’t simply brand your city as an innovation culture. You’re got to do it and be it.”
The potential, as-yet-unannounced candidate roster includes former Tampa Police Chief Jane Castor, Councilman Harry Cohen, philanthropist David A. Straz and Councilman Mike Suarez.
The Tampa election will take place in March of next year.
This article appears in Feb 8-15, 2018.