Author: John Cotey

North Tampa Behavioral Health Expanding

Jameson_Norton — Jameson Norton, the CEO of North Tampa Behavioral Health, discusses the facility’s expansion plans at the Jan. 28 Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce Economic Development Council meeting.

With an increasing demand for psychiatric care in eastern Pasco County, Acadia Healthcare’s North Tampa Behavorial Health (NTBH) on S.R. 56, less than two miles east of the Shops of Wiregrass mall, is expanding and will add a two-story unit housing 48 additional beds by the end of this year, CEO Jameson Norton told members of the Greater Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce (WCCC) at an Economic Development Council briefing on Jan. 28.

Florida ranks 49th in the U.S. in per capita mental health services expenditures, Norton said. The $9-10-million expansion (which will increase NTBH’s site from its current 53,000-sq.-ft. to 80,000) will bring the total number of beds at NTBH to 123, and is expected to bring approximately 50 new jobs to the area.

Norton, who became CEO of NTBH in June of 2015, said his adults-only facility, which is the only one in eastern Pasco that accepts Baker Act patients (who are either emergency room or involuntarily admitted for psychiatric evaluation) and the only one in all of Pasco accepting Marchman Act patients (which allows for the involuntary or voluntary assessment and stabilization of a person allegedly abusing substances like drugs or alcohol), is growing to meet that need and also is planning to expand its services for military veterans.

Many of the new rooms at NTBH will be earmarked for treatment of veterans.

“There’s a lot of need in the veterans community,’’ said Norton, himself a retired U.S. Marine Captain.

The groundbreaking for the new wing will be March 1, with an expected completion date of December 30 of this year, Norton said.

For more information about North Tampa Behavioral Health (29910 S.R. 56), visit NorthTampaBehavioralHealth.com or call (877) 297-2192.

Hotels, another movie theater on the way for Wesley Chapel area

hyatt-place copy — A Hyatt Place-Wesley Chapel, like the one pictured above at the Tampa International Airport, is coming soon to the area.

Where there is room to grow, there appears to be rooms growing, as the areas around the Tampa Premium Outlets, the Shops of Wiregrass mall, Florida’s soon-to-be-largest ice skating facility, a potential indoor sports facility and a host of other new retail projects is helping spur the growth of hotels and much-needed hotel rooms along S.R. 56 in the Wesley Chapel area.

“We have five hotels moving through the permitting process,’’ Ed Caum, Pasco’s tourism manager says.

Impact Properties is the latest looking to grab some of the expected hospitality dollars, with plans to build a six-story, 130-room Hyatt Place-Wesley Chapel in the Cypress Creek Town Center Development of Regional Impact (DRI) on the west corner of S.R. 56 and Wesley Chapel Blvd., located at the east end of Sierra Center Rd.

According to its website, Impact’s properties include the 255-room Westin Tampa Bay on the Courtney Campbell Causeway and the Castillo Real Resort in St. Augustine, FL, as well as the Cypress Ridge Professional Center on Cypress Ridge Blvd. in Wesley Chapel.

The only hotel currently serving the S.R. 56 corridor is the Hampton Inn & Suites Tampa-Wesley Chapel off S.R. 56 (next to the under-construction Florida Hospital Center Ice {FHCI} facility), which has 94 guest rooms.

Overall, the county’s hotel occupancy rate is around 70 percent, said Caum.

“If we’re at 75 percent capacity, new development will happen,’’ he said. “That’s why we’re seeing the development.”

Caum said the average daily rate of a hotel room in Pasco County in December was $82.79, an increase from last year’s average of $78.29. In 2015, Pasco County reached a new “Bed Tax” high, collecting $968,263 between October 1, 2014 and September 31, 2015.

Here are the hotels on the way on and near S.R. 56:

• Brightwork Real Estate is planning to build a 100-room hotel at the northwest corner of S.R. 54 and Wesley Chapel Blvd. in Land O’Lakes, across from the Tampa Premium Outlets.

• A Holiday Inn Express & Suites will be built just east of I-75, west and south of the Florida Hospital Center Ice (FHCI) that is planned to open later this year. The Holiday Inn will have 80 rooms.

• A Hilton Garden Inn has been proposed for S.R. 56 and Silver Maple Pkwy. in the Wiregrass Ranch DRI, west of Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. The Hilton will be six stories tall and will have 125 rooms.

• A 92-room Fairfield Inn & Suites is expected to complement the potential indoor sports complex in the Wiregrass Ranch DRI, which we’ve reported about several times over the last year or so.

Caum said the Urban Land Institute, a 501(c) (3) nonprofit research and education organization that focuses on land use and real estate development, issued a report two years ago saying that Pasco would experience an annual growth in hotel rooms of about 75 a year through 2020. “And, we are bearing that out,’’ Caum says.

The reason for the growth is due in part, Caum says, to the county’s waiving of transportation fees for builders, saving them up to $100,000. “The incentive is definitely working,’’ he says.

Movie Theater To Be Part Of Wiregrass Mall Expansion

The Grove in Wesley Chapel has a movie theater, as does New Tampa.

Now, in between those two established theaters, a new multiplex is expected to be part of the next phase of development at the Shops of Wiregrass mall.

A 1,035-seat cinema is being planned by Cleveland-based developer Forest City Enterprises as part of a residential and commercial project to be located just east of the existing mall. Forest City is currently seeking permitting for the movie theater project, which does not yet have a name.

The 39,000-sq.-ft. theater will be on the west side of the new development along S.R. 56, which will also include 249 upscale apartments, four restaurants ranging in size from 4,200 sq. ft. to 12,000 sq. ft, a specialty grocery store (one of four coming to our area we told you about in our last issue), as well as other yet-unnamed retail stores.

Here We Go Again — Politicians To Debate Kinnan St./Mansfield Blvd. Link

The infamous and befuddling barricades (photo) blocking Mansfield Blvd. in Meadow Pointe from Kinnan St. in the K-Bar Ranch/Live Oak Preserve area of New Tampa continue to stand as the area’s most notorious roadblock. But, whereas the barricades themselves have had zero movement in years, that can no longer be said of talks to remove them.

Pasco County District 2 commissioner Mike Moore and Hillsborough County District 7 City Council member Lisa Montelione sat down for a conversation last month and the two have agreed to re-open discussions to resolve the long-standing Kinnan-Mansfield impasse.

“Lisa and I met and had a great conversation,’’ Moore said. “We agreed to sit down with both of our sides either the first or second week in March. Obviously, there’s a lot of work to get through, but we both agree we want to do what is best for the region and the citizens.”

Montelione placed tackling the Kinnan/Mansfield dilemma — which, if resolved, would give Wesley Chapel and New Tampa drivers an alternative north/south route to Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. (and the two-lane Morris Bridge Rd.) — on her list of things to do in 2016. She sent a letter, dated Jan. 21, to the Pasco County Board of County Commissioners (BCC) in the hopes of sparking a new debate.

Moore, however, already had agreed to meet with Montelione before the letter even arrived. He said his first priority has been seeing that the S.R. 56 extension was approved, but once that was settled, he was going to set his sights on Kinnan/Mansfield.

“There are a lot of people for (the Kinnan-Mansfield connection),’’ he said, “but a lot of people have concerns.”

Moore said he will be accompanied at the meeting by Pasco County administrator Michelle Baker, assistant county attorney David Goldstein and Ali Atefi, Pasco’s transportation engineer.

A Scary Situation…

In her letter to the Pasco BCC, Montelione laid out the human side of the City of Tampa’s case for removing the barricades. She wrote that in early November of 2015, K-Bar Ranch (located off Morris Bridge Rd. in New Tampa, just south of the Pasco line) resident Otto Schloeter was cooking lunch for his family when a pan caught fire and severely burned his arm.

The 9-1-1 call from a cell phone ended up going to a tower in Wesley Chapel. The Pasco County 9-1-1 Dispatch Center transferred the call to Hillsborough County Fire Dispatch, which then alerted the wrong Hillsborough County station — nearly 20 miles away — in Thonotasassa, when there are two Tampa Fire Rescue stations (Nos. 21 & especially 22, which is only a mile or so from Morris Bridge Rd.) on Cross Creek Blvd. that are both only a few minutes away from K-Bar.

Hillsborough County’s fire truck eventually made it to Schloeter’s, and called in a Tampa Fire Rescue ambulance.

Due to the confusion, it took nearly two hours to get an actual ambulance to Chloeter and get him from his home in New Tampa to the emergency room at Tampa General Hospital.

While Montelione suggests that more updated emergency responder technology be implemented near the border of New Tampa (which has both unincorporated Hillsborough and City of Tampa communities) and Wesley Chapel, she also says that the pathways that should be connecting counties and cities should be open and as easily accessible as possible.

If Kinnan St. and Mansfield Blvd. had been connected, Montelione wrote, Pasco County Emergency Service Station 26 in Meadow Pointe would have been recognized as the closest station:

“With the mutual aid agreement between our governments, I believe it is fair to say that the completion of this road could have prevented Mr. Schloeter from waiting 45 minutes for emergency responders.”

A similar argument was put forward in 2012 by John Thrasher, the CEO of Excel Music (located in the Cory Lake Isles Professional Center on Cross Creek Blvd.). Thrasher organized and submitted a petition with 61 signatures representing roughly 40 businesses on both sides on the county line, to the City of Tampa attorney’s office urging for the completion of the Kinnan/Mansfield connection.

“This is not only about commerce and convenience, but in an area of wildfires, sinkholes, floods and hurricanes, it is a matter of public safety to provide citizens with as many routes as possible in and out of an area,” Thrasher wrote.

The issue of connecting Kinnan St. to Mansfield Blvd has been mired in dispute since the 2,000-ft.-long roadway was paved north to the county line in 2007 by the developer of Live Oak Preserve in New Tampa.

In November of 2012, Goldstein reached out to the City of Tampa attorney’s office about Kinnan/Mansfield and laid out of a list of Pasco’s requirements — which included a commitment from the City and/or K-Bar to pay for traffic-calming improvements at the intersection of Mansfield Blvd. and Beardsley Dr. (which runs along the southern border of Meadow Pointe), as well as at Mansfield Blvd. and Wrencrest Dr. to the north, with a funding commitment by Pasco capped at no more than $500,000.

Those requirements were rejected by Julia Mandell, senior assistant attorney for the City of Tampa, in February of 2013.

Thrasher’s petition a month later also failed to bring about any action.

One of Pasco’s requirements from 2012, however, could be part of any new 2016 negotiations. Pasco asked for four lanes of right of way, or land on which to construct the “Beardsley Extension,” which would link Beardsley Dr. east to Morris Bridge Rd. and take some of the traffic pressure off Mansfield Blvd.

Montelione did not comment on the specifics of the Beardsley Dr. request from 2012, but is open to the extension if the two sides can agree to terms. She did say that it seems unlikely that a Kinnan/Mansfield agreement can be negotiated without the Beardsley Extension being a part of the deal.

Moore says that after years of failed attempts, though, he has hopes for success in 2016.

“I feel good about it,’’ he says.

Wiregrass Ranch Tennis Team Looking For 3rd Straight State Title

The spring sports season — which includes baseball, softball, track & field and tennis — is upon us, and with it comes one burning question:

Can the Wiregrass Ranch High (WRH) boys tennis team, which had just one senior while winning the State Class 4A Championship last season, do it again?

The answer is not as easy as you might think.

Coach Dave Wilson’s best player and No. 1 singles player, Agie Moreno, has transferred to a tennis academy, and has taken junior brother Daniel with him. The team’s No. 2 singles player, Foresight Okungbowa, has graduated and now plays for Florida Tech in Melbourne. And Wilson’s No. 3 player, Alejandro Feliciano, moved back to California for his senior season.

So, instead of returning his entire state championship squad, as he had hoped after capturing the State title last April, Wilson returns hardly any of it.

That doesn’t mean, however, that he thinks his two-time defending state champs can’t make it three in a row this season.

The only Tampa Bay schools to ever win three straight boys tennis state championships are St. Petersburg Lakewood (1973-75) and New Tampa’s Paul R. Wharton High (2008-10).

WRH also won a “National Championship”last year — the DecoTurf High School Tennis Championships in Chattanooga, TN — beating the two-time defending champions from Illinois in the semifinals, and a team from Memphis in the final.

“To be honest with you, we have a shot at going back to the state tournament,’’ says Wilson, who is also the school’s athletic director and boys soccer coach. “Whether or not we can win state again depends on whether or not we can get the right people in the right spots.”

One of those right people would be junior Noah Makarome, one of the state’s top-rated players. A busy tournament schedule has kept Makarome, who is considered a blue chip, 5-Star college recruit, from competing for the Bulls in the past, but Wilson said the door is always open if Makarome thinks he can fit high school tennis into his schedule.

Makarome’s addition alone would make WRH one of the favorites to win the Class 4A title.

“I think it has sort of been left up to Noah,’’ Wilson says. “If he wants to, he can play, but he has a busy (junior) tournament schedule and I understand that completely. The door’s been open for him. If he has the interest or the time, we’d love to have him.”

Without him, Wilson says the team still has enough talent to keep it’s current run — which includes an 89-1 record in Pasco County matches the past 10 years — going for another year.

The Bulls will rely on senior and 3-star recruit Sebastian Castillo-Sanchez, who is undefeated the past two seasons and won the No. 4 singles State championship last year, and will move up to No. 1 for the Bulls this season.

At No. 2, promising freshman Destiny Okungbowa takes over.

Okungbowa’s brothers, Courage (now playing at Florida A&M in Tallahassee) and Foresight (Florida Tech) have been WRH standouts in the past, and sister Precious is the No. 1 player for the WRH girls team this season.

“At this stage, he is so much bigger and stronger than his brothers were,’’ Wilson says of Destiny Okungbowa.

While Wilson’s team lost a lot, it did gain Jared Abrams, a junior transfer from the Naples Tennis Academy, who will play at No. 3 singles.

Senior Lorcan Cavanaugh, who was the No. 6 player for the Bulls last season, will move up to No. 4, and junior Miles Caesar will fit in at No. 5.

Wilson, who led the WRH boys soccer team to a 21-3-3 record this season, said four players from that team have also come out to play tennis. In all, 16 players tried out, which Wilson attributes to the program’s heady success in recent years.

“It definitely helps,’’ Wilson said. “All of our kids at school know how good the tennis program has been. There’s actually interest in tennis, I guess, after you win two straight state titles, and last year we won a national title, so they want to know, how do I become part of that? I don’t know if we are even close to being at the capability of last year’s team, but I know everyone wants to be part of it if we could.”

The spring sports season is in full swing. Some upcoming games to check out involving local teams:

Feb. 12: Wharton at WRH baseball & softball, 7 p.m.

Feb. 22: WRH softball at Wesley Chapel High (WCH), 7:30 p.m.

Feb. 26: Wiregrass Ranch Track & Field Invitational, 3:30 p.m.

March 1: WRH tennis at WCH, 3:15 p.m.

Saying ‘Good Bye’ (Sort Of) To Former PHSC Provost Dr. Stanley Giannet

By Gary Nager

Although we chatted several times since we first met a little less than two years ago, the picture on this page of Dr. Stanley Giannet, Ph.D., the now-former Provost of the Porter Campus at Wiregrass Ranch of Pasco Hernando State College (PHSC), is how I remember him best — with a microphone in his hand, captivating anyone from his 3,000 or so students at the Porter Campus to emceeing the 2014 Wesley Chapel Rotary Spelling Bee, as he actually was in the photo.

Thankfully, “Dr. Stan” (as I like to call him) isn’t gone forever or really gone at all — he simply got another job with PHSC. In January, Dr. Giannet assumed the role of Vice President of Academic Affairs & Faculty Development/College Provost for all of PHSC.

In that new, “global” role, he says, “I am now overseeing curriculum and every element relevant to the academic programs at PHSC. “All of our campus provosts now report to and interface with me.”

The good-bye part has to do with the fact Dr. Stan is now based at PHSC’s West Campus in New Port Richey.

“But, I’ll have districtwide responsibilities, so I’m still involved in the academic programs and running all of the activities for all five PHSC campuses.”

Even so, he admits, “The Porter Campus and the Wesley Chapel community are very dear and important to me. We’ve done phenomenal things together and I’m proud to say that I know Dr. (Bonnie) Clark (see previous page) — whom I’ve worked with before (at PHSC’s North Campus in Brooksville) — will make sure that the Porter Campus continues to thrive.”

He notes that Dr. Clark’s ascension to VP of Distance Education for all PHSC online programs now gives the school, “A true online division. I really look forward to working with her in her new role. It’s a wonderful opportunity for all of PHSC to grow.”

Although it’s hard to not give Dr. Giannet a lot of the credit for the success of the Porter Campus, the former Honorary Mayor of Wesley Chapel and “Business Leader of the Year” for the Greater Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce says that. “The team I’ve been fortunate to assemble is what has made {the campus} such a successful place. The team makes this beautiful campus — which is an architectural marvel — come to life. I will miss the team and, of course, the students.”

He adds that he wants to express, “my deepest gratitude to the Wesley Chapel community for the warm reception they’ve provided me and for the level of dynamism of this community.”

The always-sharply-dressed and eloquent Dr. Giannet says that, the growth of the local business community will benefit not only the Wesley Chapel area itself but also the Porter Campus. “And, we know we will continue to grow and work hard to continue serving the needs of the business community in Wesley Chapel,” he says.

Hitting Some Highlights

Although he says he knew the Porter Campus — which graduated its first four-year degree student last semester — would be a success, Dr. Giannet was proud to have been part of the nearly doubling of the student population in two short years.

“The Porter Campus had 3,000 students as of the last (Fall of 2015) semester,” he says. “We were happy to open with 1,800 students when we opened for the Spring 2014 semester.”

Dr. Stan also says that PHSC’s Porter Campus still has two more phases of potential future expansion planned and room for that growth adjacent to the existing building. He notes that as he leaves the Wesley Chapel-based campus, “We have classes with very few gaps and very few spaces for more students, although the campus is not maxed out…at least not yet.”