Rep. Harrison’s Support Of Avis Harrison A Headscratcher For Jim Davison

State Rep. Shawn Harrison urges voters to support Republican candidates at a candidate fair held in Carrollwood on September 13. (Photo: North Hillsborough Republican Club/Facebook)
State Rep. Shawn Harrison urges voters to support Republican candidates at a candidate fair held in Carrollwood on September 13.
(Photo: North Hillsborough Republican Club/Facebook)

When District 63 State Rep. Shawn Harrison, a Republican who is running for re-election on Nov. 8, stood before a crowd at a candidate fair sponsored by the North Hillsborough Republican Club at Carrollwood Country Club on Sept. 13 and urged them to help put a Republican on the Tampa City Council for the first time since he had served on the council, Jim Davison, M.D., couldn’t help but smile.

Dr. Davison, a longtime Hunter’s Green resident and a friend of Harrison’s, had just spoken a few minutes before to the same crowd, and he viewed Harrison’s comments as something of an unofficial endorsement of his candidacy in the District 7 race.

But, it wasn’t.

The next day, Harrison sent out Facebook invitations for a fund raiser he hosted at his home on Sept. 22 for one of Davison’s opponents – Arbor Greene resident Avis Harrison, a former elementary school teacher and registered independent who proudly touts her lack of experience and is no relation to Shawn.

“She has been a family friend for several years, and I think she would be an excellent member of the City Council,’’ Harrison said.

Shawn had already co-hosted a fund raiser for Avis Harrison on Sept. 8 at the Avila home of former Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach Jon Gruden, and raised more than $8,000. But, Davison was still surprised, considering what he heard at the candidate fair.

Dana Young, who represents Florida’s 60th District and is the Florida House majority leader, spoke right after Davison and also delivered glowing remarks. While the City Council race is non-partisan, it is no secret that Davison is a registered Republican and the only one so registered in a field that includes Luis Viera, Gene Siudut, Cyril Spiro, Ph.D., Orlando Gudes and Avis Harrison.

While Davison can’t refer to his party affiliation on campaign information because he is running for a non-partisan seat, Republicans who are not running for non-partisan offices are not bound by that rule.

“I just met (Davison) last night and this is a big deal,’’ Young said. “If you live in his area, he is the only Republican running for City Council, and he’s got like five Democrats running. So, if every Republican votes for him, he wins.”

Once the applause died down, Young added, “This guy is a Republican and if you are a Republican, you need to vote for him.”

She then turned the microphone over to Shawn Harrison, who is defending his Dist. 63 seat against Democrat Lisa Montelione, who is vacating the District 7 City Council seat for which Davison, Avis Harrison and the other candidates are competing.

“Everyone up here is a real quality conservative who you need to get out and support,’’ Shawn Harrison told the crowd. “I want to plug my friend Jim Davison, as well.”

Harrison also told the crowd that when he served on the City Council for eight years, he was, for some of that time, the only Republican.  Since he left, there haven’t been any.

“There are seven democrats on our City Council now and our mayor is a Democrat,’’ Shawn said at the candidate fair. “Can’t we have just one of us? Just one? Is that too much to ask? So we’re going to get out and support Jim in his efforts here. We need one out of those seven seats to be red.”

Harrison said since he was at a Republican event, he was appealing to the Republican voters. “Frankly, I’m not sure any voters from New Tampa were there,’’ he added.

Davison said he was then completely blindsided by Harrison holding a fund raiser in his home for one of his non-Republican opponents. But, he plans on staying loyal to his party and his friend.

“Am I still voting for Shawn?,” Davison said. “Yeah.  Am I disappointed? Yeah.”

Harrison says he has no obligation to support Davison just because he’s the only Republican in the race. He said Siudut has reached out to him for campaign advice, and he touted the endorsements he has received from Democrats in his race vs. Montelione.

“If you are a good candidate, party identification should play less of a role,’’ Harrison said. “I want the best person in that seat for New Tampa.”

MONEY GAME: The Gruden fund raiser for Avis Harrison helped launch her from the bottom of the fund raising race to near the top.

She raised $10,250 for the Sept. 3-16 filing period, putting her at $20,188.34 overall, right behind Viera and Spiro.

Viera, a Hunter’s Green resident and lawyer with Ogden & Sullivan, P.A., raised $6,195 during the most recent filing period, and now has $58,954 overall, which keeps him comfortably ahead of the rest of the field.

Dr. Spiro has raised $26,217.83 overall, the field’s second-largest fund-raising haul. Siudut, an editor with La Gaceta, has raised $18,630, while Gudes, a former Tampa Police officer, is at $15,766.10. Davison, who got into the race a little later, is at $7,395.30.

ENDORSEMENTS: Davison has offset his low fund-raising numbers by picking up some endorsements he says are as big as anyone else’s.

Davison received an endorsement from former Tampa City Council member Joseph Caetano, and another from Gus Bilirakis, the U.S. Representative for Florida’s 12th congressional district.

Caetano recently received 10,681 votes in his unsuccessful bid for the Hillsborough County School Board. Viera picked up an endorsement from the Tampa Bay Builders Association last week, which is generally considered an important “get” for candidates.

New Tampa Cultural Center Weaving Way Through Red Tape

Hunter-Lakes-WEBThe land across from Hunter’s Green’s main entrance still sits there, mostly untouched, other than serving as a retention pond for a road widening.

Despite county approval 18 months ago for a village/town center, dog park and New Tampa Cultural Center, there are no dump trucks, no cranes and no men in hard hats wandering around.

If you are one of the many who have wondered — and many have asked us — what is going on, the answer is plenty.

“Tell them it’s definitely coming,’’ says District 2 County Commissioner Victor Crist, who represents New Tampa on the Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) and was one of the key forces in making the long-sought-after New Tampa Cultural Center a reality.

“There are so many hoops we have to jump through,’’ Crist says. “But we’re jumping through them.”

David Freeman knows that all too well. His company, Harrison Bennett Properties, LLC, won the rights (along with Regency Centers as part of a joint venture) in 2014 to build a mixed-use village center, tentatively called The Village At Hunter’s Lake at the time of approval.

The development is expected to feature a 20,000-sq.-ft. cultural center (expandable to 30,000-sq.-ft.) that will seat roughly 300 and include art and sound galleries — and its primary tenant will be the New Tampa Players, a local acting troupe that has been putting productions in our area for more than a decade — a 3-acre dog park and a town center that would include a “green” grocer, shops and restaurants and anywhere from 100-250 condos, townhomes or boutique apartments.

Harrison Bennett will build on roughly 17 acres of land purchased by the City of Tampa. The property is part of 80 acres originally purchased by the city for drainage and a retention pond for the widening of Bruce B. Downs to eight lanes.

Freeman’s proposal was chosen via a unanimous 7-0 vote by the BOCC on Dec. 17, 2014, with the understanding that Harrison Bennett would be responsible for obtaining the necessary zoning, permits and land-use approvals from the City of Tampa.

Victor_Crist
Victor Crist

“At this point, we are really getting started with the process of rezoning so we can move ahead,’’ Freeman says. “Right now, everything else is just on the backburner.”

“People are excited,’’ says Crist, who is often asked about the status of the project. “They want to get it up and opening and running immediately. Unfortunately, this is not just a clean piece of dirt. It’s environmentally protected land, and had an original zoning as a park site or preserve. This is a very complex deal.”

The project is currently in an inspection period, according to Josh Bellotti, director of Hillsborough County’s Real Estate & Facilities. He said that engineers are continuing their investigation of environmental and stormwater issues.

The inspection period was scheduled to conclude on July 30, but has been extended through Sept. 9 to allow the buyer to conduct its due diligence. The extension is nothing too unusual, Bellotti said, as engineers begin digging into undeveloped land and find new issues to deal with.

After the inspection period is over, the project moves into the approval period – which lasts 180 days – when Freeman has to obtain all of the necessary regulatory approvals. The approval period, should any issues arise, can be extended up to a maximum of 360 days. Closing would occur 30 days after the approval period ends, which could be sometime in March of 2017.

A Little History…

Sure, red tape can hold up projects for years. But you can’t blame those skittish about the development of the cultural center clearing obstacles. The quest for a cultural center — or a “pulse” and “identity” as some had referred to it over the years — has stretched more than a decade.

In 2001, a Connecticut firm was paid $27,000 by the city for a study that determined New Tampa could support a cultural center. The nonprofit New Tampa Cultural Arts Center — led by Hunter’s Green resident Graeme Woodbrook — was offered the six acres it requested for the project, but the city wanted the group to come up with a $10-million endowment to pay for it, killing the effort in 2005.

The project was revived again for a brief time in 2007 by New Tampa Players president and founding artistic director Doug Wall, who also was involved in the earlier efforts. But again, money was an issue, until Crist was able to secure promises of funding and the project gained traction.

“It’s rewarding for them to know their work was not done in vain,” Crist says.

Crist says he is currently working on creating a new nonprofit, similar to the University Area Community Development Corporation (which Crist helped start and he is still a Board member). The nonprofit would be housed at the Cultural Center and would manage it, while being responsible for programming and fundraising.

The cost of the Hunter’s Lake project is around $7.5-million. The county has $3.1-million budgeted in its CIP program, Harrison Bennett will provide the county with $2.02-million in cash, as well as making another $1.885 million in site improvements.

Crist said he has been told the final appropriations for the project are included in the 2016-2017 county budget, which will be debated and finalized by Aug. 1. 

Field To Fill Montelione’s District 7 City Council Seat Expanding

The list of those seeking to replace Lisa Montelione on the Tampa City Council continues to grow as two more potential candidates have declared that they will run for the seat she is vacating to challenge Shawn Harrison for the Florida House District 63 seat, bringing the total to three people who have expressed their interest in running for the seat to Neighborhood News.

As we reported in last issue’s News Briefs, Tampa Palms resident and local attorney Luis Viera had stated that he is exploring a run for the District 7 seat. Joining Viera in expressing their intent to run for Montelione’s seat when it becomes available are Cory Lake Isles Community Development District (CDD) chairman Dr. Cyril Spiro, M.D., M.B.A.; and Tampa Palms resident and La Gaceta (Tampa’s largest Spanish language newspaper) assistant editor Gene Siudut.


Since Montelione has filed to run for the state legislature, state law requires that she resign and vacate her council seat by June 10 of this year, according to Hillsborough Supervisor of Elections office spokesperson Gerri Kramer.

Although all three of the people who have expressed their interest in the seat so far are New Tampa residents, District 7 is actually a large and diverse area which runs north from Waters Ave. to County Line Rd., and includes Forest Hills, Terrace Park, New Tampa and the University of South Florida area.

DrCyrilSpiro
Dr. Cyril Spiro

Dr. Spiro, who has served on the Cory Lakes Isles CDD for nearly five years, is currently the Chief Medical Information Officer at HealthAxis, a Tampa healthcare information technology company that in 2013 bought M.D. Web Solutions — which Spiro founded in 2004.

Dr. Spiro also founded a not-for-profit organization, the Sunshine Board Cooperation, which is designed to make government more effective and transparent and facilitates cooperation between representatives and their constituents through open online workshops, or forums. The Cory Lakes Isles CDD has been an active user of the workshops to facilitate action.

Dr. Spiro also  says that as a city council member, he would emphasize technology, particularly online communications between government officials and their constituents, to fight for what residents in an area really want and need.

“I very much believe in using technology for improving democracy,’’ Dr. Spiro says. “We have used (resident) survey systems in Cory Lakes Isles with great success. That’s very exciting to me. It’s something that I think can be carried across the country at all levels of government. It will make government more effective at doing what the people want.”

Dr. Spiro, who received his M.D. degree from the University of Maryland Medical School in Baltimore, has also developed Lotterease, software that is used in charter schools to manage their lottery systems, like at Terrace Community Middle School (TCMS) and Lutz Preparatory School and others.

He says he has worked with Montelione on previous issues, including helping with resident surveys in District 7.

“We did some surveys in North Park, between Busch Blvd. and Fowler Ave.,’’ he says. “There, the primary concern is crime. When you go north to New Tampa, it’s transportation. For each of those areas, you have to be aware of what those needs are. Oftentimes, the city will address needs of groups that make the most noise. I’d like to help identify with data and more evidence what’s really in need of most repair.”

Dr. Spiro has lived in New Tampa for 13 years, with his wife of 18 years, Laura. The couple has two children, Arden, 12, and Alenna, 14.

GeneSiudut
Gene Siudut

Siudut (pronounced Sue-Dit) grew up in New Jersey before moving to Florida in 1999, where he landed a job at La Gaceta, which is renowned for being the only trilingual (English, Spanish, Italian) publication in the U.S.

As an assistant to the editor and columnist for La Gaceta, Siudut says he has been active on the city’s political scene, as well in the community in and around Ybor City.

“I’m familiar with everyone on the (current) city council,’’ he says. “I feel it’s a job I can do.”

The longtime Ybor City resident, married two years ago to wife Keri and a newly-transplanted Tampa Palms resident, Siudut says the job requires a fighter who is willing to get in the ring for the New Tampa area’s fair share of the city’s budget dollars. He says he would fight for both New Tampa and the USF area.

“New Tampa needs to have a strong voice,’’ he says. “Whatever the issue, you have to keep fighting for those dollars.”

The 42-year-old is president of the Ybor City Lions Club, a Board member of the Ybor City Development Corporation (YCDC) Executive Committee and chair of the Ybor City Retail Arts and Special Events Committee, which operated with a $1.2-million budget.

“The focus of city government is downtown, and everyone has to fight for city dollars to get their fair share, so that’s a good stepping stone,’’ he says.

Siudut has served as vice-chair of the Hillsborough County Human Relations Board (the county’s anti-discrimination board), and has done volunteer work for The Cuban Club Foundation, Cigars For Soldiers and the Ybor Mural Project.

Siudut says he has a strong understanding of  how city government works after watching it closely and interacting with the players for 17 years. He says that has helped sparked his own interest in serving. “I actually got the itch about five years ago,’’ he says, adding that he had initially planned to get into politics in 2019, at the end of Montelione’s current term. Her decision to leave the city council, however, expedited those plans.

“This is a window of opportunity,’’ Siudut says. “After 17 years working in Ybor City, I understand that number 1, the squeaky wheel gets the grease and number 2, you have to keep asking. No one is going to ask, ‘You know, I really wonder if Tampa Palms needs anything.’”

 

Montelione Considers 2016 Run For Dist. 63 Seat

dist 63By Matt Wiley

Lisa Montelione’s second term as the District 7 Tampa City Council member has just begun, but murmurs have arisen about a possible bid to take on Dist. 63 Rep. Shawn Harrison (R-New Tampa, see story on page 4) for his seat in the Florida Legislature in Tallahassee in the 2016 election. Rep. Harrison also served two terms on the Tampa City Council representing New Tampa, before taking a run at what is now the  Dist. 63 seat in 2010. He was followed by fellow New Tampa resident Joseph Caetano in 2007, who lost to Montelione in 2011.Continue reading