Community Redevelopment Agency - 10/08/26

Good morning, good morning. This meeting is called to order. Board member Miranda, hand over to you for the invocation of the Pledge of Allegiance. We strive for a moment of silence and remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. I have a roll call please. Miranda? Here. Minniscargo? Here. Hurtuck? Here. Clendenin? Here. Carlson? Vieira? Young? Here. We have physical form. Thank you. All righty, Director McCray. Good morning, Senator McCray, Tampa CRI Director. As it relates to the agenda, there was a request to move item seven presentation requested by Mr. Vieira under the Channel District CAC Chair report. Okay. Second. A motion from member Mascargo, second from board member Hurtuck, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Yes, I want to continue my item number five to November 12, 2026 to give them more time, but they have found all sorts of interesting historical information about it, so I'm glad we're doing this. I have a motion from board member Hurtuck, second from board member Mascargo, all in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay. And there also was a memo from board member Carlson to continue item seven. I have a motion from- Six. I'm sorry, six. My apologies. I have a motion from board member Clendenin, second from board member Mascargo, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Very good. I have a motion from board member Clendenin, second from board member Hurtuck, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. Thank you. Okay. We will now move into public comment. Are our online speakers on yet? The continuance for item number six is continued to February 11, 2027. That's good? They're not on? Okay. All right. If anyone in the public wishes to speak during public comment, if you could please line up against the wall, board member Hurtuck. We need to approve the minutes from September 19th, 2026. I have a motion from board member Hurtuck to approve the minutes, a second from board member Mascargo, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Thank you. Good morning. Good morning. Stephanie Poynter. Um, I don't get down here much for CRAs, but this is, um, this has really been riding my crawl. Um, this project has been in place since it is for the inner bay expansion project. And here is the letter where I walked with staff in November of 2021. And that's on the backside of your front cover for this project. And it's in, uh, there's a lot of things I don't understand. First of all, I don't understand why it's been put on the back burner in the CIP and the CIT and why we can't get this done. The company that they've contracted out to has between 100 and 500 people, not my problem if somebody quit, but people forget, often forget that McDill Air Force Base employs just as many people as the Port of Tampa does. And every single solitary one of those people comes through our community. This is, most people don't have this map. This is a map of where people live who work on McDill. The red areas are the most populated areas in the county that people live in. And every single one of them has to drive through our community. I also gave you, and I'm a moron, so I gave you all of my copies of the spreadsheet with all the apartments that have been built south of Gandy, west of Dale Mabry since 2021 when they started this project. Yes, it'd be nice, but that's okay. But the bottom line is we've got thousands more people living there. Thousands and thousands. And in that, since 2021, our tax base jump, not the annual amount, but when you have a lot that was paying $60,000 a year in taxes, and now they're paying $100 or $200 or, I'm sorry, $1 or $2 million a year in taxes. We went from $60,000 a year to $2 million a year, and yet no money has been spent in our district. No money has been spent in our neighborhoods, okay? So when you get $9 million in jump, that's a one-year jump. And I haven't updated this since 24, so it's time for me to do this again. But yet, we can't seem to find this. It's funny because this document says it's like 2.5, 2.8 million. And I also gave you a list of areas, places in the budget where you can find 1.6 right now today in undistributed funds or unallocated funds or whatever you want to call it. But I don't understand. It's 2.8 on here. But if you look at the CIP paperwork, it says $8 million. Why? It's not going to cost $8 million. Why did the Mobility Department ask for $8 million? You've got the money in the Inner Bay Transportation Area Fund to start on it now. Yes. And let me pause for one second. My apologies. Attorney Shepard, I forgot to acknowledge you. Good morning. You're speaking. Can I hear you? Yeah. I'm here. It just takes me a while to find the microphone. No worries. Sorry. I didn't forget about you. Good morning. May I be the chair for one second? Thank you. Just late. The traffic was, I left court like at 8.25 this morning and it would be 35 minutes. I'm often a few minutes late, but at this time I have an excuse. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Next speaker, please start with your name. You have three minutes. Okay. Good morning. This should take less than three minutes. My name is Gloria Sims and I live in Tampa, Florida. Clarence and I are here again at the City of Tampa City Council meeting to further address the issue of the Stolen Alley. We were here before, and that's all on record. The Stolen Alley by Commissioner Gwendolyn A. Myers. This is not an assertion. We have proof and the proper documentation of this fact. Today, we are here for two reasons. One, no one should be allowed to break the law for their personal gain and benefit. That's number one. Two, no one should be allowed to use law enforcement to harass and intimidate us for complaining about corruption. About three hours after we left the last City Council meeting on September 3rd, 2026, two police officers came to our house. One officer, a female, identified herself as a clinician, and she presented her card and herself as clinician. And she presented her card and she wore the clinician badge. The male officer said he didn't have any cards, so the female officer wrote his name on the back of her card. They rang our doorbell and knocked loudly on our door. It was, to say the least, very unnerving to see two police officers at our door, considering code enforcement had been sicked on us the first time we came down to complain. They were there like, it's like every other day, and the lady said, well, I'm just doing my job, ma'am, but we're going to make you open up the alley, which we went through all the proper channels and everything to do. Thanks. Next speaker, please start with your name. You'll have three minutes. My name is Clarence Towns, and I live in Tampa. I'm here to remind this city, this county, this state, and this country about the theft of a $2 to $3 million alley with the help of county and city employees. For Hillsborough County Commissioner Gwendolyn A. Myers of 2704 North 32nd Street, Tampa, Florida, 33605, who is also an A.K.A. Alpha Kappa Alpha and sorority sister of presidential hopeful Kamala Harris. The last time we, Gloria and I, was here at the City of Tampa City Council meeting on September 3rd, 2026, about three hours or so, two sheriff deputies showed up at our home. We later learned in order to faker actors, that's lock us up, then tear down our home or even to murder us. Right, Hillsborough County Sheriff's Chronicle FBI, you need to look into the theft of this alley and the apparent lockup or murder of us, because Hillsborough County Commissioner Gwendolyn A. Myers is a friend of the Hillsborough County Sheriff and also a friend of lesbian mayor Jane Castor and U.S. represented Kathy Castor. We think all they want to do is silence us and the truth. This is what happens when lesbians, females, and gays, males, and their friends run government. In my opinion, lesbians and gays hate straight people more than the Nazis hated the Jews. Now imagine them in control of Washington, D.C. So you young white guys marching, carrying torches, saying the Jews. Please. Beg your pardon. Finish, you can finish. Okay, no, I'm not through. So you young white guys marching, carrying torches, saying the Jews would not replace us. The Jews don't want to replace you, but the gays do. Sir, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, please. You can make your statements without making the other comments. Okay, well, here the American, wake up. I'll be locked up, gunned down, or gas by lesbian gays and their friends. Okay. Next speaker, please. I'm sorry. We'll remember her text. Thank you. I'm sorry, but we can't, like, that person should have been removed. We can't listen to it. I mean, I just want to apologize for anyone who is in here who had to listen to that. That was just uncalled for and inappropriate, and we shouldn't allow that. Start with your name. You have three minutes. Hello. My name is Cynthia Schellebarger. As the Community Redevelopment Agency Board, your mandate is to protect public infrastructure. But right now, the fast-track timeline for the $2.3 billion raised stadium district is running completely outside the law. The public has been told this deal is not final until the community benefits agreement is voted on, which cannot happen until at least November 12th. Yet, behind the scenes, the Rays are already moving to destroy the HCC campus before they even have the legal permission to build the stadium. Back in April, the Rays engineers quietly pulled an environmental permit that outlines an aggressive blueprint to completely bulldoze the HCC Tennis Center and clear half of the campus into a stadium parking lot this December. They are treating our public campus like a classic land giveaway scandal, knocking down public buildings before they have the final approval, and asking for forgiveness after the damage is done. Let's look at the true community harm. Eight vital academic buildings are slated for total destruction. The technology building, which recently underwent a multi-million dollar renovation, will be reduced to rubble. Accredited medical labs like radiology and dental hygiene are being evicted into off-campus rentals that haven't even been found yet. A state-of-the-art cyber security lab is being torn down to push students into mobile trailers this January. Tearing down permanent public education buildings to put healthcare students into trailers is institutional neglect. The total cost to replace these facilities is $216 million, but the state has only committed $50 million. That leaves a staggering $166 million shortfall. Furthermore, this demolition is rushing toward without a legally compliant educational plant survey, which is against Florida law. As the CRA board, you hold the financial leverage. We demand that this council refuses to sign and finalize the community benefits agreement unless it includes a non-negotiable provision forcing the raise to front the private capital to bridge that $166 million shortfall. Do not release public tax dollars. Do not approve the final CBA and do not let the bulldozers roll until our local students' replacement buildings are legally guaranteed and fully funded. Oh, and by the way, we remember when you said there was a 99.9 percent chance of steel was not happening, was not going to happen. Councilman Carlson, get it right this time. Thank you. Next speaker. Please start with your name. You have three minutes. Hello. My name is Ashley Morrow. I attended the CRA open house a couple weeks ago and was glad to learn that the minimum ownership requirement was reduced from five years to two. My situation, I purchased my grandmother's house. And if you had purchased before the five years was up, you could not apply for redevelopment or rehab to your house. And I need rehab because my windows are like 50 years old and I can hear straight through them. So now I can apply as of December. So I'm really excited. Um, and I wanted to bring up, oh, I would appreciate if the CRA would speak to city council about validating parking for these meetings for public comment. That would be great. And lastly, the heritage bowl is on Friday. Militon versus Blake. Come out. It's at 730. Go Yellow Jackets. Thank you. Bye. Next speaker. Please start with your name. You have three minutes. Good morning. Allison Hewitt. Um, third generation East Tampa resident and business owner. And, um, I'm here today for one fundamental question is who is the Tampa CRA really serving? Um, because as I know, y'all know, I'm active. I read your information. I participate. Um, but your grant policies, your pre-development program, and especially your homeowner occupied rehab program, I'm starting to see a very disturbing pattern. The people who have invested their lives, their businesses, their families, generationally in East Tampa, it's been left behind. And right now, the question is not administration inefficiency, bureaucratic delays, or poorly designed grant programs. This is about public accountability, responsible stewardship, and the Tampa CRA's obligation to the community. So let me start real quick with the commercial grants. You guys had workshops, um, about the grants and extensive conversations, but at that workshop, no information was provided to the community ahead of time. You actually walked into that meeting and were giving the information. And so now we have a commercial grant policy that is not conducive to small businesses. They are more conducive to the city who will be applying or people with development companies to be able to come before you because you have a opening of September 1 with a closing on November 1. And then you have to have your money between that time. So those folks who are not already wealthy or already developers, they're almost closed the door. Then the staff and their ability to help has moved the deadline up to the 19th, just so they can review it to see if you even fall within the criteria for November 1st. Then we have the gatekeeper. So you can't get an application until you have a meeting. And so you can't even start preparing before you go to the meeting to make sure that you have questions. The next one is the pre-development program. I will be meeting with you each individually on those. You have a pre-development group of people who provide services who have never worked with small developments. And it was mirrored off the Florida Housing Finance to be able to help. Now your pre-development grant can't go to housing and only can go towards the rehab of a maximum of 150,000. So no real helps to have real development in the area. So now let me get to the homeowner-occupied rehab program. So this is my mother. My family home is one of the recipients. And one would hope that Allison, who y'all know is going to bird dog everything that there would be some consistent conversations and as well as good work that's done. But we have experienced flooding, construction deficiencies, unresolved repairs, and serious communication. I just want to make sure that you understand that your process has a $150,000 30-year lien on seniors. But the warranty on the house is one year. So after one year, if something happens, how is someone on a fixed income on the Social Security going to borrow money when you have a lien of $150,000 on a seniors home for 30 years? Right now you don't allow any change orders. So in my mother's case, now we have to replace the septic tank. So now my mom has to find a lien for over $20,000 to put a lift in the backyard because of gravity. A lift and a grinder to take the waste all the way to MLK. But there's no change orders. So now she has to go get a loan at $80,000 after you have a $150,000 lien. So now the only place she has to go is to a hard money lender because every bank has said no because her fixed income. But that is the policies that you are now putting in place, that you are approving, that is not helping in the generational wealth. Now understand, I did a public records request because I know this is not just my mother because I've heard it in the community. There are other seniors who are trying to get together money to be able to fix their house. You receive change orders on your agenda for contractors who says in their GMP, we've now started and we have problems and we need to have a change order. That you get to review. That you get to approve. But no change orders for $150,000. That's your limit. You cannot go over it. And understand, the homeowners, they don't set the budget. It's the CRA staff, works with the contractor to make sure they stay within the budget. But if there's a problem, we're left out. And so now you have seniors having to try to find money because we have a $150,000 lien for 30 years on one-year warranties. So how are they supposed to make sure that if something breaks within that year, what are now their recourse? Because they can't. And understand, I can say this because I have worked with my mother to apply for money to be able to have these change orders to fix the septic so she can get back in the house. I'd like to thank Chairman Young and also Councilor Maniscalco for being able to come and see the issues at the home. And thank you for making sure that when you talk to my mother, you talk to her with respect as someone who was very stressed, trying to say, how did she get back in her house and stop living with Allison? Thank you. Next speaker, please start with your name. You have three minutes. Good morning, Chair Young and board members. I am Fran Tate. I am the founder and the current president of the Jackson Heights Neighborhood Association. I thank the mayor and Councilwoman Young. This came out in the Sentinel on yesterday. Now at this point, we're looking forward to more action. The community is looking forward to being at the meetings, the town halls, to follow the plan for the path to moving forward with a flood relief project that's going to go forward. We know it's going to be great. We just want to be included. We want to see the relief taking place. So we want to thank you. I too was invited to Ms. Gwen Hewitt's house. I got a chance to look at it. The project has not been finished. I sit on the advisory board of the CAC of East Tampa. I have been told I cannot interject my thoughts because I'm only an advisory committee member, but I do support everything that Ms. Hewitt, her daughter has spoken prior to myself. I support everything I have seen, the unfinished project. We need to do better about everything in East Tampa. We can do better. So I ask that you all please help us to bring up the underserved areas of East Tampa and Suffolk Springs. You all can do better. Help us. That's all I'm asking for. Thank you so very much. Have a blessed day. Thank you. Next speaker, please start with your name. You have three minutes. Good morning, Connie Burton. First, I want to just bring attention to the work of a hero of mine, Sister Fannie Lou Hamer, born in 1917. But the significance about Fannie Lou Hamer was a common woman out of Mississippi, was not afraid to stand up to power, made it be known that the conditions of black people, whether it was for voting rights, women's rights, had to be dealt with fairly in a so-called democracy. So that's why certain names, certain people in history, inside of our community, we shall never forget because of their work. I am so sick and tired of coming here and just regurgitating the same things about East Tampa. This broke. That's broke. Because I told Miss Hewitt, take the second take and let's find all of y'all addresses. Just throw it in front of your front yard. How is it that we have seniors inside of our community that think they almost to the goal post and now they got a 30-year lien and they can't even get into their house to have common decency? And she's not the only one and that's why people don't even touch the money inside of our community because of this. But the developers come in here and the big ticket people, the raise like he has on his display this morning, they get everything they want. And the community gets nothing, nothing. In my calmer voice, what I really want to talk about is the fact that inside of our community, we do have a jewel and that would be the vocational technical schools that we have right there on 22nd Urban Technical and there's three other sister schools. Young people in there learning trades, learning skills. If anybody that you partner with, forget the developers and go over there and get them young people. Let them come out in our communities and have real tradesmen skills, experience so we can have a genuine relationship because we don't have anything. The only thing that we know is that we keep on talking about the same issues in East Tampa and after 20 some years, if anybody in here was telling a damn lie, one of you all should stand up and say you're lying. But you can't say it because it's all true. We are tired. We want to see immediate results and not just for a chosen few in our community. Because I know there are some people inside of the black community that have that thing that called pedigree, have class, can come right here to this podium and get everything that they want. And we are spectators. Working class people are spectators because we cannot get what we want. We get all these compounding little rules and regulations that then we can't touch anything. Next speaker. You have to start with your name. You have three minutes. Good morning. My name is Keela McCaskill. I want to thank the chair for coming out to the the raised outreach for the community to see our district five representative present to remind them of the importance of making sure you see the people that's underserved or underrepresented receives an opportunity. That was huge. Thank you. I'm here today and I haven't been here in a while, primarily because I realized that as we redevelop East Tampa, it's a process. And I also learned that patience is a virtue and a big piece of that process. And as many of you know, since August 18 2022, I've really fought to see some opportunities and to see so many people be able to benefit from a grant that I really work hard to get before you to see so many different projects coming forward. And some of the things that have happened, I'm really happy to see that. But today I'm concerned about the commercial grants. That's not so successful. The commercial grants, the special projects grant, and how it's been rolled out to the community. I'm concerned because I believe it's in the hands of the wrong people, people that may not be committed to the work in East Tampa, people that probably don't buy bubblegum, or even live or care about East Tampa are making decisions on applications, and it shouldn't be. So for that, I'm going to say I'm going to ask you to read what I sent over to you. I want an exception like they gave some of the other projects. I want an exception for that project on 4709 to receive $99,000 as the scope of work suggested. You made a waiver on other applications. I want you to make a waiver on that one. I'll send it to you. I'll send it again. So on that one, it's been before you since 2021. I adopted it 2024 after declining it three times. I did not want to work with the staff that was represented because I felt like it was unprofessional. And I want of you, thank you, Councilwoman, for sitting in those meetings, ridiculous, embarrassing meetings for the worst of a request. But you got to see how they treat people in certain situations and how that happens. So thank you for sitting in there, Councilwoman. My reason for coming today is I submitted, finally, I submitted a project for a transformative development on Nebraska, in the middle of the blight, in the middle of the situation. And it doesn't fit the packages that you have for special grants, right? It doesn't fit the mold. And so I submitted it under the special purpose grant because it's open today. But when they wrote those grants, they wrote them. I was there when they wrote them. I worked with that team as they wrote those grants. It was written so that when you get an adaptive reuse, a mixed use project, it could include the commercial downstairs and the housing upstairs. But if you're going to separate them, special purpose project, and it's got to be the unit creation, it's got to be this bucket or that bucket, they're not all open at the same time. And a project shouldn't have to wait six months until you open it up. So you have the authority, you have the power to go and look at it collectively and figure out a way to make it work for an adaptive reuse for a potential 59 units at 3705 North Nebraska. And it's not, I want to caution you as you look at it, don't look at it as just another project. A community advocate, one that spent her own money to invest in this community to make it better, submitted it with great consideration and thoughtfulness. It was a well executed plan to go bring one of the best developers creating affordable housing with the commitment to work with the students at Urban Technical, a commitment to hire the students at Urban Technical, a commitment to go to Tampa Bay Tech and work with those students with the graphics and the work required to do a project. I personally would never accept money from the city and not employ the next generation, provide an opportunity for the community and the people that live in it. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please start with your name. You have three minutes. If there's anyone else. Good morning, Valerie Bullock, Ponsaleon and College Chair. My heart is broken when I walk around East Tampa, my neighborhood 34th and 29th, because it looked like to me what the CRA is doing is welcoming the new people, welcoming business owners, but the people who have been over there forever, the legacy homeowners, their lives have not been changed at all. It's the same. I'm going to try to do this. I'm going to try to do that. And it's too many barriers and roadblocks involved in the CRA when it comes to individual, especially the older people. If you got somebody that's been in that neighborhood 60 years, their house has already paid off. Why can't their lien be a mirror of the new homeowner's lien? And every new homeowner that I've talked to, and I haven't talked to everybody, they say they only got a five-year lien on their house. And that right there is the disparity that I talk about all the time. If I want to impact a hurricane wonders on my house, I have to get a lien from 15 to 30 years. But the new people come in, their lien is only five years. So by the time they got a house, they done got some equity in it, and they want to go to Carewood or Fish Hall, they got enough money to go out there and give them a down payment. I think what should be done in the CRA, if you've been there a legacy homeowner over 25 years, if you've been there, your lien should never be 30. The max probably should be 10 years. You've proven that you are for the community and a member of the community. Why do you have to keep running through, walking through all this red tape? It shouldn't be like that. And I really would like to see some of the people lives change. Everybody in East Tampa, where Ponce Meana College Hill, they are not homeowners. You got some runners over there, them guys on the street, they'll like to see their life change. When we say remove the slum and the blight, nobody wants somebody standing on the street. Let's get them a job. They won't be on the street. We need to look at this in a critical manner, because we are being left behind. The people who've been there forever, we are being left behind. Thank you. We have one online speaker. Mr. Segret Doss, are you on? Can you hear me? Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Please start with your name. You have three minutes. Hey, what's going on, everybody? I'm remote. You're Brad Doss, a Tampa resident on the discharge. United States better. I want to talk about item number seven today, if I can. But it's about Mr. Bernard Lafayette Jr. who was born in the city in 1940. He came from a family that didn't have a whole lot of money, and he was working a hard job even at 11 years old. And at 20 years of age, he left for Nashville and sat at a lunch counter in 1960, and he didn't get up. And he was one of the students who kept the Freedom Rides alive after the first buses were burned down, by the way, or burned up. Now, in Montgomery, a mob beat him. In Mississippi, they put him in Parchment Prison. In 1963, he went to Selma, and he stood and he walked there as well. And he did this despite the beatings he took, and he, you know, eventually became a teacher, and he kept on teaching. He kept working on voter registration, a campaign even in Alabama. And when the marching was done, he went to Harvard, and he earned a doctorate. And he spent the rest of his life teaching nonviolence as a discipline that, you know, I can't, I stand on the shoulders, and I don't have that kind of resolve. But anyway, but he didn't win by just ranting and shouting. He won with training. And when it comes up, the time comes to put his name on the on a building, I want you all to vote yes for that. I think he earned it. He unfortunately passed away on my birthday of this year. And I've often made mention to the fact that I stand on the shoulders of so many people who came before me. And recently, the Supreme Court denied my certiorari in the case where the city was also one of the named defendants. I'm going to consider a reconsideration because a couple of things came in that made it there, which they had the right to deny the certiorari. But I'm going to re-raise the issue. And of course, you know, there's some other things that are going to go on as well. But I wanted to say, as always, I appreciate the time. I am remote because I'm out of town taking care of some things. And as always imparting, I shout out the greatest institution of higher learning in the city of Tampa, the University of Thomas Jefferson High School. Thank you. Okay, that concludes public comment. I would just like to say, you can make your comments without insulting people and using derogatory terms. We get you can say whatever it is that you have to say without insulting people. One of the beauties of Tampa is that we have so many different people from all different backgrounds, from all different cultures, from all different walks of life. And I think that's what makes us so great. But you don't have to say negative or derogatory things to people to get your point across. If you have to go to that point, then maybe you don't have a strong enough point. So thank you. Remember her take? Yeah, I just want to approve items eight and nine. Congratulations. I would like to have a separate vote for item number eight. Okay. Yeah. But we'll start with director McCray. So we can't approve these now? We're going to go to director McCray to start with our staff reports. Good morning. I have the pleasure of introducing, under item number one, the chair for the channel district CAC, Mr. Andy Scaglione, and he will be providing the update for the channel district CRE. And he's joined by one of his fellow committee members. Actually, my great vice chairman, like Mark Siebenhauer. And also, as mentioned, I'm on CAC. Well, good morning. About how much time do you think you need, about how much time do you think you need? Three to five minutes. I'll give you five minutes. Thank you. Thank you. Well, um, if Courtney's watching us, Courtney, we miss you. And, um, but Cedric has, uh, really filled the big hole that she, um, has left. We miss her. Um, Oh, can you start with your name, please? Andy Joe Scaglione. Okay. And I've been involved in channel side on it since 1983, 43 years, and very, very proud of what we've accomplished. And, um, and what we're also, um, continue to accomplish, uh, our focus now is, is, is parks and, and the FAR, uh, making it similar to the downtown area. Okay. Um, I'm going to start out with, uh, uh, just the, the, the 1-1-2-5 and 1-1-2-7 Twigs property acquisition. Um, the closing took place in February 26th, the demo on the existing structure, which, um, was a big eyesore, as y'all know, um, was in June of 2026. Um, environmental remediation has taken place, monitoring wells have been installed, and the perimeter fencing has been installed as of September 25, 2026. I can't tell you the excitement of the residents for the additional park and green area for this area that is much needed, which was a big, big part of our strategic plan. Um, more green, green, green for the residents. We have a lot of families there now, um, that are really going to enjoy this. Moving on to the Washington street park renovations. We are waiting brands construction to provide a complete proposal and scope of work, um, scheduled for October 1, 2026 on the council agenda. The kickoff meeting was held on July 20th, 2026, and we're waiting for the brand's construction to provide complete proposal and scope of work. Third item, new neighborhood park, again, parks, parks, parks, at 810 channel side drive, Hillsborough County environmental protection has approved our remediation plan on September 9th of this year and collier's engineering is working towards a 60% completion for the park construction documents. The arts selection committee met on August 6th of this year and selected three finalists to present at our future art selection meeting. The staff is scheduling finalist presentation meeting for our gateway artwork. Fourth item channel side, just drive in the K street infrastructure, stormwater improvements. Staff is are working with the construction administration on a notice to proceed. Kim is will be making these improvements very shortly. Next item, multi district wayfinding regarding central park channel side, downtown Tampa Heights river, the channel side, CA met with API during their design development phase, as we have with the other three CACs and the CRA board council approved the program change for fabrication installation on August 20th. Um, what we have, um, what we have implemented, which I'm very excited about in the channel side is, um, in addition to getting updates, it's all about execution and the private sector. We don't get paid unless there's execution. And this adds accountability and, um, where it have, we've gone to a bar chart schedule similar to what we use and I use in my, my business and it keeps everybody accountable on the projects versus just getting an update. And you're not knowing if it's moving forward, you forget what it was the month before. This is a visual that you can tell every project timelines, why you're not meeting those timelines and it's got out to other CRAs. And I'm sure they'll be bringing it forward to you because they're, um, they want to also implement this. Um, this is going to be very, very, very helpful because it gives you a visual and it keeps everybody accountable. And it's all about execution. If we don't get projects done, the money's there, we got to get them done. Um, so anyway, very excited about this to incorporate what we do in the private sector into, into this. Um, at this point, um, I'll open it up for any questions for my vice chairman, Mark and I. Yeah, if I can get 30 seconds. Go ahead. Thank you. Appreciate it. Just to continue with that. Start with your name, please. I'm sorry. What? Start with your name. Okay. Mark Siebenhaller. Again, uh, uh, not only a CAC member, I'm also a resident in the area of the channel district, uh, just to continue on what Andy's talking about here. Uh, we did add, just give you an example of a project. Uh, we've asked to have cameras, uh, to be, uh, put in extension of cameras, uh, 12 were approved actually has come to the CRA, uh, about three years ago. And we are still told we're back at square one and trying to get it. So hopefully these kinds of format would end up giving a little bit more accountability to make sure the process is moving forward. Uh, the last comment I have is relative to, uh, the growth in the area has been phenomenal. You know, we are going to get more and more visitors, residents, and that in the area, you know, you've got the wheel coming with the 350 to 700,000 anticipated ridership. You've got the fourth terminal coming for the port. They're expecting to have 2 million passengers, uh, in the port area and just the overall construction of the buildings there. We need to make sure the community is safe moving forward with all this amount of, uh, people that's there and strongly recommend that, uh, hopefully the infrastructure is looking to make sure it's protected, uh, going forward. But in general, it's a great community to live in. Appreciate the support. In the past. Thank you. Thank you. I particularly appreciate your focus on parks. And I have a question for you. Um, what is your, do you have more park acquisition in mind? We are looking, but as you know, we missed the boat. I'm just, just that I say we've done great things at channel side. That's one that, that we haven't done well. Um, um, because of lack of execution of the, um, process of the real estate department that, that, you know, we put things under contract and then do due diligence after public sector doesn't do that. By the time it gets out, the developer already is putting it under contract. So, um, because that we have missed the boat on a lot of parcels, but are we looking, there's limited parcels available, you know, available. We're still looking at them. We're still pursuing them. Um, but if I had to say one thing that we fell short on in the last 43 years, I've been involved in it's that we didn't get more. Um, we have about 2% green area. Um, we should have about 12%. Okay. Um, and I'm going to bring up something I brought up before. Have you looked at open streets? Have you looked at possibly, you know, um, because every time I'm in channel side, I'm usually on a bike and it is scary and dangerous. It's one of the few neighborhoods that I don't, I'm not comfortable riding. And so I was just curious if you've thought maybe more about penestrianizing some of those streets or even just like a block. I mean, I know you still would have some challenges with moving people around, um, by car, but it seems like for some reason drivers and channel side are just crazy. Um, so also looking at maybe some traffic calming, um, would be really, I think beneficial in that area. So I'll respond to it. And actually I'd like Mark to respond. Um, there's going to be a great opportunity with, with the expressway authority, uh, railroad property. Okay. That's going to really add a lot. Um, also 12th street, um, towards twigs, um, and the gas works project that's going to open up. You're going to see roads go through with sidewalks. In addition to that, you're going to see more of an active use of the expressway underneath the, the, the expressway authority. So it's going to get better. Um, and I'm, I'm excited about that. Yeah. My only comment is hopefully down the road, you know, the river walk expansion, it hopefully does take you place up to Adamo. And if so, uh, I think that will resolve, uh, a lot of the safety issues for bikers at that time. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you. Um, board member Carlson and Viera, Mr. Skagland, you always remind us that the, that we have an impending in coming to the channel district CRA. And you can tell us exactly when it is that it's, it's coming at the end of it is coming up pretty quickly. Um, what else is besides what's on your chart right now, what else is in your vision and your committee's vision that you think you need to accomplish in the few remaining years? Well, we have till 2034 and, um, we have a whole list of, of, of infrastructure, a lot of infrastructure projects that, that we're still going to accomplish. Um, and again, some opportunities that hopefully we can increase some green area. Uh, those are our, our laser focus at this point. Um, since it takes so long, as you said, it takes so long to get things going. And some of us are leaving in a few months. Is there, is there anything that we should be looking to get started now knowing that we have seven years or whatever left? We're in the process right now. It's a matter of executing the, the design and construction of it. I think this, this, this, this formula here going to what we do in the private sector is going to change things because instead of just getting an update once a month and you forget what you heard the month before, now this is going to be a visual every month. Somebody's going to look at and say, well, hell, nothing's moved here. Why not? Um, and, and this is going to be a great help. And I'm, I am sure you're going to see other CREs, um, incorporate this. Yeah. If I could just interject there real quick. Um, you know, there are still more projects and development of, uh, uh, residential properties coming in, Darryl Shaw's, uh, the new, uh, uh, East Ebor and West Ebor projects right around the Marina there. Uh, the only requests I have, and we've had an opportunity when we've talked to folks is that as part of their plans, if back to the green space, if they could possibly add more green space, as Andy said, we're far from, uh, with us at 2% of the community far from where we need. But I think the only way we can get to it is by future development coming in that they would help provide us, uh, with that. And so we need, need some support on that negotiation that goes on with the city. Thank you. Um, Madam chair. No, thank you guys both for your presentation. I appreciate y'all a lot. And, um, you know, channel side, I always love talking with you, Andy about channel size, your history there. You're, you were like a, uh, a Lewis and Clark or a David Crockett out there. You were, and it's something I was out there for something, maybe like two weeks. And I was thinking about you cause I was looking around and I go, imagine the feeling. It's almost like when you see somebody that you put a lot of, a lot of work in, and you see them over the years develop and the way you see channel side, I just, you know, you're, you're probably, I don't think there's a CAC member that's better than you in terms of being more analytical on point. What you say, you got back facts. I mean, I know your, your daughter's studying to become an attorney and I know she has your, your intellect, your analytical skills. She's going to be one heck of a great lawyer, you know, because I've, I've told you that the way you prepare, you come with a big old stack of thing. And it reminds me of the pre, um, uh, the 10 years ago, we used to go to mediations, we'd have a big old stack of things and go. And so, so my hat's off to y'all. You know, one of the things I've always said that's missing, and I know we're all a broken record on this is for some sort of a fire station presence in channel side. And we talk about that a lot. I know councilman Carlson did a motion on that through the CRA and specific, do y'all think there's any space there in the future, any space or in the future, even for something that is, uh, medical only, you know, just to, is there anything at all? And it may not be something that we can do through CRA, but just any space at all where maybe the next mayor or something can take a look at that. I do think so. There's some opportunities. Um, I would, um, not want to disclose, disclose some of the parcels because the private sector are going there and try to buy them and flip it to us. Um, but, but, uh, but yeah, there's opportunities. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you both gentlemen. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Just, um, Andy, one more thing. Um, you've seen SBP's plans. You talked about, uh, you know, they're on the other side of Meridian from you all and Meridian seems like crossing Dale Mabry and, and, and, you know, traffic's getting worse and worse. Um, is there anything, I know the border is right there somewhere, but is there, is there anything we should be doing to help with the potential integration? Uh, once SBP is built out, I understand there's an RFP right now, RFQ going on with the expressway authority regarding the, the, let's call it the railroad piece. Um, and, um, one of the, one of the individuals is very, very, very knowledgeable. Uh, been a great champion, Ken Stoltenberg, uh, of channel side hell. He's done some great projects there. And, um, so I think you're going to see some really, really, uh, some exciting things happen there, uh, versus what it's been for years, just a dog on railroad. Okay. So, um, that's going to bridge downtown and channel side, um, where you're not even going to know the difference where right now there's actually a separation because of that. So I'm really excited about that. Councilman Miranda, you want to do our final comment? Uh, thank you, madam chair. You know, I, I'd like to see something done that's simple. It doesn't cost much. I don't want you to, to see if you could get working with the city administration, those in the archives to show the public what that area was 20, 30 years ago on, so we can put it up in the screen and show what was there then and what replaced it now for the whole drive because it is a transformation of something that should go down in history. Like the rest of what's happening in Tampa has happened in Tampa. Because when you look at downtown, all of it, and you look at the rest of the city of Tampa, the changes that have been made in the last 25 years, we take for granted, but they were really not for granted. There was a lot of hard work behind the individual that did it. And I just want to show the public what's happened so that they understand what it's meant to the city and developing and getting what we're getting done throughout the city. It's the taxes that come in, it's the money that's distributed. And when this is all done, that all those taxes that stay 80% there and 20 to the city coffers will be reversed to 100% of the city coffers. And that's when the general public is going to benefit from something that someone else did. And we never talked about that. We never talked about what if it never happened. And you're 100% right. This, this would have never channel side wouldn't. I mean, hell, I remember when this channel side was called 13th street. Okay. Across the street, you had the banana docks. I mean, you had more rats than people out there. Okay. I mean, it was just, it was a bad area. Um, and, and if it wouldn't for the CRA to jumpstart this and for developers to feel that, that there was some certainty of the beginning and the end of 2034, you would have never, never had the revenue you're going to have from 34 on, uh, that would have never happened. So the ROI has, has been tremendous. Okay. Even if it takes a committee to do it, it's gotta be shown in history. Not only this, all of downtown, what's happened in all the rest of the city, every neighborhood has been touched truly. Now that we have another problem because of success, it's called traffic and roads and more traffic and more road need repair and things that need to be done. But those things will come and they're going to come as soon as these things are much quicker because of what channel side and others did by that. The money's going to go when we're not more likely than others are going to be here. Maybe I don't mean death or anything like that. I mean, in office, I mean, let me qualify that. But what I'm saying is that it's going to help those generations to come because of what we've done here now. That's going to be shown 20 or 30 years later that they don't, they're not going to know where it came from. And that's the problem that I want to be showing that the public understand what it is. Next time, what we're going to do is we'll, we'll provide some pictures of what I appreciate it very much. Channel side look like and you'll be amazed. Yeah. I was, I remember, I think there was a bowling alley. These were Sparkman Wharf is. There was like a bowling alley there. And then you had a lot of, lots of dirt lots. It wasn't a whole lot. So the transformation has definitely been incredible, but thank you so much, uh, Mr. Scalculine for your, for your service. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, director McCray. Good morning again. Cedric McCray, Tampa CRA director. Um, based on the changes to the agenda item number seven and I'll, I'll yield to Mr. Vieira to introduce. Well, I'll, I'll yield to a former state representative Rain, uh, uh, representative if you wanted to come forward. So to give, I'll, I'll talk about it a little bit after representative Narain is done, but, uh, former representative Narain had come to me after the death of Dr. Lafayette and, uh, indicated it would be a great idea to do some sort of a moral or statue here for this great Tampa and American icon. And so I yield the floor to our distinguished fellow public servant. And if I may, sir, roughly how much time you think you need for this? Roughly. I'm going to take the median of, uh, Mr. Scaglione and say four minutes. Okay. I'll give you five. Good morning. Um, Edwin Narain, resident of West Tampa. I'm actually here in my private citizen capacity, not representing my company or any former title that I had. Um, I thought it was important that we recognize that in the city of Tampa, we have a lot of hidden figures. And one of those Madam chair is Dr. Bernard Lafayette. Um, as Mr. Doss called in and talked about earlier today, he's not somebody that I feel this city should just recognize because he lived here, but we should actually recognize him because he became a part of the history of the entire country. A couple of weeks ago, I was at the congressional black caucus meetings in Washington, DC, and he was recognized at the highest levels in our nation's capital. And I feel that Tampa should be doing the same thing for a man of his stature. For those of you who are not familiar with Dr. Lafayette, he was born and raised here in Tampa back in 1940. And he went from the streets of this city to the front lines of the American civil rights movement. He became a freedom rider, a founding leader of the student nonviolent coordinating committee, an organizer of the Selma voting rights campaign, and later a trusted member of Martin Luther King's Southern Christian leadership conference. His entire life's work helped to shape the United States of America. But the reason why Tampa has a special claim to his story is that the seeds of his extraordinary life were planted right here in Tampa. Dr. Lafayette often recounted being seven years old and riding in a segregated streetcar with his grandmother. Black passengers were required to pay in the front and then walk around and enter through the rear. On one occasion after his grandmother paid the fares, the streetcar pulled away as they attempted to board, knocking her to the ground. Dr. Lafayette would describe that experience and the helplessness that he felt while watching this as one of the experiences that convinced him that something had to change. In other words, one of America's great apostles of nonviolence first confronted the injustice he would spend his life fighting right here in Tampa. He left Tampa as a young man for Nashville where he studied nonviolence along John Lewis with Diane Nash and other students who would become giants of the civil rights movement. He participated in the Nashville sit-ins and the freedom rides and at only 22 years old was sent to Selma, Alabama to organize black voter registration. The organizing infrastructure he helped to establish there became part of the foundation for the Selma movement that culminated in the voting rights act of 1965. Dr. King later selected Lafayette to serve as program director of the SCLC and Dr. Lafayette met with Dr. King on the morning of April 4th, 1968, a day that will live in infamy in this country because it was the day that Dr. King was assassinated. Tampa has a lot of streets and monuments named after people to preserve the history and the events that have happened here so that we can tell our story as a city. Dr. Bernard Lafayette belongs in that story not near not just because Tampa was where he was born but because the experiences he had here in Tampa helped shape the same conviction that he took on to buses to lunch counter demonstrations through Selma and ultimately around the world as a teacher of nonviolence. I don't know what you all should do but I will say that a street a plaza a permanent bus on the riverwalk something bearing his name and likeness would therefore do more than to just honor one man as Mr. Doss called in and said it would teach future generations that Tampa produced one of the architects of the modern civil rights movement. Children growing up here they need to know that someone who walked the same streets that they did ultimately helped change the course of America. Preserving that history that's going to help connect Tampa's past to his presence and ensure that Dr. Lafayette's remarkable journey from a child confronting racism on the streets of Tampa to a leader who helped transform America is never forgotten. Again as I started out we have a wonderful history in this city. I think it's a hidden history. I've been here for 32 years and I learned something new about the figures that we have remarkable plaques and placards to all the time. Here's a chance for this council to honor one of our own and I encourage you to support Mr. Vieira's motion today uh to recognize Dr. Bernard Lafayette. Thank you very much um yep um board member Vieira thank you ma'am thank you very much ma'am and thank you sir for your uh words and again for coming to us on this this is yours and we appreciate it you know we we have on October 27th um the um yeah for Lieutenant Valdemiro Lopez and I don't know sir how you feel about this I'd love to see a life-size statue of him in in Tampa. I think that a marker um is is wonderful but something like that we're doing for Lieutenant Lopez so I and and you're right sir on his Tampa roots you know he spent a lot of time in West Tampa Ybor City you talked about that incident when he was a young person with his grandmother that I believe he said it it cut him like a knife or a sword I forgot the terms that he used um and I believe he was also a Middleton High School graduate I think um and you know when when he died um um Bryan Stevenson from the Equal Justice Initiative was one of the greatest lawyers in the United States talked extensively about the work that he did with Dr. Lafayette the work that EGI did with Dr. Lafayette because he kept on doing that work today when we need it more than ever in recent time by the way as I know we all agree um and and something else I wanted to point out is that when um Congressman John Lewis died President Obama obviously spoke at the uh funeral and talked about an incident um I think it was in Montgomery when uh Dr. Lafayette Congressman Lewis and others were pulled out of a bus by 300 white people carrying pipes and different weapons and all that stuff who were ready to beat them up and uh Dr. Lafayette said quote we didn't run we didn't fight back uh we got back up when slammed to the ground and looked at our attackers directly in the eyes fighting violence with non-violence President Obama said imagine the courage of these two people who were there challenging an entire infrastructure of oppression nobody was there to protect them there were no camera crews to record the events I couldn't I couldn't imagine that having hundreds of people there ready to tear you to pieces there's no iPhone there's no cameras there's nothing it's just you and them and his his great work that he did with the poor people's campaign the the SNCC um the uh and if I may one minute if I thank you ma'am uh with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference like you said is amazing he also spent time in what was then known as Parchman Prison in the Mississippi Delta which is today Mississippi State Penitentiary which was the notorious prison in the south for um what's it called for a convict leasing of folks after the Civil War uh so yeah that's what I'd love to see what I would suggest is because this is actually my last CRA meeting right um is that maybe Madame Chairwoman if if so that somebody um can have elected jurisdiction over so it's not my motion if you or someone else would like to make the motion to bring that back so that I don't make it because I'm not going to be here uh maybe that would be preferable but I would suggest a statue I don't know how you feel about that sir counsel let us discuss but that's it thank you and and thank you sir for your idea thank you thank you uh councilman Mascackle and then thank you very much sir for bringing this gentleman you know to everyone's attention and um as was mentioned by councilmember Vieira we're going to be honoring Valdemar Lopez Medal of Honor recipient in Tampa native in a few weeks with a life-size statue um the other day we honored uh police officer Morris Lopez with an honorary street sign in Ybor City and what struck me here and what you wrote is something that I mentioned when I when I spoke that day was when people walk by here they're going to see that police officer's name you say here children growing up here should know that someone who once walked the same streets that they walk helped change the course of American democracy why is this person so significant for everything that you said but if you look at uh something else that struck me April 4th 1968 there's famous photograph of the Lorraine Motel and Dr. King that morning and with them is a referent Jesse Jackson not too far away he was he was there you know close by and everybody knows that name but this gentleman was with them that morning that faithful morning uh in American history um in regards to the Tampa Riverwalk I think the there's a couple of things the person must be must have passed away at least 15 years ago and I last that I heard and this has been it's quite some time that they're not taking any names they're not putting more bus currently however Baltimore Lopez is going to be on the Riverwalk in a different part by Waterworks Park um I would absolutely support uh a bus a life-size statue whatever it is because you know like it says your children growing up here need to know somebody of this caliber and how close he was to Dr. King and the civil rights movement and with uh you know student non-violent coordinating committee you know we know Clarence Fort we know about the citizen uh the sit-ins at Woolworth but this is somebody that would be worthy you know as council member VR said he's leaving um whoever wants to change if it's if it's you you know Chairwoman Young I'll make a motion whatever it is but I want to see this come to fruition thank you um Councilman Clinton you know thank you uh I'm proud to call you my friend and the you know these these are the types of issues that really you know so many times as you saw earlier in our meeting today it's a burden being a public official and listening to some stuff but then you have stories like this come before us that makes you um inspired and proud to be sitting in the seat to be able to champion and remember folks that made our country stronger and um you know better than where we were so rather than even being you know looking backwards the way some folks want to drag us to have inspirational figures like yourself as you as you were a representative Noreen um it's it's really important and it's interesting because as long as I've been around I didn't know Dr. Lafayette and I did not know his story so I'm a classic example of why it's important to have these types of um tributes and memorials for folks for people like me and the generations that come to remember these stories because if you don't you're doomed to repeat them you know it's it's so this is this is this is what is so important for these things um I'm I'm really it really it's I'm moved by it it's really it's very very important and thank you Councilman Vieira for working with Representative Noreen to bring this to our attention if I mean I don't know if you're going to but if not I'll make the motion to ask CRA staff to come back on January 14th 2027 to and and if I may whatever everybody's not is that I mean I'll make the motion unless you want to do it do you want to make the motion or do you want to make the motion you beat him to it yeah um I mean I thought January 14th would be good January 14th 2027 have CRA staff come back to the CRA board with or uh or city council to uh with proposals to um with taking into account what Councilman Maniscalco said what Representative Noreen said what Councilman Vieira said uh for different types of options to be able to memorialize the life of Dr. Lafayette so we have a motion from the board member um Clendenin we have a second was he gave the second person from board member Vieira all in favor all right when he opposed thank you and whenever you're finished yeah no I just you know as I was saying earlier one of one of the things that makes Tampa so great is we have people from so many different backgrounds but also the culture and the history that we have in Tampa I always talk about Ashley because when she comes and gives the um Tampa's black history I learned things that I didn't even know I think we all do and the more and more we start to learn about especially the black history that's in Tampa and how important it is and what it's done you know like you said to change the American democracy I think it's amazing so this is a you always bring like the best things I have to say yeah I can tell but it's it's really important to know history and so thank you for for bringing this forward and I think it's really important so um I'm excited to see um we had Vieira and then Maniscalco you still I mean Miranda oh that councilman Clendenin said I never knew of the man I was born in Tampa I'll be honest with you but the story that about his grandmother and walking around the back falling that had to be a dramatic thing that he had to witness and maybe that's what started him in that direction to make sure that didn't happen to somebody else that's what I was thinking when you were talking and I was listening to that and I and I'm not suggesting this but maybe on the new area where the streetcar is going to go or any area of the streetcar to make a street stop all with his name with a with a bus there or something because that's I think psychologically if we started I got to do something about this that's what I feel maybe I'm wrong yes and if I may I will and and councilman Carl you haven't spoken yeah we can do Carlson because you'll you'll do our last comment so go ahead no thank you for uh for bringing this up it's always great to talk about history and and culture and rich history of Tampa um I I'm finding more and more with um statues and memorials that that the context is really important and uh we've gone through the Instagram era where people want to take selfies with a statue but we're we're getting into the point where it's hard to tell stories there's so many stories things are moving so fast how do you how do you quickly tell the story and and so I would just encourage whoever is going to end up uh working on this to think about the context of it if it's a bust sitting on the side of the room it it's that's a memorial but there are great lessons that you talked about that should be told simply and so if the if if instead of just a statue if there's a context of of key words to help people understand it because once you once you tell a story it it brings a statue to life thank you all right councilman theory yes ma'am and I I wanted to ask sir do you as you stand here maybe you got to think about it do you have any preference on it because this was your idea you brought I mean do you have any I I don't I would submit that to the citizens of the the community here um quite candidly the Tampa History Center has acknowledged Dr Lafayette for a few years now with an award that is recognized in his name but that was before he passed and so when I was in the legislature I worked on the the legislation that brought down the Confederate monument and allowed for Mary McLeod Bethune to go up in DC so these are the things that we need to do to correct history I don't know that we can necessarily fix it but we don't need to forget it so I will tell you whatever the citizens of this city think is best we should maybe put it out to a vote but we definitely need to acknowledge his presence and his impact on this country thank you and I'm I appreciate that and it's funny I was uh showing uh somebody here that I found a picture of me and him together this is funny I met him like three years ago which is funny but yeah that's that's him um and let the record show I'm showing Councilman Clinton and a picture of me and Dr Lafayette but uh I'm not yeah yeah I know which is funny but but yeah no I mean you know I'd love to see I I'm I mean I I've been working with Judge Salcenas for the um Lieutenant Lopez statue for probably two and a half years or so and um yeah but but and I so I'm a statue guy I love that but again whatever y'all want it's all awesome so good well thank you guys and and thank you sir thank you god bless you thank you director McCray good morning again Cedric McCray Tampa CRA director uh just here with the director's report for the month of October 2026 uh we have provided the customary project trackers for special projects commercial grants and housing um any questions um yes uh project tractor being out of date you said you would have an updated one for us yes did you not receive the email I mean was it going to be printed or emailed emailed okay well I didn't look at the email so um uh but yes going forward I think we need to find a way um whether that be something that you bring to us and like put on a website for the public just some way if it's not going to make it into on base that we still provide all of that yes so thank you absolutely any other questions or comments no all righty moving right along okay next item um just wanted to say thank you to uh members of the board community uh community advisory committees for the support related to redevelopment week across the state of florida as you are may remember we did uh have several social media posts and a capstone event in the east tampa office related to that and open house so we it was fairly good attendance from residents within the communities ncra's business owners and community advisory committee members so we appreciate your support on that the next item is florida redevelopment association conference which will be taking place uh october 20th through the 23rd we do have several of our team members that will be a part of panel discussions um miss thrower mr nunez as well as miss parks to talk about different aspects of redevelopment and we're looking forward to attending that i know that the the presentation that miss parks is going to be a part of will be highlighting and touching on the uh 30 allocation that this board approved several years ago and we have other cras across the state that are looking to kind of mirror that program so she will be on a panel to highlight that with the former or immediate past president of the fra any questions on that um can you remind everyone when the applications close for the commercial special projects and development yes the the application period closes on november 1st okay and we encourage anyone that has a level of interest to uh go through the portal uh to set up a consultation and then the staff will respond accordingly thank you we have any other questions comments no okay and the the last item that i would like to and i know that um there was a request and chair um if we could have dr collins come up just for a three minute time period to provide a verbal update related to the jackson house okay yeah dr collins good morning carolyn collins chair for the jackson house foundation dr angela scott is providing you a handout at this time in interest of the three short minutes and the necessity not to be repetitive you actually have a handout copy i think everyone have it and basically we just want to do something on a consistent format on a monthly basis to give you an update so the top portion of it is primarily what we'll do we gave you a very brief summary it covers what has occurred over our past period of time you'll see in the current phase uh where we're in the pre-construction phase with our planning with uh sinclair group that we actually have contracted with completely and you see there about five things they're not particularly phases they're more like bullets but we're in the emergency stabilization phase which is complete the pre-construction planning the design development architectural review with arc we have completed the ddr uh and then we have the permit deconstruction or reconstruction under the next section you'll see the completed work you'll see the emergency work really that has gone on at the house the pro the project team coordination meetings uh that we have been doing we have our same monthly quarterly meeting there are other meetings that are being planned the state the city the jackson house the county and anyone that have been very supportive in those meetings as well and then i think dr scott has done a great job in laying this out has also given you our next steps uh you'll have that opportunity on our monthly review to see that we are receiving uh the contract budget we're receiving a timeline hopefully you will have opportunity to see those on next month there are a number of meetings other historical groups that they have bought in that they'll be meeting with uh the remaining information from ddr and arc and then our report that will be coming to you with this last 45 minutes let me do this in sincere uh concern of what we've been doing and will continue to do at the jackson house to make sure that we're in compliance with everything there have been some questions i would like everyone to know that if there are any problems with any paperwork i'm in the process currently of investigating to make sure that when we did the emergency repair which was to cover about five days uh the notification that i gave props at that time uh to the entity in the letter with the pictures also a call that i received that they wanted us to do a temporary license the coi and make sure the insurance and things were in place we followed through with all of that i'm checking that now to make sure that all of that was done and there was one other issue came up during that emergency phase and it was the parking if there are any fees that have been accumulated because the workers who didn't know where to park may have parked uh in the inappropriate place i'm asking that the bills be sent to me and i'll be doing that in this investigation i personally will pay the bill if there was anything not done i am the one that's going to take the responsibility because it was a five-day emergency and what we will alleviate with that is we're in the process right now our board been talking about it we're doing the actual mou that we will do for the d and reconstruction that will be in its final phase it'll come back to us from the property owners they will tell us what they want as they did when we did it before we'll have it ready but not signed until there's a date and then when the date come all we'll have to do is put the date in all of the cois we're already all the insurance papers and everything will be included and we'll follow through with that that concludes it and thank you for the extra few minutes to close that thank you board member um yes so when you were when you when you um thank you for so much i really love the format of this i think this will be really um wonderful so you notice that next on our agenda is a monthly update on tampa union station would you like a motion to have this monthly update come or do you want it just to be part of the director's report mr mccray what would be easiest for you because you asked whatever it's your preference i think we talked when maybe the last cra meeting we talked about it but we didn't actually make a motion to have it be a part but if we can make a motion to yeah i was gonna offer um for board member carlson to do it because i know this is his um okay okay well um so we'll just make a motion uh that the um jackson house foundation will provide a monthly update on the jackson house that's a monthly written update i'm sorry that way you don't have to show up every month okay i have a motion from board member her tech a second from board member maniscalco all in favor aye thank you thank you very much and thank you both for your work i appreciate all of your support thank you and the cra staff yes chair young and members of the board there was one item that was omitted from the director's report and i would be remiss i believe during our briefings i may have shared this with most of you but the tampa cra has awarded the first commercial design grant in west tampa so we're we're really excited about that the property at 2113 west main street and the grant will provide 100 funding for professional design and planning consulting and engineering services for the permit ready construction plans and this will be a transformative space i mean it will be tenant ready for space for new businesses on main street um ironically you may recall that um we purchased several years ago the property at the corner of albany and maine um across from that is the uh the liquor store and that was a few months ago um this property is right on the other side of the alleyway to the west so um we've been working with the property owner and our commercial grants team has worked really hard between construction services and zoning to help the owner navigate all of that as well as the contractor that he selected so um it is moving forward and we do have some good stories that are coming out of the uh work that we're doing yeah you said that's the this is the first one yes it is the first one now exciting thank you thank you thank you all righty we are any other questions regarding the director's report all righty moving along okay the uh next item is the tampa union station update and if you have noticed we did provide photos of some of the work that are going that's going on internally and externally any questions would you mind just giving for the public give a 30-second update on where we are yes so um ultimately there there's a lot of facade work that's going on the tinting on the property has been completed and um so window treatments doors and the like some of the ceiling ceilings sent ceiling of the ceiling um and um and i believe you all are aware that the ticket booth that was internal has been moved to the uh external uh outside on the uh ramp to accommodate for the work to take place on the inside any other questions nope all righty thank you director um remember her take oh i was just ready to talk about number four because it was my motion okay you want to introduce it first yes so uh there was a request by board member her tech related to the roundabouts in tampa heights uh specifically highland and palm and then palm and north boulevard and i'm sorry just palm and uh highland correct just that one yes and um i believe individuals from mobility were going to be here but they did provide a written report uh for consumption of the board um and i want to say thank you uh for that report and i actually told them they didn't need to be here today because i do have an update of some sort i spoke to both um adam harden who owns the armature works and happened to have a meeting also with university of tampa that's looking to more pedestrianize and and cycle uh in increase that uh the the ability for people to cycle and walk along north boulevard in that area and both of them were very uh excited about the possibility of fixing the roundabout both of them said they'd be willing to do it and since mr harden has i think what it is 83 percent of the uh 70 71 percent of the 73 73 of the um of the money that comes into that cra i thought it was important to have his his buy-in as well so i'm going to be working with um uh brandon and and the mobility team on that more so i'll have a motion for that coming forward later any other questions or comments for item number four no all right we continue item number five and six now we are moving to required approvals can we do a local vote i'm doing a local vote for item number eight required approvals vera carlson yes miranda miniscargo yes her tech yes clandinen yes young no motion passes with vera be an absent vote and young veneno motion from board member maniscalco a second from board member miranda all in favor any opposed all righty and that does it for our old business um do we have any new business robert mccarlson um connie burton is talking to back um i went with miss connie and and some nasap and other folks to irwin tech the other day uh with cedric and um some other staff and um the you all may know this already but irwin tech is building um 80 use out of containers and it only costs twenty thousand dollars um that we know of right now that doesn't include labor but they're trying to figure out how much it would be to install one what happens now is they build them and they take them apart to teach the students how to build them and so um cedric i think wrote this motion or anyway somebody on staff did i'll just make the motion motion re requesting tampa cra staff in coordination with the city construction services planning zoning and hillsborough county public schools to develop a pilot program for construction and installation of affordable accessory drilling units adus on eligible properties within the east tampa cra and overlay district requesting staff return to the january 2027 cra board meeting with a proposed approach to launching the pilot including estimated costs potential funding sources partner responsibilities homeowner eligibility and affordability requirements as well as an implementation timeline so i have a motion from board member carlson a second from board member miranda all in favor hi i want to say something so um i think this is a fabulous idea and you're just doing the pilot for east tampa because i'm concerned because i think other cras would also really love that so is this just meant to be a pilot for east tampa then eventually be expanded to the rest of the cras the thing we're the thing we're trying to figure out if we if they were 20 000 each and we had a hundred thousand that would be five i think it's going to cost at least five thousand to transport them put them in hook up the electric and and plumbing and sewage and so um and also we've got to figure out what what houses have the space to put it on and and did they have the financial ability and what would we charge and so yeah it's just a pilot project to figure it out and then potentially and also there are two other schools um chamberlain and uh what was the third one middleton middleton so there are three schools that they're going to talk to to try to get involved but if we could for 25 grand each put an adu if um when i went to um uh austin a few years ago with the with the mayor of saint pete and the safety chamber um austin told us that after they got their adu policy done they said hardly any not not as many people as they expected to build them because they were so expensive and they were talking prices above a hundred thousand dollars and so if we could do these for 25 000 it could be a quick affordable housing solution and depending on if they don't put holes in the side of them uh they're hurricane proof because they're used to flooding on ships we have a motion from board member carlson a second from board member miranda all in favor aye any opposed okay you have any more any other new business for carlson no we need the other thing um i got in just before you did a minute ago we have to fix the traffic problems in downtown yes and we have to fix that we have to fix the traffic problems in other places and now you all saw on um channel eight uh what we've seen around is that these uh autonomous vehicles the waymos and the and the robo taxis they drop someone off in the wrong way when they run they run into crowds of people especially around raymond james they just stop or they they pull into people's parking lots and they're they're causing traffic congestion but we know in downtown the nacp dinner was on on saturday night it took me an hour and a half to get from uh my house which was right by gandy to uh the jw marriott it should have taken 10 minutes and even in heavy traffic it should have taken 30. it's completely unacceptable we've invited um mobility and tpd in front of us like five times but somehow we have to fix this problem it's unacceptable that downtown and also the stadium area shut down when there are events there's something going wrong about the way we're planning it i don't know what was happening this morning but but about one out of ten times we can't get near city hall and we have to be able to conduct business this is the economic center arguably of our uh city and our region and uh and if people can't get around how are they supposed to get to work yeah i ended up i was sitting in traffic for like 10 minutes i ended up getting out and i just took the street car to get to to get to the marriott you left your car in the middle of the street no i was in i was in an uber but but when i got out when i was on the street car the car that the our uber was behind was still sitting in traffic and i had waited like nine ten minutes for the street car ended up having to take the street car so yeah i agree we need to fix it i don't know what was going on this morning that that was terrible we're a modern i've said this before we're a modern city other modern cities don't have traffic jams like this because they plan better and and we should be able to manage a much higher density of people going through our downtown it's unacceptable that it's like this the big problem the big problem this is causing traffic jams all over south tampa and and not just in downtown the problem is they're redirecting people the wrong way i mentioned before coming out of the parking lot of water street i can see the salmon 100 meters away and they send me back toward um toward the arena i mean how stupid is that and the same thing is happening around there they around raymond james they're sending people through the side streets and neighborhoods right by where charlie lives um and it's it's not acceptable that that this has happened um board member clinton and you have any new business mass transit all right that's what i'm talking about board member vieira yes ma'am two quick ones if i may a couple of months ago i had done a motion um to have cras have a seat designated for a uh justice or equity group and we had supported that um and and i talked with legal and and different things and i spoke to mr mccray about this this motion i'm sort of tailoring it back um and so this is my motion again it's pretty much the same thing that i did before but more narrowly tailored which is i motioned for a feasibility report on the ability of the hillsborough county naacp to have a seat on one or more cras to come back with a feasibility report um and mr mccray is january of 27 is that too early to okay yeah no um so if i may uh for january of 2027 that is my motion what's the motion oh yes ma'am for um and i can give charlene a memo on it for the feasibility to have a dedicated seat on one or more cras for the hillsborough county naacp that's kind of what i was getting towards in my motion but long story i spoke to legal about it some potential issues so i'm trying and again it's just for feasibility to see if it's something and for one or more cras i'll leave it to the cra board to decide uh if feasible which ones to go forward with and that's my motion ma'am so you have a motion from board member vier a second from board member maniscalco all the director mccray if i may um as you know we're in the process of updating the uh cac policy for all the cras we haven't touched it since we went through the reorganization in 2024 this probably would be good to dovetail into that and um and we can just move it as a one contiguous piece thank you all in favor aye any opposed okay and one quick one if i may the channel side i don't believe mr mccray had i ever done a motion on channel side and disability accessible parks not that i'm aware of there are as you know the funding that was available for ada accessible parks across all the cras and and i don't want to question you on that now but so what i'll do if i may is yes sir i'll have a motion for february of 2027 for a report if that's good with you for time sure on um presence of ada specifically i want to be clear what i'm talking about disability accessible playground equipment at channel side at some of those parks that's there um just for report on it so we can build on that um in in that derrick there's a lot of young families out there and everything so yes sir thank you that's my motion of a motion from board member vere a second from board member maniscalco all in favor aye any opposed okay thank you board member hertech um nothing cra related but just personal um i finished my halfway mark i finished my sixth round of chemo yesterday and i feel really good so uh i um yes and i noticed a lot of people are wearing um pink and breast cancer awareness ribbons and i just want to thank everyone um but also uh um i still haven't lost all my hair i'm not with you all yet i have the wig it's ready but anyway i just want to thank everyone for the support they've given me and um i'm just so so joyous today and i just wanted to say that i really feel the love a question for board member hertech obviously we're in october if there's any events that you would like us to go to and support let us know i know there's the uh deltas have something the fight right foundation i think it is on the 24th but if anything just let us know i appreciate that actually i just did a round table on spectrum about breast cancer awareness if you happen to see it on television uh and really my main message is doesn't matter if you're a man or a woman it's not just about breast cancer make sure you get your annual physical that's the biggest thing you can do more than anything else um so make sure you do that and uh yeah check out the spectrum um special uh report it was really very good um we had a doctor from moffett and another um county commissioner from up in marion county who's gone through two rounds of breast cancer treatment so it was really good i mean honestly just just continue to mention it and when you go places and talk about it that's really it um we don't have to go to anything in particular but just uh i really appreciate that yes ma'am thank you um board member clinton yeah not new business but i just wanted to say congratulations to tampa bay rays as you see i'm wearing the shirt from last night their victory and uh moving towards uh uh in this forward in the series and hopefully four more games will be going to the world series so congratulations board member maniscalco board member miranda if they play the white socks i have to go with the white socks because one of my players that i play with tony larusa who's in the hall of fame is that is involved with the white socks so i i gotta go back to blood i will i'll do that we have a motion uh forthcoming go ahead ma'am well two things first i have um a new intern who i would like to introduce marissa can you come to the podium please please uh introduce yourself and tell us what what you were studying and what your plans are hello my name is marissa banton i'm a recent graduate of the university of south florida i was studying economics and political sciences and i did a lot of work with student engagement and civic engagement as well as studying restoration of voting rights within returning citizens and i'm currently applying for law schools and i hope to become an attorney so marissa just started with us on tuesday on tuesday and marissa just started with us on tuesday and she has already hit the ground running so we are very happy to have her in the office and getting all the experience so welcome and i also have a motion um just so recently what we have discovered we know that we have the housing rehabilitation rehabilitation renovation program and there are a few homes particularly i know in east tampa they're a little bit older than others and so the right now the amount um is it cannot go above of the 150 000 so i've been working um with our CRA director um and and staff and um attorney shepherd to craft this motion so well i'm gonna say it and then we'll we'll see how it goes so the motion is requesting the housing rehabilitation and renovation program with the current standard maximum project assistance amount of 150 000 per eligible property and to authorize the CRA director to approve hrp projects exceeding 150 000 up to a maximum amount of 200 000 on a case-by-case basis when there are documented extreme or exceptional circumstances existing or overall life safety or habit habitability concerns including projects located inside any applicable overlay district established within the CRA areas and this will be for any new applications that we get so it wouldn't be you know retroactive if there's projects that are already at the 150 000 if it needs to go up to 200 then that would be on the CRA director but just there's a you know we've been seeing there are a few houses that are a little bit older and that amount is not covering everything so for future applications that are coming in wanted to put that into consideration and i know i talked with um director mccray is there anything that you want to add or that i didn't explain well no uh miss park is here she's under the weather uh this morning but i did share some of the uh conversation we had uh yesterday with her and um we will more than likely come back with uh maybe some more definitive guidelines as it relates to that so that um it's palatable making sure that it's because there's there's several layers involved in the overall program so we will come back at a future date with that information okay so i have uh i made well that's yes ma'am yeah i know right we have a motion by board member young the second and was it maniscalco did you and um councilman miranda do you have to wish to speak on it sir okay any comments on it okay all in favor any opposed okay thank you thank you i don't think we mentioned it did we mention uh in the last couple weeks that lincoln tobio senior died just just to i think they've seen your senior no i know yeah they've kept it kind of underground but i think long you know long-term um public servant and uh to end on a positive note at least a couple of us in the audience saw um buena vista social club last night fantastic um there were people crying all over the place remembering cuba in the in the 50s of a motion from board member maniscalco a second from board member clendenin all in favor aye all righty any opposed we are adjourned thank maniscalco a second from board member clendenin all in favor thank you yes sir