Residents respond to closing of 20th St.
Ybor resident and active member of our neighborhood, Manny Leto, articulately expressed many resident’s and business owners position on the HCSO and proposed closing of 20th St.
By MANNY LETO
Published: February 7, 2008
Today Sheriff David Gee will appear before the Tampa City Council to request that the city vacate a small portion of 20th Street in Ybor City. He’ll request the street closure in an honest effort to provide a measure safety for his staff and his operations center.
However, council and the public should be aware of the sheriff’s long-term goals. The closure of 20th Street is the first step in an effort to completely enclose the facility, creating a walled "campus" around all of the sheriff’s properties in Ybor.
Not only should the council reject the sheriff’s request to vacate 20th Street, which disrupts the historic street grid, but also, leaders at all levels of our local government should begin to re-examine the operations center and its long-term impact on the redevelopment of our historic district.
The sheriff’s operations center is actually three parcels of land, which include an auto maintenance facility and several parking lots. The main facility, which occupies about two square blocks, sits on top of sections of 9th and 8th avenues.
Not only does the building disrupt Ybor’s street grid pattern, but also the sheriff’s office provides little benefit to the historic district. The sheriff has no jurisdiction in Ybor; policing the area is the responsibility of the Tampa Police Department. The sheriff (and other county facilities) does not contribute property taxes to Ybor’s CRA fund, and the building itself is a daunting fortress in the middle of a mixed-use, tourist-friendly, historic neighborhood.
What’s more, every time local reporters cover county-related arrests, they report "live from Ybor City," reinforcing the perception that Ybor is full of criminals.
People have been arguing for years over what Ybor City should or should not be. However, whatever the vision, it will never be fully realized without a critical mass of dense, residential development.
I mention this because, ironically, early urban renewal plans and sketches called for residential units to be constructed where the sheriff’s office and EPC buildings now sit.
One suggestion? Follow the lead of the West Tampa armory. I’m sure, even in a down residential market, private developers would jump at the chance to buy the land the sheriff now occupies and turn it into the kind of mixed-use development Ybor needs. The selling price could include the sheriff’s moving costs.
Rather than trying to figure out which streets to close and how to further isolate the operations center from the neighborhood in which it is located, maybe it’s time to look at what was originally intended for the sheriff’s site.
Local agencies and elected officials could take a step toward correcting the failures of urban renewal by finding a way to relocate the sheriff out of Ybor City.
Manny Leto is the managing editor of Cigar City Magazine and a resident of Ybor City.
