Couple of typos in the newsletter. It's been 36 years (not 26) since the fees were created and they were not updated in 2014 when the fee was renamed to "multi-modal". The online version of the post has been updated.

This week's impact fee workshop preview.

This week's impact fee workshop preview.

‘This was Council member @lynnhurtak.com’s third time with budget process and in that time no one else on council has demonstrated a willingness to get in the weeds with the numbers and follow through’

As anticipated, council adopted the FY26 budget last night. The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

As anticipated, council adopted the FY26 budget last night. The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Finally, some final thoughts before the second reading and adoption of the FY26 budget. My theme this year is "it's an adoption hearing." Council should know now they own the budget and are responsible for it. If they had any issues with a project or item, there was ample opportunity to change it.

Last week's CRA wrap-up includes news the city has suspended the Women & Minorities Business Enterprise program.

This week at Tampa City Council 9/18/25 Beyond the budget adoption this week, council will have a regular meeting on Thursday. TPD goes electric, Fire Station 24 coming into focus and infill housing included on the agenda.

TPD suspends officer 30 days for violation of police code of conduct. Officer kicked a suspect who was down on his knees in compliance in the head. www.tampa.gov/news/2025-09...

Last night Tom DeGeorge, who garnered 10% of the vote, endorsed Young.

results are unofficial but day of voting is in and Thomas Scott and Naya Young are headed to a run-off. (see previous post for link)

Early vote/vote by mail are in, Thomas Scott leads with 27.41%, Naya Young 2nd with 12.19% and Fran Tate close behind at 11.3%.

Voter turnout by precinct for D5 special election as of around 6:30pm www.votehillsborough.gov/UnofficialTu...

While all eyes will be on the special election today, the best goes on. Get caught up.

New week, new agenda, new preview. The CRA Board will meet Thursday morning to vote on seven items, including a services agreement with the city, funding for the West Riverwalk project, and land purchase for a park in Channelside.

There will be no wrap-up post this week. Just picture a big rubber stamp.

I'm mostly following council budget meeting in real time, slight delay, and I think the decision to combine both agenda items into one and only allow one 3 minute public comment is bad form. Two entirely separate parts of the budget both with equal importance.

The subject of impact fees and their need to be adjust for today's dollar has been circulating again around the FY26 budget adoption. I posted working draft of where things are, what our options are, and try to make clear it will have no impact on FY26 budget.

Ash Dudney, candidate for Tampa City Council D5 special election endorses Naya Young prior to the election and urges his supporters to vote for her. "I believe the representative you want is Naya Young. In case I have yet to make it clear enough: Do not vote for me. Vote for Naya Young."

Holiday weekend and all, ICYMI, look at this week's agenda and a note about how TPD Chief signed onto ICE as fast as he could after Trump took office, now wants to use Flock license plate readers (who was sharing data with ICE and who knows who else). And he wants another $1 million/yr for drones.

New milestone for the blog. I don't pay much attention to analytics or stats, but does help remind me that the site is growing. A year ago that number was less than half what it is now.

This week's preview is published. First reading for the FY26 budget adoption Wednesday evening, regular meeting Thursday. Items include TPD expanding the surveillance state, $6 million streetcar expansion study and possible alcohol sales suspensions.

This week's preview is published. First reading for the FY26 budget adoption Wednesday evening, regular meeting Thursday. Items include TPD expanding the surveillance state, $6 million streetcar expansion study and possible alcohol sales suspensions.

Onbase is extra flakey this weekend and almost impossible to review the agenda. No chance of me building my own version this weekend if nothing is resolved by tomorrow. Lot going on too.

I don't know when a good time to post this is so let's just get it out of the way. I'll be voting for Naya Young. tampamonitor.com/opinion/ill-...

Putting a pin on a couple of items before looking ahead to next week. Future land use plan update, reimbursement resolutions and municode updates for code enforcement all continued into fall/next year. tampamonitor.com/uncategorize...

I regretfully didn’t catch this and thought it was this week and my mouth is on the floor about the news **from last week** that the TPD Chief signed an agreement with ICE that didn’t require council signing off on.

I had questions about the code enforcement code change on the agenda today, Vacant to Vibrant highlight a few issues and one good change. vibrantplaces.org/2025/08/27/c...

Last Friday on @wmnf.org we had a two-hour special featuring 12 of the 14 candidates in Tampa's special election for City Council District 5 www.wmnf.org/listen-to-ca...

Naya Young won the Tampa Heights Civic Association D5 candidate forum straw poll with 42% of the vote.

Tomorrow is last day to request a mail ballot for the District 5 special election.

Not that a lot of folks are using it (yet?), but I continue to polish the version of the agenda I generate each week. Lot's of improvements under the hood and better formatting for each item. tampamonitor.com/tampa-city-c...

Preview of this week's agendas are up. Headlining Thursday will be the special call land use meeting in the evening revisiting the comp plan update originally presented in May. tampamonitor.com/tampa-city-c...

There were issues raised about some of the grant changes for the CRA and no one wants to come out and say the Sanchez Y Haya project can't move forward and receive funding until they approve the rule change allowing full liquor license for grant awardees.

Got a nice shout out today for this week's post highlighting the deeper issues with Borrell Park and the plight of the unhoused.

I’ve update the post with a link the city’s press release about the work of the Homeless Outreach team.

Quite the coincidence that I touched on the topic of the city and addressing homelessness in this morning's post and then the city posts this press release about the work of the "Homeless Outreach" team 2 hours after the newsletter went out. www.tampa.gov/news/2025-08...

Council is back in full swing this week as the CRA board where they will be approving their $91 million budget. I skip over that and speak to the broader issues of homelessness that stems from an item that might not be discussed. tampamonitor.com/tampa-city-c...

Council is back in full swing this week as the CRA board where they will be approving their $91 million budget. I skip over that and speak to the broader issues of homelessness that stems from an item that might not be discussed. tampamonitor.com/tampa-city-c...

Latest agendas are out and I've posted my version. New feature for land use cases—parsing the "STAFF REPORT FINAL" document and including basic details. Waivers requested, staff finding, etc in a drop-down within the item. Similar to parsing SUMMARY sheets. tampamonitor.com/look-ahead/a...

Filed under opinion. My takeaway from attending the candidate forum hosted by the Hillsborough County Democratic Black Caucus for Dem candidates (in the non-partisan) D5 special election for Tampa City Council.

Carroll West has now qualified and with less than 10 minutes to go, no last minute candidates. Looks like there will be 13 names on the ballot.

13 of the 14 active candidates for the D5 special election have qualified, with one of the 13 qualifying as a write-in. Carroll West just got into the race this week and may qualify before end of business. www.votehillsborough.gov/CANDIDATES/L...

It's a pretty document. If you didn't live in Tampa, it might be informative. I'm ready to see a plan. This is just "data assessment and neighborhood positioning". They do have branding ideas though.

There are 7 chairs set up.

Haven’t had time to read yet, but with Sulphur Springs in the news a lot lately, the “action plan” the city has been working on has released phase 1 www.tampa.gov/document/sul...

A new candidate has entered the field for District 5, Carroll West. Now 14 candidates with the SOE reporting 10 as qualified. I've updated this page with more campaign site links, now only 3 candidates without one. tampamonitor.com/fyi/district...

Final budget workshop wrap up is out. More talk about the future than the currently proposed budget but that's become a pattern for this council. tampamonitor.com/tampa-city-c...

It's really curious how the Tampa Bay Times seems to always get a hold of letters from the mayor to the council chair.