Months of undercover wooing helped lure the Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. to the region.
By STEVE HUETTEL
Published May 28, 2004
TAMPA - Project Flo was launched with a call from a Dallas consultant about a secret client looking to expand somewhere in the Southeast.
Over the next 18 months, the undercover wooing of the anonymous company came to include a date at the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, talks between unidentified company executives and dozens of business and government leaders, a call to the company's boss from Gov. Jeb Bush, and a final batch of financial incentives to give Tampa the edge over Atlanta.
Project Flo culminated earlier this week with the announcement that Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. will set up a major operation center in New Tampa.
Owned by major banks, broker/dealers, mutual funds and stock exchanges that use its services, DTCC handles trillions of dollars in trades for the securities industry. It is the largest U.S. clearinghouse for transactions in stocks, bonds and government-backed and mortgage-backed securities.
The selection of Tampa for DTCC's only operations center outside its Manhattan home will bring 500 jobs by the end of 2007, with an average annual salary of about $72,000.
But that's only the direct impact. DTCC's move into New Tampa will attract spin-off jobs for technology firms and bring more brand-name financial services companies, experts say.
Hillsborough County already has recruited big-name players in financial services, such as MetLife, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Salomon Brothers and Capital One. The strategy is to build a financial services "cluster" that will attract more.
DTCC is like a utility company for the securities industry, immune from the ups and downs that buffet a single company or sector, said Peter Lewis of JPMorgan Chase Treasury Technologies, based in Hillsborough County.
"The fact they came to Tampa sends a very clear signal we're going to put ourselves out to get the best players here," Lewis said.
Economic development specialists for the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce and the Tampa Bay Partnership spend lots of time talking up the area to corporate relocation consultants. One of their top themes is promoting Hillsborough County as "Wall Street South."
One consultant, Dallas' Partners National Real Estate, called the Tampa chamber in November 2002 seeking preliminary information for a client. To avoid alarming a company's employees, protocol dictates that consultants not name their clients, and chamber staffers don't ask, said Robin Ronne, the chamber's economic development director.
At about the same time, a DTCC vice president responded to a magazine ad by the Tampa Bay Partnership, which promotes a seven-county region. Anthony Savarese told partnership staffers he was with DTCC but didn't want the company considered a relocation "lead," said Stuart Rogel, the partnership's chief executive.
The group invited Savarese and his wife to town for a weekend of briefings and to watch the inaugural Grand Prix of St. Petersburg in February of 2003. Savarese introduced himself only as "Tony," Rogel said.
By early summer, Tampa was on a short list that included Atlanta and Jacksonville. About a dozen insiders - in the partnership, the chamber and local government - learned then that the target was DTCC.
That triggered the first of more than a dozen visits by DTCC executives over the next few months.
They talked with the bosses at the county school district. They toured neighborhoods from Carrollwood to FishHawk Ranch in Brandon to Mirabella in south Hillsborough. They went on a helicopter tour to see how landmarks such as the University of South Florida, downtown and the Interstate 75 corridor fit together.
A key piece was interviews with financial services firms - more than a half-dozen - that already had moved to Tampa, many from New York.
Still anonymous to all but their chamber hosts, DTCC officials were impressed that Tampa was the New York Yankees' spring training home, said Irv Cohen, president of JPMorgan Chase Treasury Technologies. Their biggest concern was getting qualified workers locally, he said.
"You don't want to be the experiment," he said.
By late February of this year, the search had narrowed to Tampa and Atlanta. Bush called Jill Considine, DTCC's chief executive, to lobby for Tampa. Hillsborough County and Tampa pledged $1-million in "premier business" incentives above the $500,000 DTCC already qualified for under a state program.
Then legislators put $10-million into a "quick-closing" fund designed to tip the scales in favor of Florida communities recruiting companies. Unlike programs offering tax refunds, the new fund provides cash for any expansion or relocation cost.
State Sen. Tom Lee, R-Brandon, said Tampa officials told him DTCC needed about $5-million to close the gap between offers from Tampa and Atlanta.
Bush said Tuesday he would give DTCC $2.2-million this year and go for an additional $2.2-million from the fund next year.
Incentives were an important part of the decision, said DTCC spokesman Stuart Goldstein, but not the key.
"It's about the overall business environment toward folks coming in from the outside," he said.
