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RODNEY THRASHThe New Tampa Community Council is looking for other events it can hold in the fall to complement the success of its annual "Taste' festival.
NEW TAMPA - Picture this, New Tampa. Hordes of auto fanatics in picnic chairs. Shiny cars moseying down the road. Not just any car, but the classics - Mustangs and Model Ts.
Sometime next fall, this scenario may very well become reality.
The New Tampa Community Council, which hosts the annual Taste of New Tampa every April, wants to pull off another large-scale event. Not in the spring, but in the fall. The group is toying around with several ideas, from a vintage car show to an arts and crafts festival. Whatever they decide, it will be part plug for the council, part community building, council secretary Dr. Todd Wiener said.
Eleven years have passed since a group of New Tampa business leaders formed the council, a community advocacy group. Yet people still don't know what it does.
Oh, that's the group that puts on Taste of New Tampa is a common response, Wiener said.
"The feeling was ... that the Taste for 11 to 12 years has been our most visible event, but it only comes up once a year," Wiener said. "We don't want that to be the only thing we're known for."
More than the Taste, the council meets with city and county officials to advocate for the area's fair share of services, among other things. For example, when Tampa Palms homeowners begged the City Council for an entrance ramp into a proposed shopping complex earlier this year, the community council met with city officials. Ultimately, the city approved the driveway.
"We can't do that with a dozen or so people isolated," Wiener said, a reference to the council's 230 members - barely 1 percent of the nearly 30,000 people that call New Tampa home.
"We want to strengthen the council. We want to increase membership. We want people to feel the council has value to the community."
In addition to raising the council's profile, a fall festival has the potential to bring together people from all corners of New Tampa, people who may not otherwise interact with one another. For example, the Taste draws crowds from all along the Bruce B. Downs corridor, even Pasco County.
"If we can put on additional events and make people part of the New Tampa community, it will fulfill the overall goal of the New Tampa Community Council," Wiener said.
But will it be able to pull off two large scale events in one year?
The council has tried everything from a run-walk to Oktoberfest. But nothing came close to the success of the Taste, which this year netted $57,000 for charity.
"It requires experimenting," Wiener said.
- Rodney Thrash can be reached at 813 269-5313 or rthrash@sptimes.com