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A big party pooper, or just awash in prudence?
By HOWARD TROXLER
Published February 6, 2005
The honeymoon is long gone in Tampa. The mayor, already halfway through her (first?) four-year term, is past the easy stuff such as announcing goals (City of the Arts, Riverwalk) and getting rid of predecessor Dick Greco's old buddies.
Now the going gets tougher. Pam Iorio is presiding over her first big-time showdown with some of the most powerful, influential and wealthy people in town. They are eager to get started on building a new, long-planned Tampa Museum of Art.
Yet the same mayor who preached the Rise of the Creative Class for Tampa might well end up presiding over the collapse of a museum idea for which private supporters have raised an impressive $43-million. At the risk of sounding un-arty, that is a lot of jack to spurn.
This episode is going to define her. She is going to come out of this either as the Prudent Mayor Who Did It Right, or the Party-Pooper Mayor Who Ruined It.
To summarize the parties' positions, taking brutal editorial license:
Museum backers
Grr! We've raised 43-million clams. We've set aside extra dough to run the joint just in case it opens and falls short, which we don't think it's gonna do anyway. The bank says we look good for the construction financing. We even just got an extension until April 11 before the price tag jumps.
But Mayor Goody Two-Shoes here keeps hem-hawing over whether the city is satisfied. The target keeps moving. A lot of us think she secretly hates the whole thing because it was Dick Greco's baby, and she'd just as soon let it die and come up with her own, scaled-down museum. A soulless box, no doubt.
Pam Iorio
Honest to goodness, I'm not trying to kill what the city agreed to under Dick Greco, even the "urban canopy" on Ashley Drive. All I'm saying is that before we leap into this deal, which is going to cost $72-million if we're lucky, we have to have it totally nailed down, including an iron-clad commitment from the bank. Remember, the costs of the project have grown beyond the supporters' ability to line up pledges. So if they come up with the money, the city is in the deal, fair and square. If they don't, we can't do it.
Museum backers (rebuttal)
Your lips say maybe, maybe, maybe, but your deeds say no, no, no. We are THIS close to making this work, and if you were out there pitching in, instead of acting like your finger is poised on the "Eject" button, maybe we'd already be breaking ground.
You get the general picture.
This is quite a culture shock for Tampa, having a political leader looking askance at big-deal ideas. This is a community that either on the city or county level, or both, over the years plunged into the Tampa Convention Center, Harbour Island (remember the people mover!), the Florida Aquarium, the St. Pete Times Forum, Raymond James Stadium, Centro Ybor and its associated debt-bomb parking garages, trolleys and, let us not forget, kicked in $30-million-plus for Mr. Steinbrenner's baseball team to play spring training.
True, a mere art museum is not nearly as big a deal as some of those projects. But considering the pledges in hand, and the operating revenues estimated even conservatively, the museum is starting off on firmer ground. (Heck, compared to St. Petersburg's decision in the 1980s to build Tropicana Field without a baseball team, the museum's numbers look like gold under armed guard in Fort Knox.)
It is late in the game, but poopy naysayers (like me) point out that Tampa might be better served with a more modest project, fitting in with overall downtown plans. There even could be a new focus on expanding the museum's permanent collection, which, not that I am Joe Art Expert or anything, everybody says is not exactly up to MOMA standards.
Yes, late in the game - but, like it or not, this deal could collapse. If so, the mayor's job will be to lead the way to a new deal and placate $43-million worth of poohbahs, preferably with a plan that doesn't take a decade, if she wants to approach a second term vindicated as Prudent Pam instead of Party-Pooper Pam. Piece of cake, really.
[Last modified February 6, 2005, 00:21:17]
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