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Neighborhood Report

Commission hopefuls separated by funding, name recognition

In the District 1 County Commission race, newcomer Mary Mulhern faces Tampa's Rose Ferlita.

By S.I. ROSENBAUM
Published October 13, 2006

You see a flash of green by the side of U.S. Highway 41 in Ruskin: a squadron of life-sized cardboard women, each wearing a neon-green jacket and holding a cardboard sign emblazoned with the name Mary Mulhern.

But wait! One of them's not cardboard at all!

It's Mulhern herself, sweating in the afternoon heat, wearing the same neon-green jacket and waving at passing drivers.

She won't say where she bought the cardboard likenesses. She doesn't want other candidates copying her. But she will tell you that the trademark green jacket is from Stein Mart, 75 percent off on the clearance rack.

Her roadside campaign for District 1 county commissioner reveals several things about Mulhern: She's competitive. She has an artist's eye. And despite being a Democrat, she prides herself on being a fiscal conservative.

Mulhern, 47, is campaigning against two-term Tampa City Council member Rose Ferlita, a Republican and Tampa native with a hefty war chest. District 1 hugs Tampa Bay west of Interstate 75 in southeastern Hillsborough County and extends northwest into Tampa.

At 60, Ferlita is an experienced small-business woman who has run her own pharmacy, Rose Drugs, since 1984.

Her last name carries weight in Tampa, where people still remember her father, Joseph Ferlita, giving free bread to customers during the Depression.

She has no children and three dogs, one of whom often shows up at campaign events in a T-shirt that reads, "Vote for my mom!"

Mulhern, a first-time candidate with less name recognition, no local roots and less money to spend, could end up outgunned by Ferlita.

But she remains undaunted.

"We don't have a lot of money," she says. "So we have to be smart and creative."

Creativity comes naturally to Mulhern, a fine arts major who worked for years as an administrator at the Art Institute of Chicago.

She moved to Tampa nine years ago to marry a man she met on a trans-Atlantic flight, advertising executive Cameron Dilley. The two live in South Tampa.

About four years ago, Mulhern began a graphic design business, which she said is just starting to be profitable.

Politics runs in her family. Her father was a city council member in a Detroit suburb. Her brother is married to the governor of Michigan.

As a county commissioner, she said her top priority would be growth management.

"One of the things that inspired me to run was the runaway growth," she said. "There did not seem to be appropriate planning. ... It wasn't paying its fair share."

She said that the process for approving a development seems to favor developers, not communities, since developers can appeal decisions that go against them. But residents have no way of appealing a decision they don't like.

"There's relief for business interests but no relief for the community," Mulhern said. "I don't know if we could change the procedures, but I'd like to take a look at it."

She has other ideas, such as holding development meetings at night so more working residents could attend, or even holding them in the community that would be affected by development. "Those aren't really radical ideas," she said.

She criticized Ferlita, pointing out that Ferlita has accepted donations from developers.

"I will not be funded by development interests," she said.

Ferlita countered that those donations don't determine her vote. And her record as a City Council member backs her up, she said.

"I would venture to say if you looked at everybody's record, straight across the board, I would be in the minority that has voted the most against development in South Tampa," she said. "My opponent needs to do her homework."

Indeed, Ferlita has voted against developers on many projects, sometimes going against the council's majority.

Like Mulhern, Ferlita is also campaigning against unchecked growth. She said she would decide development questions on a case-by-case basis, "based on what the infrastructure can support, not on what the developer wants."

But her top issue is public safety.

"We come home and get to sleep and the police officers take care of us," she said. "It's the area where the most is done and the most is taken for granted. ... I want to continue to protect the men and women who protect us."

She said she would preserve funding for the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office as well as Hillsborough County Fire Rescue.

"It's the most important thing for any community," she said.

Ferlita said she would also look to lower taxes and millage rates, although she wouldn't rule out increasing them as a last resort.

"The trend should continue to be reduction of millage," she said.

Mulhern said she thought taxpayers should have gotten more relief this year, but said raising or lowering taxes would depend on the financial circumstances of the county.

In Ruskin a few weeks ago, motorists drove past a Ferlita billboard only to confront Mulhern and her legion of cardboard look-alikes at the side of the road. As cars whizzed by, Mulhern waved. All the cardboard versions of Mulhern, held by volunteers, also waved.

In the end, Mulhern said, campaigning is "not about issues so much, as your name being written really big."

S.I. Rosenbaum can be reached at 661-2442 or srosenbaum@sptimes.com.

[Last modified October 12, 2006, 07:57:56]