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Days numbered for notorious Gene's bar

Tampa is buying the business, just to close it down.

By JUSTIN GEORGE
Published February 8, 2007

TAMPA - Gene's bar, an east Tampa institution that served patrons for more than 50 years and has been the target of neighborhood complaints for the last two decades, is finished.

Pending the mayor's signature and City Council approval, which could come as soon as next week, Tampa has agreed to buy the building for $200,000. Gene's, a small concrete building at 22nd Street and E Mallory Avenue, has been blamed as the origin of stabbings, shootings and other crimes over the years. Police were summoned there 137 times last year - about every other day, which was a 51 percent decrease from the year before.

Drug deals went down at Gene's, police said. State alcohol agents raided the bar in 1989, and a bouncer was stabbed to death on Christmas Eve once.

"It's a relief," said City Council member Frank Reddick, whose business is four blocks away. "We have a lot of senior citizens who live in that area, and we have a lot of kids who go back and forth to school. People were afraid of going in and out that area."

Michelle Patty, a longtime community leader, was one. She felt afraid doing business at the nearby Florida Sentinel-Bulletin and said drug dealers outside Gene's have approached her grandchildren, who live two blocks away.

"Finally it's over," she said.

The city will use property tax dollars collected in the neighborhood to buy Gene's, which has a market value of nearly $130,000. A use for the site hasn't been decided, but Reddick said it will be used for a "community purpose."

Gene O'Steen, who has owned the bar for 40 years, said he's happy to have worked out a solution with the City Council, which was aiming to shut down the bar. He said the bar has taken too much blame for east Tampa crime when it's just representative of the problems in the crime-heavy area.

"We did the best job we could do, and we made a lot of friends in the community over a long time," he said. "I'm sorry I have to leave."

Justin George can be reached at 813 226-3368 or jgeorge@sptimes.com.

[Last modified February 8, 2007, 06:29:01]