Tampabay: Malls' firm top pick for Pier

ST. PETERSBURG -- The company that runs the Citrus Park and Brandon Town Center malls should also run St. Petersburg's Pier tourist attraction in Tampa Bay, city staffers recommend.

"Some of our objectives were to get more traffic at The Pier and try to reduce the subsidy," said city purchasing director Louis Moore, who worked with the committee of city executives that chose Urban Retail Properties Co. "If we can reduce the subsidy, we can turn that money into other Pier improvements."

Hiring Urban would be a change. For more than 10 years, William H. Griffith has run the city-owned attraction, the past seven under a contract with a corporation he formed just for the purpose.

City taxpayers kick in about $1.3-million every year because rents from the shops and other revenue fall far short of paying the attraction's operating expenses. Griffith has said repeatedly that he cannot reduce the subsidy significantly, and that was a big reason the city decided to seek competing proposals instead of simply renewing his contract when it expires in September.

Besides Griffith's proposal to stay in charge, the executive committee also considered three other companies that wanted to take over.

The committee picked Urban and another large retail management company, Divaris Real Estate, in June as the two best. They selected Urban as the top choice Monday.

Moore said large firms have an advantage: They can use their corporate resources to help run The Pier, saving the city money.

"The current management, because it's just a one-person firm, they have to do the payroll and they pass the cost back," Moore said. "Urban, on the other hand, they will centralize their payroll in their Chicago headquarters, so it won't cost us any money."

Urban thinks it can save $688,588 per year by cutting expenses and adding portable merchandise kiosks to bring in more rent.

If Mayor Rick Baker endorses his staff's recommendation, he will ask the City Council to give Urban the contract Aug. 16.

Some see The Pier as a stale collection of taxpayer-subsidized, cluttered shops pushing cheap trinkets on tourists. Others call it a charming group of thriving local businesses providing a relief from chain-store homogeny.

Former Pier staffer Betty Blanks is helping to lead a last-ditch effort to lobby the mayor and City Council to keep Griffith in charge. She and others have collected hundreds of signatures on a petition.

Blanks fears Urban will ruthlessly cut costs, clear out local tenants in favor of national and regional ones and turn the upside-down pyramid into a bland mall.

"It is so unique that it would be such a shame to change it," Blanks says.

Deborah Brown, who owns three shops there -- Peppers at The Pier, Gingerbread House and DD Collectibles -- agreed.

"There are two constant things we hear from people," she said. "They love the stores because they are not mall stores, and everybody brings their out-of-town company here. People love to show it off because it doesn't resemble a mall in any way, shape or form."

But while Urban envisions changing the mix of tenants, it has proposed to operate The Pier as a "festival retail" location like Navy Pier in Chicago or Faneuil Hall in Boston, not a mall. It will try to get new tenants like Ritz One Hour Photo, the Devil Rays Dugout Store, Haagen-Dazs and Caribou Coffee.

The company wrote to the city that it wants "to incorporate a balance of national, regional and local retailers in the merchandising mix," adding that "unique tenants that support a tourist destination and that will appeal to local residents will be sought."

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