NEW PORT RICHEY — Some big changes are coming in 2016, says City Manager Debbie Manns. First and foremost, is the Sims Park Grand Reopening Celebration, which is coming 12:30 p.m. Jan. 30, Manns recently told the audience at Greater New Port Richey Main Street Lunch and Learn. The park has been closed since June. The…
ST. PETERSBURG — Mayor Rick Kriseman wants to make one thing clear: at least $5 million is headed to the impoverished neighborhoods of south St. Petersburg from the Tampa Bay Rays deal — regardless of whether the team stays or goes. And that $5 million is just a down payment, he said Tuesday. The predominantly African-American community…
West Palm’s Community Redevelopment Agency wants to hire a company to set up a design competition to re-imagine the city waterfront and downtown. “The city wishes to evaluate, imagine, plan and design for continued growth along the West Palm Beach Waterfront that will help to grow the economic base of the city.” At today’s 3…
Lonnie Ballard, assistant city manager over development and transportation, resigned today. Ballard — whose last day will be Jan. 29 — led the Aviation, Public Works, Growth Management, Planning Land and Community Enhancement and Economic and Community Development departments since former City Manager Anita Favors Thompson hired him in April 2014. Ballard also provided oversight to the Capital…
FROSTPROOF — Building a grocery store, improving roads and attracting Dunkin’ Donuts topped the list of projects a potential Community Redevelopment Agency should work on, according to residents. Before city commissioners vote on whether to form a CRA, the Central Florida Regional Planning Council held a workshop Monday to get community input for what problems…
Port St. Lucie, a disparate series of residential developments and strip malls, had little to boast beyond its proximity to a nuclear plant and its fame as the spring training home of the New York Mets. Then Lily Zhong came to town, plunked down $500,000 for vacant land and promised to finally build a real…
SPRINGFIELD — Springfield commissioners want 2016 to be the year the city comes clean. “We need to get everything in this city cleaned up,” Commissioner Phillip Dykes said during a recent board meeting. “Things have been let go in Springfield. We need to get to work on our city.” As a result, the commission is…
BRADENTON — In its first workshop since assuming control of three community redevelopment agencies, the Bradenton City Council inched forward this week with the transition, focusing mostly on creating a new economic development department. The goal is to create the department and hire an economic development director to work closely with the CRAs and the…
CRYSTAL RIVER — So this is what Main Street looks like. Quaint downtown shops and restaurants, signs along a landscaped-divided U.S. 19 that point out parking and areas of interest, a boardwalk along the bay that intersect with bike trails, and decorative crosswalks to get visitors safely from one side of the highway to the other.…
ST. PETERSBURG — For decades, the three vacant buildings have been encased in aluminum grillwork that makes them look like enormous cheese graters. As the rest of downtown roars back to life, the block they sit on remains a dead zone in the heart of the city. But that soon could change. Once-warring owners of…
ST. PETERSBURG — The frontiers of condominium development in downtown St. Petersburg continue to push farther south and westward. With Beach Drive condos in short supply and extremely pricey, the proposed eight-story, 20-unit Vela near Fourth Avenue S and Seventh Street will bill itself as a more affordable, if less central, alternative. “There’s not a…
TAMPA — Strategic Property Partners went out to bid Friday for a contractor to do up to $35 million worth of work on roads, utilities and amenities for its $2 billion downtown redevelopment project. “To get the master infrastructure in place” is “going to be the first tangible sign of major progress that you’re going…
