Starbucks - one last time!

The following are some excerpts from close captioned transcripts from the City Council meeting held on 4/14/05 regarding Starbucks


>> Tony Garcia, Planning Commission staff. This location is at the core of three Neighborhood Associations that represent the area. Old Seminole Heights, Southeast Seminole Heights, and South Seminole Heights. Each proposed development in an urban village offers different opportunities to the area and must be viewed on a case-by-case basis, based on location, transportation connections and potential impacts to residential uses. I have labored for the last three years in the Seminole Heights community with both residents and commercial property owners. In developing a potential to bring a rift that's occurred in the last three years in this area, three to five years. There were several of you that were on Council when we went through the Walgreen's debacle. We had a great rift created between the residents and the commercial interests in the area. We also had the save-a-lot a very contentious rezoning along Hillsborough Avenue. What happened as a result of that was a terrible divide between the commercial interests and the residential interest in the area. And I would say a perception had been created and a huge mistrust among all these people in this area which is sad because when you look at Seminole Heights you have three Neighborhood Associations but it is Seminole Heights in its entirety. The greater Seminole Heights community……… On that separate note I had to add what I've gone through in the last three to four years with both commercial interests in the area and residential interests in the area and what I find fascinating is you have at my count by looking through the lobby, you have two Neighborhood Association presidents here that I think are going to be supporting a commercial use, which is unprecedented in the Seminole Heights area. So I think --[ LAUGHTER ] I'm serious when I say that. Because what you're seeing here, you may also see a much greater thing. You may be seeing the potential for some ties here between the residential component and the commercial component that have had some genuine mistrust of what could potentially benefit their area overall and this could be something significant for them in that respect. [ APPLAUSE ]

CITY COUNCIL MEMBER
>>KEVIN WHITE…. I think the people in this audience speak volumes tonight because the old Seminole Heights Civic Association as well as the southeast Seminole Heights Civic Association as well as South Tampa Civic Associations are very, very protective of their neighborhoods. They don't -- South Tampa they don't want trees cut down. And Seminole Heights, code enforcement and conformity to the neighborhood and the character of the neighborhood is paramount in Southeast Seminole Heights and Old Seminole Heights. But to have something come in that does not meet the character of the neighborhood and have both organizations come out in droves to say they support this speaks volumes for these two neighborhoods. And it is an awful ugly site that needs to be developed.

NEIGHBORS
>>My name is Victoria Valdez. …. Seminole Heights is a historic neighborhood, but not a museum neighborhood, only meantto be enjoyed and viewed by passersby on weekends. We are a living breathing, working neighborhood. We need businesses in our neighborhood that will support the economic growth of our neighborhood. And especially a business like Starbucks that I consider to be in keeping with our front porch community style of neighborhood that we have. Where people can meet other friends. They can walk their dogs. They can sit and have a cup of coffee and enjoy Seminole Heights just like we do from our front porches.

>> David Scott Banghart ….. I support Starbucks because, one, I want my coffee…….. You can't have a historic house if that historic house has been burnt down. Economic blight will destroy any history that you have. …… A.R.C. was founded due to public clamor to protect our neighborhoods. But I think in this particular unique -- this unique circumstance, you need to look at the public clamor and let us have Starbucks.

>>Mark ………. The last comment that I'll make, the last point I want to raise, when you guys were running for this wonderful job of yours, you all made statements like crime is bad. Education is good. And probably somewhere along the line, you said I support neighborhoods.That's all we're asking you to do tonight. Thanks.

>> My name is Jeff Craft…….. And I am the president of Seminole Heights business association. I'm a CPA and tomorrow is a big day for me. I'm just a bean counter. But I'm a pretty good bean counter, and one of the things that I've done is just look at the economic impact.We have a piece of property that pretty much is an economically stagnant. I know it pays some real estate taxes. According to my calculations, intangible taxes paid. Tangible taxes paid. City licenses paid. Increased real estate taxes paid. At a minimum, I think there's an extra six to ten thousand dollars a year in revenues coming into various governments and what have you. And over, of course, the next ten years that could be 60 to 100 thousand in new revenues coming into the city governments and what have you. I'm doing what bean counters do, just count beans. Nothing could make this bean counter happier. Than to sit at a Starbucks sniff that wonderful aroma of all those coffee beans and think, they need to be counted.

>>Randy Baron. I am the president of the old Seminole Heights Neighborhood Association. I have to tell you, I am just proud to represent a neighborhood that can turn out this kind of support, support of something that they so vastly and dearly want to have and need to have in this neighborhood..… I don't think that the purpose of the guidelines is to re-create fabric that is gone. It is -- once we've determined that the commercial area is in the district, I think we should use that as an opportunity to attract businesses and make sure that they are compatible with building design, that there is something that when people enter Seminole Heights, they can look at that building and say that's different…...It will bring vastly improved economic development. Anything is better than 25 car lots between Hillsborough Avenueand the river. I counted them. 25 car lots, two restaurants.…..So I urge Council to look at this support including Jeff Craft and the business alliance because this is a historic day when they get together. And understand that we are thirsting, no pun intended but we are thirsting for this development and I urge you to vote in favor.

CITY COUNCIL MEMBERS
>>GWEN MILLER: I would like to say to each and every one of you, I would like to say thank you. You were very understanding. You were patient. You were just wonderful. We have never had so many neighbors to come out on a support of a project that you have done tonight. We want to continue to say to you, stay together, work hard like you've been doing, come back again and be understanding and we are really honored to have you here……….. I would like to say really thank you, thank you, thank you for all that you all are doing.

>>ROSE FERLITA: ………When he (Tony Garcia) said it was unprecedented that all three Seminole Heights areas got together, he's absolutely right. I can attest to that. Many times the interstate was the line of demarcation between Southeast Seminole Heights and Old Seminole Heights. I never could understand why one portion of that community that has so much to offer would stay away from the other instead of uniting. And now all of a sudden, it's an area that is incredible. You've got South Seminole Heights, Southeast Seminole Heights, Old Seminole Heights. I have seen that community come together, be stronger than any of the Civic Associations that I've seen throughout the city. ……Each proposed development in an urban village offers different opportunities to the area and must be viewed -- and I think this is the key -- on a case-by-case basis based on location, transportation connections, potential impacts to residential uses………………..So we have to look at guidelines, but sometimes there are exceptions and we go back to the case by case that we talked about versus your concerns about precedent. So in closing, when you (Bruce Gibson) said -- and this should be my closing as well as yours and we go forward from here, communities must require better to get better. And I submit to you and to this audience that this is what Starbucks is going to do for that community.

>>SHAWN HARRISON: With the possible exception I think of councilman Dingfelder, every single one of us up here represents some of or all of Seminole Heights. And those of us who have been on the Council for more than a couple of years now know that this night is truly unprecedented. We have never seen the type of cooperation, the type of unanimity that we have seen on this particular project. It's really mind-boggling when you think about the history of this particular area

>>LINDA SAUL-SENA: This might be the biggest response we've ever had to a zoning hearing………Tonight is extraordinary, and I have to say that what impressed me the most is the passion of everyone inhere for the betterment of your neighborhood. And I think that it's important to understand that those of us who are skeptical of this proposal is not that we didn't want Starbucks. It's that we really want something that is superb design and oftentimes as you've seen by the previous petitions at Council, if you present things to a petitioner, they come up with something even better. I guess the franchise template is the best we're going to get in this place. But at least it's a Starbucks and not a Checkers. And I think that -- and I think that Bill Duval's suggestion that we look at how we can improve the commercial side of the design guideline so that there will be more and better commercial, I think Seminole Heights is fabulous. You all have worked so hard. Your homes are fabulous. The commercial side needs work. And I think together we can all work to improve the guidelines and make sure that in the future that there are more exciting petitions that everyone can embrace.

>>JOHN DINGFELDER:………..And another thing very persuasive and I don't know who said it, but it was very well said, was that we do go out and talk a lot about supporting neighborhoods, that we support this neighborhood, we support that neighborhood. And I think we really try and support neighborhoods. And in this case, the neighborhood is speaking very loud and clear. And then finally, the best e-mail that I saw in this little packet was from David Banghart who really put it all in perspective and he says: We need Starbucks because we need coffee.

>>MARY ALVAREZ: I want to chime in a little bit here, too, and say that a lot of good comments have been made here tonight and very appropriate and especially the one this young lady said it's a historic district, not a museum. I wholeheartedly concur with that. And design guidelines are just that. Guidelines. So we can tweak the guidelines to make them fit. I don't know what is so historic about a car lot. I just can't support that. I mean, if we can get all those car lots out of this and put some good businesses in there, I think we would really have a good historic district in there.