With payroll costs steadily rising and property and sales tax revenue declining, the city is facing a projected deficit of more than $35 million in next year's budget. ...more

December 10, 2008

City council members have made it official: The proposed Sangria's Tapas Bar & Restaurant can join Starbucks as a commercial anchor on the Hillsborough Avenue gateway to historical Seminole Heights. ...more

December 10, 2008

With payroll costs steadily rising and property and sales tax revenue declining, the city is facing a projected deficit of more than $35 million in next year's budget. ...more

December 9, 2008

TAMPA Declines in property and sales tax revenue forced the city to lay off workers over the past two years and cut more than $17 million from this year's budget. And the worst may be yet to come. ...more

December 9, 2008

Push TECO To Be Greener After nearly three and a half hours of facts, figures, opinions and pleas, Tampa City Council members Charlie Miranda, Gwen Miller, Thomas Scott and Joseph Caetano voted against delaying approval of the 25-year franchise agreement with Tampa Electric Company. The delay would have given all of us time see and hear the changes sought by President-elect Barack Obama pertaining to energy generation and its effect on climate change as well as the effect the fiscal crises might have on jobs and other opportunities in the near future. The delay would have given concerned citizens and groups time to work with the city and TECO to solve the problems pointed out by the 40-plus people present and the hundreds who communicated with council members with letters and e-mails. ...more

December 6, 2008

A decades-old vision to bring homes, shops and offices to land beside a prominent bend in the Hillsborough River, just north of downtown, took a key step forward Friday when developers broke ground on an office building and riverside boardwalk. ...more

December 6, 2008

The city's Public Nuisance Abatement Board reemerged from oblivion earlier this year, vowing to crack down on the owners of blighted, crime-ridden properties. ...more

December 6, 2008

Efforts to rename the New Tampa Regional Library took a hit Thursday. The Tampa-Hillsborough County Library Board accepted the recommendation of its policies and bylaws committee not to change the name of the library at 10001 Cross Creek Blvd. The review committee decided neither candidate met the criteria to have a library named in their honor. ...more

December 5, 2008

Today, Tampa City Council members will hold the final vote on the city's franchise agreement with Tampa Electric Co. In the last few months members have gone back and forth about approving it, with at least three hoping to use the negotiations to push the utility toward cleaner environmental policies. ...more

December 4, 2008

As they prepare for the opening of the new Tampa Bay History Center along the Garrison Channel, city officials want to return a nearby roadway to its original name. ...more

December 1, 2008