Regent may face state review
By From staff reports
Published: October 05, 2011

http://www2.tbo.com/news/news/2011/oct/05/menewso5-regent-may-face-state-review-ar-262848/

TAMPA — Hillsborough County commissioners have asked the state Joint Legislative Auditing Committee to review funding and operations at The Regent, a controversial community center near Brandon.

Commission Chairman Al Higginbotham sent a letter last week to state Sen. Jim Norman, chairman of the audit committee and a former Hillsborough commissioner, asking for the review of the center. Built with county, state and federal money, The Regent was sold to government officials as a community center and hurricane shelter. After the building was finished in January, however, it was criticized because of its lavish decor and lack of accessibility for ordinary residents.

Commissioner Victor Crist, a former state senator, suggested at the Sept. 21 commission meeting that the audit committee look at the center. Crist made the suggestion after a county auditor reported that $35,000 in county money had been spent on consultants and other inappropriate uses during construction. Commissioners asked the board running The Regent to return the money.

“From the holistic perspective, we really need to have the full bird’s-eye view of what this deal is and what has really taken place,” Crist said at the meeting, “and the best way to do that is to send a formal request from this board to the state Legislature and ask that the Joint Legislative Auditing Committee look into this matter.”

Commissioner Sandy Murman is also scheduling meetings with The Regent’s board to discuss the future management of the center. Murman has suggested that Hillsborough Community College, which owns the building, also operate it.

Platt Street to Close for 120 Days

Posted: 4:00 AM

  • By: Heather Gordon

Hillsborough County officials will hold a meeting Tuesday to discuss the upcoming closure of the Platt Street Bridge in downtown Tampa.

District 1 County Commissioner Sandra L. Murman and other city and county staff will be leading the Community Information Open House Meeting beginning at 6 p.m. The meeting will be held at the Freedman Tennis Court Center at 59 Columbia Drive, Davis Islands.

At the Open House, citizens will be able to hear a briefing and visit information stations to find alternate commuting options and to provide comment.

The Platt Street Bridge will be closed beginning Monday, October 3, and is scheduled to remain closed for 105 days. Officials say the closure is necessary as part of the required rehabilitation of the bridge to allow the contractor to open the drawbridge and perform replacement work on its components. The full project is expected to be completed in the spring of 2012.

For more information on Alternate Routes, call the City of Tampa at (813) 274-8333.

For more information on the Platt St. Bridge Project, call Hillsborough County at (813) 635-5400.

Detailed information can be found on online at www.hillsboroughcounty.org/publicworks/traffic/platt.

Read more: http://www.abcactionnews.com/dpp/news/region_tampa/platt-street-bridge-to-close-for-105-days#ixzz1Z9m2yFcE

By Shelley Rossetter, Times Staff Writer

In Print: Friday, August 26, 2011

St. Pete Times

http://www.tampabay.com/news/humaninterest/former-ruskin-firehouse-is-one-yes-away-from-becoming-cultural-center/1187790

 

RUSKIN — A former fire station could become a community arts center by January, thanks to $100,000 allocated by commissioners in next year’s tentative Hillsborough County budget.

The opening of the Ruskin Firehouse Cultural Center hangs on the approval of the county’s fiscal 2012 budget, which will be voted on in September. If approved, the money would go toward improvements at the fire station on First Avenue, which was vacated by the county for a new one this year, said Sandy Council, president of the Ruskin Community Development Foundation, which is handling the project.

Construction would start as soon as the money was approved.

“A lot hinges on the final vote of the budget,” Council said. “We’re moving ahead as if that’s going to happen.”

As the first of its kind in the South Shore area, the cultural center would provide access to a wide selection of arts, Council said.

“It’s not just going to be visual art,” she said. “There will be theater, music, the whole spectrum.”

Meeting rooms would be available for rent, and the building would accommodate classes, workshops and visiting artists.

The fire station, which is owned by the county, would be leased to the foundation, which submitted a business plan and is awaiting final approval from the county, Council said.

Renovations planned for the building include bringing the facility up to code and making it handicap accessible. Council estimates that will cost at least $70,000.

In addition to the county’s money, the foundation is set to receive $60,000 from the Foundation of Greater Sun City Center once it gains possession of the center, Council said. Keller Williams and the South Shore Arts Council have donated an additional $6,000 toward the project.

It’s something the community has been seeking for a while, said Commissioner Sandy Murman, who helped secure the money for the center, which is in her district.

“Ruskin has often been overlooked,” she said. “This is going to be a good addition to south Hillsborough County.”

Though the center’s money is not part of the $2.5 million set aside by commissioners for the restoration of historical properties, the discussion that led to that fund also benefitted the center, Murman said.

Public outcry over the amount of money spent at the Regent, she said, brought attention to the need for community centers in other areas.

People in the arts community are excited, said Nina Tatlock, co-director of Big Draw Studios, an art studio in Ruskin.

“For the community, it will be a place where things can happen,” said Tatlock, who also serves on the foundation’s committee. “It’s where people from the community can come to participate in the arts, which we feel is an enrichment to the community.”

Besides drawing more attention to the arts in South Shore, supporters hope the center will create more interest in the area.

“The Ruskin area has great potential for economic development,” Murman said. “This could be the focus, the hub of where it starts.”

Shelley Rossetter can be reached at srossetter@sptimes.com or (813) 661-2442.

By MIKE SALINERO | The Tampa Tribune
Published: August 17, 2011
Updated: August 17, 2011 – 10:30 PM

TAMPA 

 

Usually one of the calmer, more-demure Hillsborough County commissioners, Sandy Murman broke out of character Wednesday when a fellow board member suggested delaying an ordinance to shut down internet sweepstakes cafés.

Murman made the motion to ban the cafés, which she described as illegal gambling operations that feature computerized slot machines. The county sheriff’s office also supports a ban.

But Commissioner Victor Crist, raising the specter of lawsuits by the café owners, urged caution and suggested the county appoint a work group that included sweepstakes café owners to study the issue.

“I am totally surprised at what’s come out of your mouth,” Murman almost shouted at Crist, who served with her in the Florida Legislature. She pointed out that Crist had served for years on the state Senate Committee on Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations.

“You can’t sit at the table and try to work out a consensus with people that promote illegal gambling,” she said.

After long debate, Crist withdrew his motion and the board voted 7-0 to have the county attorney draw up an ordinance banning the cafés. A public hearing on the matter will be held sometime in coming months.

The cafés have proliferated in Hillsborough as adjoining counties have moved to shut them down. Murman said there are now 25 operating in the unincorporated areas of the county, and an unknown number in Tampa.

The businesses, which often locate in strip malls, sell internet time on computers. Patrons get phone cards that allow them to participate in sweepstakes contests that are just like playing a slot machine on a computer.

Chris Brown, a lawyer with the sheriff’s office, said the video sweepstakes games meet the state’s legal definition of slot machines, which are largely prohibited in Florida.

“They are illegal gambling,” Brown said.

But the cafés have persisted because of the ambiguity of state gambling law, Brown said. The law’s loopholes make it difficult to successfully prosecute café owners, who often fight back with civil lawsuits.

Defenders of the cafés say they are no different than the sweepstake cards that some businesses give to customers who buy something.

Jacksonville attorney Kelly B. Mathis, representing a not-for-profit called Allied Veterans, said Brown mislead the commission about the legality of the cafés.

“No judge has ever held that they are illegal, that they’re slot machines,” Mathis said after the meeting. Mathis said the veterans group, which operates about 40 internet cafés in Florida, would welcome “reasonable regulation.”

Commissioner Mark Sharp asked whether the board should wait to see if the Legislature passes clarifying legislation to the gambling statute next year. But Commissioner Kevin Beckner, citing the Legislature’s failure to deal with personal injury protection insurance fraud, nixed the idea.

“We need to protect our own community and not wait for Tallahassee to act,” Beckner said. “We have that responsibility as legislators up here to do what we feel are in the best interest of our community.”

Hillsborough County News

August 1, 2011

Contact: Commissioner Sandra L. Murman’s office, (813) 272-5470


Hillsborough Commissioner Sandra Murman Hosts Community Office Hours On August 5

 

Hillsborough County Commissioner Sandra L. Murman, District 1, is hosting office hours in the community to hear from residents without them having to travel to County Center in downtown Tampa.

 

Commissioner Murman and her staff welcome this opportunity to meet residents and to discuss their thoughts and concerns on various projects and community issues taking place in Hillsborough County.

 

No appointment is necessary to meet with Commissioner Sandra Murman and her staff. Residents are seen on a first-come, first-served basis.

 

The community office hours are:

 

Friday, August 5

11 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Jan K. Platt Library

3910 S. Manhattan Ave. in Tampa

Witt Community Room