Mary Mulhern Thank You Party

Tampa City Council member Mary Mulhern will hold a thank you party for her supporters.

Friends - Rochelle A. Reback, Jane Gibbons, Gary Gibbons, Yvonne Yolie Capin - are hosting a Thank You Party for me at the end of my 8 years on Tampa City Council. It is as much an opportunity for me to thank YOU for your support! Hope you can make it. No contribution and NO GIFTS.

WHEN: Wednesday, March 18

5:00pm - 7:00pm

WHERE: Gaspars Grotto

1805 E 7th Ave, Tampa, Florida 33605

Mary Mulhern to Speak to Occupy Tampa

I stressed the importance of electing a progressive like Mary Mulhern to the Tampa City Council. This is the result of backing progressive candidates.
Mulhern will speak to Occupy Tampa this Wednesday.

It's official: Tampa City Council Member Mary Mulhern will address Occupy Tampa tomorrow (Wednesday) at 7pm directly before the General Assembly meeting at Curtis Hixon. She will help illuminate the process of dealing with the City and dispel some misguided rumors floating around as well as answer questions from the group. This is part of an important process of creating a dialogue with the City of Tampa as these protests continue to grow locally and nationally. If you are interested in speaking to a city-wide representative who votes on issues that could affect this group, please attend this meeting.

The other option is you can follow the Joy-Ann Reid strategy of backing conservative Democrats like Ben Nelson. Reid did an amazingly asinine post pointing out that Nelson votied against the jobs bill. Reid then stressed it is essential that Nelson get re-elected. I ask you, would you rather have Democrats like Mulhern or Nelson. To me the choice is obvious.

Is Light Rail Going to TIA?

The Tampa International Airport has been resistant to a light rail line going to the airport. TIA officials said they don't have the space; which very well be true. What is interesting is recent developments have caused TIA to reconsider a light rail line going into the airport. Tampa City Council members Mary Mulhern and Joe Caetano have expressed a desire to have a light rail stop at the airport. David Armijo, executive director of the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority, said he has had requests to extend the line to the airport.

"Adding the segment into the airport will require more environmental and engineering work and will add more time," he said. "However, it would appear that, subject to the review process, that is the No. 1 request from the stakeholders and the public. … HART is now working on estimating the cost to add this to the project review."

I wonder why the change of heart from TIA. Obviously, members of the Tampa City Council and Hartline are big supporters of light rail. Mayor Pam Iorio and Hillsborough County Commissioner Mark Sharpe have been pushing for light rail for years. I'm wondering about the politics, but it seems some people did some very delicate behind-the-scenes arm-twisting to TIA. Personally, a think a light rail line to TIA makes sense.

In related news: the U.S. Conference of Mayors released a report saying the Orlando to Tampa rail line would add $3 billion to the Central Florida economy each year. I haven't read the report so I won't comment on the numbers. I will add is I-4 is a traffic nightmare. Anything to help aleviate the gridlock is a good thing.

Light rail won't be the only answer. Eventually, the economy will rebound and people will start moving back to Central Florida. That means the need for more roads, schools, and other infrastructure. The Florida tax base can't fund schools during good economic times. Gridlock is going to get worse in future years. The Florida government needs to talk about infrastructure and gridlock asap.

Alan Grayson Event

Congressman Alan Grayson will speak to the Hillsborough County Democrats. Other speakers will be Tampa City Council Member Mary Mulhern and potential Tampa City Mayor candidate Jim Davis. You can get more information on the Facebook page. A $50.00 donation is required.

Join us for an afternoon to honor

CONGRESSMAN ALAN GRAYSON
in Tampa on THIS Saturday, January 16

EVENT TIME & LOCATION:
Saturday, January 16th from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m.

824 S. Orleans Ave.
Tampa, FL 33606

The Host Committee being formed. Hosts so far include:
Tom & Linda Scarritt
Tampa City Council Member Mary Mulhern
Larry Biddle
Aaron Smith
Congressman Jim Davis
The Hillsborough County Young Democrats
Pat Kemp

The Chutzpah of Pam Iorio

Everyone with a basic knowledge of the legislative process understands all budgets contain financial line items of financial statements. Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio submitted a budget to the Tampa City Council with no line items. The City Council knew Iorio wanted to spend $754 million for city needs. The City Council had no idea what those needs were. This is where things take a turn for the hysterical. Iorio's office said they did not put the line items in the budget because they wanted to save money on paper. The City Council wasn't buying that nonsense.

"It doesn't serve any public purpose for us not to have transparency," council member Mary Mulhern said at a budget workshop on Thursday. "The devil's in the details. We need to see the details."

The bogus green claim claimed. Finance director Bonnie Wise got more blunt and said the law doesn't require budgets with line items.

"I was kind of taken aback," Scott said.

Chief of Staff Darrell Smith said they were just trying to save costs. This has to be the worst spin I have heard. Iorio didn't want the City Council to pick her budget apart. Mulhern says at much.

"They don't want anyone to question their appropriations," Mulhern said after the meeting, although she declined to speculate on why that might be. "The fact they didn't want us to see it makes me suspicious."

It is bad when a Democrat is making such a statement about a Democratic Mayor. This takes amazing Chutzpah for a Mayor to submit a budget without financial statements and claim it is a cost-cutting move. Wow.

Mary Mu

Hillsborough County comission candidate Kevin Beckner has been endorsed by Mary Mulhern.

More Seats At the Table

Republican blogger Jim Johnson points to a William March post about Patrick Manteiga and Doris Weatherford starting a petition drive to add more members to the Hillsborough County Commission. Their group is called Citizens for Equal County Representation.

It is not clear how many commisioners CFECR wish to add. They do wish to rid the Hillborough County Commission of the three county-wide seats.

And finally, she said, if the petition drive for a county mayor is successful, “It would not be wise to have at-large commissioners who might challenge his/her authority.”

It would be rather redundant.

Jim correctly points out that the county's growth demands more seats. Here are Census numbers from 1960 to 2000.

1960 - 397,788
1970 - 490,265
1980 - 646,960
1990 - 834,054
2000 - 998,948



The Republican members of the commission will resist this idea.

In other news: Tampa City Council member Mary Mulhern wants the Hillsborough County Environmental Protection Commission to add two board members from City Council and one each from the Plant City commission and Temple Terrace city council. Temple Terrace Mayor Joe Affronti and environmental activist Mariella Smith are supportive of the idea. No one will be shocked that Brian Blair hates it.

"I don't think it's broken," Blair said. "Why fix it?"

Pam Iorio is another pol that is unsupportive. I never viewed her as a green Democrat. She was dragged kicking and screaming into signing the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement. Her office then sent out a hysterically defensive and rambling press release.

Mulhern needs a sponsor in the state legislature to add more seats. Jim Norman wants to lump Tampa Sports Authority and the Hillsborough Planning Commission into the legislation. Mulhern is against this. She has a difficult task with the Mayor and Blair against her. I hate to see this be another good idea that dies.

Mary Mulhern Victory Party

Campaign manager Mitch Kates speaks at Mary Mulhern victory party. He is a raising star. He guided Mulhern and Justice to victory while being vastly outspent.

Mary Mulhern Wins

Congratulations to Mary Mulhern for winning the winning the the district 2 Tampa City council race. Democrat John Dingfelder also won. Democrats I'm not too fond of like Gwen Miller, Tom Scott and Pam Iorio won.

Jim Johnson liveblogged the election and has the play by play details. I can safely say after the election that I thought Shawn Harrison's money advantage was going to give him the edge. So I can't get on Jim getting the Mulhern/Harrison race wrong. Wow, Harrison is even more of a sucky candidate than I imagined.

The good news for the left is we got a progressive on the City Council.