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Tampa mayor to Gasparilla pirates: 'We're fighting to the death!'

 
Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn laughs with members of Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla on January 24, 2012 at Lykes Gaslight Park in Tampa after refusing to surrender the city to the pirates. "Pirates, nobody occupies my city," he said. Buckhorn will face the pirates again today. [Edmund D. Fountain, Times photo]
Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn laughs with members of Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla on January 24, 2012 at Lykes Gaslight Park in Tampa after refusing to surrender the city to the pirates. "Pirates, nobody occupies my city," he said. Buckhorn will face the pirates again today. [Edmund D. Fountain, Times photo]
Published Jan. 27, 2016

TAMPA — The seafaring scalawags had some nerve.

The pirates of the Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla showed up Tuesday firing cannons in the streets of Tampa. Then, they docked their rolling pirate ship at the curb, stormed into Lykes Gaslight Park and hurled insults as they awaited an audience with Mayor Bob Buckhorn.

They wanted the keys to the city.

"A lot of voters gathered around," said one of the scalawags, nodding at the crowd. "I'd think he should come any time now."

"I think he's huddling in his quarters, scared of the scoundrels we brought with us," said krewe Capt. J. Rex Farrior III.

And so began the annual ritual that heralds this weekend's Gasparilla parade. Grown men dressed as pirates demand the keys and, when rebuffed, vow to return Saturday, steering their Jose Gasparilla up the Seddon Channel between Davis Islands and Harbour Island to the Tampa Convention Center. They'll take the key and celebrate with a parade down Bayshore Boulevard.

When Buckhorn, dressed in a gray plaid suit, showed up at the park, the pirates tried a different tack.

"We salute you as a leader who has demonstrated your prowess to rule," said captain spokesman Robert B. Gough III. "We rejoice with you in your successes, of which you have many. We come in peace, not in war."

But they still wanted the keys.

Now in his fifth year as mayor, Buckhorn certainly has some successes to trumpet and plenty of reasons not to turn them over.

The long-awaited Riverwalk is nearly complete. The Tampa Bay Rays finally have permission from the city of St. Petersburg to search for stadium sites in Hillsborough. Tampa Bay Lightning owner Jeff Vinik and his partners at Cascade Investment LLC are making progress on their $2 billion downtown redevelopment project.

Some headache-inducing issues might make it tempting to turn over control. The persistent flooding in South Tampa, perhaps? Then again, how motivated would pirates be to fix that?

There are personal considerations for Buckhorn, too. The term-limited Democrat has flirted with the idea of running for governor, and rolling over now would leave him vulnerable to charges of being soft on pirate crime.

Buckhorn asked for a vote of the crowd, then proffered his decision: "We are not giving you the keys! We're fighting to the death, and we'll see you on Saturday when we throw one hell of a party!"

Farrior threatened to "lay waste to the city's walls and devastate your finest buildings."

"Bring it on, Gilligan!" Buckhorn said.

Afterward, a Tampa Bay Times reporter asked Buckhorn if he ever thought about offering the pirates a place in city government.

"I think it would be a lot more colorful, a lot less boring, a lot more alcohol and a lot less productivity, but they would have fun.

"I'd be happy to make them all Florida state legislators."

Contact Tony Marrero at tmarrero@tampabay.com or (813) 226-3374. Follow @tmarrerotimes.