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A city-only transportation referendum? House candidates in South Tampa are all over the map

 
The three candidates in Florida House District 60, which covers South Tampa and coastal areas around the bay from Dana Shores to Ruskin, have varying opinions on whether the Legislature should let Tampa hold a city-only referendum on a sales tax for transportation. [Times files] 
The three candidates in Florida House District 60, which covers South Tampa and coastal areas around the bay from Dana Shores to Ruskin, have varying opinions on whether the Legislature should let Tampa hold a city-only referendum on a sales tax for transportation. [Times files] 
Published Aug. 24, 2016

TAMPA — For most of the years he's been mayor, Bob Buckhorn's wish list for the Florida Legislature consistently has included one thing: The chance for the city of Tampa to hold its own transportation sales tax referendum.

He hasn't been alone. In 2013, the mayors of Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Miami, Hialeah, Jacksonville and Fort Lauderdale came together to lobby for the proposal. They didn't get anywhere in a Republican-led Legislature with a dim view of tax initiatives.

And there's no guarantee that the race to replace Dana Young in state House District 60 will elect a new legislator who is friendly to the idea.

Both Republicans in Tuesday's primary for District 60, which covers South Tampa and coastal areas of Hillsborough from Dana Shores to Ruskin, say transportation is a priority.

But when the topic came up this month at the politics-focused Cafe Con Tampa breakfast group, neither embraced the idea.

Development lawyer Ron Weaver asked one candidate, construction company owner Rebecca Smith, whether she would support allowing Tampa or St. Petersburg or maybe both to hold their own referendums.

In her answer to Weaver and then after the breakfast, Smith said a lot would depend on hearing from voters directly that a referendum was something they wanted.

"The voters need to be asked whether or not they should have their own ability to create that tax," she said. "The city needs to indicate desire … but the welling needs to come from the community up. … The community knows what's best for them. Then the government is there to support the needs and the desires of the community."

Then, Smith said, as a "deliberative thinker," she would "want to know the argument why I shouldn't support what a community wants. And if there is an equal argument to why that shouldn't be allowed, I would want to factor that into my final decision."

Smith's opponent in the GOP primary, civil engineer Jackie Toledo, had a shorter answer.

No.

"I'm against any sales tax referendums," said Toledo, who was at the breakfast but was not a speaker.

The winner of Tuesday's Republican primary will face Democrat David Singer in the Nov. 8 general election. And he has a different position.

"Yes. I would support the city having the option for a sales tax referendum," he said. He noted that the 2010 transportation tax referendum won support inside the city while failing in unincorporated Hillsborough County. A referendum doesn't mean City Hall is raising taxes, he said, but instead is about city voters deciding whether to do so and having a chance to "determine their own destiny" on transit.

"I think it's important, especially on the issue of transportation, that we've been trying in this community for years to resolve, to make progress where we can," he said.

Contact Richard Danielson at rdanielson@tampabay.com. Follow @Danielson_Times.