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Top 10 stories in the Tampa Bay area — 2014

 
Fans try to get a glimpse of Anil Kapoor on the green carpet before the IIFA awards at Raymond James Stadium in April in Tampa.
Fans try to get a glimpse of Anil Kapoor on the green carpet before the IIFA awards at Raymond James Stadium in April in Tampa.
Published Dec. 31, 2014

The Tampa Bay area saw a busy 2014 that was dominated by elections, inexplicable tragedy, key revelations that informed the citizenry and events that reflected the region's growth. As the year draws to a close, Tampa Bay Times editors have selected 10 stories that stood out, presented here in no particular order:

'Work therapy' program under scrutiny

For years, Tom Atchison dispatched his homeless labor crews to Tampa Bay Rays, Lightning and Buccaneers games, to the Daytona 500 and the Florida State Fair.

Many of the men were alcoholics, but were told to serve beers to thirsty fans. All were indigent, but none received any pay. Most of the money for their labors went to New Beginnings, a nonprofit charity in Tampa that requires its residents to work — often for large, for-profit companies — in exchange for a bed and three meals.

The Times wrote a series of stories about Atchison's program, a controversial regimen that includes having residents do illegal construction, make telemarketing calls, even strip copper from air conditioners. Atchison calls it "work therapy.'' Labor experts call it exploitative, and possibly illegal. After the Times began publishing stories, two national concessionaires canceled their contracts with New Beginnings. And the U.S. Department of Labor began an investigation.

m Pinellas voters reject transit plan

A $2.2 billion plan to expand public transportation in Pinellas County offered voters a trade-off: Pay for it all with an extra penny of sales tax, bringing the tax to 8 cents on the dollar, and county would eliminate the transit system property tax. Proponents saw the Greenlight Pinellas plan as a step toward the goal of a robust mass transit network spanning Tampa Bay.

But a resounding 62 percent of Pinellas voters rejected that idea in the Nov. 4 election, sending planners, business leaders and advocates back to the drawing board. Meanwhile, Hillsborough County leaders are working toward a transit referendum in 2016.

Greenlight would have improved bus service throughout Pinellas and built a light rail system between St. Petersburg and Clearwater by 2024, with the idea it could some day link with a line to Tampa. A post-election poll showed the plan would have gone down to defeat even if you took out its most controversial element — light rail. More than 90 percent of those who voted against the plan could not get past the idea of an 8-cent sales tax.

Four murdered in Pasco County

As summer was winding down, four decaying bodies were found stacked on a hill in Hudson. Now prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Adam Matos, who they say murdered his ex-girlfriend, her parents and the man she had recently begun dating.

Authorities had visited the family's home, which Matos shared, in early September after receiving a tip that no one could be reached there. They found large amounts of blood. About a mile away, Pasco sheriff's deputies found the bodies — some with gunshot wounds, others with evidence of severe trauma. They were 27-year-old Megan Brown, the mother of Matos' 4-year-old son; her parents, Margaret and Greg Brown; and Nicholas Leonard, 37.

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A search and media blitz ensued. Deputies found Matos soon afterward at a Tampa hotel, where he had checked in with his son. The child, severely autistic, was unharmed and has since been adopted. Authorities found weapons inside and surrounding the Browns' home. In a jailhouse interview, Matos denied the crime. He is being held without bail in the Pasco County jail.

Tarpon Springs officer killed

A routine call on a 2 a.m. noise complaint turned deadly Dec. 21 for Tarpon Springs police officer Charles Kondek, ending the year in tragedy for the close-knit North Pinellas town and the larger law enforcement community.

Marco Antonio Parilla Jr., a 23-year-old ex-convict, shot Kondek, 45, just above his bullet proof vest as the two came face-to-face outside an apartment building, officials said. The officer returned fire but collapsed and was run over as the shooter sped away in a Hyundai Elantra.

It was hard to imagine a more cruel set of circumstances: Kondek was married with six children, and he was murdered four days before Christmas. The suspect might well have been back in prison for violating probation if authorities had arrested him earlier.

The shooting sparked an outpouring of grief as friends and strangers alike paid their respects at Tarpon Springs police headquarters. Kondek was the first area officer slain in the line of duty since 2011, and the first from the Tarpon Springs department since 1926. Parilla was charged with first-degree murder.

. Marijuana falls short at the polls

The ballot initiative to legalize marijuana for medical purposes offered all the ingredients of a classic Florida political yarn, pitting right against left, young against old, law enforcement against pot smokers.

But it also was a human conflict between people seeking legal access to a substance they believe can ease pain and serious disease symptoms, and others who believe just as firmly that legalizing pot will only encourage teen use and bring back the worst excesses of Florida's now-outlawed opiate pill mills.

On Election Day, most voters agreed to amend Florida's Constitution to legalize medical marijuana — but the tally fell short of the 60 percent needed for passage. Supporters, led by famed personal injury lawyer John Morgan, vow they will be back again, urging the Florida Legislature to take the lead on the matter. But they're also gearing up to put the question on the 2016 ballot, adjusted to address at least some questions raised by opponents.

Bollywood Oscars come to Tampa

The official name was the 15th annual International Indian Film Academy's Weekend & Awards, but virtually everyone just called it the "Bollywood Oscars." The awards festival, which hops from city to city around the world, landed in the Tampa Bay area April 23-26.

In addition to global superstars — Deepika Padukone, Priyanka Chopra — who remain virtually unknown to American audiences, the main awards show at Raymond James Stadium featured Hollywood stars John Travolta and Kevin Spacey, and drew a crowd of nearly 24,000. In all, Hillsborough County saw an estimated 30,000 visitors, many from elsewhere in Florida, more than half from other parts of the United States and 11 percent from foreign countries.

An economic impact study estimated the awards weekend gave the bay area a total boost of more than $26 million, though it didn't consider whether the event crowded out other economic activity. "We've been somewhat of a faceless, nameless place in the eyes of the world," Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn said the night of the show. "This is our chance to expose Tampa to a whole subcontinent that's never seen it before."

Florida politicians, a Texas ranch and Big Sugar

For years, Florida's sugar barons paid for the governor and other top elected officials to go hunting at Texas' famed King Ranch. The politicians got to hunt big game, and U.S. Sugar got access to top decision makers. Though the trips were largely kept out of official records, a Times investigation unraveled the story.

Once they could no longer deny the trips' existence, politicians and Republican Party of Florida officials insisted they were party fundraisers, not subject to the disclosure rules governing gifts. But the Times showed that no money at all was raised for the party.

Next came news of a plan by U.S. Sugar to develop thousands of acres that the state had an option to buy for Everglades restoration. In the end, amid a statewide outcry, a Florida regulatory agency that rarely said no to any developer turned down the plan.

Huge trauma center fees revealed

In the past decade, at least 120,000 Floridians were charged as much as $32,000 merely to enter the doors of a trauma hospital. This "trauma response fee'' was unregulated by any government agency and hit especially hard at the uninsured, who don't have a corporate or government health plan to negotiate on their behalf.

A yearlong Times investigation found that the fees were especially steep at the for-profit HCA hospital chain, but also have been a feature at not-for-profit hospitals. Even patients with injuries so minor they could be treated and sent home the same day faced big trauma fees. After the Times investigation was published, the Florida Legislature sought to cap the fees — and protect HCA's new trauma centers from legal challenges by existing facilities.

Ultimately, the bill went nowhere, but the legal challenges were dropped and HCA volunteered to rein in its fees for the uninsured. The investigation also revealed that having a trauma center nearby can sometimes be a disadvantage. Rescue personnel often sent children to those facilities rather than to pediatric trauma centers, resulting in treatment delays.

Downtown Tampa lands USF medical school

For all his wealth, business savvy and vision, there are some things even Tampa Bay Lightning owner Jeff Vinik can't bring to his plans for reshaping 30 acres of downtown Tampa: Youth and vibrancy, as Vinik put it.

For those ingredients he turned to the University of South Florida and gave it land near Amalie Arena for a 12-story tower to house the new Morsani College of Medicine and the USF Heart Health Institute. USF next must ask for state funding from the Florida Board of Governors, which meets in January. The total cost of the new medical tower was estimated to be between $150 million and $163 million. USF believes it has as much as $130 million in state funding already lined up.

USF and city officials applauded the move as a boon for everyone involved at a time when many U.S. universities are building urban medical schools. And the move would free up space at the main campus so USF could train more nurses and do more research. Longer term, the new medical school could help efforts to one day turn downtown Tampa into a hub for medical education, research and treatment.

. One congressman, two families

In late 1985, U.S. Rep. C.W. Bill Young divorced his wife of 36 years and, eight days later, married a secretary in his office with whom he had been having an affair. She was 25 years his junior and had given birth to his son. Already a veteran Congressman in his mid 50s, Young was starting an entirely new life.

Together, he and Beverly Young would raise three sons and have eight grandchildren. This was the family in his official biography — the ones who showed up in a video montage at Young's public funeral in late 2013. But in the months following his death, the details about Young's first family began to spill out: A wife, Marian, who made the suits he wore on the campaign trial; three children; seven grandchildren; five great-grandchildren and summers at a lakeside home in North Carolina.

The unusual situation was never aired publicly. Young was largely estranged from his first family. They had stayed in the background because of an alimony agreement that required Marian to stay quiet. But when the alimony stopped, his first three children authored their own story about the family life of a local political icon. They called it Bill Young — The Forgotten Years.