TAMPA, Fla. — From potentially contaminated land to community redevelopment.
That’s what’s on the table right now for a part of Ybor City that you might not normally visit.
Besides chickens and trucks, there’s not too much to see on the west side of Ybor but that may be changing.
Anthony Copeland works in the area and is hopeful about the look of a potential development promising retail, office, and residential space taking up over 24 acres.
The proposed development would essentially be near Channelside Drive and N 15th Street in Tampa.
“The look, the environment, it’s going to be beautiful. A-plus,” Anthony Copeland, who lives in Tampa, said. “It’s a good idea, really it’s a good idea.”
But first, developers are hoping to get the area designated as what’s called a “brownfield.” These are areas that may be “underused industrial and commercial properties, where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by actual or perceived environmental contamination.”
“Historically, it was used by a gas utility,” McLane Evans, the assistant city attorney, said in regard to this site. “So there is likelihood that if you test the soil and the groundwater, you will find some residual petroleum or something like that.”
City staff members say if the area gets the “brownfield” designation, the developer cleans it up and then follows through with their redevelopment plan, then the area essentially gets revitalized without spending tax dollars.
“They spend real dollars in today’s money, and they get tax credits after it’s done,” Evans said.
While residents like Copeland are loving the look of Tampa’s changing landscape, he’s just hoping that one day, there’s something for everyone.
“It’s getting really expensive,” he said. “It’s not going to entertain certain classes of people, and I don’t know where the fit is going to be for those people.”
The redevelopment plan does say the plan is to include 300 units of affordable housing.
Council will have a second public hearing on the plan on Sept. 7.