- This is a production of WEDU PBS, Tampa, St.

Petersburg, Sarasota.

[music] - Coming up: Latino voters helped reshape American politics in 2020 for a significant new survey is suggesting the ground is already shifting, with one notable exception Florida.

The Tampa Bay Rays want a new home and need public money to build it.

The deadline is real.

The legal questions are unresolved, and the stakes for this community are high.

And the race to lead one of America's fastest growing cities is unlike any Tampa has seen before.

We have the panel, the experts and the conversation.

Florida This Week starts now.

[music] Welcome back everybody.

I'm Lissette Campos on our panel today is Patrick Manteiga, editor and publisher of La Gaceta.

That's Tampa's century-old trilingual newspaper and a long-standing voice in Florida's Latino community.

We have Aakash Patel, Tampa businessman and community leader, former board member of Hillsborough College and the founder of Elevate Inc., and journalist Nina Moske, who covers Tampa city politics as well as the Rays stadium debate.

She does that for the Tampa Bay Times, and we've lined up two experts to help frame our topics.

First, joining by Zoom is Professor Eduardo Gamarra of Florida International University.

He is the director of the Latino Public Opinion Forum, which conducted the National Latino Voter Survey and later, with Tampa Bay deep in a stadium debate, few know the ballpark playbook better than Mark Hyman.

He's the director of the Shirley Povich Center for Sports Journalism at the University of Maryland.

He and his students produced the docu series Creating Camden Yards.

It's an oral history of how Baltimore pulled off one of the most influential stadium projects in baseball history.

We begin with a seismic shift in voter support in 2024.

President Trump made history with Latino voters, winning 46% to his side.

That was the highest share ever for a Republican presidential candidate.

Now, a new national, highly regarded survey from Florida International University suggests that much of that ground has been lost.

The poll of more than 1000 Latino adults finds that two-thirds now disapprove of the president and believe the country is headed in the wrong direction.

Cost of living, immigration and health care are driving their concerns.

The notable exception is the state of Florida.

Joining us via Zoom with the survey's findings is the poll's director, FIU Political Science professor Eduardo Gamarra.

Thank you so much for joining us.

- Pleasure to be here.

Thank you.

- Immigration enforcement, that is a very high topic.

What was the result of the study in terms of Latino voters nationwide versus Florida voters nationwide?

The sentiments on the immigration enforcement.

- There are some very interesting results.

First, Latinos want, uh, a, uh, coherent immigration policy.

They're in favor of border control.

They're even in favor of the deportation of undocumented aliens who deserve to be deported.

But at the same time, they're extraordinarily critical of ICE.

And most importantly, of ICE tactics.

And then the other thing that Latinos are in favor of and which sort of shows you the coherence of the argument, is they're in favor of granting undocumented aliens who have not committed crimes, a pathway to citizenship, or at least a pathway to residency.

So there's, I think, the clear message there is the need to have that immigration debate, that immigration policy debate that we have, you know, basically not had over the last 30 years.

- In terms of foreign policy.

How was it different between the responses of Latino voters in the rest of the country and Latino voters in the state of Florida?

- Well, most of the country rejects the policy, foreign policy, and we largely measured policy toward Latin America.

So policy toward Cuba, policy toward Venezuela, not just the extraction of Maduro, but working with the current administration there.

Um, most of the country rejects it.

But Florida is an outlier in Florida and particularly among the Cuban American population here in Miami-Dade.

There is still strong support for the administration's foreign policy.

- When you look at the Cuban American vote, which you've just referred to, do you see the striking differences between what could be coming in the mid-term elections?

So, for example, Hispanic voters that were interviewed in other states like Arizona, Texas, New York, new Jersey, how far apart are these two groups from each other in terms of the Cuban Americans in Florida and everyone else in the rest of the country?

- Well in the rest of the country, it appears quite clear that when you ask them a generic vote on congressional elections, there's a very significant favorability for the Democratic candidate.

And the same thing goes for a generic presidential ballot.

But in Miami in particular, in Florida in particular, the difference it's still not all good news for the Republicans because, for example, just in the Cuban American vote, 53% are very positive on the president, but that's down from almost 70% in the vote in November of '24.

So even though Cubans are still largely with the president, that level of support has fallen significantly.

- Professor Gamarra, thank you so much for joining us.

We will be on the lookout for the next survey that you will be doing.

that's coming up in September.

October, right before the midterm.

Correct?

- Correct.

- Yes, ma'am.

Thank you so much.

And now I'd like to turn to our panelists.

You both have heard the results of this national study.

What would you say this realignment of Hispanics could mean for Florida politics?

Patrick, I'll start with you.

- Well, I call it a reset.

I mean, this is where we were before, a few years before you had Hispanics across the country, people with Mexican backgrounds and Puerto Rican backgrounds and others who were favoring the Democrats.

Miami Cuban-exile community, if you'd call it that, has always been very pro-Republican.

Donald Trump's moves earlier this year with Venezuela gave these Cubans a big hope that they would do something in Cuba and gave these Venezuelans hope that something was going to change at home.

Nothing's changed dramatically in either place.

It's just gotten harder to live in Cuba, and Venezuela hasn't had that much improvements.

And so, you know, I think that what you're seeing is as a result of, of not things not panning out the way everybody thought they would.

And of course, with immigration, everybody always thinks the, the guy down the street is going to get deported, not me.

And I think with the aggressive way that immigration happened, they started to realize, no, these are our kids going to school.

These are people who have long term jobs.

These are these are families.

And this is not what they thought this was going to be.

- Akash, do you think that the looking at the numbers, do you think that Cuban American stronghold that everyone is talking about will remain or that certain things can shift by the time we get to the midterms?

- No, I think things will get better in Florida, especially with the Cuban American community.

I think the governor has actually reached out to a lot of Latinos and appointed them to higher positions.

And you're seeing a little bit of that.

And of course, this is the president's backyard.

And the saying goes, as Florida goes, so does the country.

So I think...I think things will shift as we get to the midterms.

- Thank you for that.

As we talk about voting, a few important Florida dates to keep in mind.

If you need to register to vote or change your party affiliation ahead of the August primary, the deadline to do so is July the 20th.

To vote in November's general election.

The deadline is October the 5th.

The Tampa Bay Rays want a new $2.3 billion ballpark, and they want an answer from local leaders by June the 1st.

That's the deadline the Rays CEO has set to get clarity on financing.

The proposed stadium would sit on land currently used by Hillsborough College and the city, and the county would need to contribute roughly about $1 billion in public funding.

A key unresolved question is whether Hillsborough's half penny sales tax can legally be used for the stadium construction.

Now, during the campaign to renew this community investment tax back in 2024, voters were told that it would not be used to build a stadium.

But the language on the ballot was not as clear.

Now commissioners are being asked to take a look at this.

The Rays warn that without a deal they may look elsewhere.

- $2.3 billion is a lot of money for a ballpark.

A lot of people have questioned whether it really needs to be that expensive.

- That reaction coming from Hillsborough County Commissioner Harry Cohen during their first look at financing last week, Tampa City Council will get its chance to discuss the ballpark at a meeting that's happening at the City Hall on May the 5th.

I'd like to start with you, Nina.

Tell me about the timeline and how tight this all is.

- Yeah.

So the Rays have set a June 1st deadline for the city, the county, the Tampa Sports Authority to come to final agreements.

And that's because they want to open a ballpark by 2029.

So that's pretty swift timeline.

But as we've seen at that recent county Commission workshop.

There are still lots of questions.

So I think it's a question as to whether city and county will rush to meet those deadlines or continue expressing their questions and be able to be able to meet that deadline.

- I would suggest that their deadline hasn't have a whole lot to do with building the stadium at the timeframe.

I think it has to do with this.

Funding for new HCC College campus.

Legislature as a couple special sessions left, and nobody's given any money yet to rebuild these buildings that the Rays want to tear down.

And if they don't get this money through in this session, they're going to have to wait a year.

And that means their whole situation gets a lot slower.

And so my understanding is the they've heard from the legislature that they're not going to pass any money until they have a local agreement here.

And so they want this local agreement now.

- So what were you going to say?

- I think that there's no doubt that the county Commission and the City Council want to keep the Rays in Tampa.

They just got to get more creative on the funding.

As far as the deadline, I think that's a moving target.

I mean, the Rays, they have to let us, as the community and the elected leaders come up with more creative ways to finance.

This is just day one.

- Yeah.

There's so much to weigh.

Um, a lot of voters are saying are looking at the economic impact for the future, whereas others are saying this is too much money.

So you've got the critics and the supporters on two different planes.

Um, when you look at the economic studies that have been done, they, they are projecting that perhaps in Drew Park that neighborhood could possibly generate $97 million in property tax revenue if this is approved over 22 years.

Chairman Ken Hagan has said that the economic studies that he's looking at show a $75 billion economic impact, um, over 30 years.

How do you see this.

- Accom who did the study will tell you that there's a lot of things that they did get answered that wasn't answered by the race.

And so a lot of this is just taking the assumptions that they've written down on paper and saying that we're going to have 4000 units of this and we're going to have a mix of office and them saying, well, let's put a number on this.

And without questioning, are these things really going to happen?

So the economic study is not rock solid.

I would say.

The other issue is, is that even if they produce a tremendous amount of tax revenue on the site, they want to eat all that tax revenue up.

So they don't want to use the tax revenue at created in Drew Park for police and fire.

They want to use it to pay for operating costs for the Rays and for maintenance for the Rays building.

So this isn't money that the community is going to get.

This is money that they're just going to eat up themselves.

- It's going to come from organizations like Visit Tampa Bay.

If the six cent, six penny cent tax pass.

Visit Tampa Bay will get cut, as will the Tampa Bay Convention Center.

That's where, you know, we have tourism is huge here.

So we have to be creative and make sure we don't take away from other organizations.

- What are the what are the Bucs looking at in terms of the area, how it could change for them, because they're right across the street from this site.

- And parking is going to be an issue.

- Yeah.

Right now we're going to have a hard time.

And when I say we, I'm on the Sports Authority, we're going to have a hard time providing them with a number of spaces.

If the Rays go under construction and take up everything at HCC site.

And in our agreement, if we don't have enough spaces for them, we have to write them a check.

And so that means the public is going to have to write the Bucs a check for parking that's missing.

So it's a very big concern.

We're having to scramble because of course, this is all on short term and HCC, while they haven't renewed the lease, we don't know if they're going to have a construction on that site or not.

- Nina, when you look at it and you're talking to folks doing your stories, what's the sentiment?

Is it shifting in favor or against or just staying straight?

- It really depends on who you speak to.

And I think that's the case on the City Council and the county commission as well.

You know, there's a couple folks who we know will not vote for this deal.

Charlie Miranda, for example, city Council member who famously wore all black suits for months when the Bucs deal was approved in the 90s and he started wearing all black suits again to city council.

And then there are other folks who look at the a Aecom economic study and say that this development is going to pay for itself.

And then there's a lot of folks in the middle on the county commission and the City Council who are not quite sure yet.

- But I do disagree with Patrick.

We've talked about it.

I think the governor and the legislature will come to some solution where they will, before the budget's passed, that Hillsborough College will get some sort of funding.

I mean, Senator Burgess passed a bill that appropriated 50 million.

I know it didn't pass in the House, but there'll be some solution this year.

- Well, the debate over the use of public funds is exactly why we brought in our next guest.

Mark Hyman is director of the Shirley Povich Center for Sports Journalism at the University of Maryland.

He led the production of creating Camden Yards.

It's an oral history of how Baltimore built the ballpark that changed how America thinks about stadium deals.

Professor Hyman, thank you so much for coming in.

- Thank you.

Lisa.

- What was it that made it so revolutionary, the negotiating for Camden Yards, and what are some of the lessons that we can learn from that and apply today?

- Well, uh, you know, it's the story of the creation of a ballpark, but it's more than that.

Camden Yards really changed the way we think about ballpark architecture, where ballparks should be located.

Um, of course, you know, going way back to Fenway Park and Wrigley Field and those iconic ballparks, they're all built in the city.

But there was a period of 30 or more years when most ballparks were built in the suburbs.

And they were architecturally, they were not very inspiring.

They were concrete donuts and, and they were multi-purpose.

So you were playing football and baseball there?

Oriole Park was retro in a way.

It was progressive, but also retro in the sense that it's baseball only and it's in downtown Baltimore.

And the ballpark is very quirky because it had to be shoehorned into a piece of property in the city that that made it very unusual.

- Just like in our community, there's talk when we look at possible financing the public funds, there's conversations that the public may, um, may be looking at $1 billion investment during the Camden Yards conversations.

I know that a beer tax was researched and another different tax, but they decided on creating a brand new revenue source that was the lottery.

- A sports lottery.

We we had not had, you know, we're talking about scratch off tickets that, uh, that people would buy at a convenience store or a drugstore or something like that.

Uh, we'd never had one in Maryland until the, the ballpark financing debate began the.

The problem was that the.

The Maryland legislature was very hesitant to approve public funding for a ballpark that I'm sure is similar to the story in Florida.

There's a lot of pushback.

I mean, legislators whose districts were far away from Baltimore.

They were like, you know, why would we approve?

Why would we support an expenditure of public funds for a ballpark that's really not going to have a positive effect on our constituents?

And there were other legislators who just were reluctant to support.

They didn't want to pay for a rich team owners ballpark.

So there were lots of reasons.

- And we certainly hear some of the same sentiments now in the year 2026.

You, your students went out and talked to a number of people.

You have the benefit of 30 plus years of Camden Yards being there in the community.

Part of the culture.

The finance, the economic engine.

Did they find that most people thought it was a good investment?

- Well, at the time it was very much a mixed bag.

There were even Orioles fans.

Some of them were very attached emotionally to the old ballpark, and they didn't really see the need for a new ballpark.

Um, but now, 35 years later, I think everyone embraces Camden Yards.

It's really a point of public pride in Baltimore.

- And my final question to you is, as we look at the different, the different statistics that our leaders are looking at, there is the, the, the taxes and the public funds.

And then you also have studies that indicate the possible economic impact to the region, the Drew Park neighborhood, where this ballpark would be built, if it's approved, would generate $97 million in property and property tax revenue.

That's one of the studies.

Another $75 billion in direct and indirect economic impact over 30 years.

Those are some of the projections.

So when you look at this what advice do you have for us in Tampa Bay.

Should leaders be weighing one more heavily than the other.

The projections of future gain or the cost to taxpayers now?

- It's a great question.

You know, for me, the answer is to wrestle with the question, what does the presence of a of a Major League Baseball team mean to your community?

Forget about the dollars in and the dollar.

Of course, you have to consider that.

But what does having the Rays in the Tampa, St.

Pete area mean to you?

If that's important, if you think that improves the quality of life in your community, then I think you're willing to make that expenditure and find the resources to make it happen.

Um, and I think that's what we decided in Baltimore that maybe, maybe personally, I'm not going to benefit from the presence of a ballpark, but it increases and improves the quality of life here.

- Thank you so much for your time.

And again, congratulations on that beautiful docuseries Creating Camden Yards.

Professor Mark Hyman of the center for Sports Journalism at the University of Maryland.

- Thank you.

- The race to replace term limited.

Tampa Mayor Jane Castor is already one of the most crowded in the city's history.

11 candidates and counting filed, and the election is still nearly a year away.

The front runner in both name recognition and fundraising is former mayor Bob Buckhorn.

He left office in 2019 with a 75% approval rating and nearly $2 million already in the bank.

He faces two sitting City council members.

Lynn Hurtak and Bill Carlson.

Also in the mix.

We have urban designer Terrence Sabia and former HART board member and business owner Gary Hartfield, plus six others.

The election is going to happen on March the 2nd, 2027.

How do you all see this is such a crowded political scenario.

Do you think that this will lead to an opening for a newcomer, or do you think that folks were going to stay and vote for the names that they know?

Akash, I'd like to start with you.

- Yeah, I think they're going to vote for who they know and who they got to know over the last decade or so.

When the mayor, when Mayor Buckhorn has been out of office, he's been out in the community meeting these businesses that are relocating, and he's telling the Tampa story and the City Council folks that are relatively new.

Carlson has been there eight years and Hurtak shortly after.

So I think it's going to be interesting to see.

Obviously, the money is there with Mayor Buckhorn.

and money's going to play a big factor because it's about getting message out.

- Patrick.

How do how do you see this?

Because in the last special election we saw a newcomer.

- You know, the city of Tampa election is a very intimate election.

50,000 people are going to vote.

In the past, it hasn't been newcomers to Tampa who participate.

It's been long term residents.

And there is an issue with long term residents here afraid that their neighborhoods are being impacted by the new development.

There's a lot of people.

I'm one of them who doesn't recognize the Tampa I grew up in anymore, and it doesn't feel like it's a bunch of Tampa hanging out in waterside.

It's, you know, people from all over the nation, all over the world.

And so, you know, if that hard core group of voters are the ones who are going to make a decision, I think the issue is going to be is what kind of development do we want?

Do we want a Tampa for the people here, or do we want a Tampa for somebody to move into?

And and that could mean that Bob Buckhorn, who's got a lot of money from developers, could end up facing a backlash from people who don't want developers to have this much influence in our community.

- Nina, what are some of the other issues?

Housing affordability is one you've talked about in your stories.

- Yeah, housing affordability definitely storm water.

How Tampa is preparing for hurricane season.

I, you know, you mentioned the special election as well.

I think, uh, several of Mayor Buckhorn opponents would point to a string of recent local elections, city council, um, even in 2019 when Mayor Castor won her election or Brian Nathan just a few weeks or months ago at this point out.

- Tomko.

- Yeah, exactly.

Um, you know, winning elections against candidates with a lot more money who, who spent a lot more money.

And so I think opponents are going to point to that trend.

And I think some of the experts I've spoken to have said, you know, it doesn't just matter how much money you have on hand, but it matters how you spend that money.

- There's just so much on the table, right?

This week is a big news week.

What are some of the other big stories that you're following?

Nina, I'd like to start with you.

- Yeah, sort of merging the two.

I'm still really focused on the Rays, and we haven't heard much yet from City Council members.

So I'm focused on how they are taking in all of this information as the negotiations are ongoing.

And on May 5th, they are going to hold their workshop and there will be public comment.

So we're going to have the opportunity to hear from a lot of folks in Tampa.

- Patrick.

- Due to a legal opinion by Attorney General James Uthmeier.

Scholarship funds are being administered by.

Universities are now telling people who've put private funds into these funds that they can no longer target them to blacks or to Hispanics, that they just have to be targeted to people.

And of course, if you've if these are your private dollars and you put them in trust with the university, that can be a problem because that's how you want your money to be spent.

And all of a sudden the university is telling you you can't spend it that way.

I think there's going to be a big issue down the road.

And when you talk about things like, you know, the Hispanic vote, uh, finding out that your kids can no longer find a Hispanic scholarship might not, might not make you too happy.

- This would impact the USF Latino Scholarship, the University of Tampa, Hillsborough College, they all receive donations from the community specific, specific to students who are of Hispanic descent.

Yeah.

- Absolutely.

- Aakash.

- Well, on the note of USF, USF just has a new president, as you know, started a few months ago, and now they're going to have a new board chair.

Will Weatherford has been the board chair of the trustees for the last five years who led the stadium project and the real hiring.

And now I'm hiring.

And, uh, Mike Griffin will take over as chair as of next week.

- Thank you for coming in.

It's always nice to see you.

As always, thanks to our panelists Patrick Manteiga, Aakash Patel, and Nina Moske.

On behalf of the entire team here at WEDU.

Thank you so much for watching.

We know you've got plenty of choices for your news and information, and we thank you for choosing us.