Building a ballpark while solving an infrastructure dilemma, and Florida oranges show some juice

This is the Florida Matters Live and local broadcasting from the Doctors Lorraine. Rubus and Neil Frankel Studio at WUSF in Tampa. I'm Matthew Petty. Well, mayoral elections are happening on both sides of Tampa Bay. In a couple of weeks, voters will pick who they want to run their city, and next year, Tampa voters will get to have their say. One thing, the mayors of both St. Pete and Tampa will have to grapple with the future of baseball in Tampa Bay. Tampa City Councilman Bill Tucker Carlson is one of the candidates running to succeed Jane Castor. Just to note, Tucker Carlson is president of Tucker Carlson Hall. It's a public relations agency that does business with WSF. Councilman Tucker Carlson joins us now. Thank you so much for being with us. Thank you. Thanks for inviting me today. And if you've got questions for Councilman Tucker Carlson about the raise, the potential new stadium, property, taxes, stormwater, anything else you can call in. Our number is 8137556562. You can email... Florida Matters at WUSF.org. Well, Councilman, before we talk about the stadium, let's just talk flooding for a moment. I understand you were at a budget workshop meeting, right, talking about stormwater. What can you give us an update on stormwater funding or the budget around that? Well, we have obviously a stormwater problem all over the city. It's especially pronounced throughout South Tampa. Thousands of homes were hit. And there are two different funding sources for stormwater. Unfortunately, for the first few years, the newest one was misspent on projects. It shouldn't have been. We found that some of the stormwater resources were spent on parades, and we've been trying to stop that. Sorry, did you say parades? Parades, yeah. They used stormwater staff to prepare for parades. And so we've been pushing back the administration thinks it's okay. And we've been pushing back to prevent that. There are 20 or so places just in South Tampa that flooded. And we need billions of dollars to be able to fix the problems that are there. That's billions with a B. Yeah, billions. Because we're dealing with decades of lack of money and planning, but especially in the last 15 years. money was spent on pet projects instead of um instead of infrastructure and even basic maintenance was not done in 2016 a new tax was passed where the public was promised that maintenance would be done throughout the city and after milton we discovered that there are culverts with trees growing out of them so that shows that maintenance was never done so i mean isn't this sort of within your um you know sphere of influence as a city councilman like as have you been aware of some of the the misspending as you say up until now I've been on city council now almost eight years, and I've been pushing for more accountability and better spending of the money in the city. And some of it went through and some of it didn't. The way the city is set up is that the mayor has equal powers to city council. And so on city council, we need four votes or five votes to be able to overrule the mayor. The discussion we had this morning, which I encourage people to watch, is about stormwater budget for next year. And some of the information that was presented to us was not true. And so we were pushing back saying, how can we trust anything when some of the data is not accurate? Which data are you saying isn't true? Well, in particular, they showed us that certain line items in the budget were already approved and they weren't.

Okay, we're talking with Tampa City Councilman Bill Tucker Carlson. He's running for Mayor of Tampa, that election, of course, next year. But if you've got questions for Councilman Tucker Carlson, we're going to talk about the Ray's Stadium deal. We've just been talking about infrastructure and flooding issues. You can give us a call. 8137556562. That's 813755652. Let's talk about the stadium. Now, the original memorandum of understanding between the city, the county and the raise included $180 million from the city. That's broken up into $80 million in community investment tax money, $100 million from the Drew Park Community Redevelopment area. You didn't support that, so why not? I think that the promises that were made around the community investment tax were such that the money shouldn't be spent on this. And there were other concerns as well. Drew Park was concerned that all of the money that they would be able to use for their future was taken away. And in addition to that, as we talked about a minute ago, the biggest issues facing the city are deferred maintenance. We know that just in roads, we have two billion in deferred maintenance. And I've asked for a citywide accounting of deferred maintenance. This is where somebody spent on boat houses instead of on roads or flooding control or whatever. And so if we have five or 10 billion, we don't know the number yet, five or 10 billion in deferred maintenance, where are we going to get the money? The city can't raise taxes because the legislature doesn't want us to and the public doesn't want us to. In fact, the legislature may reduce revenues. So where are we going to get the money to be able to spend on infrastructure? And I'm not a baseball fan, although members of my family are and I have friends who are passionate about baseball. But what interested me was trying to figure out, a solution where we could have baseball, but also create a fund for infrastructure, because that's really what the constituents of our city want. Okay, and we're going to talk a little bit about the details, at least what you want to see in that deal. But before we get into that, I mean, the mayor was the chief negotiator for the original MOU, right? Now, understand that didn't really sit well with you or some of the other council members. Can you talk about that? Well, I think the county was the chief negotiator and there really wasn't much participation from the city side. And the raise and the county were asking us as city council to weigh in, but we weren't included. And part of it is the style of government because we have a mayor and the county doesn't. County commissioners were very involved in the original deal. We were given the deal a week before we had to discuss it and approve it. We didn't have sufficient time to look at it. We didn't have sufficient time to get feedback from our constituents. And so I've encouraged the raise and the county to have more transparency this time. When I finally stepped in at their request, I found out that they were very open to negotiating and the things that I suggested, they quickly adopted. Whereas six months ago, we were told that none of the ideas that we had could be adopted. We're talking with Councilman Bill Tucker Carlson.

He is running for Mayor of Tampa talking about the Ray's Stadium deal infrastructure flooding much more. You can weigh in on the conversation too. If you've got questions for Councilman Tucker Carlson, give us a call. 8137556562. That's 8137556562. You can also email Florida Matters at WUSF.com. or drop us a note on the YouTube channel if you're watching along there as well. Now, you've been talking with Ken Babi from the Ray. So what's the discussion? What's the substance of that discussion with you and Ken Babi? Oh, it's very positive. And the race so far told us tentatively that they've approved the suggestions. The county seems to be very positive toward it, although they haven't had a vote. And I don't know what my colleagues think because I haven't been able to talk to them because we can't do it outside of the day. As it hasn't been on the agenda. But the purpose of me pushing out the idea is to see what other feedback we might be able to get. And there are some things that we. might be able to influence on some things we cannot. So the county will have a deal and the city will have a deal. The city is more limited and what we can put into it. But I think the deal is many times better than it was a couple months ago. So what would it take for you to sign off on a deal to get the stadium built at the Hillsborough College site in Tampa? Well, first of all, I think it's a great location because it... It's in an area that it needs to be redeveloped. There are some concerns in Drew Park and West Tampa, and we're trying to address those. But it also is close enough for the folks in St. Pete to be able to go to raise games. People who want it further east, like at the fairgrounds, don't realize that we'll lose the entire St. Pete audience if it's that far away because they won't want to drive two or three hours to get over to a game. So it's a good location from that perspective. I think the synergies with HCC are really, or Hillsborough College are really, interesting, especially in the tech area and AI area. I've been talking to some tech companies about what they can do there. To specifically, to your question, it can include CIT money, and it needs to include this fund for infrastructure. And there are other things that we can talk about if you want, but we need to make sure that the revenue stream that would come to the city from the deal and also. I'm proposing taking half the money out of the downtown CRA, putting them into an infrastructure fund so we can spend them on things like roads and flood prevention. Okay. So just to clarify, what is off the table is CIT funding? You don't want to see that in the deal. The CIT is included. I vote no. If any of the agencies refuse to take half the downtown CRA money, I say no. Downtown does not have slum and blight anymore. It would not qualify for a CRA. And even if we take half of it, it will have more than any of the other CRAs that we have. And so it's not fair that the rest of the city continues to subsidize downtown when we could move.

even just half the money out and dramatically change our budget for road repair and flood prevention. Okay, so how do you raise that money then? Because you're saying that you've come up with an idea that could raise money for the stadium and also put some money into the kitty for the city to spend on some of these projects you say have been put off. Yeah, so one thing, our deal really is with the county, not the raise. And so with the county, once we open up one of the CRAs, which is true part, then it gives us the opportunity to affect others. And so that's when I proposed taking half the money of downtown, also proposed extending the East Tampa CRA by 30 years. It seems like that's not connected, but if we have this contract open already, it makes sense to go ahead and do it. And then Drew Park doesn't want the raise to take all of their money and their CRA. So the raise in the county have agreed to create a TIF tax increment at financing instrument that will go around the project and the money from the project will be captured in there. And then the Drew Park will have a new boundary that will not include the raise. That way Drew Park can control its own destiny and they'll get 30 more years also to control that. So the money inside the tip would be split in three ways. and the county is still working on the formula but it would be split three ways county city and a cdd community development district none of it would go to the raise and in the cdd it would be subject to um public scrutiny public oversight and all of it would have to be spent on government owned facilities any of the money they spend would be on something that would ultimately be owned by the city county or state yeah Councilman, if you could stay with us for a few more minutes, it's kind of complicated getting into this and there are just a couple more questions I have for you. So if you could hang with us for another couple minutes and we'll get back to you in a moment. That's when Florida Matters Live and Local continues. You can weigh in on the conversation talking about the complexities of this potential raised stadium deal, what it takes, what it would take for Councilman Tucker Carlson to give a yes vote to it. 81375621 hear from you too and also email Florida Matters. at WUSF.org.

Welcome back to Florida Matters Live and local. We're talking with Tampa City Councilman Bill Tucker Carlson. He's running for mayor, that election, of course, next year. What questions do you have for Councilman Tucker Carlson on the Ray Stadium deal infrastructure more? 8137556562 if you want to weigh in or send us an email, Florida Matters at WUSF.org. Councilman, I just wanted to come back to that kind of idea for funding, not only the Ray Stadium or the city's part of it, at least. their commitment to it, but also putting more money into infrastructure. Now, there's this potential new sort of tax sharing revenue from new businesses that you've talked about, and you're talking about splitting it into three different parts, one for the city, one for the county, and one to sort of help pay for the stadium. Are you saying there's going to be enough tax revenue from this new taxing district that you propose creating to pay for all of that? In addition to the infrastructure that needs to be spent through the CDD, the city and county will each get a revenue stream from this. And we don't know the exact numbers yet, but kind of back of the nap being calculation, it could be anywhere from 6 or 700 million, all the up to 2 billion, over 35 years. The TIF is 35 years. Okay, and just to kind of break down some of the alphabet soup a little bit, the CDD, that's a community development district. So that's like a taxing district, kind of like a... community redevelopment area is also. So, yeah, it's really, by the way, Rick Péter Magyar, Rick Meyer, your colleague on WSF.org has a lengthy story that for the first time over the weekend, detailed all of this in it perfectly. So I encourage anybody who has questions besides asking me here, go to his story on WSF.org and grab it because it really has all the answers. Sure. Okay. So, but you're confident that there'll be enough money in that to pay for what needs to be paid for over the course of the next 30 years or so. Well, it won't pay for everything because we have billions in backlog. But if we take that, let's say it's $750 million from that revenue stream and we take half the downtown CRA money. At a minimum, over 35 years, it should generate $1.5 billion on up. that at least gives us a pretty good head start because we don't have any other revenue streams without raising taxes. The public doesn't want us to raise taxes. The legislature doesn't want us to raise taxes. So where are we going to get the money to pay for the black log? And what it means is for the next eight years, at least, we're not going to be able to spend on boat houses and other kinds of frivolous projects. So the clock is ticking a little bit for the rays, right? They need to get shovels in the ground fairly soon. What's the next, you know, marker in this? What are we looking for? Is there a vote coming up? So they said very publicly that they would like to have a vote at the city and the county by the end of August. And the reason I didn't know this until I really talked to them about it. Again, city council was excluded until two weeks ago by the administration, not by the raise. And the reason they need to hurry is because the raise are paying for the temporary facilities for Hillsborough College. And to be able to.

help folks move into the temporary facilities in January, they need to start moving right away to get that done. And if they miss that window, then it's going to be something like June. So it's not just missing a few weeks. They'll miss maybe six months. And so it's critically important to get that done. I'm not being rushed by them. I'm just proposing what I think we could do. told them that I would circulate the idea this week, take feedback on it. If anybody wants to give me feedback, my city emails, bill.Tucker Carlson at Tampa.gov. And then sometime in the next week or so, I recommended that they put out a draft of the document, the final document, so the public can see it and provide input. And also elected officials can provide input. And then based on that input, then I recommended that they put out the final draft. more than seven days before the vote because the public and city council need a chance to, and county commissioners need a chance to look through it. Yeah, we're going to have to end the conversation there, but councilman Bill Tucker Carlson with the Tampa City Council, really appreciate you joining us. Much more to talk about and we'll definitely invite you back on the show. Thank you so much. Great. Thank you so much. Take care. Let's turn our attention now to oranges. One thing this state knows very well, they aren't native to Florida, but for decades the state had relied on oranges to boost its economy. Production has slowed significantly over the last few decades. We harvested about 13 million boxes during the 2025-26 season, but the industry is expected to see a small boost this year. And joining us for an update on the citrus industry is Ned Hancock. He's a fifth-generation grower from Peace River Valley. Ned, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you for the opportunity. Now, you're a citrus farmer, and it's been pretty tough, right? The headlines have been quite grim for the last few years. So what's it been like for the farm this year? And have you personally seen an increase in production? We are very optimistic about what this year looks like. You know, for the first time in a few years, we haven't had a hurricane. And, you know, with God's help. The season is yet young, Ned. Yeah, the seasons yet young, but we're optimistic. We've got to be we're farmers. But we're seeing an improved tree health. We're seeing a lot of things that are trending in the right direction. You know, we're still several months away from beginning of harvest. So, you know, but we are optimistic. We do think the condition of the grows look good, the crop looks good. You know, a lot of things positive right now in the industry. Yeah. Your family's been in this business for a long time, right, five generations. How did they get started? Yeah, we've been at a long time, but on a very small scale. Most of the, my family is not in the citrus industry. I'm kind of the only one that chose that path. Most of the other relatives that are in agriculture or in row crop or in the cattle business. So everybody, I mean, it's, you know, it's the industry in general is, you know, kind of quietly optimistic about what we think we're going to be able to harvest this year, but more importantly, what it's going to look like going forward. Yeah. Now, during the peak of the orange industry in the early 2000s, Florida was producing millions of boxes of citrus. They were shipped all across the country. How does that compare to sort of what you're doing now?

You know, it's kind of like night and day. We were 240 million boxes of oranges, 50 million boxes of grapefruit, specialty fruit. And so just the sheer volume and the sheer numbers are so much different than what it was today. We basically could supply all the orange juice that our country could drink as well as many other places. So it's, you know, it's just a different feel right now. It's a different industry right now. So you've seen a lot of growers that have adapted. And we're just trying to maintain our market share as best we can and provide the great tasting, healthy product that our American consumers have come to know and love. Why is it so hard to grow citrus in Florida now these days? That's a good question. I think that the number one problem that we're having right now is a... a disease called Wong Long being originated in Southeast Asia. Citrus greening, right? It's spread by tiny insect. Yeah, citrus greening. It's just spread by tiny insect that, you know, it's vectored by an Asian citrus cillid that, you know, there's just no real, currently no real total cure for. And really there was very extremely limited research when it was. first arrived in florida so we've we've kind of started from ground zero to develop a plan and and kind of a growing practice that you know how do you combat this disease until that tolerant or resistant tree is actually developed and you know it's it's just taken a while but we're we're closer today than we've ever been Yeah, it takes a lot of research to get to an answer for some of these things. I mean, you mentioned hurricanes, but there's been freezers which have really dealt blows to the industry over the years, too. How have you been able to survive in what's quite a challenging business? And you mentioned the fact that you've got a lot of family and other aspects of agriculture too, so it doesn't matter which part of the agribusiness you're in. It can be tough, right? I think, you know, the American farmers probably never faced a tougher time than we have right now. That's certainly, you know, true of the citrus industry. But, you know, it's just as we continue to have pressure from population increases and relocations, you know, just... just a lot of different pressures on agriculture in general. You know, just finding labor that wants to work in the agricultural sector is a very difficult thing. You know, it's just, it used to be that everybody knew somebody that was involved in growing food. Now it's rare when you run into somebody that's actually involved in food production in this country. And we don't, I don't think is a country that we value. what our food production, what those people do and what they actually provide in the security that our country has because we can't produce all of our own food. Yeah. So it's, but it's a, it's a greatly different day today than it was, say, 50 years ago. Ned, I mean, you mentioned at the top of our conversation that you're a smaller scale operation than probably some of your competitors, but give me a sense of what that means. Like when you're in harvest season, how many folks are you employing on your farms?

Well, you know, including our harvesting labor, probably 100. But, you know, most of that's seasonal and most of that's, you know, strictly for harvesting and temporary. Yeah. But as an industry, that's kind of the way that it is. We have always operated with seasonal labor. Used to be our season really would get. get started heavily in the early part of November and run through the end of June. Now we're probably, you know, early part of December through the 1st of May. So finding those short-term workers is kind of problematic, much like it is in anything where you've got a hand harvest of commodity. Yeah, right, because some agricultural producers I've talked to have said, well, we're looking at robotics, but that's challenging for citrus. And that's challenging. I mean, we have looked at different types of robotic operations and mechanical harvesting, but we have not found anything yet that we feel like we can consistently pick the crop that would, you know, without damaging it, without, you know, without having a crop loss. So it's proven to be challenging, however, with the improving technologies and the different things that are becoming available to just the American public. I feel like that, you know, at some point you'll see that work its way into the citrus industry as well. We've been talking with Ned Hancock. He is a citrus grower, fifth generation grower from Peace River Valley. Ned, thank you so much for giving this update on the citrus and good luck for the rest of the season. Thank you for your time and your interest in Florida citrus. Well, coming up next, we'll later this hour, I should say, a zesty chicken with a zest, Delia Cologne, and St. Petersburg's former Deputy Mayor Kanika Tomlin, talking about St. Pete's foodie, scene, community health and more. But first, we'll take a look at dengue fever. It's on the rise in Florida. Find more about this alarming disease. Next, that's when Florida Matters, live and local continues. Stay with us.

Welcome back to Florida Matters. Live and local, I'm Matthew Petty. Well, the state's health department is warning about locally acquired dengue. There have been four confirmed cases in Florida so far. Two in Hillsborough, one in each in Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties. And you've probably seen advice about drain and cover when it comes to mosquito prevention. But what does locally acquired dengue actually mean? How does it spread from mosquitoes to people? What can we do to reduce our risk? We're joining us. In studio is Christy Miley, a researcher and an adjunct professor from the University of South Florida's College of Public Health. Dr. Miley, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you for having me. Thank you for having me. Dr. Miley, thank you. Dr. Miley, thank you, too. Thank you. And we want to hear from you too. Maybe you've got questions about Dengue or the mosquitoes that spread it. What strategies do you have to keep the mosquitoes away? The number is 813755-62 to join the conversation. That's 813755-6562. You can also email Florida Matters at WUSF.org. Well, Dr. Miley, tell our listeners exactly what Dengay is and how it's transmitted. Of course. So, yeah, Dengue has actually been around for quite some time. As early as the 1800s, we saw cases in Florida. But for the most part, by the 1940s with the advent of mosquito control districts and pest management, we basically saw that interrupted for quite some time. I think the first case that hit the United States was in 2001 in Hawaii. And then we saw an outbreak in... the Keys in 2009. And that was kind of when we started to see it again happening within the state of Florida. Dengue itself is considered breakbone fever. Sometimes it's asymptomatic on that first initial stereotype that you're infected with. Sometimes you'll have fever-like symptoms. Generally... Where does the break bone come from? What does that refer to you? It's the pain, actually, that people, the myalgia and pain that people have. It actually feels so severe that it feels you've broken your bones. Wow. These cases, when they initially happen with a single stereotype, It may be as mild as flu-like symptoms. But when a person is infected with a secondary serotype, they're more at risk for developing hemorrhagic symptoms, this breakbone fever. Okay, now tell me what that means, hemorrhagic symptoms. So that is bleeding from the nose, the mouth, the eyes. Yikes. Yeah, bruising. It can be quite severe and lead to dengue shock syndrome. And, you know, in some of these cases, if they're really severe, they can die from it.

We don't necessarily see that here yet. Let's keep our fingers crossed that we don't. We do have really good pest management. Mosquito controlled districts are kind of our go-to. But it does require community involvement because this mosquito is quite different than what people are used to seeing with mosquitoes. We think, oh, they come out at dusk, you know, in low-lying areas. Unfortunately, a lot of Florida has been urbanized on low-lying areas. Sure. And this mosquito is actually a daybiter. So it doesn't follow that same pattern that people are used to seeing. So it definitely can put people more at risk. If you're just joining us on Florida Matters Live and Local, we're talking about Dengay, locally acquired Dengay in Florida. It's a virus transmitted by mosquitoes. I want to hear from you. Maybe you've got some experience with Dengay or other mosquito-borne illness. Tell us about it. Or maybe you've got some questions about protecting yourself from mosquitoes. Give us a call 8137562 or email Florida Matters at WUSF.org. Well, Dr. Frye, talk about locally acquired cases. What does that mean exactly when you say something is locally acquired? Sure. Thanks for asking. Well, so a lot of times people travel to Cuba or to Central South America, those areas where dengue is endemic. In other words, it's there. It's in the population all the time. Upon return, they may be infected and they may not know that yet, but if a mosquito bites them, the mosquito becomes infected with the virus. That virus replicates. And once that virus replicates, and that mosquito bites others. you're going to have other people being infected. They inject their saliva actually under the skin to do that infection. So when that happens, you have a local case if a local mosquito did the person. Does that make sense? Yeah, okay. So what is the sort of thinking from Department of Health and other health officials when you think about these four locally acquired cases? I mean, is that cause for alarm? Well, it's cause for making sure that we're proactive. We certainly need to be draining and covering standing water. I don't think a lot of people know that the 80s Egypti mosquito can breed in just the tiniest amount of water. So think about a dog bowl that's sitting outside. And it only takes seven to 10 days from larva to a mosquito that can, you know, begin to bite people. So a tiny amount of water, even clean water, that stuff needs to be dumped. It can't be kept standing. So think about flower pots and all those types of things that can hold water outside. We need to get rid of those. So that's one of the big things we can do is really prepare. So concern, yes, definitely. But I think our public has been responding well to the messaging, which is keep yourselves covered. you know, wear spray and draining cup or any standing water. Well, let me bring you into this conversation, Adrienne. So when you hear about locally acquired cases of dengue, what happens with Pasco County mosquito control and I imagine other mosquito control districts? Certainly. So the good news is that Florida has a very sophisticated mosquito surveillance and control system. We know which mosquitoes transmit dengue.

and other mosquito-borne diseases, we know where those mosquitoes occur, and we have systems in place to detect disease activity and respond appropriately. When we're talking about mosquito-borne disease, we're really talking about the relationship between the virus, the mosquito in this case that's able to transmit it and the environment. And understanding that relationship really helps us to know how to intervene appropriately. So dengue is primarily transmitted by 80's Egypti mosquito species here in the state of Florida. These egypti is highly adapted to live around human habitation. They do have a preference for human blood as their blood meal that they need that is required to produce the proteins for their egg development. 80s, the species of mosquito lays their eggs in very small containers around homes and businesses in people's yards, around their vegetation underneath porches, sometimes very difficult to even find these habitats that can be utilized by this mosquito species. And so. They're not the conventional wisdom of protecting yourself during crepuscular periods of the day, during dawn and dusk. While that does apply to the dengue vector species that we have in Florida, Aedes-Agypti is also quite active during the day. So you do want to make sure that you're being proactive and protecting yourself from mosquito exposure day and night. But for control response in particularly, at the Pascoe County mosquito control, district, we have a great relationship with the Florida Department of Health in our county and at the state level. And so when we're notified of a suspected case of mosquito-borne disease, whether it's dengue, West Nile virus, or some of the other mosquito-borne diseases that we're concerned with, we are immediately responding to that notification from our partners at health. And what that means is we have very targeted surveillance that we will conduct in the area, the geographic area where it's believe that that person either resides or areas that they frequent outdoor activity. And then we can really target our control efforts in that area based on the surveillance data that we're using. And so once we're looking for that mosquito vector, if we find 80s Egypti, in this case for dengue, we can employ very targeted. mechanisms in place that includes door-to-door inspections. Again, this is a mosquito species that lives in people's backyards. It's very important to get on people's property, looking for the habitat that they're producing in, and then educating the public awareness is huge with this mosquito because a lot of these habitats are things around people's homes that you may not even understand that you're... Making the problem worse. Yeah, lots of education needed. Sorry to buzz in here, but I've got a caller who wants to weigh in. Vincent, I believe you're on the air and I understand you have some experience with Dengue yourself.

Yes, I caught dengue in Puerto Rico. I'm a physician, and I knew about dengue, but the precautions you think you take are rarely adequate. I was staying at housing where there were mosquitoes inside. You don't think about it until you see them flying around the next morning. So the reason I called is I would tell everybody, be excruciatingly careful about mosquitoes because this is something you don't want to get. It took me out of the workforce for at least two months. I lost about... 30% of my body weight, you know, I was critically ill. So I would recommend no one, no one catches disease, take all precautions, take it with all seriousness that it deserves. Yeah, Vincent, thank you so much. I'm glad to hear that you recovered after what sounds like a pretty arduous ordeal, but I appreciate your call. I mean, let me just kind of bring it back to you, Dr. Miley, talking about precautions, like cover, cover up and make sure that you're, you know, being aware of mosquitoes, but as... All of the guests today have said these mosquitoes are quite persistent. They're around in the day. They could be inside as well. Yes, in the home. Yeah, of course. So what else should you be aware of? Yeah, so, I mean, this mosquito vector is a little tricky. You know, that's part of the problem with creating surveillance plans for it. You know, we have other mosquito-borne illnesses that Florida Department of Health screens for the state of Florida. You know, but we have other programs that support that, like Sentinel Chickens that, you know, can detect West Nile and Eastern equine. I like good for dengue as well? No. So. These human cases that occur actually become a bit of a sentinel for us because then we know that area is, you know, either travel-related has come into that area. We have the competent vector that can then transmit the virus. So localizing, as mosquito control just mentioned, looking for that vector, doing heavy surveillance and treatment. As also mentioned, they can breed in a bottle cap of water. It does not take much. Yeah, a very adaptable and quite kind of persistent little mosquito. We're going to have to leave the conversation there, but I want to thank you all for your conversation today, Dr. Christy Myley, researcher and adjunct professor at USF's College of Public Health, Adrian Rogers, Executive Director of Pascoe County Mosquito Control and District and Dr. Carla Fri with the Florida Department of Health. Christy, Adrian, and Carla Dr. Frye, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Well, coming up next, there's this. Delia Cologne catches up with Kanika Tomlin, former deputy mayor of St. Pete to talk about her COVID-era cookbook, her new role as a community health advocate, and more. That's when Florida Matters, live and local continues. Stay with us.

Welcome back to Florida Matters Live and Local. I'm Matthew Petty. Well, this summer, the Zest podcast has been checking in with some past guests. In 2020, St. Petersburg, Deputy Mayor Kanika Tomlin released a cookbook called St Pete Eats. She chatted about the project with the Zest Delia Cologne. And Delia joins us now with an update. So why did Dr. Tomlin write this cookbook? So before becoming St. Pete's deputy mayor and city administrator, Dr. Tomlin, she has a doctorate degree in law and policy, by the way. She was a health care executive at Bayfront in St. Pete. So health has been a longtime passion of hers. And she founded an organization called Healthy St. Pete. It's a community engagement program. So she invited some local chefs to create healthier versions of their most popular dishes so that the community can enjoy them at home. Now, Tomlin talked in your original interview six years ago about St. Pete's foodie scene and how restaurants help shape the city's identity. Let's take a listen. Our restaurants become extensions of our families and symbols and illustrations of our most critical and amazing moments in life. And so... We need our restaurants as a part of our culture. They're a staple in our culture and they help, certainly in St. Pete, it's the case, help define who we are. It's also one of the most apparent ways that people are able to find and infuse diversity in their lives in meaningful ways. And we are so proud that in St. Pete, we have restaurants from across the world stage. So, I mean, it really sounds like the cookbook is a bit of a love letter to St Pete's foodie scene, but it also came out in 2020, which is, you know, when you did the interview, and it was a difficult time for everyone, but especially for restaurants because of the coronavirus pandemic. So how did timing play into the... book's publication. Yeah, it certainly is a love letter to these restaurants. So Dr. Tomlin and her team debated whether to hold the release of the book or go ahead and publish it as planned. They decided to move forward with proceeds benefiting the areas struggling small businesses, including restaurants. And that was a time when a lot of us were cooking more at home anyway. So in some ways, the timing was perfect. Now, here's Tomlin talking about why they thought it was important to go ahead and release the book then. You'll recall that time when everything was closed. Restaurants just were not operating and people felt so disconnected from each other in the community. And we had the same thought that you have. You know, what a great connector this could be. And to give people the flavors that they've come to know and love, but in a safe way that they can experience them in their homes. It's hard to believe that it's been six years already, right? I mean, it's such a kind of a topsy-turvy time in everyone's lives. But moving on, what is Dr. Tomlin up to these days? So today she's the president and CEO of the Foundation for a Healthy St. Petersburg. It's an organization that focuses on health equity. They've done some amazing work in the community, including bringing thought leader Michael Twitty, who's a James Beard Award-winning...

Food writer, we got to interview him for The Zest. So it's just incredible what she's done in her short tenure there. And on a personal note, Dr. Tomlin recently donated a vehicle to WUSF in honor of her late husband, Terry Tomlin. Oh, wow. And we're going to listen to your latest conversation with Dr. Tomlin. So let's listen to that now. When and why did health become a passion of yours? Well, I trained as a journalist in college and learned about the power of stories and was very fortunate to work in my community telling its stories. And then an opportunity opened up at Bayfront. When I went to Bayfront, I took what I'd learned about stories and I realized all of the things we were trying to do as a community were, like, rooted in health. and people's ability to move through their lives in a state of well-being. And over time, just really it got rooted in that concept of the social determinants of health. And I think it's one of the biggest ways we can make a generational difference for our community. You're right. Everything is about stories. Yes. And you can't do anything if you're not healthy. Yes. And all of the stories, everybody's story, all of the people's stories, we're pointing back to health, whatever the determinant. It may not be directly health as it relates to a medical outcome, but it was all of the conditions of our lives that shape a story. You could trace it right back to one of these five conditions. What are some of the determinants? And I just find it fascinating. Economic stability, obviously, our neighborhood and built environment where we live. obviously access to quality health care, but also social and community context. These things all shape how our health is experienced. For sure. Okay, how long have you been with this organization? And what are some wins? Because this is not something you can easily... turn around. It's like turning around a cruise ship. It is. So the foundation for a Healthy St. Pete exists to really eradicate disparities in our health outcomes as a community. And we do that through those determinants that I was just talking about, trying to infuse some improvement there. I've been here for three years, came in June of 2023, and we've had lots of great ones. One of the biggest is... solidifying a vision that we are going to work on generational change, systemic changes that are self-perpetuating and sustainable. So not only answering the need right now, but figuring out why does the need exist and working together with our community to really craft a long-term solution. So that was our first big one. That sounds like enough. It was huge. It took us a year to get there as a team. And since then, we've been just... building the blocks that it takes to do that over the course of right now we're working on a five-year plan to get to a 20-year vision of being a community where good health allows all people to thrive. So we're looking at the issues that really drive passion in our community and that there's already a consensus.

Food systems is a place that we've been working on. We're doing everything from bringing great intellectual capital with nationally renowned speakers to really working with the purveyors of the food system to try to understand how we can make an impact. I love that. And since you almost brought it up, I'll bring it up. I got to go to the event with Michael Twitty, who was a Zest guest as well. That was incredible. Exactly. And we know that that is something that we as a foundation can do. That is the power of philanthropy. This nationally renowned, internationally known, expert on a topic that we care about as a community, we have the ability to bring him here and not only bring him here, give our community access to learn from his wisdom and apply it to our solutions. So that's a perfect example of how we work around community narrative and the power of stories and community empowerment. I was just in downtown Tampa and I was at the new public's that's over by armature works like off a North Boulevard and it was packed and it were a lot of like black and black and brown. people in there and I'm like, people have been wanting this. People don't want to buy their dinner at a gas station. That's right. They just didn't have any other choice. That's right. And it's all about choices. It's all about agency and empowering people to create their best lives. And it's also about innovation and looking at things through an alternative lens when it's helpful. So we know that food deserts are a very real thing. We know that traditional grocery stores are a way that most people purchase their food. But it's not the only way. And so how do we bring the healthy choices to people where they are, make them easy, make them quick, make them on a currency exchange that works for them. We've had some great innovation there, and it's one of our biggest wins. We've been working with the city and some others. We have mobile fresh stops that actually travels around neighborhoods. So maybe we haven't built a grocery store in South St. Pete yet, although we have many. But we are taking fresh fruit and vegetables every day to communities that need it. That's so cool. So what are you guys working on now? What are you excited about? Oh, we're working on so many things. I'm particularly excited about a couple of things. One is our youth griot program. We had some, we believe narrative, in our theory of change, we believe narrative is a critical component of the change that we seek, and we need an inclusive narrative that reflects our entire community. And in African-American culture, storykeepers are called grios. And so we trained some very talented young... people to carry that tradition forward. They completed that program earlier this year, and it was such a stunning outcome for these young people who will carry these lessons for the rest of their lives. I'm speechless. I love that idea. It was really transformative, and it's a way that they can impact the health of their community by keeping its stories. Yes, that's so good. And stories are sticky. Absolutely. numbers, but they remember the story of the one person who really made an impact. I love that. Okay, somewhat personal question because I'm a fan of your family and I got to work with your late husband, Terry Tomlin. Okay, you recently and...

On a journalistic level, it's public media. You recently donated a vehicle to WUSF. Thank you so much. Oh, absolutely. Can you tell me the story behind that? So Terry was a long-time journalist in our community, 25 years, the outdoors editor and adventure writer for the Tampa Bay Times. Best job. And it was the best job. And he was so good at it. He went all over Florida doing adventures. And his car, he was an equipment man. Everything was about his equipment. and his car was a big part of that. He called it the war wagon because he was always like going into battle and had 250,000 miles. after he drove it and was beloved to him. It's been all over the state. My son then drove it for eight years, and it was at a point where it wasn't going to work for us as a car anymore, but it could certainly work to honor his legacy and his love for public radio and WUSF and all things journalism. So we decided to donate it to WUSF. Oh, that's beautiful. I love that. He would be so happy. Oh, yeah, for sure. It'll have many more adventures. For sure. USF is the constant in my husband's car all the time. So my kids grew up on it. It's a big part of our family, and so it was very fitting. And by the way, I should mention that you have a recipe in the cookbook that is... in tribute to your husband. It is. It's called Be Prepared, and it's a pear-based cocktail, but he was always prepared because he's a journalist, an adventure journalist. And writing that cookbook was so much fun. The proceeds went to all the restaurants that had to close down or pair back during COVID. And I still have people requesting copies today. So we're so glad we did that project while in City Hall. Oh, amazing. Would you do another one? Absolutely. You would? Yes. Okay, I need to talk to you about this because I wrote a cookbook, and I don't know if I would describe it as so much fun. It just seemed like a lot of work. There's a lot that can go wrong, the wrong ingredient, the wrong quantity. And the pressure, my goodness, it really took my understanding of the anthology of cooking to another level. But it was such a project of love. And it was a celebration of St. Pete's food scene. And it was giving people access to the meals they loved so much but couldn't get to because of COVID and to do it with a healthy spin. So it was such a celebration. of all the things I love, I would do it again in a heartbeat. Well, that was Kanika Tomlin, president and CEO of the Foundation for Healthy St. Pete talking with possessed Delia Cologne. We got this email from Greg about our interview with citrus grower earlier. He writes, Nice interview with citrus grower. I didn't hear anyone say might more research from the universities and pesticide producers might have helped lessen greening or are the bugs too small, move too fast, so hard to detect and prevent. I think they're about an eighth of an inch long. But thank you so much for your email, Greg. Next time on Florida Matters Live and Local 813 Day later this week, chance to celebrate the things that make Tampa Bay unique, maybe score a deal or two at a restaurant or a local shop. What does 813 day mean to you? We'll talk about it tomorrow at noon.

That is our show for today. I'm Matthew Petty. Thank you so much for watching and listening and we'll see you tomorrow.