GOP convention not boom for Tampa merchants

[DonCoquixote]

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2012-08-28/gop-convention-not-boom-for-tampa-merchants

Excerpt:
"This has been a ghost town," Morzella said Tuesday morning, standing outside his restaurant named FRESH. Streets surrounding the block were barricaded. The biggest source of downtown traffic for the past few days has been police officers on bicycles, but they have been eating at meal stations catered by outsiders, not local restaurants, Morzella said.

OK, I am a Tampa resident who goes to the Channelside district (where the convention is) a lot. This place has had to sell itself to local merchants, who were tired of ghost own buisness. It is surrounded by HUGE condominium areas, which are slowly picking up, emphasis on slowly. It does not help that some in Tampa are hoping that covention success in the Channelside area will lead to a new baseball stadium, so they can steal the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team away from nearby St. Petersburg.

But if this convention remains the fiasco, a lot of small buisness will take a dive, especially as the whole "we will be the next great convention area" will prove to be a load of hype. What worries me is that, as many have pointed out, the Channelside area is the result of Democrat mayors investing money into the area. The trolley, the museums, all of it a prime example of where government invested in the economy. In true fashion,what I fear is this: the GOP will suck everything up they can, complain about everything, then Rick Scott uses that as the excuse to kill urban development, period. It does not help that many GOP types hate Tampa, wanting the state to focus on the red counties, the rural jaizzzzuz-lovin places.

Now, part of me is feeling schaenfrude, as many of us tampa lefties warned the democratic mayors that there was too big a risk having this convention in town. We already had to blow 50 Million on security, and the Channelside area looks more like a bunker than a place to relax. Of course, many of the restaurant owners, the ones who are often solid Republicans, thought they would make a mint, but in true fashion, the GOP "outsourced" the buisness, making sure that they did not even have to leave the complex to mingle among the locals. Of course, many GOP types here are already complaining, as if we servants deserved to be thrashed for not meeting their demands. I do not want to gloat, especially as I know that I am in the blast radius, but I saw this coming a while away.

[Turbineguy]

1. As long as

the massage parlors and strip clubs do OK, why worry?

[flobee1]

2. Did they honestly expect

the right to spread their wealth?

The right does not believe in buying local or supporting local business
they would rather have us pay people to bring their food and drinks to them. AND THEY STILL COMPLAIN ABOUT THAT!