The “David A. Straz Jr. Center for the Performing Arts.” That will soon be the new name for the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center.
By any other name, however, we are talking about one of the premier performing arts venues in the Southeast. Recall its brief, uniquely Tampa, history.
Tampa was a late cultural bloomer. While other cities were turning to the arts for downtown revivals in the 1960s, Tampa was still clinging to its industrial ambience – as witnessed by warehouse row along the Hillsborough River. Sarasota would have its Van Wezel Hall; Clearwater its Ruth Eckerd Hall; and St. Petersburg its Mahaffey Theater. Tampa had its Curtis Hixon Hall.
When the $57-million, 335,000-square-foot TBPAC opened in 1987, it was a product of municipal bonds, nine city-owned, dirt-lot acres and a unique cadre of visionaries that prominently included Hinks Shimberg, H.L. Culbreath, Frank Morsani and Mayor Bob Martinez.
And while civic leaders and local luminaries basked in a waterfront, acoustics-touted venue worthy of great performance, the reality was this: It was an economic development tool. Every major municipality, especially one dubbed “America’s Next Great City,” had to have one. Reminding outsiders that Elvis once performed at The Armory no longer impressed. Tampa needed this to credibly sell itself as a first-class city. The kind that a corporate CEO just might like enough to consider relocating to.
And once they built it, they came. Principally Broadway, thanks in large part to Judith Lisi. She arrived in 1992 – and the new president made Broadway a priority. Over time the offerings would range eclectically from The Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables to cabaret shows such as Forever Plaid to the concerts of Mariah Carey and Ruben Blades. TBPAC would eventually rank among the top grossing venues of its size in the country.
And now that TBPAC has, not unexpectedly, felt recessionary fallout in ticket revenue declines and endowment erosion, up steps another visionary, Milwaukee native David A. Straz Jr., 67. The 29-year resident already has a track record of giving back to the community – the University of Tampa’s Straz Hall and the David A. Straz Jr. Manatee Hospital at the Lowry Park Zoo. But Straz also comes with an abiding love of the arts –as well as very deep pockets.
The amount of the Straz gift hasn’t been revealed, but it’s being billed as the biggest individual act of cultural philanthropy in the Bay Area. Ever. That would likely mean eight figures. Easily.
Straz’s rationale was blunt: “Our goal is to ensure that it remains world class for our community.”
It should. But the performing arts center is also, we are reminded, so much more than a cultural icon. The venue that will welcome Wonderland next month is a graphic testimonial to one of Tampa’s most precious natural resources. Those special individuals who have made Tampa their home – and, as a consequence, made Tampa a better place. From Shimberg to Straz. Now more than ever, we are fortunate to be — and to have been — blessed by their generosity and their civic involvement.
“We believe that we are all better people when we have access to the arts,” underscored Straz.
Indeed. Plus, they’re still a great economic-development tool.