In its recent “developer-mayor” editorial, the St.Petersburg Times made much of outgoing Tampa Mayor Dick Greco’s “loose and forgiving managerial style.” That certainly is true, even if the assessment that the last Greco years were “the most ethically compromised administration in modern times” seems overly harsh.
But to attribute much of Pam Iorio’s impressive mayoral win to being the un-Greco is simply a simplification. As is the assertion that Greco, however enamored of large-scale projects, was personally polarizing “between business and neighborhood needs, between affluent and struggling areas of town.”
Iorio may be the antithesis of polarization, but that is not what catapulted her to victory. Here’s why she was elected.
First, the competition. Irascible Charlie Miranda was too provincial. Blindly ambitious Bob Buckhorn was truly too polarizing. Newly arrived Frank Sanchez was too na