MAYORAL SLASH
2/20/2008 11:50:38 AM by Sandy Lindsey
Tampa’s mayor, Pam Iorio, has a lifelong relationship with the sea that started in Maine and followed her down to Florida’s west coast and hasn’t subsided since.
Few mayors can say that their city has been attacked by pirates in the last century, let alone in the last decade. And even fewer get attacked by pirates every year. No one, in fact, except Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio.
And that “attack” is a huge economic boon to the city. Nearly half a million people turn out every year for the annual Gasparilla Pirate Fest. Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla in their oversized replica pirate boat lead a fleet of krewes and spectators on their personal boats through Tampa Bay and demand the key to the city. Once Iorio hands the key over, the pirates parade along Bayshore Boulevard and party downtown.
“Gasparilla helps define Tampa,” says Iorio. “It’s much more than a party or something good for tourism — it’s a signature event for our city, just as the Mardi Gras is for New Orleans. We’re fortunate to be a city that has such a colorful history, resulting in an occasion like this.”
Iorio says that even before she was mayor, she’d watch the Gasparilla boats come in at waterfront parties on Davis Island. “One of Tampa’s greatest assets is the waterfront,” she says.
Iorio’s administrative focus on the water is seen in three other highly-respected boating events which now come yearly to Tampa: The World Championship APBA Speedboat Races; the annual International Dragon Boat Festival & Races; and the inaugural St. Pete Marine Marine SuperShow Seafood & Arts Festival May 23-26 at Vinoy Park, Marina & Hotel. The woman who has canoed the Hillsborough River with University of South Florida students also spearheads the highly effective Annual Mayor’s Hillsborough River and Waterway Cleanup that attracts several hundred volunteers.
For a woman who has had dinner with Tom Cruise and has no problem taking political risks, life can be more challenging, she finds, on the water or, rather, under it. “One time I took up scuba diving. That was a disaster, because I got down 60 feet below the water and lost my buddy and wasn’t quite sure how to get back,” she says. “I had to figure out a way to get back up by myself. That was risky, but didn’t seem like it at the time, just in retrospect.”
Another notable maritime memory was when she christened the Tampa Bay tugboat Independent. “Due to the day of the boat’s christening, we now share a birthday,” she says. “Also, both the tug and me were born in Maine, though the tug was birthed in Boothbay.”
Iorio feels a personal connection to the water and takes advantage of it as often as she can. Many times it is a simple walk along scenic Bayshore Boulevard or a weekend bike ride there with her husband. But how else does this hard-working politician relax? A devout fan of non-fiction, she once went through a phase where, she explains, “I just began swallowing up Agatha Christie novels to relax,” she says. “It’s such a nice escape for me. I’ve always loved mysteries.” And where better to curl up with a good book than in the cockpit of a boat out in the Gulf?