Shawn Harrison narrowly avoided losing his House District 63 seat last year. Heading into the 2018 election cycle, Democrats are fired up about a “wave” election they say will help them win the seat. Harrison is fully aware of that, which is why he’s stepping up fundraising efforts early in the election cycle, raking in $36,178 in last month. Harrison has now raised $55.678 for the cycle.
In 2016, Democrats targeted a handful of Florida House districts they believed they could flip from red to blue. One of them was Hillsborough County’s House District 63, where the Florida Democratic Party put some money behind Lisa Montelione in her bid to oust Republican incumbent Shawn Harrison. After a close race, Harrison ultimately prevailed, 51 to 49 percent. Although off-year elections are traditionally harder for Democrats, there is hope that an energetic resistance to Donald Trump could make 2018 a year of opportunity.…
Former Tampa City Councilwoman Lisa Montelione has a new gig. The native New Yorker accepted a position at the Corporation to Develop Communities, Inc (CDC of Tampa) in its Career Resource Center. Her responsibilities will be developing relationships with employers in the Tampa Bay area to assist the CDC’s clients in finding jobs. “Bringing Ms. Montelione onboard expands the reach of our Career Resource Center, allowing us to have a greater impact across the Tampa Bay region,” says CDC CEO Ernest Coney. “Her dedication…
The Florida Elections Commission has dismissed a complaint made against Jim Davison in his race for the Tampa City Council District 7 race last fall. Luis Veira defeated Davison last December in the special election to succeed Lisa Montelione, who stepped down from her seat to run for a state legislative seat. In the days before the November 8 election, Hillsborough County Democratic Executive Committee Chair Ione Townsend had filed a complaint with the FEC, calling on the agency to look into the $1,000…
Tampa City Council Chair Mike Suarez says Bob Buckhorn‘s decision to opt out of a statewide run in 2018 should mean a lot less drama associated with the election for council chair next month, a development he says “is a good thing.” There was plenty of such drama surrounding the election of a council in 2015 and 2016, due to the uncertainty around Buckhorn’s political ambitions. But his announcement that he will forgo a run for governor and instead fulfill the last two years as…
Saying that he is “shocked” that a committee in the Florida House voted to kill funding for Enterprise Florida and Visit Florida last week, Governor Rick Scott came to Tampa on Monday to urge the public to urge their state legislators to maintain the funding for those two besieged agencies. “This is an important issue to me personally,” Scott said in his comments to reporters after concluding the second of three scheduled appearances around the state in what his staff is calling a “Fighting for…
In his “As We Heard It” column, Patrick Manteiga writes that candidates of all stripes are starting to measure their strengths for a potential run for Mayor of Tampa. Among the names the plugged-in Manteiga mentions are the obvious contenders, like former police chief Jane Castor and current City Councilman Mike Suarez, as well as Councilmembers Yolie Capin and Harry Cohen. Also in the mix, Manteiga says, are Hillsborough Property Appraiser Bob Henriquez, Public Defender Julie Holt, former state Rep.…