TARPON SPRINGS – Former city leaders Frank DiDonato and Chris Alahouzos are battling for votes to lead the city as mayor as current Mayor David Archie terms out.
Alahouzos, 65, served as commissioner in two, back-to-back terms that ended three years ago. He is a retired manager for Verizon who says he would be a full-time mayor. He has lived in Tarpon Springs for about 48 years and graduated from Tarpon Springs High School. He has three sons and two granddaughters.
“We need to move forward. We want to take the city to the next level with a new vision and new ideas,” Alahouzos said.
DiDonato, 68, has been out of politics for 12 years, serving as commissioner from 1991 to 1994 and then as mayor from 1998 to 2004. He has been working as a chiropractor in Tarpon Springs for 40 years, and has lived in the city for 35 of those years. He has two sons and a grandson and has been married to his wife, Debbie, for 10 years.
“I just love the town and I want to see it go in a positive direction,” DiDonato said. “I also think it’s a very critical time for Tarpon, to plan for its future.”
Critical issues
DiDonato says he joined the race for mayor because he saw three critical topics on the horizon.
“For one, we need to do some infrastructure, desperately,” he said, naming flooding as a key problem. “We need to work on those and get the vital areas taken care of so there’s not that drainage problem.”
Second, and related to that issue, is creating a new list of capital improvement projects, as the city checks projects off from its list.
“We need to reestablish and prioritize some upcoming projects for future, based on hopefully the passage of Penny for Pinellas in 2017,” DiDonato said.
Finally, he said the city needed to plan for a future budget as the economy stabilizes. DiDonato said he would like to see the city lower its tax rate, but at the right time.
“You can’t just go in and haphazardly drop the tax rate (and), a year or two down the road, realize that you don’t have enough money and have to go borrow from reserves. It need to be done the right way,” he said.
The city needs to get to the point where its not using reserves, he explained.
“Our citizens deserve the best in services at a decent rate. That’s what I did in the past. When I left office, the tax rate was much lower when it is today,” he said. “I think we can get back there as the economy progresses and through good planning for the city.”
Alahouzos said the city faced a number of unresolved issues, from the needs of senior citizens and families to increasing the tax revenue. A key part of his plan involved attracting “large job-generators” to Tarpon Springs.
“What we need to do is offered incentives for those companies to come to the Tarpon area, based on number of jobs they’re going to offer,” he said.
Those incentives included a reduction or waiver of city permits and impact fees, he said.
“Tarpon Springs has become the classic bedroom community. We live here, but work somewhere else,” he said. “
More business would equal more tax revenue for the city and more jobs for the residents, he said.
Alahouzos also said he wanted to see a hotel built in the Sponge Docks and already knows of investors who are interested.
“I want Tarpon Springs to be a designation area, After 6 o’clock when it gets dark, everyone disappears and goes back to Clearwater. We want to change that. We want them to stay here,” he said.
With the boost to local tourism and increased property tax revenue, the city could afford to lower the tax rate, stop using reserves and put “more money into people’s pockets,” he said.
Alahouzos wants to see the city step up its investment in infrastructure, calling for an upgrade in drainage at the Sponge Docks and in tying the 800 homes still using a septic tank into the city sewer lines. He also said he wanted to create a program that would help those residents pay for the sewer connection, which can be very expensive.
New projects
Alahouzos has big plans for helping the senior citizens in Tarpon Springs. First, he said he would work to increase the county’s transportation options within the city, calling especially for an oversized van to help senior citizens who can’t drive run errands around the city.
“It’s time for us to get what we pay for and bring circulation routes to Tarpon Springs,” he said. “By doing that also helps the local businesses as well.”
Alahouzos also thought a senior center and information center would help the older residents of the city.
He wanted to see more playgrounds – a relatively low cost expenditure, he said – to be built to give youth more to do after school. At the very least, the city needed playgrounds near Tarpon Springs Elementary School and in the Greek town.
Alahouzos also wanted Tarpon Springs to have its own public dock and, with the growth of downtown Tarpon Springs, a parking garage in the near future.
“Definitely, we’re going to need parking for the future as we grow,” he said.
Both candidates said they wanted the city to purchase and put to use the old Walmart site on the Anclote River.
“It’s priceless real estate that could be used for (a) sports complex,” Alahouzos said.
DiDonato, who at one point wanted the land to be used for a commercial enterprise, said that use isn’t the right fit anymore.
“That piece of land, to be a prime commercial site, needs a traffic light. A major anchor is not going to purchase that without a traffic light,” he said. “To me, now it makes more sense to look at it as park, preferably an ecotourism-type park, where we would have canoes and kayaking.”
DiDonato said he wanted to see the city highlight the Safford House.
“Right now, if you don’t stop and ask right person, you wouldn’t even see the Safford House, which I think is a very interesting piece of our history,” he said. “In its current location maybe that’s not the best place.“
DiDonato said he would like to see more Community Redvelopment Agency funds invested more thoughtfully.
“I also would like to see the downtown and Sponge Docks areas spruced up more to make it more attractive. I think we need to make downtown area shine again as well as the Sponge Docks,” he said.
To find out more from the candidates, contact DiDonato at 727-934-9794 and Alahouzos at 727-432-3468.
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