TAMPA, Fla. — Tampa must open its files on the South Howard flood relief project after a judge ruled the city took far too long to answer a business group’s public records requests.
Hillsborough Circuit Judge Mark Wolfe sided with the SoHo Business Alliance, whose members sued earlier this year. They argued the city held back engineering contracts, cost figures and other paperwork tied to the roughly $100 million plan to ease flooding along one of South Tampa’s busiest corridors.
The final judgment, entered Nov. 2, lists 38 records that are still outstanding and sets a Dec. 2 deadline for the city to deliver them. Within five days, Tampa has to tell its contractors to gather what they and their subconsultants hold, including the engineering firm AtkinsRéalis. Once that date passes, Tampa has five additional days to confirm its compliance in writing to the court.
The judge found that some requests had been sitting for more than 200 days. The group sent the city two requests on Feb. 2 and another one on March 26, and the city had finished only 70 of 93 requested categories by late October.
The order also tells the city to stop making the alliance pay contractors directly for records, to try to recover files that may have been deleted, and to explain the legal basis for anything it withholds or blacks out.
Among the documents at stake are flood model files, earlier versions of the designs, storm simulations based on Hurricanes Milton and Helene, and cost estimates for alternatives the business group had pitched.
City Council approved the project in September. Its plan would close stretches of South Howard from Swann Avenue down to Bayshore Boulevard, one section at a time, for up to a year, a prospect that has set business owners against residents who want relief from repeated street flooding.
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