Now that Tampa and Hillsborough County are poised to bring the question of improved, modern, transit to county residents, you should know that the official campaign website appears to be at Moving Hillsborough Forward. They also operate a Facebook fan page right here.

Motorman Henry called my attention to Creative Loafing piece The Bumpy Ride to Light Rail in Tampa, which is a ride not quite over but I'm now guessing will be, in large part, come next November.  It's the most pronounced press on light rail since the referendum's inclusion on the ballot passed.  Another interesting article is St. Pete Times's Hillsborough County Rail Tax Faces Tougher Road than Funding for Buccaneers Stadium, which disturbingly notes that even rail's biggest cheerleaders (which might well be this site, right?) are worried the tax won't pass. Personally, maybe I was worried in pre-hearing thinking, but after reports of so many transit advocates showing up and outnumbering and outlasting transit foes, I've grown more confident. 

Plus, as is noted in the Trib's The Many Faces of Transit Backers, the winning side simply has more intelligence and muster behind it in terms of relevance.   The cranks who stood up at the public hearing meeting and enjoyed such a sneering overtone to their position statements revealed the "kind" of people who typically oppose progress.  Sneering, selfish, self-righteous, and even somewhat intellectual in that creepy kind of "don't jitter their worldview even a little lest they pull out a gun and start shooting wildly" kind of air.

Col. Frank Fitts, USMC
(Chris Cooper in American Beauty) - A Composite of the Anti-Transit Personality in HIllsborough County

In fact, you must remember this about the transit and rail issue in Hillsborough County to fully understand just how likely it is for this vote to pass after all.  Bottom line, the movement is supported by the Tampa business community, the folks who stand to lose the most in terms of prosperity and job enrichment to the community at large if it doesn't; something business-smart local Republicans understand just as well.  Anti-transit-anti-tax folks usually rant against government's decisions in these matters, but in this debate they have little to shoot at.  The light rail question in Hillsborough is not a government-driven affair.  It's one being pushed, and mightily so, by the smart financial types with business plans that anti-government people swear government should smartly regard themselves.  These are the people who stand to lose or gain real dollars in decisions made by local politics, not people like some who spoke during the hearing, who only know the limits of their selfish economics.