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Merchants No Help For Berry Hill

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By TOM JACKSON

tjackson@tampatrib.com

Published: January 14, 2009

DADE CITY - It turns out the little city on the ridge is every bit as much a state of mind as it is a real-world town with real-world concerns. In fact, these apparent contradictions constitute a textbook example of cognitive dissonance - the ability to entertain, simultaneously, conflicting attitudes.

Except that in the case of Dade City, the natives scarcely manifest the anxiety that serves as a marker for CD. Not only do they hold conflicting attitudes, they embrace, cultivate and nurture them.

This makes a certain amount of sense. Dade Citians wage civic war against intrusions from the outside because of threats, real or imagined, to the town's self-image as Brigadoon with a Southern-accent. As antiques mall owner Thaila Stilson says, "It's very special here. We'd hate to see that change."

Special it is, as anyone from indigene to newcomer to day-tripper would readily attest.

"I came because of the small-town charm," says Lisa Knous, a sales associate at a Seventh Street women's fashion boutique. What choking, charmless metropolis did she flee? Tarpon Springs. "Well, they opened McMullen-Booth Road to development, and now there's not a meadow or a pasture or any open space to be found."

In short, anyone eager for an economic argument to energize the fizzled negotiations over Berry Hill Estates will be hard-pressed to find one by mining the nearby commercial district. Never mind the probable upside of 402 rolling acres across from Pasco-Hernando Community College becoming nearly 1,000 new nearby residents in upper-middle to high-end houses.

Density, Schmensity

Says Phil Williams, proprietor of Dade City's iconic Williams Lunch on Limoges, "For me, some things are more important than the bottom line." Among those some things would be: "I don't want any of that high-density stuff."

And if the developer can't make a deal with the county? Says Williams, "Good. No development is good development."

Knous, who idled briefly in Wesley Chapel on her way to a settlement on St. Joe Road, concurs. "We could all stand to have more business," she says, "but not if it's going to jeopardize this town's small-city charm."

Stilson, too, would happily engage a new and expanding client base. But the price "scares me," she says. "The impact on the roads, the water, the schools. ... It could be too much."

An equal-opportunity worrier, Stilson also frets about the one-day surge promised by the confluence of the Kumquat Festival and Super Bowl XLIII Eve. Says Stilson, "Where are we going to put everybody?"

Pause, But Don't Settle

Phyllis Smith, formerly of the local chamber of commerce, has some thoughts on the latter. Gracing the doorway of "The Gallery," Smith sweeps her hand over the comfy donated space at Seventh Street and Pasco Avenue, Camille and David Hernandez's Christmas-through-Kumquat timeshare gift to the city.

Set with furniture on consignment from the local Habitat for Humanity chapter, "The Gallery" is a place for pausing, reflecting and recuperating. It also is available for lease, in the interest of "vitalizing Dade City."

Prospective tenants will want to know that local merchants disfavor lobbying for additional nearby customer base. You don't mess with Brigadoon, y'all.

Tom Jackson can be reached at (813) 948-4219.

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