Pam Iorio, 51, is the mayor of Tampa, the nation’s 54th largest city. Sworn into office for a second four-year term on April 1, 2007, Mayor Iorio has established six strategic goals to guide Tampa: investing in neighborhoods, economic development of our most challenged areas, creating a residential community downtown, efficient city government focused on customer service, establishing Tampa as a city of the arts, and making regional mass transit a reality. 

Mayor Iorio is committed to improving the quality of life in Tampa. Under her leadership:

• Tampa’s crime rate has dropped 56%.
• Iorio has advocated for better transit for the county and the region. The mayor is in support of a multi-modal plan that includes light rail, a greatly expanded bus systems and improved roads to be funded by a one-cent sales tax referendum that will be on the November 2010 ballot. .
• The new Curtis Hixon Waterfront Park and cultural arts district, designed and constructed under the Iorio administration has opened to the public and transformed our downtown waterfront. The eight-acre park features a great lawn, interactive fountains, a playground, and dog park and opens the waterfront to the beautiful vista of the University of Tampa minarets.
• The Tampa Museum of Art, a 66,000 square-foot public-private partnership designed by architect Stanely Saitowitz, opened in February 2010.
• The Glazer Children’s Museum, a 53,000 square-foot state-of-the-art facility, is scheduled to open on September 25, 2010.
• The Tampa Riverwalk, has been a major priority of the mayor’s. Designed as another public-private partnership, the Riverwalk will ultimately connect pedestrians from the Channel District to Tampa Heights –45 % has been completed.
• The redevelopment of East Tampa has been one of the City’s goals. Since 2004, over $25 million in Tax Increment Financing has been generated and reinvested back in the community, plus more than $119 million has been invested by the private sector.
• Downtown has transformed from a business and government center into a 24/7 regional center for business, entertainment, the arts and urban living – 5,000 people now call downtown home with a capacity for 17,000.
• The Mayor’s Youth Corps was initiated in 2003. A service-oriented leadership program for a select number of Tampa’s teens, the Youth Corps provides an opportunity for involvement in community service projects, leadership development activities and the production of an award-winning television show From the Corps. Since its inception, 265 students have participated in the program.
• The City has taken a leadership role on environmental issues. In 2009 Tampa was named a Certified Green Gold Local Government by the Florida Green Building Coalition – one of only two cities in the state to receive this designation. Iorio named Tampa’s first Green Officer in 2008. In 2007, the City implemented a historic minimum flow for the Hillsborough River.

As mayor, Pam Iorio serves on the Aviation Authority, the Port Authority, the Board of Trustees of the University of Tampa and the Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority. Additionally, she serves on the University Press of Florida Government and Politics Advisory Board and on the Advisory Board for the Reubin Askew Institute on Politics and Society.

Iorio began her political career at age 26, when she became the youngest person ever elected to the Hillsborough County Commission (1985-1992). A year later her fellow commissioners elected her chairman. After serving two terms on the County Commission, Iorio was elected three times to the office of Supervisor of Elections for Hillsborough County (1993-2003). In 2000, she was elected President of the Florida State Association of Supervisors of Elections, becoming the spokesperson for the supervisors during the 2000 presidential election. Iorio was elected Mayor of Tampa in March 2003 and re-elected in March 2007.

Iorio attended Hillsborough County public schools and graduated from American University in Washington D.C. with a BS Degree in Political Science. Iorio also earned a Master’s Degree in History from the University of South Florida in Tampa in 2001. She has published several articles on Tampa’s civil rights and political history.

Iorio is married to Mark Woodard. They have two children, Caitlin and Graham.
 

 
 

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