TAMPA — Two girls huddledaround one laptop and a collection of notes on dental hygiene.
Behind them, a small group of students knocked a table tennis ball back and forth across the table, while others played a heated game of pool. A girl wearing headphones sippedher coffee.
Outside the student lounge at Hillsborough College’s Dale Mabry campus, construction whirred— the technology building is getting two new elevators. A security officer who’s worked at the college for 15 years made his rounds.
At some point in the next few years, it’s possible all of thiscould become the new home for the Tampa Bay Rays.
The team’s owners, who hope to build in Hillsborough County, said whatever site they choose should be more than 100 acres and have space for retail and restaurants. Hillsborough College’s largest campus, which sits beside Raymond James Stadium and George M. Steinbrenner Field, is one of a few options they are considering. It’s also one of the college’s five campuses across the Tampa Bay region.
While little is known about the potential plans, business leaders, students and elected officials already have mixed opinions about landing the stadium — somewhere — on campus. Some think a stadium could drive economic development in the region while incorporating Hillsborough College’s programs, or at least not disrupting them too much. Others worry about traffic and the effect on academics.
It’s not uncommon for colleges to share stadiums with professional sports franchises, said Victor Matheson, an economics professor at College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts.
Some colleges have temporarily hosted pro teams during stadium construction, and many college teams play in professional arenas, including the University of South Florida at Raymond James Stadium. Hillsborough College’s baseball team plays at the Yankees’ Steinbrenner Field complex.
But most of those partnerships involve renovatingan existing stadium, he said, not building one from scratch.
“If they’re really going to put it somewhere where there is not a big open plot of land,” Matheson said, “that means permanently displacing those academic buildings somewhere else.”
‘We need this campus’
The Dale Mabry campus sits on117 acres and serves more than half of the 45,000-plus students enrolled at Hillsborough College, said Paige Niehaus, campus president.
Before it was a college, though, some of the land was a municipal airfield called Drew Field.
When the United States fought in World War II, the federal government leased Drew Field to train thousands of soldiers, said Rodney Kite-Powell, director of the Touchton Map Library at the Tampa Bay History Center.
Later, the state donated 75 acres of land on Dale Mabry Highway for the college to build its first campus in the early 1970s, according to the college’s fact book. The social sciences and humanities buildings popped up soon after, Niehaus said.
The campus now houses a gymnasium, an auditorium, more than half a dozen academic buildings, a student center, a dental clinic, a cafeteria and two art galleries.
“We have a very large humanities division here,” Niehaus said. “We have close to 100 full-time faculty, and so that division alone is larger than all our faculty at some of our other campuses.”
The campus is also known for its tennis center, which includes 15 pickleball courts and 20 tennis courts, said Joe Bentrovato, the campus’s dean of student services. He said the college’s tennis team plays there, and so do community members.
The Patel Allied Health building is another campus landmark. The college spent $20 million to build the facility, which opened in 2019. It’s home to the campus’s emergency medical services and nursing programs.
The campus also regularly refreshes common areas, Niehaus said, including repaved parking lots and an upgraded cafeteria. Kelly Metivier, a criminology student, said she’s grateful the college traded a Subway for a place with bowls and gelato.
Leonardo Ospina, chief of staff for the Dale Mabry Campus Student Government Association, said he loves the campus because so many students can complete their entire program at Dale Mabry without having to take classes at the Brandon, Plant City, SouthShore or Ybor City campuses.
He said he doesn’t know why a college campus would be considered for a Rays stadium because it would be disruptive for students.
“We need this campus,” Ospina said.
Tampa City Council member Charlie Miranda, whose district includes the campus, said he thinks the team ultimately will look elsewhere.
Miranda believes the owners would prefer a site that already has businesses and residents. The nearby stadiums also already draw so much traffic, he said. That creates challenges for students trying to get to campus, Niehaus said, especially when Raymond James holds events and the buses stop running.
“I’m concerned about the college, I’m concerned about the location,” Miranda said. “Yeah, they have ample parking, but they also have that college that’s open during the day and night. So what’s going to happen to those students?”
The impact of a stadium
It’s extremely common for professional sports teams like the Rays to seek a public-private partnership when it comes to stadium development, Matheson said.
He said if a public agency, like a college, owns the stadium, that means the Rays could lease it from them and avoid a big property tax bill.
Most of the land south and west of Steinbrenner Field is owned by the Hillsborough College Board of Trustees, with some adjacent parcels owned by the state and Tampa Sports Authority. The trustees must approve any agreement regarding the stadium, Hillsborough College spokesperson Angela Eveillard said in an email.
Gov. Ron DeSantis appoints those trustees, which could make things easier for Patrick Zalupski, the managing partner and co-chairperson of the Rays, who has ties to the governor. DeSantis appointed him to the University of Florida’s board of trustees in 2023. His company gave $250,000 to a DeSantis political action committee last year.
Michael Maurino, the executive director of the Westshore Alliance, an organization of business and community leaders, said it makes sense to build a Rays stadium in the Westshore District. Other public agencies operating on parcels adjacent to Hillsborough College, including a Department of Motor Vehicles office, a juvenile justice center and a Florida law enforcement building, could easily be moved to another location, he said.
“If the desire is to have a stadium with a mixed-use development that can be accommodated at that site, you can probably accommodate the needs of Hillsborough College,” he said.
The college could transfer some operations to other campuses, though Maurino doesn’t suspect they would. Dale Mabry is the biggest campus and the college likely would want to maintain a centralized location, he said.
There is some publicly available land nearby that could suit relocated college facilities, Maurino said. Al Lopez Park is one option, he said. Another possible site is owned by the U.S. Army, and another — a former public school — is owned by Hillsborough County Public Schools, he said. Maurino said adding Hillsborough College academic buildings there would be a great way to redevelop.
Without specific details, the college is unable to gauge what change in operations or costs might come with a new stadium, Eveillard said in an email.
Greg Celestan, chairperson of the college’s board of trustees, said he knows as much about the plan as the general public does. He said he hopes itinvolves preserving at least some of the campus’s academic buildings.
Investing in higher education and major sports are important parts of strengthening a local community, Maurino said. He said cities want great professional sports as well as great education systems.
Colleges and universities tend to have larger local economic impacts than stadiums do, Matheson said.
Employees and students at community colleges often live in the area, which means the money they earn and spend circulates in the local economy.
“But someone who buys a footlong hot dog and peanuts and popcorn and Cracker Jack at the Rays game, that’s not something that contributes long-run productivity benefits for the community,” he said. “That’s just pure consumption.”