- December 15, 2025
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Grand Prix yachts return
After a one-year hiatus, the Acura Yacht Club will return for this year's Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, allowing boaters to watch the race from private floating docks at turns 10 and 11.
Slips will be available starting at $4,000 for 30 to 79 feet or $9,500 for 80 to 150 feet. They will include benefits such as paddock passes, closed-circuit video and access to other event sites.
Acura will also sponsor the Sports Car Challenge as part of the three-day festivities March 25-27 in downtown St. Petersburg. The 1.8-mile, 14-turn circuit includes Pioneer Park, the Mahaffey Theatre, the new Salvador Dali Museum and Alfred Whitted Airport.
Hotels may rebound
Tampa and Miami are among 21 markets nationwide where hotel revenues are expected to rise this year, according to an analysis by The Plasencia Group. The Tampa-based hospitality research firm also reported that buying opportunities for hotel properties will be greater in 2011 than in the last two years.
Occupancy at hotels in most major U.S. markets picked up last year, but the average daily rate remained soft because operators had to keep prices low, the Plasencia report stated. It added that improving corporate earnings and more certainty about taxes should help hoteliers this year.
Tampa Bay hotel occupancy rose at least 6% through most of 2010, while rates increased nearly 2% to $88 per night, according to Smith Travel Research.
McDonald's now delivers
Caspers Co., the largest franchisee of McDonald's restaurants along the Gulf Coast, began a new delivery service for businesses wanting fast-food catering.
Five McDonald's locations Tampa and one in St. Petersburg are making weekday breakfast and lunch deliveries within a five-mile radius as part of a test run by Caspers. The service costs $7 per trip on top of the total bill, and includes the entire McDonald's menu along with chafing dishes if needed to keep the food warm. No minimum order is required.
Orders must be paid in advance by credit card and can be placed online at mcdonalds2u.com.
Jackson stops application
The Jackson Laboratory withdrew its application for state funding to build a genetics-research center in eastern Collier County, leaving open the possibility it might propose an alternative plan.
The Bar Harbor-based nonprofit research organization sought $130 million in state funds and another $130 million in county money to build a facility that would initially employ 244 people. The Barron Collier Cos. planned to donate 50 acres to the venture near Ave Maria, a new town it is developing in eastern Collier County.
In a statement, Jackson officials say they will continue to explore a Florida expansion and said they plan to work with Gov. Rick Scott's administration to craft a new proposal.
Psych hospital planned
Park Royal Psychiatric Hospital raised $23 million in a bond issue to finance the construction of a 76-bed psychiatric hospital.
Construction is scheduled to start next month on the 69,500-square-foot hospital on the campus of Health Park Medical Center in Lee County and be open by February 2012.
The hospital will focus on in-patient psychiatric care with an emphasis on senior behavioral health. Currently, Park Royal contracts to provide services at Lee Memorial Hospital's 15-bed senior behavioral care unit in Fort Myers.
HMA sells hospital
Health Management Associates sold Riley Hospital in Meridian, Miss., to Anderson Regional Medical Center. Terms of the sale were not disclosed.
HMA, the Naples-based hospital company, currently operates 59 hospitals with about 8,800 beds in non-urban communities. Anderson Regional Medical Center is based in Meridian. Riley Hospital has 140 beds.
Fly to Lansing
Sun Country Airlines has inaugurated nonstop service from Southwest Florida International Airport in Fort Myers to Lansing, Mich.
Sun Country will operate the flights three to four days a week during the winter and spring season. This is the first time an airline has provided nonstop flights from Fort Myers to Lansing.
City markets site
Sarasota city officials prepared a preliminary marketing plan to help sell vacant land the city owns downtown.
City commissioners say they would like to sell the land to a developer who would build a hotel on the site, which is just north of the Palm Avenue parking garage that recently opened. The city hopes to finalize the marketing plan, with demographics and tourism figures, early this year.
The city has already heard from at least five Gulf Coast-area developers interested in possibly building a hotel and office space on the site, even before an official marketing plan is approved. No developer has indicated interest in building a conference center on the site, although local business leaders have long believed the area is in need of one.
LWR building again
Winter Park-based Lost Creek Apartments recently announced plans to build an apartment complex with at least 270 units on the Manatee County side of Lakewood Ranch.
The site for the planned complex covers 24 acres on State Road 70, a few miles east of Interstate 75. Officials with Schroeder-Manatee Ranch, the developer of Lakewood Ranch, say the project has already obtained regulatory approvals and construction could begin by March.
The complex would be one of the first new construction apartment projects to be built in the Sarasota-Manatee region in five years.
Home sales rise
Manatee County home sales climbed slightly on a monthly basis in December, but took a tiny dip on an annualized basis.
Overall, there were 305 sales in December, according to the Manatee Association of Realtors. That was up from 282 in November, but down from 313 sales in December 2009.
Despite the annual drop in December sales, there was an increase in sales for the entire year, from 3,407 in 2009 to 3,927 in 2010, according to the Manatee Association of Realtors.
