Unemployment rose despite tourism: Unemployment rates in Southwest Florida typically decline during the January-April months as the tourism industry hires more people.If you don't like them, join them: A philosophical battle of opinions over the concept of whether setting up auctions to sell homes is a good thing has been brewing on the Gulf Coast for the past yearUT business students win competition: Chalk one up for business students at the University of Tampa.Land sales slow, opportunities continue: Coffee Talk conducted an informal poll of land brokers in the Tampa Bay area and found sales are off substantially during the past yearAt least we're not in Flint, Mich.: There's plenty of dark humor going around these days at real estate gatherings as industry folks try to keep each other's spirits up.The guts to survive the downturn: Another sign of the rough economic times on the Gulf Coast: There has been a proliferation of seminars devoted to surviving an economic downturn.Take the Lee County pop quiz on taxes: Pop Quiz: How many separate taxing authorities does Lee County have?Forty Carrots center donation deadline looms: The Forty Carrots Family Center, a well-known Sarasota-based nonprofit group dedicated to early childhood and parenting education, is closing in on a deadline for raising money for its end of a unique commercial real estate deal.
