January 15, 2003 the Saint Leo University campus was fortunate enough to have Mayor of Tampa, Dick Greco speak to the student body, faculty and staff. When he was first elected, he was the youngest mayor in America in a major city of 25,000. He then clarified that he was first elected in 1967. He Mayor Dick Greco s Visit to Saint Leo University is the son of Sicilian immigrants and emphasized the value of hard work. He said that as long as you find something you want to do more than anything, then you will be successful. He received his value of education from his father with whom he helped run then family business. After a re-election in 1971, the mayor resigned in 1972 to pursue the position of Vice-President of Development and Governmental Relations with the Edward J. DeBartolo Corporation. When speaking about his last election in 1995, he explained that one who is running for public office should not just point out the problems with the area, but what they plan on doing to solve those problems. His campaign advisors suggested that he not bother with the University of South Florida precinct because those people out there just don t vote. He went anyway and treated the precinct as he would any other. When speaking about the city of Tampa and the United States post-September 11, 2001, Mr. Greco told the audience that the city has hired more police officers than ever. He said that when he was at Raymond James Stadium, looking out at the crowd before a Bucs game, about the capacity of the stadium, 60,000, plus about 10,000 is the amount of people arrested in Hillsborough County and the threats after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, DC are greater than ever. He is amazed at what we pay attention to now and how we think, referring to the incident in November of 2001 where a 15 year old boy crashed a small plane into the Bank of America building in Downtown Tampa. He said that improvement begins at home within the family and we can t assume that things just grow by themselves; everyone has to be involved. Many people will complain about government policy, yet they don t vote and don t quite understand the issues they are mad about. His habit is to go out at night in the city and witness the things that go on in his city like fires, shootings, poverty, etc. He concluded that there is no other place in the world that has it better than what we have in the United States, but we have to give something in order to get something back in our community. Questions followed; Dr. McTague asking the Mayor about his recent trip to Cuba. Mr. Greco told the audience that he went to see Cuban dictator Fidel Castro on his own, not to carry a message from his [personal] friends: President Bush and Governor Bush. Mayor Greco had a 5 hour meeting with Castro and questioned him about the condition of his people. The Cuban people have a 98% literacy rate, but where are they going with that? Castro's regime has kept 11 million people in immense poverty. To these accusations, Castro asked the accompanying monsignor if God will forgive the things we do in this life, to which the monsignor affirmed. Castro told his audience that the Pope told him the same thing. The meeting with Castro concluded with the monsignor praying over the aging dictator, with those in the room in complete silence.

 Biographical information provided from: http://www.tampagov.net/dept_Mayor/lence. Time did not permit further questions, but Mr. Greco stayed afterwards for a bit of time to greet the students, faculty and staff of Saint Leo.