It’s 9 a.m. in City Council chambers and Ken Ferlita sits listening to attorney Michael LaBarbera rattle off the list of maladies associated with the building Ferlita’s immigrant grandfather once owned. The roof is gone, the grout between the bricks is crumbling, the walls are bowing.
He already knows the story. For the past year or more, Ken Ferlita has tried to find a way to save the former Ferlita Macaroni Factory, which his Sicilian grandfather founded in 1912 in West Tampa.
Giuseppe Ferlita moved the factory to 1607 22nd Street in Ybor City in 1924. The building served both as his family’s primary residence and business. Giuseppe embellished the building with neo-classical columns and a grand front entrance to mirror the nearby Italian Club, which was constructed just a few years earlier, in 1917. The business eventually outgrew its Ybor City headquarters and, in 1946, Ferlita sold the building to Pedro and Digna Diaz Perez, who used it as a cigar factory and residence. The family eventually sold the cigar business but
continued to live in the building until 1974.
In 1985, Less Thompson purchased the property and, after 25 years of ownership, has brought LaBarbera before the Barrio Latino Commission to argue his case for demolishing the historic blonde brick structure.
Faced with the threat of demolition in February of 2009, Ferlita approached Joe Capitano, a past president of the Italian Club, local business owner, and Ybor City native, for help. Capitano proposed that the Italian Club’s Building Trust acquire the old macaroni factory through a partnership with an un-named tenant, who, sources report, may have been the Columbia Restaurant. Ferlita’s architectural firm and a host of others agreed to work pro bono. The deal fell through when sufficient parking could not be secured. With no parking, the deal was dead.
“I don’t know why this burden should fall on the shoulders of a non-profit,” said Ferlita, who feels the city and the Ybor City Development Corporation could take a more active role in saving the building.
There’s no doubt the old factory needs work. To stabilize the property, an internal steel cage would have to be erected since the existing walls are too weak to support any meaningful restoration- a financial hardship that Thompson argues he cannot bear, hence the demolition request.
The real issue, however, is why Thompson, who purchased the building a quarter century ago, was allowed to let his building rot. According to the City, Thompson has never filed a single application for repairs or modifications of any kind on the building. A progression of aerial photos presented by the City during the hearing show a small hole in the roof growing like a cancer. The roof caved in last year, which prompted the first demolition request. Thompson, by the way, owns a roofing supply company.
To read more go to www.CigarCityMagazine.com
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