{"id":327058,"date":"2026-07-02T09:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T09:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/327058\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T09:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T09:28:11","slug":"west-tampa-residents-fight-to-preserve-marti-colon-cemetery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/327058\/","title":{"rendered":"West Tampa residents fight to preserve Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n Cemetery"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n Cemetery <\/a>is the final resting place for African, Cuban and European immigrants who worked in West Tampa’s thriving cigar industry <\/a>in the late 1800s. <\/p>\n

Shortly after the cemetery’s founding, private and public caretakers let the unmarked, predominantly Black graves in the cemetery’s “pauper section” fall into disrepair. <\/p>\n

A city work crew routinely dumped<\/a> raw sewage in an abandoned section, and funeral home owner Arturo P. Boza<\/a> applied to rezone the northern portion for commercial use.<\/p>\n

ALSO READ: The ‘language of memorial’: A network connects those working to preserve forgotten Black cemeteries<\/a><\/p>\n

In 2018, Patrick Thorpe, who wrote his master’s thesis on cemetery conservation, bought two acres of Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n<\/a> and vowed to build a nonprofit safeguarding the burial grounds from further commercial development. <\/p>\n

“How you treat the dead is indicative of how you treat the living,” Thorpe told the Tampa City Council in 2021.<\/p>\n

Five years later, Thorpe hopes to build four single-family homes there \u2014 possibly on top of unmarked graves.<\/p>\n

The ensuing backlash from West Tampa residents and activists centers around what they see as opaquely shifting motivations \u2014 those of the developer and of the city officials who approved his permits.<\/p>\n

City stance shifts from 2021 to 2025<\/p>\n

On June 18, City Attorney Scott Steady<\/a> told council members the laws on the book don’t obligate officials to search for unmarked graves. <\/p>\n

“The fact is that this property has the correct zoning and is compliant with our land development code,” Steady said. “We were, in my opinion, obligated to issue the permit.”<\/p>\n

Steady said Section 872 <\/a>of the Florida Statutes requires Thorpe to stop all development activity if he discovers human remains.<\/p>\n

Council member Guido Maniscalco,<\/a> acknowledging the painful history of Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n’s neglect, said he’d like to see the city take action to protect the cemetery.<\/p>\n

“Is there really nothing we can do?” he asked Steady. “These are \u2014 possibly \u2014 people’s relatives.”<\/p>\n

ALSO READ: Land swap gives more land to group preserving Tampa’s Zion Cemetery<\/a><\/p>\n

Ultimately, the Council voted to consider a land swap or purchase from Thorpe. They’ll hear a written report on that possibility on July 16. <\/p>\n

In 2021, zoning leadership denied<\/a> Thorpe’s lot split application, citing Section 27-11<\/a> of the city code.<\/p>\n

“Given the poor maintenance of burial records, I strongly recommend that any area for development be certified that there are no graves in the development area,” Cotton wrote in earlier correspondence about the property. <\/p>\n

Steady told WUSF he didn’t think the 2021 letter was relevant to today’s conversations about Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n’s future. He said Thorpe’s attorney would ask for $1 million if the city decided to pursue the eminent domain route. <\/p>\n

West Tampa rallies around Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n<\/p>\n

In 2025, over 80 Macfarlane Park<\/a> residents and other West Tampa neighbors wrote opposition letters,<\/a> urging Cotton not to approve Thorpe’s second application to split the parcel. <\/p>\n

One of their most vocal supporters is Aileen Henderson of The Cemetery Society,<\/a> a nonprofit dedicated to preserving historic burial grounds. <\/p>\n

She said the city must explain why they changed tack on Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n, seemingly tabling all concerns about disturbing unmarked graves. <\/p>\n

“We have a systemic issue here in terms of a process that favors developers and not the community,” Henderson said. <\/p>\n

The Hillsborough County Property Appraiser has long classified the lots in question as cemeteries \u2014 and, therefore, tax-exempt. Records<\/a> show Thorpe has never paid property taxes on the West Saint John Street holding. <\/p>\n

\n 1 of 2
\n \u00a0\u2014\u00a07-1 W Tampa Cemetery 3.png\n <\/p>\n

Historical tax rolls show the parcel Thorpe purchased (Folio #: 180137-000) was classified as a cemetery. <\/p>\n

Hillsborough County Appraiser’s Office<\/p>\n

\n 2 of 2
\n \u00a0\u2014\u00a07-1 W Tampa Cemetery.png\n <\/p>\n

Historical tax rolls show the parcel Thorpe purchased (Folio #: 180137-000) was classified as a cemetery. <\/p>\n

Hillsborough County Property Appraiser <\/p>\n

“The zoning department made the decision to not treat it was a cemetery,” Henderson said, referencing the parcel’s Residential Single-Family classification.<\/a> “You can’t have it both ways.” <\/p>\n

In 2024, Chabad Chai of South Tampa<\/a> considered purchasing the land from Thorpe and creating a Jewish cemetery. <\/p>\n

However, when a ground penetrating radar study they commissioned found 16 “anomalies” with unidentifiable origins, Chabad Chai pulled out. <\/p>\n

ALSO READ: The ‘language of memorial’: A network connects those working to preserve forgotten Black cemeteries<\/a><\/p>\n

Barbara Diaz-Juskowski grew up in the neighborhood, and she said the potential housing development was known as “Dead Man’s Field.” <\/p>\n

She wonders why the city won’t prioritize the dignity of those unknown bodies, whose families likely could not afford tombstones.<\/p>\n

“I don’t understand why profit is so much more important than human beings,” she said. Just do the right thing.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Phoebe Martel<\/p>\n

\/<\/p>\n

WUSF Public Media<\/p>\n

Thorpe built a white fence to divide marked from unmarked graves. <\/p>\n

Thorpe erected a white fence to separate his property from the primary section of Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n. A sign advertises “easy living, prime location” real estate coming soon.<\/p>\n

Diaz-Juskowski said the fence also created another opening for cemetery visitors to access the neighborhood, which already sees a high volume of traffic because of its proximity to the Raymond James Stadium.<\/a><\/p>\n

She added that Thorpe has failed to properly cut the grass on the border between the unmarked and marked graves.<\/p>\n

Geraldine Alvarez’s family has been in West Tampa for generations. Her father worked in the cigar industry, and she describes Macfarlane Park as an exceptionally tight-knit neighborhood.<\/p>\n

Her parents, great-uncle and great-aunt are all buried at Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n.<\/p>\n

Last year, she joined The Cemetery Society in a burial ground clean-up. While pulling weeds and painting concrete, she heard about Thorpe’s plans for 3203 West Saint John Street.<\/p>\n

“If there’s nothing there, I don’t have a problem,” she said. “But for him to come in as the savior and the hero? Then, come to 2025, and now it’s okay to build on it \u2014 what changed?”<\/p>\n

State lawmakers have joined the fight to preserve Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n.<\/p>\n

Hillsborough County Representatives Danny Alvarez<\/a>, R-Riverview, and Fentrice Driskell<\/a>, D-Tampa, wrote letters to Tampa city officials, calling on them to investigate claims of unmarked graves on Thorpe’s parcel.<\/p>\n

The rediscovery of Zion Cemetery,<\/a> one of Tampa’s first Black burial grounds, sparked Driskell’s interest in protecting neglected cemeteries. <\/p>\n

She’s since introduced legislation <\/a>that would have expanded Florida’s conservation easement<\/a> protections to abandoned cemeteries. <\/p>\n

ALSO READ: Land swap gives more land to group preserving Tampa’s Zion Cemetery<\/a><\/p>\n

The House Minority Leader said cemeteries are a window into Tampa’s rich, but troubled history. <\/p>\n

“You can look at the segregated cemeteries, and they speak to a particular time our society lived through,” Driskell said.<\/p>\n

She added that Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n could set a historic precedent, and lawmakers must strike the balance between the rights of private property owners and descendant communities. <\/p>\n

“We actually have a chance to intervene before anything gets built on top \u2014 we want to protect the dead and give them a good final resting place.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mart\u00ed-Col\u00f3n Cemetery is the final resting place for African, Cuban and European immigrants who worked in West Tampa’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":327059,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-327058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=327058"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327058\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/327059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}