Your utility bill changes on October 1
Plus $3.4 billion in old pipes, 60 units on First Avenue South, and a big date for 2027.
Here's what changed in St. Pete: utility rates rise October 1, a First Avenue South apartment project is in the works, and Go Greek Yogurt opens this month.
City Council approved new utility rate ordinances for fiscal year 2027. The rates take effect Oct. 1, the first day of the new budget year. That makes this one of the few council votes that lands directly on a household bill.
If you track monthly costs, pull your current statement now. Write down what you pay today. Then compare it once the fall billing cycles come through. That is the simplest way to measure the change at your own address.
Rate votes also carry a longer story. Utility money is how the city runs and repairs the system under our streets. St. Pete has a large repair bill ahead, and rates are the main tool for covering it. What council sets now shapes what gets replaced over the next several years.
Five stories and 60 units planned for First Avenue South
Plans call for a five-story, 60-unit building at 3200 First Avenue South. That is new housing on a working stretch of the avenue, not a downtown tower site.
Nothing is under construction yet. Projects like this move through review before any dirt turns. The address is the useful part to hold onto. If you live, park or walk nearby, that is the block that changes.
Sixty units is enough to shift a corner without remaking it. Expect the familiar questions about parking, height and traffic as it moves along. First Avenue South keeps drawing that kind of attention.
Go Greek Yogurt opens at Sundial this month
Go Greek Yogurt is opening its first Tampa Bay location at Sundial. The shop is set to open in September.
The format is simple. Greek yogurt shops build bowls to order with toppings, which lands somewhere between a snack and a dessert stop.
For downtown, the location does most of the work. Sundial already sits on the walking route plenty of us take through the middle of downtown. A new food tenant there is the kind of thing you find without planning for it. That counts for something on a hot afternoon.
Bill Edwards, who reshaped downtown, dies at 81
St. Petersburg businessman and philanthropist Bill Edwards has died at 81. He spent 15 years managing the city-owned Mahaffey Theater through Big3 Entertainment and put $2 million of his own money into theater renovations.
Edwards bought the struggling BayWalk shopping plaza in 2011, renamed it Sundial, renovated it, and sold it in 2022. He also owned the Tampa Bay Rowdies from 2013 to 2018.
His work linked three familiar downtown places: the Mahaffey, Sundial, and Al Lang Stadium.
St. Pete's aging pipes carry a $3.4 billion price tag
Council reviewed a water main risk study last week. It flagged 21.99 miles of mains as very high risk. The price tag attached to the system's needs came in at $3.4 billion.
The study helps explain why utility rates and street work keep returning to the council table. Very-high-risk mains are the lines most likely to break first.
When they do break, the effects are local and immediate: streets get torn up and water service can be interrupted. The long repair list connects the October rate change to the pipes under each neighborhood.
Taste of Pinellas returns to St. Pete after 13 years
- When
- Saturday, February 6, 2027
- Where
- Tropicana Field
Taste of Pinellas is coming back to St. Pete for the first time in 13 years. The restaurant and music celebration is set for Tropicana Field.
The date is a long way out, and that is its own kind of useful. Winter weekends here fill up early with festivals, fundraisers and out-of-town visitors. Marking it now saves a conflict later.
Ticket details are not out yet. What is settled is the return itself, the venue and the day. If you missed this one the last time around, that is enough to start planning around.