Hillsborough College will move Dale Mabry classes to downtown Tampa and an office park while the Rays build their stadium

Hillsborough College will split operations at its Dale Mabry campus among three locations while the Tampa Bay Rays build a new ballpark and the college rebuilds its own facilities on the site, according to a plan shared with faculty and staff at an internal meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 27. Most classes will move off the campus entirely, to a medical training center in downtown Tampa and an office park on Himes Avenue, while a temporary village of trailers known as "The Nest" will house student services and administration.

The plan, first reported by the Tampa Bay Times, is a significant change from what college leaders originally described. They had planned for The Nest to accommodate the same programs and roughly the same number of students as the Dale Mabry campus. Under the new plan, students and faculty will have to leave the campus to teach and take classes.

Where classes and services are going

The plan divides the campus among three sites, according to the Times:

College spokesperson Angela Eveillard said in a statement that the college is housing classes offsite in areas conducive to learning. "All services will be housed at The Nest, and we will have a continuous shuttle service available to help accommodate schedules and parking," she said.

Separately, the college has already moved to relocate its culinary and hospitality programs to its Ybor City campus. In June, trustees considered a two-year lease with Feeding Tampa Bay for 4,395 square feet of commercial kitchen, dining and office space at $84,000 a year, the Times reported. Culinary management was among the most popular programs offered only at Dale Mabry, where students run the Bistro 118 restaurant.

The timeline

The relocation and construction schedule, according to the plan described by the Times and the Rays' stated target:

The Rays are paying for the temporary relocation, WUSF has reported.

How the stadium deal came together

The plan follows a year of approvals for the Rays' roughly $2.3 billion ballpark and surrounding district on the college's land at Dale Mabry Highway, near Raymond James Stadium and Steinbrenner Field. College trustees unanimously approved a non-binding memorandum of understanding with the team in January, then approved a ground lease on May 20.

Under the lease, the Rays pay base rent of $10 a month and cover all costs of developing and operating the property, including utilities, taxes and capital improvements, the Times reported. The lease runs until 99 years after the first building is completed, with options for the team to extend it in 10-year increments up to four times. The ballpark portion can be transferred to Hillsborough County, but it returns to the college if it is not used as a ballpark for more than six months, outside of casualty events or renovations.

The public money followed in late August. The Tampa City Council approved the city's $80 million share by a 4-3 vote on Aug. 27, and the Hillsborough County Commission approved the county's $796 million share 5-2 the next day, Bay News 9 and the county reported.

What the college gets

College President Ken Atwater has called the deal a generational opportunity to reimagine the Dale Mabry campus. He told Bay News 9 that the agreement made it possible for the college to receive between $150 million and $180 million in state money toward a redesign, and that maintaining the campus's aging buildings, which date to the 1970s, costs the college $5 million to $6 million a year. Without the stadium deal, he said, the college had no plans for a redevelopment of that scale because state construction funding is highly competitive.

In May, state lawmakers agreed to include $50 million for Hillsborough College campus improvements tied to the project, money Sen. Ed Hooper said would help rebuild three buildings rather than go to the team, WUSF reported. Hooper said at the time that the funding depended on local financing agreements being finalized.

Atwater has said students should expect some disruption but that the college does not plan to cap enrollment or turn students away. Hillsborough College recorded its highest enrollment in school history last year, with more than 47,000 students, according to Bay News 9.

Concerns from students and residents

The project has drawn pushback on campus. At a September trustees meeting, seven speakers urged the college to delay demolition of Dale Mabry buildings that could begin in December, arguing that public facilities would be torn down without firm replacement plans, Bay News 9 reported. Some speakers also objected that trustees approved higher lab fees for some health sciences courses the same day they approved a spending plan that included $5 million for rebranding under the school's new name.

When trustees approved the lease in May, student activities staff questioned whether state funding would be enough to rebuild the Patel Allied Health Building, redevelop other buildings and pay for portable classrooms, and others worried about losing access to the college's tennis center, the Times reported. The tennis facility will be removed and eventually relocated, according to WUSF.

Students interviewed by WUSF in September said many of their classmates did not know about the planned move to trailers, and commuters worried about traffic. Atwater told WUSF he did not expect traffic to change much because the campus already sits beside two major stadiums.

What's next

The college's board of trustees was scheduled to discuss the relocation plan at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 28, at the Brandon campus, 10451 Nancy Watkins Drive in Tampa. If the schedule holds, students who now attend class on Dale Mabry will be riding shuttles to downtown Tampa and the Himes Avenue office park by the middle of the spring 2027 semester, while the Rays race to open their ballpark for the 2029 season.