Tampa Residents Meet To Complain About Gasparilla Pirate Invasion, Request Federal Intervention To Block Brigands

Tampa residents met with city and county officials yesterday to voice their concerns over what has become an annual invasion of legions of scurvey pirates, which, coincidentally, takes place every year on the same Saturday in February.

Those people living along Bayshore Drive are especially incensed over the drunken debauchery that takes place when the buccaneers storm ashore, including public urination on their manicured lawns. Said one resident, who declined to be identified, "It's only a matter of time before this goes beyond someone's lawn. It's only a matter of time before some poor soul gets their head lopped off with a rusty cutlass and the filthy beggar pisses down their throat. What part of 'THEY'RE PIRATES' don't you people understand??"

City officials expressed concern over trying to repel the invaders. A spokesperson for Mayor Pam Iorio said in a written statement, "So far, the pirates come just one day a year, do some minor looting, pillaging and plundering and then leave for another year. What happens if we make them angry and they come and stay? It's not like anybody's ever gotten killed. Moreover, it's become quite a tourist attraction when they storm ashore and, in this economy, anything that generates business has to be looked at with an open mind."

The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Dept. suggested that Bayshore residents put up their hurricane shutters during the invasion and hunker down inside while the cutthroats roam the streets.

Unappeased, the irate residents said they will appeal to the federal government. Spokesperson Angelica Topton Virginville vowed, "We are tired of hearing from city leaders who say, 'Oh, well, it's just pirates being pirates.' We intend to ask President Obama to send a contingent of Navy Seals to Tampa next year to help put an end the desecration of our lawns."