WestShore Plaza sold to company based in Maryland
By Susan Taylor Martin
Tampa Bay Times
Published: Sep 19, 2014

TAMPA - WestShore Plaza, Tampa Bay's oldest mall, is getting a new owner.

Washington Prime Group Inc., a real estate investment trust based in Bethesda, Md., will acquire the Tampa mall and nearly two dozen others as part of a $4.3 billion deal to buy Glimcher Realty Trust of Ohio.

WestShore Plaza shoppers won't notice any changes - at least not in the foreseeable future.

"We do not anticipate any disruption to normal operations throughout this process and remain focused on offering a great mix of shopping, dining and entertainment," Glimcher spokeswoman Karen Bailey said in a statement Friday.

Opened in 1967 as Tampa's first "fully air-conditioned" shopping center, the 1-million-square-foot WestShore Plaza has a movie theater, several restaurants and dozens of stores, including anchor tenants Macy's, JCPenney, Sears and Dick's Sporting Goods. It predates St. Petersburg's Tyrone Square Mall by five years and has survived competition from the now-defunct Tampa Bay Center and the glitzy International Plaza, which opened in 2001.

Washington Prime, created earlier this year when Simon Property Group spun off its strip centers and smaller malls, currently owns and manages about 100 properties.

In addition to WestShore Plaza and Merritt Square Mall in Florida, Glimcher has 23 malls and shopping centers in 14 other states. Two of the malls are being sold to Simon Property Group for $1.09 billion at the same time as the deal with Washington Prime closes, probably early next year.

All of the rest will become part of a new company called WPGlimcher, which will keep Washington Prime's New York Stock Exchange ticker symbol, WPG, but will be based at Glimcher's headquarters in Columbus, Ohio. The new company's portfolio would be composed of 119 properties with about 68 million square feet of leasable space.

Susan Taylor Martin can be contacted at smartin@tampabay.com or (727) 893-8642. Follow @susanskate.