🎉 Happy Halloweekend!

⛅ Today's weather: Partly sunny, with a high of 86 and a low of 72.

Sounds like: "Halloween," Phoebe Bridgers

Today’s newsletter is 1,125 words — a 4-minute read.

If you've been in St. Petersburg for a while, you know we go hard for Halloween.

• Rows of homes transform into elaborate haunted houses and ghostly scenes perfect for getting into the spooky season spirit — if you know where to find them.

Why it matters: Local dad Spencer Caton made a map for that.

State of play: Fright This Way, a website Caton built using ChatGPT, features interactive neighborhood maps pinpointing decorated homes across the city.

• Click on a house, and a text box pops up with the address, scare level, descriptive tags including "clowns" and "ghosts" and, for some listings, photos.

Driving the news: Caton got the idea during evening walks with his three young boys in their neighborhood of three years, Old Northeast.

• The enclave's all-out decor has long made it one of St. Pete's hottest trick-or-treating destinations.

Yes, but: "There are plenty of people who want to go out and see cool decorations and maybe don't have a nightly routine" of it, he said.

• So Caton, who has a background working in tech, set out to make it more accessible.

How it works: Caton mapped the first 30 or so Old Northeast houses based on his nightly walks, but his goal is for the website to take on a life of its own.

• There's a button to submit your own home or a neighbor's. Users can also heart and add photos to listings, or "haunts" as the website refers to them.
• And while it hasn't happened yet, there's a button to report listings if, say, you didn't want your house included on the site.

By the numbers: As of Thursday, the website had logged nearly 300 haunts in 52 neighborhoods from Pinellas Point to Woodlawn to Jungle Prada.

• Old Northeast had the most, with 85 haunts. Then it was Crescent Heights (43), Crescent Lake (17) and Shore Acres (15).

Pro tip: 17th Avenue Northeast in Caton's neighborhood "has to be the best block in Pinellas," he said.

Tell your neighbors

The Tampa City Council signed off Thursday on an agreement with the Rays, laying out the team's obligations to the communities helping pay for its new ballpark.

Why it matters: Tampa and Hillsborough County agreed to spend nearly $1 billion on the team, the largest commitment of taxpayer dollars toward a sports stadium in the region's history.

Driving the news: The Rays have committed $4.2 million in community benefits over the next five years to support neighborhoods across the city, from New Tampa to Drew Park, the future site of the stadium.

• City Council narrowly approved the agreement in an hours-long meeting that had all the hallmarks of the stadium votes before it.
• The Rays (again) made last-minute revisions, council members complained about being left out of negotiations, and public comment grew heated and, at times, personal.

Friction point: Council member Lynn Hurtak took issue with the distribution of benefits across Tampa, estimating that District 6, the stadium's future home, would receive $1.5 million of the $4.2 million.

• Council members Naya Young and Luis Viera defended the broader distribution, arguing that taxpayers across Tampa are helping finance the stadium and deserve a share of its benefits.

Hillsborough College president Ken Atwater also faced questions about plans to demolish buildings on the Dale Mabry campus and relocate students to make way for the new stadium.

• Atwater said the college aims to reopen a rebuilt campus by 2030 but acknowledged it lacks guarantees for $150 million in state funding needed to complete the project.

Follow the money: Nearly $2.6 million will go toward housing and neighborhood improvements, including rental assistance, upgrades to Al Lopez Park, and sidewalks in Drew Park and West Tampa Heights.

• Another $1.1 million will support workforce development, local businesses and youth programs, among them West Tampa's historic Yellow Jackets Little League.
• About $525,000 is earmarked for transportation projects, public safety initiatives and outreach to Spanish-speaking residents.

Keep reading

🏆 Post-World Series blues? Pivot to soccer! The Tampa Bay Rowdies play their first USL Championship playoff game at 7:30pm today against Miami FC at Al Lang Stadium. (USL Championship)

🎫 Noah Kahan is coming to Tampa. The singer will play April 29 at Raymond James Stadium on the third stop of his Last of the Bugs World Tour. (Tampa Bay Times)

• Sign up for the ticket presale here.

We asked for your creepy local legends, and Stetson College of Law's Kate Bradshaw delivered.

• Bradshaw, the college's assistant director of media relations, sent us this tale from the Gulfport campus' Dolly & Homer Hand Law Library. Read it in her own words:

"In 2008, a member of the nighttime cleaning crew, who had been working at Stetson Law for many years, tearfully told her boss she was too frightened to work in the building.

• While working alone, she witnessed a book throwing itself off a shelf and then sliding in her direction, as if by a playful spirit.

The spirit is believed to be Dr. Madison Mosley, the beloved director of the Hand Law Library from 2000-2005, when he died tragically at the age of 50.

• Madison, himself an alumnus of the College of Law, cared deeply about his staff and students.
• His likeness has been seen only once that we know of: reflected in the glass as a woman cleaned a window in the Law School Archives.
• She later identified him from his photograph in the library's Mosley Conference Room.

He has, however, been sensed and heard by many people in the library over the years.

• A globe in the Larkin Reference Room has spun for several minutes by an unseen but friendly hand.
• Librarians standing at the puzzle table have heard and sensed the presence of someone nearby.
• The chair in one librarian's office turns by itself and is often found in the mornings facing the wall.

Our librarians say Madison wants everyone to feel at home in his library.

• And if you ever feel a sudden draft, hear a squeak that lasts a beat too long, or sense someone who isn't there, don't be afraid, they say.
• It's just Madison, looking after you."

Spread the local lore

Here are the top costumes Tampa and St. Pete residents are searching for, according to Google Trends data.

• 🪄 Raven (from "Teen Titans")
• 🚀 Astronaut
• 🤡 Joker (from DC Comics)
• 🐺 Clawdeen Wolf (from "Monster High")
• 👧 Boo (from "Monsters, Inc.")

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🥱 Kathryn and Yacob are hoping to catch up on sleep this weekend after some late nights this week.

This newsletter was edited by Jeff Weiner.