In terms of organizing, Bailey scored. Dozens of residents of the area north of Ybor City crammed into the Tampa City Council chambers to tell local lawmakers that they didn't want the facility in their area.

But it remains doubtful that their activism will make any difference, at least for now. That's because the cafe has been classified by the city's zoning department as a restaurant, which is permitted to be built in the area, though critics say in fact it's a soup kitchen.

Kim Headland and Bailey — president and vice president, respectively, of the V.M. Ybor Neighborhood Association — said the fact that the cafe could be classified as a regular restaurant demonstrated that the city's zoning matrix was antiquated. Headland complained that citizens of the neighborhood have been shut out from having any voice on the volatile issue.

Bailey said that 200-400 homeless people coming into her neighborhood to get a meal will threaten her and her neighbors' quality of life.

• Pam Iorio says there's a total lack of leadership in Tallahassee

Following the lead of Hillsborough County Commissioner Mark Sharpe's personal letter to Senate President Mike Haridopolos, the Tampa Tribune is now calling for the removal of the Lake Wales Republican as chairman of the budget committee for his ham-fisted attack on the Tampa campus, manifested by the threat of a 58 percent cut in state funding. (That cut has already been reduced; the budget committee on Wednesday restored $25 million in costs related to the creation of a new university in Polk County.)

But perhaps folks in the Tampa Bay area are protesting too much. I mean, look how it's bringing people together in the community! Heck, after Jim Norman pressed Senator Evelyn Lynn, chair of the higher education appropriations committee, he even won some praise in the editorial pages of the Tampa Bay Times!

Most interestingly, former Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio has taken to the op-ed pages as well to weigh in.

But the growing awareness of such labor conditions is growing. On Tuesday, Apple chief executive Tim Cook did something I don't believe Mr. Jobs ever did: Cook said that he wanted to make safe working conditions at Apple's overseas plants a priority.

"Apple takes working conditions very seriously and we have for a very long time," Cook said during an on-stage interview at a Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference in San Francisco.

Apple agreed in January to allow inspections by the Fair Labor Association (FLA) at a plant in China called Foxconn that makes products for the company, after a devastating New York Times story reported on the overworked and underpaid employees at such factories in China.

For over a decade Trinity, currently housed at the Salvation Army on Florida Avenue, has offered high-quality lunches to the homeless or those who just want to come in for a meal cooked by a professional chef and served by waiters.

In June, officials with the Trinity Cafe purchased a property on Nebraska Avenue and 17th Avenue to serve meals at a facility that they could call their own.

But the move has not been greeted with open arms.

Kelly Bailey is the vice president of the V.M. Ybor Neighborhood Association, which is leading the opposition. She says her group's legal challenge is that the Trinity Cafe is calling itself a restaurant, "but people don't queue up 24 hours in advance to eat at a restaurant," referring to the fact that the cafe would predominantly be serving meals to the homeless.