Affordable housing advocate builds campaign for Manatee commission

Bradenton’s Glen Gibellina, 74, has been an activist since the days of the Vietnam War when his brother Gary was drafted. Gibellina’s draft number was too high to be called on to serve. 

He was a student at Arizona State University and enrolled in the Air Force ROTC at the time.

“I’d be there in my uniform at 5:30 in the morning,” Gibellina said. “About 4 in the afternoon, I had my tie dyed T-shirt on protesting at the same building.” 

Gibellina loves a good T-shirt, especially the blue one that reads “free range gadfly.” But the casual attire should not be confused with a flippant attitude. 

Gibellina is serious about Manatee County government. He pays attention and stays involved — so involved that he was labeled a gadfly by Commissioner Amanda Ballard. 

In nature, gadflies bite livestock. In the commission chambers, gadflies ask questions and hold elected officials accountable for their actions. 

Now, Gibellina wants to be the elected official taking action. He’s challenging Commissioner Mike Rahn for the District 4 seat in the Republican primary this August. 

Photo by Lesley Dwyer

District 4 starts at University Park and runs west to Bayshore Gardens. 

“I want to focus on District 4,” Gibellina said. “Stay in your lane. When (the other commissioners) run over (the late District 1 commissioner) Carol Felts and (District 5 commissioner) Bob McCann, they’re acting as at-large commissioners. You didn’t get the votes from that district for you to make that decision. You should respect that district commissioners’ wishes.” 

Gibellina was referring to votes cast for developments in East County. He noted that there’s enough work to be done within District 4. 

But one issue that Gibellina is especially passionate about, which spans all five districts in Manatee County, is the lack of affordable housing. 

The Manatee Tiger Bay Club honored him with the Nonprofit Leadership Award in 2025 for his advocacy with local nonprofits and the nonprofit he founded, Uncontained 360. 

The nonprofit is attempting to turn repurposed shipping containers into affordable housing. 

Helping the homeless is not something Gibellina only addresses through nonprofits in the community; he brings those who are homeless into his own home, as well.

Gibellina met Ron Melichar more than two years ago standing outside Ollie’s Bargain Outlet in Bradenton. Melichar had been sleeping inside a car wash for six months after hitting hard times.

He'd always worked odd jobs, so he does the same for Gibellina now. When the East County Observer visited Gibellina’s home, Melichar was doing some maintenance around the property and feeding the flock of chickens homegrown sweet potatoes. 

"Glen helped me out a lot," Melichar said. "Anything he needs fixed or repaired or cleaned up, I do that." 

Courtesy image

While Melichar is not a veteran, Gibellina mainly houses homeless veterans. He accepts Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing vouchers issued by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and covers all the veterans’ utility bills. 

Most of the veterans are referred by the Sarasota Housing Authority, which also controls Manatee County vouchers. Gibellina has taken six veterans off the streets over the past five years with not a ton of space or resources — just a lot of willingness and patience.

“We should never have any homeless veterans here,” Gibellina said. “Veterans jump in front of the line (for vouchers). They can live wherever they want, but you have to find a landlord that’s willing to take them, and that’s the problem because they come here with issues that most landlords won’t put up with.”

Gibellina's background plays a large role in his dedication to veterans. He described his brother post-Vietnam as “disabled and a different person.” It took 33 years and a class action lawsuit before he was compensated for exposure to Agent Orange.

Gibellina has another tenant, who isn’t a veteran, but she struggles with a son whose condition has been diagnosed as autism and bipolar disorder. She lives in a home Gibellina built out of shipping containers. 

She pays $1 per square foot. The 745-foot home survived all three hurricanes in 2024. It’s made of three metal shipping containers and sits on a 16-post pier system and foundation that used about 40,000 pounds of concrete.

While the house is built like a bunker, it feels like a home. 

With a small front porch and Cuban oregano climbing up the sides, the containers resemble a cottage from the street. The inside is cozy and provides everything a tenant could need, including a washer and dryer. 

Jones chose “blue suede” paint for her cabinets because her mom loved Elvis. She had photos turned into magnets to decorate the metal walls. 

Photo by Lesley Dwyer

Gibellina understands affordable housing. He’s in his fourth term on Manatee County’s Affordable Housing Advisory Board. He quit during his third term when the last commission was in place because he didn’t feel heard. 

He was fighting for longer-term Land Use Restrictive Agreements to keep designated affordable housing units affordable for longer periods of time. 

Gibellina wanted affordable units set at lower income requirements to make them truly affordable. A single mother with two children living in any one of the affordable housing units that have been approved for the Lakewood Ranch area will need to earn between $72,350 and $108,600 to qualify because the rent on a two-bedroom unit will cost between $1,937 and $2,907.

But the biggest pushback Gibellina received was in regards to charging developers added value when issuing a rezone from agriculture to residential zoning. Once developed, the land values spike. 

Gibellina said Manatee County is about 30,000 units behind in workforce housing, and the county has given away too much money by not requiring developments to either devote 10% of the units to workforce housing or to pay the difference. 

“You can force (developers) to do that, but nobody has had the (nerve) to do it,” he said. “I will.”