Metro Jacksonville & City Budget

[Cheshire Cat]

Timkin,  Call the mayors office and ask for a copy of his speech given 7/17/2012 during the dedication of the Historic Brewster Hospital.  It contains comments by him speaking to the importance of the preservation of historic structures that should be helpful to your efforts. 

[dougskiles]

Thanks, Diane.  SMPS and SMMA have been talking to our District Councilwoman (Lori Boyer) about it.  She is as concerned about the right-of-way issues as we are (if not more so), and appears to be open to finding creative solutions to solve the problem.  It won't happen overnight, but I am optimistic that we can take steps to solve the problem.

[Timkin]

Timkin,  Call the mayors office and ask for a copy of his speech given 7/17/2012 during the dedication of the Historic Brewster Hospital.  It contains comments by him speaking to the importance of the preservation of historic structures that should be helpful to your efforts. 

Will do, Diane.  Glad to have you back amongst us. 

[Ocklawaha]

One solution I would like to see explored is allowing more control at the neighborhood level regarding right-of-way maintenance.  The current philosophy at Public Works regarding maintenance is one-size-fits-all.  This city is too large for that approach.

Cutting the grass 4 times per year may work in some of the rural areas without devaluing the property (and these are the properties that have more right-of-way to maintain and are paying lower property taxes).

In the urban neighborhoods, where the per-acre taxes are much higher (because of greater density), allowing the right-of-ways to deteriorate will result in devaluation of the properties, and eventually the tax base.

KA-POW! Great idea Doug, I've long thought our right-of-way landscape and maintenance is so poor that it hurts us severely in attracting new business.

When I was on city council in Oklahoma, a major corporate relocation to OKC was rejected when the CEO took a drive around by himself and decided OKC was dirty and had little pride. OUCH! Since those days OKC has remade itself into a sparkling model city on the prairie... How many CEO'S leave the northeast or midwest daily and whisk the family through Jacksonville only to get to the same conclusion as that long ago OCK embarrassment? The airport road exit, I-95 between I-10 and 20Th street as well as large sections of other roadways in town look like open sewers. I realize it might be impossible to quantify the impact that rejects us, but one only has to go as far as Disney to see what might have been.

[Tacachale]

^I think this is just going to be the way of the future. No surgical cuts are going to get us out of a deficit this big, especially when we wont be adding any revenue. Unfortunately, our better equipped neighborhood groups may just get stuck with handling maintenance if they don't want the work left in the hands of an even more ennervated public works department.

Also: Disney never seriously looked at Jacksonville.

[Cheshire Cat]

Two sayings come to mind.  "Don't count your chickens until they are hatched" when budgeting and "Do as I say, not as I do" when a politician. 

http://jacksonville.com/opinion/blog/400601/ron-littlepage/2012-08-26/ron-littlepage-little-humor-mixed-drafting-city-budget