I had heard rumors of this over the last couple of days, and I found out for sure today.
I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. This is certainly an opportunity to get a qualified person in the positon, but I'm not sure if Peyton will go that route.
I wonder what happened. This is a bad time to resign, unless there's a better job opportunity available someplace else.
I think the city could use him, just not as a planning director.
Seriously, what is working for Peyton like? Is it that bad? Delaney had one real shakeup of his staff in eight years (in 1999 as he began his second term), and it was brough on by the passing of Lex Hester (he promoted Sam Mousa from within, and other positions followed suit). How does no one stay there?
The one guy who I think is left from his original 2003 staff is Adam Hollingsworth, and he's not in the same positon.
He has always been a nice guy, he just wasn't a planner. He was not qualified for that position, and I think it was wrong to put someone not qualified there.
Now, this is not saying that he couldn't have been useful in other aspects of the administration, just not here.
On a completely different note, the "taking a unique opportunity" line has been heard pretty frequently from people leaving this administration.
I don't think Brad is leaving because of any issues w/ the administration....he just a got a great opportunity....starting next month, Brad will be at FDOT as the State Transportation Planner.
City planning director going to FDOTQuoteAfter an 11-year career with the City, Director of Planning and Development Brad Thoburn is leaving the City early next month for a planning job with the Florida Department of Transportation.
March 5 is Thoburn’s last day with the City. He’ll start the next day at his appointed position with FDOT as its transportation development administrator.
full article: http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/showstory.php?Story_id=51870
How many years has he helped JTA develop it's world class Transit System? Now he goes UP to the State?
"Promote them up and then get rid of them..." Roman Proverb quoted by Lucky Luciano
I'm just Banana's over these things. (Smile Stephen)
OCKLAWAHA
Sorry Stephen, but Jeannie Fewell was by no means a transportation planner either....the fact is most of the transportation planning for the area is done by the North Florida TPO, which used to be housed in the same building as the Planning Department.
JTA has also started doing a good bit of transportation planning....one plus of the Regional Transportation Center is that it will put JTA and NFTPO staffs together in one building.
As for Brad Thoburn, the primary role of that position at FDOT is setting policy and working on funding issues...both of which are strongsuits for Brad.
again, not really...what they had at the time was the MPO staff housed inside the Planning Department...but as the region expanded, it did not seem appropriate for a metroploitan agency to be within a City/Duvall department.
ok....let me try to explain this to you...
MPOs get their funding from federal transportation $, not local City funds like the rest of the Planning Department....there are several MPOs in Florida that are housed in other agencies (like the 3 for west Florida that are part of the WFRPC, or Tempa's which is housed in the Planning Commission)....but in all cases their operations are kept separate.
Bottom line, the MPO staff doesn't do anything different now than they did when they were "housed" in Planning Department.
And yes, I do agree that the JP+DD should have some transportation planners in-house.
Bill Killingsworth has been named the interim Director of Planning. Knowing Bill personally, I think this is a good move on the city's part. He's been with the planning department for almost 20 years.
http://jaxpolitics.wordpress.com/2009/03/07/city-cuts-positions-adds-interim-planning-director/