LIVE BLOG: MOBILITY FEE MORATORIUM: Rules&Finance Committee

[tufsu1]

The plan needs to stay as is for now....there are some edits that can be made to the fee that would avoid having to amend the comp plan

[Tacachale]

Thanks for the coverage, everyone. Very enlightening.

[Bridges]

I saw someone with jax daily record, but i think he left before a lot of it.  I had to leave early too, so I didn't notice.

[Cheshire Cat]

News4Jax was following it.  Saw a blurb on the news. 

[JeffreyS]

A statement from the mayor was also read into the record and it much less than supportive of another moratorium.

[simms3]

I love Councilwoman Boyer. We need to clone her to replace a few council seats.

Yes.

Gulliford:

Reminds everyone that fees are marginal costs to builders. It does not dictate whether or not something will be built.

This.

[sheclown]

I cannot express how wonderful Lori Boyers was tonight. She smiled and then took aim.  It was worth the journey there to watch.

She needs to stay put.  Email her and congratulate her on her leadership, if you are an email-warrior.

[JeffreyS]

Lori was fantastic and Doug Skiles is a great front man on this issue.

[sheclown]

Doug Skiles did a fantastic job tonight.  He has a way of putting the information so that all can understand.  And with something like this, that is not an easy task.  Even the council was paying attention when he spoke.

Doug for mayor!!

[dougskiles]

There was one statistic that was provided to me over the weekend that really stood out, and I wish I could have explained it better, but that darn timer was counting down faster than I could talk.  So I didn't get to crack as many jokes as I wanted either.  There is so much dripping political irony out there.

I will see if I can explain:

In the residential real estate market, we are finally at a point where the inventory is at 5-6 months.  This is considered an "even" market.  Until this year, we were in a "buyers" market, which means that home values are depreciating.  Why on earth would people who build and sell homes want to return to a depreciating market?  They need to get a new set of advisors!  If anything, they should want more controls to limit the supply of inventory and keep us in a "sellers" market with appreciating values.  I didn't go to business school, but even I understand the basic laws of economics.

The banks appear to understand this concept well.  Which is why they are not releasing the "shadow inventory" at rates more than the market can absorb safely.  The "shadow inventory" are those properties that have been foreclosed.  They are smart enough to know that if they sell too many at once, we will go back to a depreciating market and they will recover less of their money when they do sell.

This entire moratorium issue is primarily driven by the landowners.  I disagree with whoever said the fees will get passed on to the public.  In reality, they will be mostly absorbed by the landowners because the market sets the price of nearly all goods and services (at a larger scale than Jacksonville).  Slurpees cost just as much here as they do in Charlotte.  The price of land, however, is more locally controlled.  Developers (who aren't always the original landowner) will factor all of the development costs into what they are willing to pay for the land.  The old saying in real estate development is that you make your money in the deal up front, based on what you pay for the land.  I'm sure Simms3 will weigh in on this and correct me if I am wrong.

One last comment.  I was about to go crazy when they kept asking Curtis Hart to come up and opine if he was willing to compromise by going to 1 year.  Did they notice how eager he was to say yes?  Well, this is because that is all they ever expected to get.  I was never asked what the opposition felt about a compromise until the very end and it was supposed to be a word answer.  Personally, I feel that anything involving a complete reduction in mobility fees is not a compromise and I would not support it.  I would be in favor of sitting down and looking at how the credits are calculated, and might be in favor of a percentage reduction in the fee, depending on the terms.  Hopefully a workshop will give us a chance to work out these details.

And yes, Lori Boyer, is the smartest person I know.  Thank God for what she does for this city!

[Cheshire Cat]

Super job Doug with all your facts and figures.  I can well appreciate your frustration during a meeting of this nature but by all accounts, you not only held your own, but got your points across.  Thank you, well done sir!

[thelakelander]

I thought my head was going to pop when they started talking about 7-Eleven needed to be subsidized or else they would take Jacksonville off their global expansion list. Great job, Doug.  Tonight turned out better than I was originally anticipating.

[fieldafm]

I have to say, Bishop was impressive today. 

[jcjohnpaint]

Well at least we know what some in our council think of our city:  not even good enough to get a chain that is in every other city- or at least using it as a pathetic excuse.

[fieldafm]

Crescimbini asks Skyles "do you think the construction industry is hurting?" Skyles "yes, but getting better."

Crescimbini: Deferring the bill would be kicking the can down the road. It would be like "putting a moratorium on the moratorium." Wants to see if they can hammer out a bill in the short term while they are waiting on the committee to come up with long term suggestion.

Bill is deferred. Unanimous decision. Clark said "nay" but he is not on the committee.

Bishop will be forming a committee for a long term solution. Crescembini will be working out a short term solution.

The moratorium could very well be lost in the shuffle. 

Meeting over.

Bye everyone. This is TheCat and This is Jacksonville! (working out catch phrases).

Stellar job, Ennis, Arash, Bill Hoff and JCPaint.  Thanks for keeping us all informed.  Were there no other media present?

TU, Daily Record, News 4 Jax, NPR/WJCT and The Resident