A.G. Gancarski
In a move that can only be construed as a rejection of Alvin Brown by Jacksonville’s right-of-center establishment, The Florida Times-Union on Tuesday afternoon endorsed Lenny Curry for mayor.
The Brown campaign, though, said it doesn’t think it matters all that much that the T-U endorsed the “party boss.”
“The endorsements that will always matter most are those of Mayor Brown’s supporters,” said Yianni Varonis in a prepared statement. “They know that it’s because of his leadership that overall crime is down and unemployment has been cut in half. They also know that party boss Lenny Curry isn’t qualified to be Jacksonville’s mayor; not when he’s spent his entire career playing partisan politics and opposing wage increases for working families.”
The newspaper endorsed Brown last year in the runoff election against Mike Hogan. In the First Election each year, they have gone in a different direction: Audrey Moran four Marches ago; Bill Bishop this past March.
The local paper of record absolutely lacerated the mayor.
They accuse him of having “accepted bad advice [or having] a closed mind.” They say he has flouted the state’s open-record Sunshine Laws, a grudge going back to a lawsuit over having to sue to obtain public records. They dis him for failing to move on LGBT protections. They bemoan a “leadership deficit” in the executive branch and excoriate the city’s finances as “chaotic and erratic.”
They also say the budgets have been terrible.
The T-U contends Brown’s staff has “underperformed.” In response, the paper says, the mayor threw his staff under the bus at a recent editorial board meeting, promising “major changes.”
Everyone loves to hear that from their boss. Especially second-hand.
“We simply cannot trust that the next four years of a Brown administration would be much better than the first four,” the board says. Conversely, “Curry has the financial and management background to lead Jacksonville out of its fiscal morass. He should be Jacksonville’s next mayor.”
The paper claims that Curry has grown on the campaign trail, and they expect that growth to continue if he is elected.
