A.G. Gancarski
At the Monday meeting of the Jacksonville City Council Transportation, Energy, and Utilities committee, the group voted 7-0 to withdraw 2015-360, a controversial bill that would have closed a river access “pocket park” on Little Van Wert Avenue in the Avondale neighborhood.
The bill, introduced in the spring by then-Councilman Richard Clark, was supported by local all-star lobbyist Paul Harden and a couple of local families, who had apparently hoped to have the riverfront property ceded to them by the city of Jacksonville. They had made claims that the river access point was a den of vice, where the open container laws and other local ordinances were brazenly flouted with impunity.
Cooler heads prevailed, and dozens of local neighbors came together to ensure that the property is properly maintained, under the aegis of the Friends of Van Wert group
At the Monday meeting, Councilman Jim Love (in whose district the river access point lies) suggested that Public Works should be able to handle the lawn mowing of the 60-foot rectangle that constitutes the property.
Whatever conditional support for this measure, derided as a “land grab” (and worse, depending on who you talk to), which might have existed on Council seems to have disappeared.
