A.G. Gancarski
The highlight of the agenda meeting before Tuesday’s Jacksonville City Council meeting: a discussion of a potential appeal of the Property Appraiser budget (2015-616).
“The success of this” sort of action is “nominal at best,” said Matt Schellenberg, referring to exchanges that he had with the Florida League of Cities.
Schellenberg, of course, was not driving this attempted action. Councilman John Crescimbeni is. And Property Appraiser Jerry Holland thinks a lot of Crescimbeni’s animus is personal.
“There’s a certain power he has,” Holland said before the meeting, referring to Crescimbeni’s use of the “bully pulpit.” Holland contended Crescimbeni has had a personal issue with him dating back to when Holland was supervisor of elections and didn’t hire the woman who became Crescimbeni’s wife.
The simmering contretemps between Crescimbeni and Holland threatened to enliven a council meeting that most expected to be placid going in.
Budget ordinance 2015-616 was proposed on an emergency basis, which requires a two-thirds vote. Many council members were immediately on the queue.
Aaron Bowman indicated not being in favor of moving the bill on an emergency, saying he’d gotten assurances that such actions wouldn’t happen again from the Lenny Curry administration. Schellenberg reiterated his points that it would be “fighting an upstream battle” with “no success rate.”
Then Crescimbeni spotlighted that it was an “awkward situation” created by the June 1 submission of the Property Appraiser’s budget. He spoke at length about his objections: “I see where this bill is going … but I’m going to stand on principle” because “it’s not fair for these employees to get raises year in and year out” when other city employees find their pay stagnated.
Reggie Gaffney called Holland to the front.
Holland pointed out the effect of training, and attrition, saying it takes “six months to a year” to train his employees.
The emergency fell, 17-2.
Beyond that bill, there were a few measures of note.
Ordinance 2015-618 amended interlocal agreements with the Beaches communities, and had to be addressed for HUD funding purposes regarding Community Development Block Grants by Friday, so it was being considered as an emergency. Failure to pass it would result in a loss of funding for all of Duval County. The emergency passed by voice vote. The bill passed 19-0.
Ordinance 2015-143 was removed from the consent agenda by Councilman Reggie Brown. The bill, which would appropriate a $225,000 grant from the Rockefeller Philanthropic Advisors for the 100 Resilient Cities initiative, will be refiled later by the administration. Concerns were raised in committee about the ongoing commitment to a “chief resilience officer” after the grant elapsed.
All third-reading ordinances were approved. They included an appropriation of $1.8 million for petroleum cleanup from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s Inland Protection Fund, a $50,000 appropriation from a Jacksonville Veterans Resource & Reintegration Center Grant to buy a new van for veterans services, and appropriations for transitional housing for the homeless, affordable housing for low income individuals and families, and for rental housing assistance for people living with HIV/AIDS and their families.
