A.G. Gancarski
On Monday, the Jacksonville City Council Neighborhood Improvement and Community Enhancement Committee kicked off 2016.
The ad hoc committee has become a source of consternation for many on Council, who note that it is unable to take action, and is just a deliberative committee.
Some highlights included a further discussion of Land Bank issues and the Spring Clean Jacksonville initiative.
Councilman Bill Gulliford talked about the need to establish a land bank or some other similar vehicle for distributing vacant housing to people who can actually benefit from it. A rewrite of the relevant bill, 2015-519, was presented by the Office of General Counsel, with numerous modifications. The bill, as discussed over the last six months now, would raise the value limit on donated properties from $25,000 to $50,000. Donation for Residential Housing procedures were first adopted by Council in 1997.
NICE Chair Garrett Dennis, after roughly 45 minutes of discussion, noted the difficulty of determining what to do on the over 550 properties in the list on a yearly basis, as the ordinance would establish. OGC recommended more frequent reviews of potential surplus properties. As discussion of the bill reached the one hour mark, Gulliford noted that the scoring criteria for eligible agencies to acquire the property, as currently constituted, is too “arbitrary” and thus he can’t support it.
Ali Korman Shelton, speaking on behalf of the administration, noted that while the current iteration is “not perfect,” but that Council has the opportunity to refine the bill….
After 90 minutes of the discussion of 2015-519, Chairman Dennis turned the committee’s attention to a 2016 City Wide Initiative.
“On a Saturday in the Spring,” Dennis proposed a “huge citywide cleanup” with “dumpsters in certain areas” or with “trash bags on the lawn.”
A successful citywide initiative in previous years, the Tire and Sign Buyback event, was discussed; it had exceeded expectations. With that in mind, the possibility of extra capacity was beyond what is anticipated.
Denise Lee, former Blight Committee director who is now the Director of Blight Initiatives for the city, grilled Councilman Dennis on what she thought she’d heard him say, regarding phasing out the Tire and Sign Buyback Event in favor of this proposal.
The two had a fairly fractious discussion thereafter, and after the meeting adjourned, they continued their spirited dialogue as other parties cleared out of the room.
