A.G. Gancarski
In a meeting Wednesday, Councilman John Crescimbeni criticized the Committee of the Whole process on HRO expansion, which runs through March 3.
“Whether [I was] for it or against it, I likely wouldn’t drag it out until [March] 3rd,” Crescimbeni said when asked about the HRO by Tommy Hazouri.
His opposition to the protracted process pertaining to protections for the LGBT community is pragmatic. The process itself, with the spirited back and forth, risks a “damage to the reputation of the city.”
Crescimbeni, who lived through this four years prior, told Hazouri that “between now and March 3, it’s going to get awful.”
Crescimbeni, who supported the substitute bill that failed by one vote, addressed the inaction on Council’s part in the previous class. Given that minds would not have changed, he said there was “no reason to readdress” the question “with the same class of players.”
Crescimbeni also predicted a protracted road to referendum.
“Regardless of what happens on the 3rd,” Crescimbeni said, this “still ends up on the ballot.”
That’s likely not music to the ears of Lenny Curry, who told the Jacksonville Coalition for Equality that he opposes a ballot measure.
Crescimbeni is in favor of one referendum: the discretionary sales surtax to address the unfunded pension liability.
That referendum, Crescimbeni said, is “worth $200 million a year; that should be our priority.”
