Jake Godbold calls on ‘army’ of seniors to support pension-tax referendum

Former Jax Mayor Tommy Hazouri and current Jax Mayor Lenny Curry listen as another former Mayor, Jake Godbold, talks in 2016.

There is nothing quite as interesting and larger than life than a 20th century Jacksonville mayor.

And nothing amusing in quite the same way as seeing two of them in a parking lot.

Riding to a “Yes for Jacksonville” event at the Eastside’s Mary Singleton Center with Councilman Tommy Hazouri, we noticed a SUV parked provocatively by a curb … and not exactly legally.

But it didn’t exactly matter. The driver’s-side window rolled down. And as the glass descended, the face of Mayor Jake Godbold — chief of #jaxpol from 1979 to 1987, and a mainstay on the city council since before  consolidation — appeared.

Godbold, 82 years young, had a cigar roughly the size of a Jimmy John’s sub.

Hazouri asked him where he was parking.

Godbold’s response? “Wherever the hell I want.”

****

And that is Godbold in a nutshell. Too old to mince words, and from a generation that didn’t pretend to pretend.

A lifelong Democrat, his public appearances are rare these days.

And when he does come out, to a place like the senior center, it’s for a damned good reason.

He was there last year to endorse Alvin Brown over Lenny Curry.

And on Friday?

Godbold was in the house, to endorse the signature initiative of this year for Curry: securing a yes vote on County Referendum 1, which would secure a revenue source for the city’s $2.8 billion unfunded pension liability, pending collective bargaining, and at least one of the three Jacksonville public pensions agreeing to revised terms.

Hazouri was there also and, despite being a Democrat of long standing, he’s all in on CR 1 as well.

For Curry, this was a big deal, as he told the crowd on hand Friday.

“The easy thing to do would be for them to oppose [the referendum] simply because I’m a Republican,” Curry said, “but they stood up.”

Curry, who’d had friction with Hazouri in his first year that culminated with him stealing the “he wouldn’t bust a grape in a fruit fight” insult from Jay-Z last fall to diss Hazouri, has come to really appreciate Hazouri, especially since he bucked some members of his party to become an integral part of the “Yes for Jacksonville” operation.

There were those who worried about the “party boss” trope from Curry.

There were those who fulminated about his participation in a Donald Trump rally.

But when it comes to the business of the city, it is clear Curry values greatly cooperation with Democrats, especially “two men who have sat in the chair” in the mayor’s office.

****

Godbold, as is the case with politicians from his era, was not ambiguous in his remarks.

The highlight was when he considered the question of who caused the pension debt crisis.

“It’s time to forget all of that,” Godbold said to media. “That’s a bunch of shit.”

“I’m tired of seeing the city fall apart,” Godbold added.

It’s that bluntness, that piquant “old Jacksonville” turn of phrase, that makes Godbold so devastatingly effective, as he validated the crisis Curry is encountering selling the plan by likening it to his own experience.

“I’ve been there,” Godbold said, and “I don’t know a bigger problem” faced by a Jacksonville mayor than the unfunded pension liability.

Jacksonville, said Godbold, is in “bad shape with infrastructure,” and “lacking for quality of life,” but there’s “not much more Curry can do until we get this elephant taken care of.”

Eight years of a bad economy, Godbold said, hasn’t helped. Two mayors have faced this problem; now a third must address it.

Curry, in his remarks to media, noted that while he doesn’t want to raise the millage rate, “if this doesn’t pass, those who want to see a property tax” raise will get “louder.”

Even if the economy expands modestly in the coming years, Curry added, the obligation will be paid off “on time.”

And, Curry added, it will take at least one plan closing to unlock the revenue tool in 2030 or whenever the current infrastructure surtax is slated to sunset.

“In order to get access [to tax revenue], plans have to be closed … the tax would stop when one plan is fully funded” if only one plan agreed to terms.

However, it’s Curry’s belief that all three plans will want access to the guaranteed revenue to stabilize their future.

****

The event had a dual purpose: offering content for the older folks at home watching the Friday noon news, and having Godbold work the crowd that spent much of its adult life seeing him as a city leader.

“We owe too much money … too much budget to the pension plan,” Godbold said, linking the issue to job creation and quality of life.

“There ain’t no quality of life if your daddy don’t have a job,” Godbold thundered.

“I want you to be the mayor’s army to help him,” Godbold said. “If I’ve got this army, and I’ve got the firemen, I can’t lose.”

“You hold the ticket to this election,” Godbold added.