A.G. Gancarski
Fourth Circuit State Attorney-elect Melissa Nelson isn’t a natural politician. The paradox, however, is that she won her GOP primary race against incumbent Angela Corey by the kind of margin just about any career politician would envy.
As a result, perhaps, of those unique dynamics in the primary, every time Nelson appears in public she is greeted by well-wishers galore. This was the case when FloridaPolitics.com interviewed Nelson at Bold Bean in Jacksonville’s Riverside neighborhood.
One example: police officers, at an adjoining table, talking to Nelson and congratulating her on her victory.
Another example: a gentleman approaching Nelson to let her know that, no matter what the campaign rhetoric might have been, she has a lot of support in law enforcement.
The campaign, of course, is over — and has been for almost two weeks according to the electoral results, and for some weeks longer if you believed the polls. The old axiom — campaign in poetry, govern in prose — holds true even in races for state attorney.
Under the Corey administration, there has been a lot of prose: on one side, statistics contending Corey has run the office well, with high conviction rates and a lot of cases going to trial. On another side, articles from around the country saying Corey is the “cruelest” state attorney in America, and a BBC documentary on the death penalty that filmed a lot of footage in Jacksonville.
With that in mind, one might wonder how the transition from candidate to state attorney-elect is going for Nelson.
Right now, there’s a lot of “listening,” Nelson says.
“A lot of folks have strong ideas,” Nelson said, on how criminal justice in Jacksonville should proceed.
“In the campaign,” Nelson continued, “I realized early on that people were interested in the reasons why I wanted to run,” which inexorably included a discussion of where the incumbent had been “deficient.”
“The reason why I was doing this mattered to people,” Nelson said.
However, now that the election is in the books, “looking forward” is most important.
Nelson references a conversation she had with her husband recently, in which he gave her typically straightforward advice.
“Do the right thing,” Mr. Nelson said to the state attorney-elect.
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In terms of “looking forward” so the “right thing” can be done, the immediate transition of the office from Corey to Nelson is of most immediate salience.
Nelson does have a transition contact in the SAO — not Corey, but a top lieutenant — and Nelson is still hopeful Corey and she can “work together” toward an “efficient transition.”
Of course, getting to that level requires actual cooperation.
Nelson’s challenges include coming in in the middle of a budget year, and whatever decisions Corey may make in the interim, such as five new hires made last week.
“I’m hoping going forward,” Nelson said, “that I would be included.”
Time will tell if that is the case, of course.
No matter how much (or how little) cooperation Corey cedes to Nelson as the clock runs out on her tenure, Nelson will adhere to advice she was given during her campaign.
“Don’t look in the other dugout,” Nelson was told. “Focus on your own race.”
“I’ll govern the same way,” Nelson contended.
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Nelson may not be getting cooperation from Corey in the most seamless way; however, she has established communication with Sheriff Mike Williams, a Corey supporter during the campaign who Nelson met Friday.
“We had a great discussion,” Nelson said, describing Williams as a potential “partner in alternative sentencing” who “has his thumb on everything going on.”
Nelson anticipates a strong working relationship, rooted around a commitment to “being smarter, being fair” in pursuing justice, “focusing on making the community safe.”
Those campaign priorities of Nelson’s, she said, are something the JSO itself is “investing effort” into, toward “meaningful reform.”
Expanded diversion programs and other reforms will be coming from both offices, Nelson predicted, with her shop “utilizing what’s there now” while “implementing new programs.”
All of this will take time. However, Nelson does have the first part figured out.
Nelson will be meeting with judges and the nonprofit sector, of course, and creating committees on different topics, for advice and “hopefully valuable work product.”
Among those topics: “juvenile justice” and “diversity and race relations in general,” the latter of which — rightly or wrongly — was a sticking point for the Corey administration.
Nelson has had what she calls a “productive meeting” with Isaiah Rumlin, head of the Jacksonville NAACP. And that’s not going to be the limit of her engagement with Jacksonville’s African-American community.
Being discussed: community outreach, including neighborhood walks where Nelson introduces herself to Democratic voters who didn’t have the opportunity to vote for her because of the closed primary.
The goal: to address a pervasive “perception of the system” as being fundamentally unfair.
“I am committed to starting a dialogue … a discussion about inequities. We have to start by accepting the reality that they do exist,” Nelson said.
Part of remedying those inequities is providing meaningful redress to people who believe law enforcement in certain parts of Jacksonville is rooted in the same preconceptions and philosophical groundings as was the case decades back.
“What’s happening right now is not economically sustainable,” Nelson said, adding that her office will be committed to smarter enforcement, including “differentiating dangerous people from low-level offenders.”
The office’s current approach — and its zeal for jury trials as a desired outcome — drains finite resources.
“Every time we try a case,” Nelson said, a “ton of money” is spent, with prep time for attorneys and other non-negotiable costs eating up departmental budgets.
Thus, “trying the right cases” becomes a priority.
Still, “people have to know you’re willing to go to trial,” Nelson said.
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Another campaign promise Nelson intends to fulfill in a timely manner: a commitment to transparency, including better relationships with the media than the current officeholder has, and better facilitation of public records requests.
As well, the definition of what constitutes a public record will be liberalized, with Nelson vowing that her office will review ways by which text messages can be stored.
Beyond those issues, there will be a philosophical shift in the management of the office.
Nelson noted that, when she was an assistant state attorney, she “enjoyed the autonomy to think critically and do the right thing.”
“I look forward to giving lawyers that autonomy,” Nelson said, “in a manner that they think is fair and balanced.”
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The honeymoon period will end for Nelson soon enough.
The campaign iconography and rhetoric will fade into the ether, as is always the case.
And Jacksonville — and the 4th circuit writ large — will face inevitable existential challenges.
The state attorney elect has a plan to handle them, to be sure.
Will a stauncher commitment to reform and bringing this area of the state in line with the criminal justice measures used elsewhere prevail?
It’s no stretch to say that the future of the Jacksonville area depends on that being the case.
