Florida Politics - Campaigns & Elections. Lobbying & Government.

A.G. GancarskiDecember 21, 2016

Johnnie-Carter-on-crime-sce_1467820869751_7233524_ver1.0_640_360.jpg

The job of a big city mayor includes receiving a lot of accolades, but there is the flip side as well. That flip side: being the person who deals with the grief of a city, and the specific mourning of individuals who seek redress. One such individual — a mother who outlived her son — […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 20, 2016

Compared to other members of Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry‘s administration, Policy Director Robin Lumb has a behind the scenes role. He’s rarely at meetings of the city council – an irony, of sorts, given his term spent among that body. However, Lumb has been working on the policy side, on issues that largely are under the radar […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 19, 2016

Friday saw an official meeting between Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry and former Mayor Alvin Brown. And with that meeting, a message to #jaxpol: the bitterness of the 2015 election was finally consigned to memory. The picture above: worth a thousand words. Acrimony expunged, replaced by bonhomie. The campaign for Jacksonville mayor was the most expensive local campaign […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 19, 2016

It’s been a rough stretch for the Jacksonville Children’s Commission, and the week before Christmas brought even more coal for its stocking. This month had already seen the Jacksonville City Council’s Finance Committee taking JCC CEO Jon Heymann to task for an unusual amount of “emergency” appropriations bills in recent years, and keeping the council in the […]

Staff ReportsDecember 19, 2016

It’s fair to say Lenny Curry had one heck of the year. He did everything from addressing the public pension funding shortfall to bracing his community for a 100-year storm. And now the 46-year-old Jacksonville mayor can add one more thing to his list of 2016 accomplishments: INFLUENCE Magazine’s 2016 Politician of the Year. The biggest […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 16, 2016

Jacksonville’s Eastside faces challenges on par with any area in Jacksonville. One census tract has 51.2 percent of its residents below the poverty line, an 18 percent unemployment rate, and a $23,158 median household income. Another nearby tract is even worse. 65.3 percent of residents fall below the poverty line, and 60.3 percent are unemployed. […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 16, 2016

For the first time since the acrimonious election of 2015, Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry and his predecessor, Alvin Brown, met in the mayor’s suite. Curry and Brown, in a brief appearance in the lobby of the mayor’s office, smiled for the camera, with Curry saying they were “just catching up.” Curry’s spokeswoman, Marsha Oliver, noted that “Mr. Brown […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 15, 2016

On Thursday, Patrol and Enforcement Director Michelle Cook of the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, presented a “good news/bad news” scenario. As she told the Jacksonville Journey Oversight Committee, the good news is that the JSO “violence reduction strategy” is working in some of the city’s more crime-plagued areas. The bad news: violent crime is spiking elsewhere in […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 14, 2016

The crossroads for pension plans for new hires in Jacksonville is here, and is casting a shadow over virtually every aspect of the city’s future. The latest bond rating trip for the city, for example, saw the pension issue – and whether or not Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry will succeed in getting at least one […]

A.G. GancarskiDecember 13, 2016

Introducing one of three winners of JAXUSA awards at a Tuesday luncheon, Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry was in civic booster mode. Curry took stock of a “really busy year … a really good year,” in which “the Chamber, civic and business leaders and the city council … demonstrated to the public what is possible.” Curry referred […]

Tag: Lenny Curry
A state investigator, right, works with a Florida resident to look out for fraud after Hurricane Helene. Photo via Florida Chief Financial Officer,.

Grieving mother: ‘Jacksonville’s Westside finally destroyed me’

Behind the scenes, Robin Lumb guides Jacksonville’s public policy

Reading the tea leaves of the Lenny Curry-Alvin Brown meeting

Lenny Curry demands audit of Jacksonville Children’s Commission

Lenny Curry is INFLUENCE Magazine’s Florida Politician of the Year for 2016

LISC unveils ambitious redevelopment plan for Jacksonville’s Eastside

Alvin Brown, Lenny Curry meet, putting election behind them

JSO ‘violence reduction strategy’ working in hot zones, but not everywhere

John Rutherford, a former Jacksonville sheriff, discusses police pensions

Jacksonville’s place in ‘changing global economy’ discussed at JAXUSA luncheon