Legislation authorizing the city to purchase the old Fire Station No. 5 and adjacent property from Fidelity National Financial Inc. is headed to City Council for a public hearing.
The council Finance Committee approved Ordinance 2019-527 in a 7-0 vote Tuesday morning, moving the proposed $2.6 million, 1.21-acre purchase forward.
A summary of the bill says if the purchase is approved, the city would realign Forest Street with the properties at 347 Riverside Ave. and 0 Alfred Dupont Place, providing better access to those and surrounding properties, as well as Sidney J. Gefen Riverwalk Park.
The fire station, built in 1910 and taken out of service in 2008, likely will be demolished.
The bill also passed the council Neighborhoods, Community Services, Public Health and Safety Committee on Monday and is scheduled for a public hearing at the full council meeting Aug. 13.
The two properties are adjacent to a 4½-acre parking lot at 323 Riverside Ave. owned by Florida Blue. That property is identified in Downtown Investment Authority documents as the future corporate headquarters site for the secret Project Sharp.
Sharp is described as an international financial technology services company. It would pay an average annual wage of $85,000 to the 500 jobs it will create and retain its existing 1,216 jobs in Jacksonville.
The city wants to provide $29.9 million of incentives to secure Sharp’s headquarters for the Downtown riverfront site. A development agreement will go before the DIA board Wednesday, and city documents state that companion legislation has been drafted and is ready to be filed.
All three properties sit near the existing Fidelity campus on Riverside Avenue. That includes Fidelity National Information Services, which completed its $43 billion acquisition of Worldpay Inc. on July 31. Sharp matches the profile of Fortune 500 company FIS.
Simultaneously, Florida Blue has proposed building a 750-space, $23 million parking garage on city-owned property on Magnolia Street, two blocks west of its existing parking lot. The city wants to provide the insurance company a $3.5 million grant to build the garage.
The fire station property was part of a 2005 Land Swap Agreement between the city and FNF. The city received a parcel for Sidney J. Gefen Riverwalk Park and FNF received a parcel needed for the construction of a new building.
The legislation to purchase the land includes an amendment adding the $2.6 million to Mayor Lenny Curry’s proposed 2019-20 Capital Improvement Plan released July 15 as part of the mayor’s proposed $1.3 billion budget.
The legislative fact sheet by the city Finance and Administration Department says deferring the amendment to the CIP until the next budget year “will be detrimental to the best interests of the community” and “impede redevelopment of a vacant property in the Northbank area and allow blight conditions to persist.”
The next full council meeting is scheduled for 5 p.m. Aug. 13 in Council Chambers at City Hall, 117 W. Duval St.