by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
After 10 months of scrutinizing every aspect of the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission’s incentive policy — and a little last-second tweaking — the Special Committee on Economic Development Incentives will submit its final report to Council early next month.
At Thursday’s meeting, the committee (a special sub-committee of City Council) voted unanimously to send its findings to Council for approval.
The committee, chaired by Council member and mayoral candidate Alberta Hipps, was created by Council president Matt Carlucci to look at every facet of Jacksonville’s incentive practices from who gets them to what’s available to who isn’t eligible. Along the way, the committee heard from developers, the public and members of the JEDC regarding local incentives. The committee also spent a lot of time analyzing what other cities of comparable size do to keep existing businesses, and lure new ones.
The committee’s findings? Jacksonville’s incentive policy is closely in line with what other communities are doing nationwide and the 90-page policy needs only minor adjustments. For JEDC executive director Kirk Wendland, who has been present for all of the meetings to answer questions and explain the policy, this comes as good news, especially considering there was trepidation at the JEDC when the committee and its purpose was announced.
“To me, I’m not as concerned about the report as I am the incentive policy itself,” said Wendland, adding that the JEDC will probably make some subtle changes in the future. “The JEDC board will take a more proactive role, not just with projects, but with strategic development as time goes on. This may be the first revision to the policy, but it certainly won’t be the last.”
Although it won’t be formally included in the new policy, the committee asked the JEDC to start looking at ways the entire city can benefit from incentives. Currently, per Mayor John Delaney’s direction and with very few exceptions, economic incentives are limited to specific geographic areas of Jacksonville. Other areas may receive tax breaks — for example, several areas of Jacksonville are now designated Empowerment Zones — but they aren’t eligible for low-interest loans and grants.
Jim Catlett of Agency Approval & Development, Inc., told the committee it should consider establishing an Intensive Care Business District designation for various struggling industrial and business communities around town that aren’t eligible for JEDC-sponsored incentives. Catlett, who was representing Metro Square 95 — developer Craig Meek’s project at I-95 and Emerson Street — said Metro Square is a prime example of an area that doesn’t need much to stimulate growth, but won’t make it without some help.
“I’d like the committee to include these Intensive Care Business Districts in their report and recommendations for areas that are not incentivized,” said Catlett, adding there are two other areas that would immediately benefit from such a designation. “On A. Philip Randolph [Boulevard] north of Union Street there is a great deal of blight that needs to be cleaned up before the Super Bowl and the Town & Country shopping center in Arlington is another area. These may be in Empowerment Zones, but there are no low-interest loans available for enhancements.”
Wendland sympathizes with the developers of those areas, but said funding is the current obstacle.
“Low interest loans are certainly viable, somebody’s got to come up with the money,” said Wendland, agreeing that something should be done, but the issue is one that should be addressed another day. “We’ve spent 10 months going over this document and I don’t think in today’s meeting we are going to be able to come up with any major revisions.”
Committee member Elaine Brown agreed with Wendland’s assessment, but also reiterated that the JEDC needs to develop a method to assist once-thriving areas of town that are now falling victim to the surrounding blight.
“We need to move forward with what we have, submit it to City Council, but ask the JEDC to start looking at other areas of town,” said Brown. “We can consider this unfinished business for the future.”
Overall, both Wendland and Hipps are satisfied with the results of the 10-month process.
“I’m pleased with the outcome. It’s been a lot of work and we’ve put in a lot of time over the past 10 months,” said Wendland, adding that it’s good to see tangible results from JEDC-incentivized projects. “What’s rewarding to me is for a long time I spent a lot of time doing contracts. Now, I see the results of those contracts in the form of Berkman Plaza, the Adam’s Mark and others. That’s the rewarding part of the job.”
Hipps said, “I think we did an in-depth look at the policy down to the i’s being dotted and the t’s being crossed. The end product is input from the committee and at each meeting we got input from the public.
“Today, there is a consensus building that the offering of incentives in our community is a healthy, business-friendly environment that we want to maintain and this review has authorized the Council to fulfill its oversight responsibilities for the policies of our government for economic development.”
Like many other aspects of local government, the business community and its needs are in a constant state of flux. Because of these variations, both Wendland and Hipps also agree that the revised incentive policy that will be presented to Council will hardly last forever.
“It’s hard to say if it should be every year or two, ” said Wendland of how often the policy should be reviewed. “It should be consistently and periodically looked at.”
“It’s a fluid document in terms of when things are brought forth that should be amended,” said Hipps, adding that she had no idea how or when the next incentives committee would formed. “That’s up to the City Council president.”