• Jacksonville Jaguars tackle Bob Whitfield won a poker tournament last week and donated his $10,000 winnings to the Children’s Home Society. The “celebrity” tournament used play money and was sponsored by the Poker Room at St. Johns Greyhound Park. The participants included State Reps. Dick Kravitz, Don Davis and Stan Jordan. Second place went to Toni Fox from WQIK and the Daily Record’s J. Brooks Terry took third. The top five got money for their charities. Checks will be presented later this month.
• A 6,000 pound replica of the Liberty Bell will start a tour of Jacksonville today when it rings from the deck of a Mayport ship to commemorate Pearl Harbor. The “Jubilee Bell” has been shipped throughout the country to welcome home Iraqi Freedom troops. It will be on hand when the Navy’s JFK carrier strike group returns Dec. 13 to Mayport. The Bell will be on display later this week at City Hall and on Dec. 11 at the Jacksonville Veteran’s Memorial Wall.
• Jacksonvillians like to give to charity but not to the government according to an investor’s prospectus put together by by the Chamber, JEDC and Downtown Vision Incorporated and designed to interest potential real estate investors. Among the revelations in the seven-page pamphlet: Jacksonville is ranked by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance as having the third lowest tax burden in the nation for a City its size. The prospectus said about 60 percent of City residents voluntarily give up their money or their time to charity, however.
• Though work is not expected to begin until after the Super Bowl, the City is expected to award a bid to overhaul Hendricks Avenue by Dec. 16. Repaving and landscaping are part of the project.
• City Council member Warren Alvarez was feeling especially feisty during Monday’s Finance Committee meeting when fellow Council member Lad Daniels asked why at-large Council members never get money to fund pet projects in the City like district Council members do. Said Alvarez: “They don’t get money because they don’t do nothin’.” Daniels is an at-large Council member.
• Property Appraiser Jim Overton is hoping the Council will allow him to create a new community relations position at his office. Overton asked Finance Chair Reggie Fullwood to file legislation that would appropriate $80,000 that would pay whoever is hired.
• She still doesn’t know how her name got on the list, but veteran T-U writer Jessie-Lynne Kerr has been invited to the White House for the annual holiday party.
• The Jaguars honor outstanding volunteers in 10 local non-profit programs today with a luncheon at the stadium. They’ll hand out $20,000, including $10,000 to the organization with the winning volunteer.
• Mayor John Peyton hired former City engineer Alan Mosely as the City’s Director of Public Works. The job has been vacant since Lynn Westbrook resigned in September. Mosely returns to government after serving as president of his own engineering firm, Kloss, Mosely and Associates, since 1999. Mosely will make $150,000 per year. He starts January 3.
• The Salvation Army will be getting a hand from the Jacksonville Jaguars with its holiday bell-ringing campaign. The team’s radio voice, Brian Sexton, and wife Melissa will be ringing today at the Neptune Beach K-Mart. Next Tuesday, long snapper and backup tight end Rob Zelenka will be ringing with wife Rebekah at the Sam’s Wholesale Club at 10690 Beach Boulevard.