• General Counsel Rick Mullaney has declined an offer to become the new dean at Florida Coastal School of Law, saying, “I greatly enjoy serving the City as general counsel and believe that the General Counsel’s Office plays an important role in the future of Jacksonville.” Mullaney declined the offer in a letter dated Wednesday to Tom Wippman, principal with Sterling Partners in Northbrook, Ill.
• Florida Coastal School of Law will try to select a new dean in the next week to 10 days. Tom Wippman said the new dean will come from the five remaining candidates who have already been interviewed, “unless somebody wants to throw his or her hat into the ring, and that person is of such high quality that we would have to reexamine our process and reconstitute the selection committee.”
• After making changes to the City’s parking garage development deal, Council member Jerry Holland told Jacksonville Economic Development Commission director Kirk Wendland that he wanted future incentive deals to be finished products by the time they reach the Council. Wendland said he only knew of two or three deals that had been changed significantly, but said he would work with the Council auditor to minimize future changes.
• Throughout the week, the Landing is extending music-lovers’ evenings with two hours of tunes before performances of “42nd Street” at the T-U Center. The Starlight Sisters are singing big band, swing and Broadway songs each evening through Sunday. The entertainers are strolling in and out of all the restaurants, entertaining patrons while they dine.
• Judith Stevens, Friends of the Jacksonville Library board member and past president, recommended to the Public Library Board chair that interim Library Director Carolyn Shehee Williams fill the post permanently. Williams stepped in when former director Ken Sivulich retired. “I doubt you could do any better,” said Stevens.
• Rep. Stan Jordan revealed his vision for next year’s Super Bowl halftime show to Host Committee president Michael Kelly. Jordan’s “Musical Salute to the Greatest Generation,” would include “a host of dancers performing a high energy ‘Jitter Bug,’ ” and “toe–tapping, fast–moving 1940s music,” in a tribute to the generation that fought World War II. Jordan, chair of the Veterans and Military Affairs Subcommittee, said an armed forces medley would make “a fitting tribute.”
• Florida Coastal School of Law professor Nancy Hogshead-Makar is the speaker at the 30th anniversary celebration of the FCCJ Rosanne R. Hartwell Women’s Center. The luncheon is scheduled for March 1 from noon-1 p.m. at the Wilson Center on FCCJ’s South Campus. Cost is $15 and includes lunch.
• The I.M. Sulzbacher Center for the Homeless has a new addition to its staff. Rebecca Casbon started last week as a contract manager grant assistant.