• The owners of Chives restaurant in San Marco have signed a three-year lease with the Jacksonville Museum of Modern Art to operate the museum’s restaurant, Cafe Nola. Bruce and Pam Pollett are planning to make the restaurant more upscale, with a full dinner menu three nights a week. “We plan to transform it into a downtown cornerstone restaurant,” said Pam Pollett.
• The daughter of one of the construction crew members killed while building the Duval County Courthouse, wrote Mayor John Peyton to ask what would become of a memorial plaque displayed outside the Bay Street building. Former mayor John Delaney told her previously the plaque would either stay on site or become a part of the new courthouse when it opens in 2007.
• City Council vice president Elaine Brown returned to City Hall this week with a personal perspective on a recent Finance Committee debate over a proposal to create a health care benefit for retired firefighters. Brown, who recently broke her hip, had a first–hand view of rising health care costs. “Just coming out of the hospital, I can tell you it’s very expensive. My heart goes out to those who cannot afford access to medical care,” she said in supporting the resolution.
• Due largely to a struggling stock market in 2002, the City paid an additional $10 million to the Police and Fire Pension Fund last year, according to City Council Auditor Richard Wallace. Fund Administrator John Keane said his fund rode a rebounding market in 2003 to return about 50 percent on its securities investments.
• The managing director of the Downtown Development Authority hopes people buy downtown housing as enthusiastically as they have rented. Al Battle said rental properties like 11 E. Forsyth were essentially full. “There’s no available rentals downtown,” he says.
• The Super Bowl Host Committee and the University of North Florida Small Business Development Center are hosting free workshops every second Wednesday of each month for anyone interested in becoming vendors or service providers for the Super Bowl. Call 620-2477 for details.
• Ponte Vedra Travel in Ponte Vedra Beach has merged with Valerie Wilson Travel, Inc. and is now known as Valerie Wilson Travel — Ponte Vedra.