by J. Brooks Terry
Staff Writer
The City’s ongoing efforts to make its Fair Share Policies just that — fair — are taking root. A special committee dedicated to revamping past procedures met recently and decided that, with adequate preplanning, public schools could avoid paying a hefty price to develop new facilities near congested roads.
Currently, when a developer, including schools, wants to build in crowded areas, they are required to pay certain amount to the City so that area roads can be upgraded accordingly. That fee is based upon the number of cars or “trip” the proposed development would place on those roads during peak traffic hours.
City Council member Sharon Copeland chairs a Fair Share committee. She said this week if the Duval County School Board could determine where new schools are going to be built five or more years ahead of time, the City’s Planning Department would be able to reserve those sites before the surrounding areas become overly-developed.
That’s seldom done today, Copeland said.
“What we’ve seen is that historically there hasn’t been a lot of thought given to planning for the future when it comes to our schools, specifically where we’re going to develop new sites,” Copeland said. “We’re not being as proactive as we can be in identifying our future demands and that, ultimately, has caused some of our roads to become over capacity when that could have been avoided.
“It sounds like a fairly simple solution but it has the potential to make a large positive impact.”
At a recent Fair Share Committee meeting, the City’s Planning Department agreed that with some preplanning, schools could save the City time and effort while also saving themselves from having to pay out of their limited budgets.
“Otherwise that’s what they’re going to have to use, which is ultimately our tax dollars, when those roads need to be upgraded to account for all of the new traffic that will be put on them,” Copeland said. “So it is absolutely essential for the schools to determine their needs as early as possible so the land can be reserved for them.”
The Fair Share Committee was created on Feb. 17 of this year and, to date, they have met a handful of times. At their twice-monthly meetings, Copeland said the committee continues to find new ways to manage growth across the Jacksonville.
“The Fair Share was initially established as an opportunity to ease traffic woes in ares where any proposed development compromised the level of service on the roads impacted to render them failed or beyond capacity,” she said. “We still have a lot of work ahead of us, but by making only minor tweaks that process we can make it so much better.”