by Kent Jennings Brockwell
Staff Writer
It looks like downtown Jacksonville will not be the new home for the Florida Coastal School of Law.
Florida Coastal Dean Peter Goplerud says the private law school has abandoned plans to relocate downtown and will be purchasing and moving into a building in the Southside.
“A variety of considerations went into planing and we assessed the various things that we would have either on site or adjacent to the law school, and it just wasn’t going to happen downtown,” Goplerud said.
Goplerud couldn’t give many exact details about the school’s new location because they are in due diligence regarding the purchase of the new building. He said the new Southside location is roughly twice the size of the current building and “everything will be under one roof.”
With almost 900 students and more than 100 faculty members, Goplerud said the school’s current location on Beach Boulevard is simply too small for future growth.
“Most people are pretty well aware that we have significantly outgrown the current location,” he said. “We are planning for growth over the next four to five years and the new facility will adequately facilitate that growth.”
Florida Coastal leases its current location and Goplerud said the school has been searching for a larger location for more than a year. Though downtown was a prime option for a while, he said the search committee didn’t rule out any area of Jacksonville throughout the process.
Goplerud said more details will be released about the new location in June and the school plans to be in its new home by early 2006.
“The new location will be a great future home for Florida Coastal,”
said Goplerud.