• City Council member Elaine Brown, a former Downtown Development Authority member, has been slow to warm to Mayor John Peyton’s plan to eliminate the DDA. “I’m coming around on it,” said Brown. She said she wants the DDA’s replacement, the advisory Downtown Committee, stocked with downtown advocates and hopes the mayor’s office clarifies how the City’s approval process for downtown development deals will work in the DDA’s absence.
• Apologies to the Salvation Army — we printed the wrong date for the organization’s annual Red Kettle/Angel Tree kickoff. But here’s the good news: if you think you missed it, you didn’t. The kickoff, which will feature former Mayor John Delaney, University of North Florida president, as guest speaker, is today at noon at the Avenues Mall’s center court.
• The Greater Jacksonville Agricultural Fair claims it had attendance of 493,457, the highest in at least six years and almost 100,000 more than last year. Reasons, according to the Fair, were “beautiful weather during all 12 days, well-attended main stage entertainment, a cleaner midway and a wide variety of free entertainment attractions...” If you’re excited about next year, mark your calendar for Nov. 1-12.
• The Jacksonville Port Authority’s new board chairman is investor Jerry W. Davis. Tony Nelson, president of the First Coast Black Business Investment Corp., takes over as vice chairman; former Ambassador Marilyn McAfee is the secretary and contractor Rick Morales Jr. is the treasurer.
• The Riverside Avenue YMCA continues to renovate. Several classrooms will be converted to workout areas, the nursery will move downstairs and new equipment is coming. It’ll close for five days next month to get it done.
• Share and share alike: the Independent Living for the Adult Blind program at Florida Community College raised $10,000 from its recent “Vision Walk” and share the money, giving $1,750 to the local guide dog program to train a puppy for a blind person.
• Some City Council members are having heartburn over granting City incentives to Morris Communications for planned capital improvements to The Florida Times-Union’s Riverside Avenue offices. The incentives are targeted at low-income neighborhoods and some on the Council say the riverfront area around the T-U building no longer qualifies. Others on the Council say Morris qualifies for the program under the current criteria and say that it’s not fair to change the rules in the middle of the game.
• Yes, that was Jaguars Coach Jack Del Rio and his family at the symphony the other night in the box seats.
• More good news on the downtown parking front, courtesy of City Hall: JTA is preparing to publish a special, limited-time rate at the King Street garage that would reduce the four-month rate from $133.32 to $99.99. The mayor’s office is trying to raise awareness of alternatives to City lots ahead of Dec. 1 rate increases.
• JU’s new sports information director Joel Lamp came up with some facts that bring back some old names. The JU basketball team starts its first season under Coach Cliff Warren Saturday night at the Arena and Lamp says that the coaches who won their first games with the Dolphins were Hugh Durham, George Scholz, Tom Wasdin, Joe Williams and Dick Kendall. Of those, only Durham had a losing record at JU. The coaches who lost their first games with the team were Buster Harvey, Matt Kilcullen, Rich Haddad, Bob Wenzel, Tates Locke, Don Beasley and Bob Gottlieb, and only Wenzel, Locke and Gottlieb had winning records at JU.
• Robert K. Cromwell, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Jacksonville division, will speak Nov. 30 at the local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union’s annual membership and supporters meeting. Cromwell will be speaking about how the FBI had changed since Sept. 11.
• Susan Ludrow, recipient of the 2004 Jacksonville Woman Business Owner of the Year award, has left her UPS Store and is now the retail sales manager for EverBank. Also joining EverBank is Julie Brookshire, who will be the new manager of corporate services.
• There might have been a few ruffled feathers after Jacksonville Area Legal Aid’s Equal Justice Awards Reception this week. Just before the evening’s guest speaker, Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Barbara Pariente, gave her keynote address, she made an offhand remark about The River Club’s food selection, which included gourmet mashed potatoes, carved roast beef, a Caesar salad and a Peterbrooke chocolate fountain. “I don’t know how you do things in Jacksonville,” she said, “but when I think of heavy hors d’oeuvres, I don’t think about mashed potatoes and chocolate covered pretzels.” After the event, one perturbed local guest was overheard replying, “Maybe her idea of heavy hors d’oeuvres is a steak dinner.”
• The Economic Roundtable of Jacksonville, an affiliate of the National Association of Business Economics, is hosting an “Economic Outlook” luncheon Nov. 29 at Jacksonville University’s Davis College of Business. Mark Vitner, a senior economist and director of corporate banking with Wachovia Bank, will be speaking at the event about national and regional economic trends and how they could affect Northeast Florida.