Downtown Vision Inc.’s board of directors voted Wednesday to support a position statement limiting the presence of food trucks Downtown.
DVI Executive Director Terry Lorince said allowing the mobile transient vendors to offer their services weekdays during lunch would take away business from permanent vendors.
Though it supported limitation, the board also unanimously supported the food trucks to conduct business Downtown after 11 p.m. and during some special events.
In other action, the board approved a position to advocate for the demolition of the Duval County Courthouse and Courthouse Annex along East Bay Street after the buildings become vacant. In their place, the board supported the development of a landscaped public green–space without fences.
Both buildings are scheduled to be empty by June 1 when the courts and other state and City offices move to the new County Courthouse in LaVilla.
Introduced Tuesday, the subject of Mayor Alvin Brown’s economic development reorganization legislation also was a topic for the board.
The ordinances seek to create an independent Downtown Investment Authority with the power to disburse funds for urban core projects, among other duties, and create the Office of Economic Development to handle non-Downtown economic development.
The bills would eliminate the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission.
Paul Crawford, JEDC acting executive director, said the proposed authority would be funded by the City, but that no budget has been established other than about $1 million to continue the functions of the JEDC through Sept. 30, the end of the City’s fiscal year.
Crawford also said the proposed authority would consist of a board of nine members appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the City Council. The board would hire an executive director, who would then hire a staff, he said.
Council member Don Redman, who serves on DVI’s board and represents Downtown, said the proposed reorganization and establishment of the authority must be approved by the Council.
He questioned the public’s interest level to invest in Downtown.
“I see the need because I represent Downtown, but the other 18 Council members have to cater to their constituents,” Redman said.
Receiving Council approval to create the entities through reorganization will require a “strategic and specific” lobbying effort, Crawford said.
Crawford said he “imagines the entity will take on a variety of roles” and that DVI could be a “contracting entity” to the authority.
DVI has been participating since September with the Council Ad Hoc Committee on Hemming Plaza. Chaired by Council member Denise Lee, the committee is charged with presenting Council with recommendations on ways to improve the park adjacent to City Hall and encourage more usage of the space.
DVI Director of District Services Amy Harrell updated the board on the committee’s progress and presented the preliminary results of an online survey. Harrell said Lee is expected to present the committee’s final recommendations in about a month.
Harrell said DVI is advocating for removing many of the tables and benches in Hemming Plaza and replacing them with “movable furniture.”
She said about half of the existing furniture is unsafe because of missing seats and other damage. The removal and replacement could be performed by closing the plaza for a month this summer. That would also allow time to remove dead trees and make other landscape improvements.
When the park reopened, lunch-hour activities that would attract nearby office workers could be scheduled, she said.
Harrell said the preliminary results of the survey indicate that 72 percent of the 1,300 respondents rarely or never visit Hemming Plaza. Of those who use the park more often, Harrell said most responded that their use was limited to First Wednesday Art Walk or the annual Jacksonville Jazz Festival.
Respondents were given the opportunity to submit suggestions and rank their opinions and preferences through multiple-choice questions. Harrell said many respondents offered lengthy written statements and the comments from the survey may prove to be as valuable as the opinion poll.
“Sixty-four percent said ‘do something about the people hanging out in the park and their behavior,’” Harrell said.
Harrell said that at every meeting, Lee has said the committee is “about the park, not the people.”
“Based on the survey, it’s about the people and their nuisance behavior,” said Harrell.
“It’s not the answer we were looking for. It’s the answer we got,” said Lorince.
The committee is next scheduled to meet at 10 a.m. Wednesday in the Don Davis Room at City Hall.
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