On the campaign trail, Mayor-elect Lenny Curry consistently talked about “celebrating our neighborhoods.”
To best accomplish that, Ed Burr posed a simple question to members of his Infrastructure Transition Committee.
“Should there be a Neighborhoods Department recreated?” Burr asked the group that began its work Wednesday.
The city’s Neighborhoods Department was deconstructed during Mayor Alvin Brown’s reorganization of city government. Its responsibilities were spread across other departments.
Burr wasn’t looking for an immediate answer. It was more of a threshold question, but one that likely will be addressed early in the group’s work.
Burr later said there will be a reorganization, although not massive.
However, Kerri Stewart said earlier she can see a substantial reorganization on the way. Stewart said she was speaking as an individual and not for the Operations, Human Resources and Productivity Transition Committee she heads.
The group will be looking at the way the city government is structured. The committee will look at whether activities throughout are best performed by the city — or perhaps might be better shifted to the nonprofit or private sector.
It won’t be making recommendations on specific employees.
Like Burr openly asking about neighborhoods, Stewart also points to the department as an example.
She served as the Housing and Neighborhoods director under former Mayor John Peyton and questions whether the department being “blown up” in past reorganizations was effective.
“Was it really the right thing to do?” she asked. “If we are going to focus on neighborhoods, why would we have all these functions that make neighborhoods better in four or five different departments?”
That doesn’t mean she can see it being recreated as it once was. The city and times have changed, she said.
The fresh eyes her group will bring to city government will make recommendations to Curry on the best way for neighborhoods — and other city departments — to move forward.
Burr’s group will, too, through the lens of the past and present of city parks, public works and neighborhoods.
There are six other groups, too, that begin their work at latest starting Monday. Economic Development, Fiscal Responsibility, A Safer Jacksonville and more all have their focus.
There’s also a committee comprising attorneys that will help make recommendations on the city’s next general counsel.
Wednesday served as an opener for some of them, but much of the work will be compacted into twice-a-week meetings over the next month, all with the goal of results by July 17.
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