City Facilities Management LLS filed a notice with state officials under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act saying it is laying off up to 126 employees at its Jacksonville office beginning July 31.
“Various efforts will be explored to find other opportunities within the company prior to layoffs commencing,” the company said in its May 31 letter to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity.
“We hope to implement these layoffs with the least possible disruption to our employees and the community,” it said.
According to its website, City FM provides facilities management services to clients in four continents.
The company provides maintenance and engineering, technical procurement and support, and cleaning and ancillary services.
In addition to its Jacksonville office at 8211 Cypress Plaza Drive, it lists a second office in Burlington, Massachusetts.
The jobs impacted comprise primarily technicians and other positions that include the regional facilities manager.
City statement
Late June 8, City issued this statement:
City Facilities Maintenance FL, LLC. entered into a long-term agreement with a partner in October 2020 after a successful pilot based on City’s standard facility maintenance model, where job volumes are controlled to an agreed volume by our corporate partners to fit an agreed labor model. Unfortunately, the partner indicated an unwillingness to work within that model and therefore, we have agreed to end the partnership at the end of July 31, 2022.
We are doing our best to retain a significant amount of City’s team engaged with the partnership. And, we are currently working through the transition of our valuable, highly-skilled team members to as many open positions within City as possible, to continue the excellent service we strive to deliver for our partners.
City continues to invest in its operational capabilities, systems and business development across the US and Canada and looks forward to continuing to deliver operational excellence, financial savings and innovation to support our partners’ goals and critical objectives such as energy and sustainability.
Scotland-based company
City Facilities Management, a Scotland-based company, established its U.S. headquarters in Jacksonville in 2016 to provide refrigeration and other facilities maintenance for Southeastern Grocers’ stores in the Southeast. Southeastern Grocers is the parent company of Winn-Dixie.
In 2018, it announced it would be servicing 427 Walmart stores in the South.
In 2019, it added at least 90 office positions in Southside and 220 field jobs in the Northeast U.S. because of an additional contract.
The company provides maintenance services for refrigeration, heating and cooling systems, electrical, plumbing, food equipment, lighting, shopping carts, roof repairs and landscaping.
As of June 2019, it had about 240 employees in Jacksonville and 530 in the field.
The company operates in Cypress Point Business Park.
City Facilities Management LLC was established in 1985 in Glasgow, Scotland. It says its business model provides maintenance and engineering, technical procurement and support, as well as cleaning and ancillary services in retail, residential and commercial markets.
It has offices in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia.
Company received incentives
City Council enacted legislation in March 2016 to provide City Facilities tax incentives to create 51 jobs paying an average salary of $67,000 a year by the end of 2017 and invest at least $5.7 million in IT equipment, furniture, fixtures and real estate improvements.
The deal went through Council under the code name Project Star.
The resolution called for a Qualified Target Industry Tax Refund of $153,000, of which $30,600 came from the city and $122,400 from the state, along with a 10-year city Recapture Enhanced Value grant of up to $200,000.
City Facilities said at the time it would create more than 100 jobs by year-end 2017.
This story was updated with a statement from City.