After a proposed exchange of city-owned riverfront property for an office building that would be used for the University of Florida graduate campus after the swap drew opposition from a former Downtown Investment Authority board chair and a pro-parks advocacy group, the DIA’s top administrator is defending it.
In a detailed interview May 30, DIA CEO Lori Boyer answered questions about why the DIA considered a proposed 17-story tower project for the site as the most valuable option for the site, why the organization considered a smaller development to be unsuitable, why the property was eliminated from a request for an optimal use study from several lots in the vicinity and more.
The Jacksonville City Council Committee of the Whole is scheduled to meet at 5 p.m. June 2 to discuss the exchange, which would provide the 1.23-acre property at Riverfront Plaza plus an option on an adjacent property to the owners of the former Interline Brands Inc. building at 801 W. Bay St.
The city hopes to acquire that property from Gateway Jax, its owner since October 2024, to provide for the UF campus in LaVilla. The university plans to invest $7 million in the two-story, 38,136-square-foot building and launch classes there in the fall of 2025.
For Gateway Jax’s part, it has committed to building the tower project, which would include a hotel, condos, retail and restaurant square footage, and public spaces.
Boyer’s interview came after former DIA board Chair Jim Citrano Jr. came out against the exchange, advising the city to instead complete an optimal use study for the site and nearby properties.
In August 2024, the board ordered that the DIA seek proposals from consultants to perform the analysis, but it attracted no bidders and the board later amended it to not include the Riverfront Plaza site.
Coinciding with Citrano expressing his concerns publicly, the advocacy group Riverfront Parks Now issued a proposal to scrap the exchange in favor of building a two-level retail and restaurant development on the site.
Both Citrano and Riverfront Parks Now expressed support for an outright purchase of the Interline building, which Council also is considering.
Study parameters revised
In the interview, held in the DIA’s offices at City Hall, Boyer praised Citrano’s board leadership but countered his view about further study being needed on the Riverfront Plaza development pad.
She said numerous plans and studies of the site dating back more than 10 years had called for development on the property.
Boyer said that when the DIA held a competitive process to create a master plan for Riverfront Plaza, all three respondents recommended building on the site.
She said Gateway Jax’s proposal for the site adheres to the approved design from Chicago-based Perkins & Will.
When the DIA board voted in August to conduct the optimal use study, she said, it was in response to a proposal for another tower project on what is known as the east Landing parking lot, a former parking lot for the Jacksonville Landing. That is the property on which Gateway Jax would be given an option.
The board included the Riverfront Plaza development pad, the east Landing parking lot, the site of the razed Duval County Courthouse and the city hall annex.
A DIA procurement and property disposition specialist who joined the staff in November 2024 was assigned to steer the request through the city procurement process, Boyer said, but that staffer resigned without warning in December 2024 without progressing on the project.
December also brought UF’s announcement that it had selected LaVilla as the site of its campus, leaving the DIA staff deluged with work to prepare legislation to transfer several city-owned properties to the university.
In February 2025, the land swap with Gateway Jax was proposed.
The board approved it on a 6-2 vote. The optimal use study came up during discussion on the swap, and members questioned why the Riverfront Plaza site would need to be part of the study when Gateway Jax had submitted a proposal that adhered to the Perkins & Will master plan.
Boyer said “the voice that carried the day” from the board was that the Riverfront Plaza site should be excluded from the study. The DIA is pursuing the study again, minus the Riverfront Plaza pad, after hiring a new staff member in March.
Boyer said Gateway Jax had agreed to consider input from the completed study on best uses for the east Landing parking lot.
Incentives and agreements
During the February DIA board meeting, Gateway Jax principal Bryan Moll estimated the Plaza tower project would require $20 million in completion grants, plus an indeterminate amount of Recapture Enhanced Value Grants.
A REV grant is a refund on ad valorem tax revenue generated by a new development.
Citrano said he believed the costs of building the tower could require far more incentives than are currently being discussed.
In response, Boyer noted that in city Ordinance 2025-0319, which would order the swap, the completion grant is capped at $20 million and would be provided for from funds controlled by the DIA as opposed to the city general fund. From the general fund, the city provides services citywide.
The DIA placed the Plaza pad up for disposition, a process by which the city provides public property for private development, resulting in Gateway Jax presenting the only suitable proposal within the deadline.
Citrano and others questioned the parameters of the disposition, which required developers to either provide office space in LaVilla for UF or $8 million for the city to acquire the Interline building.
Citrano said he believed that if a study showed the tower was the optimal use of the property, the city should seek proposals that excluded the requirements related to UF. He said “an RFP is always in the best interest of taxpayers.”
Boyer disagreed, saying RFPs on the former courthouse site and the Riverfront Plaza pad yielded agreements with high-quality developers but failed to generate construction. She said that between the time when developers make proposals and when they begin designing their projects in earnest, changes in construction costs and other financial issues can erode their profitability.
“You’re asking someone at the very front of the project to tell you in detail what the construction cost is going to be, what they’re going to build and how much incentives they’re going to need,” she said.
“When we’re doing these dispositions, they (developers) aren’t willing to invest a ton of money before they get the nod they’re going to get the land. And then when they spend the money to do the detailed architecture on their project, you’ve got this mismatch because they can’t perform on the terms they initially proposed.”
Return on investment
Boyer said the Gateway Jax proposal also offered an attractive return on investment of at least $1.30 to $1.70 in taxes and fee revenue per $1 of taxpayer-funded incentives the city would provide for it. The range depends on finalization of construction costs, incentives and other factors involved in the development.
“We haven’t had a deal that yielded that (much) in a long time,” she said.
Through a hotel surcharge and HOA fees on the condos, it would also generate $700,000 per year for maintenance and programming for the city park that is being built at Riverfront Plaza.
She said studies of similar projects, including some sent to her by Riverfront Parks Now, concluded that such revenue was critical to keeping parks attractive and well-visited.
“You have to find a recurrent revenue stream to operate these parks,” she said. “This is the revenue stream.”
Boyer said a smaller, retail- and restaurant-oriented project like the one recommended by Riverfront Parks Now would provide the city with less than a 1-to-1 return on investment and would not generate hotel surcharges and an HOA fee for use in maintaining the park.
The advocacy group says its alternative project could provide maintenance funding from contributions from restaurateurs and retailers.
Riverfront Parks Now says its model is based partly on developments along Tampa’s riverfront, such as the two-story Armature Works and one- to three-story Sparkman Wharf, that would be quicker and easier to build and would provide public benefits without needing tens of millions of dollars in incentives.