Notes from the Mayor

“Democracy can be noisy messy and complicated, but it is forthright and honest, and encourages people to pay attention and consider the views of others.”

–paraphrased from “American Democracy”

Once a quarter, I’ll be sharing with you the progress we’re making on what you asked for—solutions to congestion, tackling our roads, water, sewer and storm water shortfalls, and updating our zoning–and along the way, deliver good governance and transparency.  And the good news is—we are making genuine progress in a very short period of time.

First, thank all of you for the new energy and active participation you are bringing to City Hall and our City.   I hear from you at coffee’s and walks around our City, meetings with your organizations, in e-mails, on the street, and in the grocery store.  We now have two new neighborhood associations contributing to the dialogue.  A group of business people who drive our tourism economy are working on a proposal to “reimagine” our Visitor Information Center after the 450^th with an eye toward a better experience for our visitors.   All good.

Your entire Commission and the City staff are focused on delivering information to you that you deserve and improving our governance:

• Public comments in Commission meetings are responded to by City staff
• Commission agendas are published close to week in advance so we can all see what’s coming and be prepared to weigh in
• Budget performance is reported monthly so we know better where we stand
• 450^th finances on the City website as suggested by Commissioner Neville
• We’ll be reviewing our contracting to ensure we have the best practices in place, and have set the right policies. (That was a little “noisy and messy” but we all got to the right decision.)

And your Commission has made some tough decisions—with most of our votes unanimous.  Our lively and thoughtful discussions are a far cry from a “rubber stamp” (and as one resident told me “It’s the best TV in town.”)  We all work hard and each bring unique skills and experience to representing you.

Here’s where we are with tackling our “big three”:

1. Our infrastructure:

We have our first ever assessment –and a grade of C- overall.  And we know the price tag to get up to speed- $140,000,000.  Our next job is to understand what we can spend, and establish priorities.  An improved budget process will be underway soon—and your participation in how your tax dollars are spent is vital, so watch for the meeting schedule.

2. Zoning:

Planning and Building is on the road to each neighborhood with a zoning workbook, gathering your input, which is so important.  Neglect of our zoning has cost us a lot in legal fees.  Updating zoning along with our comprehensive plan, is vital to protecting and preserving our livability (and our property values).

3. Congestion:

We have the narrow streets of a City in Europe—but we have our American cars, and we have our visitors, even if they are just coming from Nocatee. We’ve had many studies, a committee on parking and traffic and have made some progress, but we all know we have a lot of work to do.  Every person in this City has an idea or a solution– including every one of your Commissioners—and the truth of the matter is that some of them may be “spot on”.  But without a comprehensive plan that includes all the piece parts of getting around town–cars, parking , pedestrians, bikes, pedicabs, carriages and more—we don’t know if these ideas  fit well.

As an example of unintended consequences, a neighborhood street was recently paved.  Good, right?  Except that the potholes had served as a “traffic calming” device, sort of like speed bumps, and now the problem of high speed traffic needs to be addressed.

That said, we do have some quick wins in the works.

• We are making progress on a better approach to truck deliveries and have a study underway with the Northern Florida Transportation Planning Organization (which Commissioner Nancy Sikes-Kline chairs), part of which included a survey of our businesses.
• Our garage filled up 77 days last year, and we now have an overflow parking plan that uses 500 spaces in non-profit lots, and a 511 number for parking information.

So what’s next?

The Commission agreed at its last meeting to develop a comprehensive plan, and identify quick wins for piloting with citizen input.

A good approach might look like this—and we’ll look to the City staff to move this effort forward as quickly (and wisely) as possible.

1. Partner with experts to help build a plan
2. Identify the most promising quick wins to pilot from the many ideas we have
3. Organize City staff so we have a centralized team focused on all aspects of mobility

They say that your budget reflects your values—and the Commission has agreed that solving congestion and improving our infrastructure will drive our City budget for next year.  Big issues, big dollars and hard choices—but together we can make real progress.

Thanks for everything you do!

Nancy