{"id":179642,"date":"2026-03-05T19:01:24","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T19:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/179642\/"},"modified":"2026-03-05T19:01:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T19:01:24","slug":"jea-board-member-who-jacksonville-city-council-president-was-trying-to-replace-to-become-vice-chair-104-5-wokv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/179642\/","title":{"rendered":"JEA board member who Jacksonville City Council President was trying to replace to become vice chair \u2013 104.5 WOKV"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The JEA board member who Jacksonville City Council President Kevin Carrico tried to replace as a \u201cbig favor to a friend\u201d<\/a> is now nominated to be the board vice chair.<\/p>\n

>>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<<\/a><\/p>\n

At the JEA board executive committee meeting on Monday morning, the following slate of leaders were approved:<\/p>\n

MG Orender, Board ChairArthur Adams, Vice ChairDonald \u201cWorth\u201d McArthur, Secretary<\/p>\n

You can watch the nine-minute meeting as it streamed on Action News Jax\u2019s YouTube page:<\/p>\n

CLICK HERE<\/a> to learn more about JEA\u2019s board members<\/p>\n

Action News Jax\u2019s Ben Becker first told you February 16<\/a> that he obtained a text exchange between Carrico and Adams that appears to show Carrico opting to remove sitting board member to repay what Carrico called a \u201cbig favor\u201d to his boss, Paul Martinez at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida.<\/p>\n

In that exchange, Carrico wrote:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s up bro\u2026 hey I owed a big favor to a friend and opted to put him on the JEA board as your term is expiring\u2026 Not sure if you wanted to stay but I needed to do this for my guy.\u201d<\/p>\n

INITIAL STORY: Carrico text suggests \u2018big favor\u2019 driving push to replace JEA board member with boss<\/a><\/p>\n

Adams replied:<\/p>\n

\u201cMy plan was to stay\u2026 I\u2019m disappointed – I wanted to serve a full term and felt I was adding real value\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Adams, formerly a 20-year CSX veteran, replaced Edward Waters University President Dr. Zachary Faison Jr. on the JEA board and was serving the final year of Faison\u2019s term. Adams played a key role on JEA\u2019s Capital Projects Committee.<\/p>\n

[DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/a>]<\/p>\n

Emails obtained by Action News Jax show the timeline of the decision to nominate Martinez and that the wheels were in motion to replace Adams before he was told:<\/p>\n

February 4: An email from Boys & Girls Clubs VP of marketing to the City\u2019s Chief of Research. It contains Martinez\u2019s JEA board application.<\/p>\n

February 5: Carrico sent the text message to Adams, informing him his term was not being renewed because Carrico \u201cowed a big favor to a friend.\u201d<\/p>\n

February 6: Another email from the city back to the Boys & Girls Clubs saying \u201cThe legislation for Mr. Martinez\u2019s appointment to the JEA Board was filed today.\u201d<\/p>\n

February 10: The bill was introduced to the City Council.<\/p>\n

[SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter<\/a>] <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what\u2019s happened since Becker\u2019s initial story on the text message exchange:<\/p>\n

February 18: Martinez announces he will no longer pursue<\/a> the opportunity to serve on the JEA board.<\/p>\n

February 19: Carrico accuses JEA CEO Vickie Cavey<\/a> of \u201cracism\u201d and \u201ctoxic culture\u201d after text controversy.<\/p>\n

February 20: Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan calls the accusations<\/a> against Cavey a \u201csmear campaign.<\/p>\n

February 25: Carrico is served a subpoena<\/a> by the State Attorney\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

February 26: Jacksonville City Councilman Jimmy Peluso calls on Carrico<\/a> to temporarily step down as City Council President until the State Attorney\u2019s Office finishes its investigation.<\/p>\n

Click here<\/a> to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here<\/a> to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here<\/a> to stream Action News Jax live.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The JEA board member who Jacksonville City Council President Kevin Carrico tried to replace as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179643,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[344,84969,347,84971,28,348,116,4040,76125,351,118,117,501,75613,84968,84970,349,350,346,345],"class_list":["post-179642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-action-news-jax","tag-arthur-adams-jea","tag-cbs47","tag-donald-worth-mcarthur-jea","tag-florida","tag-fox30","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-city-council","tag-jacksonville-city-council-president-kevin-carrico","tag-jacksonville-fl","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-jea","tag-jea-board","tag-jea-ceo-vicky-cavey","tag-mg-orender-jea","tag-northeast-florida","tag-southeast-georgia","tag-wfox","tag-wjax"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}