{"id":203351,"date":"2026-03-24T02:42:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T02:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/203351\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T02:42:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T02:42:07","slug":"former-jea-exec-water-fees-have-been-an-issue-for-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/203351\/","title":{"rendered":"Former JEA exec: Water fees have been an issue for years"},"content":{"rendered":"

JEA\u2019s former chief of staff says the public utility\u2019s management has been trying for years to resolve its lax policy that\u2019s caused the under collection of what are called capacity fees from several commercial water customers for decades.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kurt Wilson, whose position was eliminated in February by JEA CEO Vickie Cavey, testified under oath Monday during a hearing in front of the\u00a0Jacksonville City Council\u2019s Special Investigatory Committee on JEA.<\/p>\n

In addition to Wilson\u2019s testimony on the fees, the committee\u2019s questions also zeroed in on Wilson\u2019s dismissal from JEA<\/a>, his allegation that Cavey created a toxic work environment for some on her senior leadership team, and Wilson\u2019s involvement in ending a lobbying contract with Ballard Partners<\/a>, which employs former Mayor Lenny Curry. <\/p>\n

The scope of the newly created committee \u2014 chaired by Ron Salem, with council members Rory Diamond and Ju\u2019Coby Pittman \u2014 has been criticized by others on the council and by Mayor Donna Deegan\u2019s administration as overreach.<\/p>\n

According to Wilson, JEA\u2019s senior staff became aware of the lax capacity fee policy in 2022, during the tenure of former CEO Jay Stowe.<\/p>\n

He said a customer\u2019s development project triggered an audit, which found multiple companies within JEA\u2019s service area\u00a0were building and expanding but not reporting it to JEA and therefore not paying additional capacity fees.\u00a0<\/p>\n

By 2025, the problem was raised to the level of the CEO and other senior management, Wilson said.<\/p>\n

One example referenced in the investigation is Mayo Clinic\u2019s water usage. <\/p>\n

A December 2024 memo<\/a> from JEA\u2019s then-chief legal counsel Regina Ross to Mayo Clinic\u2019s attorneys says the hospital could owe $18.9 million in water and wastewater capacity fees. That was based on how much more water Mayo has consumed due to its growth since 1995.<\/p>\n

In a contentious meeting last week<\/a>, city General Counsel Michael Fackler said Ross \u2014 who\u2019s now an attorney for the city \u2014 would not be made available to auditors due to her attorney-client privilege with JEA. <\/p>\n

Mayo Clinic claims it\u2019s exempt from paying for the additional water and wastewater usage based on an agreement with the city dating back to 1986.<\/p>\n

Wilson said one issue is when a growing or expanding company applies for a permit with JEA\u2019s electric business, there is no coordination with the water and wastewater services to verify if the company needs to report additional capacity.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no flag in there. Ask key account people, they don\u2019t know. If you\u2019re not driving past these businesses on a daily (basis) and your mind\u2019s not thinking, \u2018This place has really grown in the last 20 years. I wonder if they\u2019ve ever paid\u2019 \u2014 I\u2019m not putting this on people (or a) person; the system\u2019s broken on JEA\u2019s side,\u201d Wilson told the committee.<\/p>\n

He said instead of filing a lawsuit or going to mediation, which he and Cavey agreed would have been \u201cbad optics\u201d because the oversight was JEA\u2019s error, Cavey came to an agreement with Mayo: JEA would waive the previously unpaid fees and Mayo would pay the full amount moving forward. According to Wilson, there was some question as to whether the CEO had the authority to waive the fees unilaterally or if that needed board approval.<\/p>\n

It never came to the board.<\/p>\n

\u201cForty percent of our customers right now struggle to pay our bills. So whatever the business is \u2014 there\u2019s plenty of them out there \u2014 but the reality is, if they\u2019re not paying the capacity somebody else is,\u201d Wilson said.<\/p>\n

Wilson highlight the pushback JEA received from developers in 2021 when its board approved a 149% increase<\/a> on the one-time water and sewer fees for new housing and commercial development \u2014 the first increase in more than 15 years. <\/p>\n

JEA is required to collect capacity fees under Florida law<\/a>, and it says the fees repay bonds it uses to borrow money to build water plants and infrastructure.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Wilson said he didn\u2019t see any evidence JEA was trying to cover up the uncollected capacity fees.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do think (the fees are) the 800-pound gorilla that makes me the most nervous,\u201d council member Diamond said. \u201cAnd hopefully it\u2019s just something that they can get worked out and JEA goes along in a good way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who owes capacity fees? \u00a0<\/p>\n

There are still questions about how many and which organizations could have unpaid and unreported water capacity increases.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Wilson told the committee he heard it\u2019s anywhere between 12 and 20 companies. Salem previously said there could be more than $100 million in unpaid water capacity fees.<\/p>\n

During the investigatory committee\u2019s first meeting last week, Diamond named Florida State College at Jacksonville and the Jacksonville Zoo and Botanical Gardens as examples of organizations that could be on the list.<\/p>\n

Salem said Monday that it would be unfair to single out Mayo Clinic.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to resolve this once and for all, and fairly to all parties involved,\u201d Salem said.<\/p>\n

A spreadsheet\u00a0provided to the City Council Auditor by JEA and obtained by Jacksonville Today lists more than 40 organizations and their water\/wastewater capacity increase. But the document is marked \u201cNot accurate \u2013 Do not rely on.\u201d<\/p>\n

City Council Auditor Kim Taylor told the committee her office will be trying to independently confirm JEA\u2019s capacity data through its own research.<\/p>\n

She told Jacksonville Today in an email Monday that she doesn\u2019t think the utility has an updated list.<\/p>\n

\u201cPart of the problem is knowing the initial starting benchmark for capacity, and that requires pulling very old records,\u201d Taylor said.<\/p>\n

Taylor stressed the capacity fee investigation will be time intensive, as the auditor, city attorney and JEA work to locate records dating back to the 1980s and \u201990s, when the city controlled Duval County\u2019s water service.<\/p>\n

\"\"Former JEA Chief of Staff Kurt Wilson (foreground) testifies Monday in front of the Jacksonville City Council\u2019s Special Investigatory Committee on JEA. | Mike Mendenhall, Jacksonville Today<\/p>\n

Oversight or overreach?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Not all council members are on board with getting involved in JEA\u2019s internal personnel issues or investigating its handling of capacity fees.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Council members Matt Carlucci, Jimmy Peluso and Michael Boylan \u2014 who led the effort to reform the JEA charter after the failed sale attempt<\/a> \u2014 are calling out what they see as the committee\u2019s slant.\u00a0<\/p>\n

City Chief Administrative Officer Mike Weinstein, who\u2019s worked under Republicans and Democratic mayoral administrations, says the council\u2019s move to influence JEA\u2019s leadership makes him nervous.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that JEA shouldn\u2019t have oversight, but the oversight shouldn\u2019t be people who are here for a few years trying to get a next position in politics. It should be done by professional organizations that are in the business, not people who don\u2019t know anything about electricity and water,\u201d Weinstein told Jacksonville Today.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Council President Kevin Carrico, who formed the special committee to aid the city Office of Inspector General\u2019s investigation into the fees and look into the allegations against Cavey, is asserting his authority to be a voting member.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Carrico is himself the subject of a State Attorney\u2019s Office subpoena, which appears to be looking into his attempt to appoint his boss, Boys & Girls Club Boys & Girls Club CEO Paul Martinez, to the JEA board.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Weinstein previously served as chief financial officer in the John Delany and Curry administrations. He said he watched the attempt to sell JEA during Curry\u2019s tenure, and said a \u201clegitimate\u201d problems inside JEA should be looked at by professionals, \u201cnot politicians.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just nervous that again, here we are years later with local politicians exerting a tremendous amount of influence and power trying to take over management decisions of a very large business,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JEA\u2019s former chief of staff says the public utility\u2019s management has been trying for years to resolve its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":203352,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":["post-203351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203351","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=203351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203351\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/203352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}