Jacksonville, Fl \u2014 This afternoon is a formal ribbon cutting for the University of Florida graduate campus in LaVilla, just outside downtown Jacksonville. <\/p>\n
The project is being hailed as transformational for the city by Mayor Donna Deegan and other community leaders. <\/p>\n
During our monthly visit with Deegan on Jacksonville\u2019s Morning News, the UF grad campus was one of several key topics of conversation. <\/p>\n
\u201cEventually what you\u2019re going to see is all the jobs of the future and really the jobs of the present into the future, are a focus of that graduate campus,\u201d Deegan said. <\/p>\n
The city approved $105 million in taxpayer funding for the campus. An additional $245 million in state funding and private donations will pay for the project that\u2019ll take years to complete. <\/p>\n
Deegan addressed the City Council Finance Committee\u2019s looming budget cut of $23 million, which includes $4.9 million for affordable housing. <\/p>\n
The committee wants to move the money into a special contingency for public safety. Deegan supports Council Member Matt Carlucci\u2019s effort to restore the affordable housing trust fund. <\/p>\n
Deegan also addressed the recent resignation announcement by JEA CEO Vickie Cavey, whom Deegan had fully supported during a monthslong saga that included investigations into allegations of racism and a toxic workplace. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m obviously extraordinarily frustrated by the way that she was treated,\u201d Deegan said, as she called a special City Council Committee regrettable. <\/p>\n
\u201cUntil we get to the point where we are treating people with respect and humanity, where we are treating people like humans instead of like pawns to be used in a political game, we\u2019re going to have collateral damage,\u201d Deegan said. <\/p>\n
Cavey\u2019s resignation is effective September 25th, the same day the JEA Board has scheduled meeting to discuss the next steps in its CEO search. <\/p>\n
\u25b6 Listen to Jacksonville\u2019s Morning News Interviews<\/a><\/p>\n [\u00a0Read more local news from WOKV<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n Click here<\/a> to download our free news, weather and traffic app. And click here<\/a> to subscribe to our daily 3 Big Things newsletter.<\/p>\n \u00a92026 Cox Media Group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jacksonville, Fl \u2014 This afternoon is a formal ribbon cutting for the University of Florida graduate campus in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":394964,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":["post-394963","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\/394963","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=394963"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394963\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}