The preliminary scope of financing would have the city shoulder $536 million of the cost for infrastructure, riverfront parks, the riverwalk, marina improvements and the proposal s Exhibition, Entertainment and Technology Center that Akins envisions rising up behind the Hyatt Regency Riverfront Hotel.
A key to Southeast Development s approach is it would have a master developer for parcels of city-owned land that the Downtown Investment Authority has been marketing separately up to this point. I m a big believer in master plans and I think that the type of development that we need to see on the Northbank, particularly in what is essentially the face of Jacksonville, needs to be addressed in a master plan, Atkins said. I think that s critical.
‘The Biggest Impact’
When President Jim McCarthy joined the North Florida Land Trust in 2014, the non-profit conservation organization had a $233,000 budget and a staff of three. In seven years, the trust has grown to 14 full-time employees and a budget of $8 million and has secured protection for more than 25,000 acres.
“The secret to that (success) is finding really good people,” McCarthy says. “But, we have also stayed focused on where we could have the biggest impact.”
The organization achieves its mission of preserving the natural resources, historic places and working lands of North Florida by purchasing or receiving donations of land, as well as by helping public agencies with real estate transactions.