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2019-01-11
Preservation Green Lab of the National Trust for Historic Preservation;
Jacksonville is rediscovering the value of its older urban core. This report from the Preservation Green Lab of the National Trust for Historic Preservation highlights how Jacksonville's older buildings and blocks are already outperforming newer areas of the city across many sustainable development metrics. But they can become even stronger. Analysis of data from city, state, and national sources points to numerous areas of the city with high potential for successful reinvestment and revitalization. Unlocking this potential requires stronger incentives, innovative new policies, and increased awareness and capacity in the nonprofit, government, and private sectors. Using a methodology developed by the Preservation Green Lab, this study includes an analysis of all of Jacksonville's existing structures to assess the connections between the character of the city's building stock and more than 30 measures of neighborhood livability, economic vitality, and diversity.
2019-01-25
Jacksonville Community Council, Inc.;
The Great Recession of 2007-09, as pundits are now calling it, hit Northeast Florida brutally. A regional economy that had been fueled by population and construction growth, consistently doing better than the national average, saw unemployment skyrocket when the housing market collapsed, the economy retracted, and population growth slowed to a trickle.Jacksonville Community Council Inc. (JCCI) surveyed the community to identify residents' top priority for in-depth study. Job growth far surpassed any other regional issue. Volunteers and partner organizations from the seven-county region came together to explore new ideas for retaining existing jobs, rapidly creating new jobs, and for positioning the region for long-term economic growth.The study committee visited the seven partner counties (Baker, Clay, Duval, Flagler, Nassau, Putnam, and St. Johns), examined existing job development plans and economic development strategies for the region, and explored promising practices from other regions that were achieving success despite the national economic climate.The resulting recommendations are designed to enhance economic development and job creation, signaling to the state and nation that Northeast Florida is open for business.Implementation of these recommendations will highlight Northeast Florida's existing assets and strengthen its competitive advantages in the economic world. Most significantly, action will build on Northeast Florida's successes and enhance the combined regional approach to competing in the global marketplace.First, the region must focus on its key regional growth industries. The primary immediate opportunities for substantial job creation in the region are in the areas of:* port logistics and associated industries* health and medical sciences* aviation/aerospace and defense contracting* financial servicesSecond, the region must bring its business and education sectors together in a shared emphasis to build and maintain an educated and skilled workforce. Shifting economic realities, along with the skill sets required for job growth, necessitate the training (or re-training) of local workers and the retention of these skilled local workers in their employment positions. It also prescribes the need for attracting talented workers from around the world.Third, economic success will require even more emphasis on encouraging the growth of small businesses. Enhancing the region's entrepreneurial spirit is critical to sustaining a vibrant economy. Improving access to support for small business development and expansion holds the potential for creating more jobs and more business owners.Fourth, the region requires both a vibrant urban heart and an expanded vision of its assets and aspirations – unfettered by current boundary definitions. The outsider's view of Northeast Florida often begins with Jacksonville and its downtown core. A good first impression of the city, along with having strong economic development partners with a variety of different attributes, can have long term positive implications. Successful regional economic development also means rethinking the regions boundary lines and embracing all the potential Northeast Florida has to offer – such as the research capacities demonstrated by the University of FloridaFifth, regional leadership must come together to encourage economic growth and enhance the business-ready environment of Northeast Florida. Regional leadership (political, business, and community) must maintain focus on reducing issues that unnecessarily add roadblocks to sustainable economic growth, by streamlining regulation and permitting processes, in order to improve Northeast Florida's competitiveness and economic success.Together, the implementation of these recommendations can accelerate short-term job creation and, more significantly, strengthen the region's ability to sustain economic growth for years to come.
2019-01-28
Jacksonville Community Council, Inc.;
Around the world, communities are working to take advantage of the technology revolution now propelling the global shift toward an information-based society, in which knowledge is the new capital and higher education is the new machine. Jacksonville, even with some of the necessary machinery in place, needs to build its intellectual infrastructure, which includes everything from improving high school graduation rates to attracting more research dollars into the local economy. Despite the recent rapid growth of the community and its higher education institutions, neither the community nor its colleges and universities have worked together in a strategic, comprehensive way to position Jacksonville for the future.The Town and Gown study committee began by identifying current and potential roles for both the community and higher education institutions in building the intellectual capacity of Jacksonville. In doing this, the committee reviewed the historical growth of higher education in the community. The committee then examined how higher education institutions were meeting the needs of the local community, and whether the community was supporting those endeavors. Lastly, the study committee identified successful efforts in other communities where strategic collaborations between institutions of higher education and the community have produced tangible results.The committee found that Jacksonville has reached a critical juncture in its history. Nothing less than the future of the community is in question. On the one hand, the future can be shaped through a deliberate, thoughtful, and intentional focus on building a community that recognizes knowledge and the acquisition of knowledge as a valuable local commodity beneficial to every resident's quality of life. On the other hand, the community (town) and its colleges and universities (gown) can continue growing along separate paths and Jacksonville may lose the opportunity to own its destiny in a world increasingly driven by intellect, ideas, and innovation.To compete globally and improve its quality of life, the Jacksonville community has to work locally with its higher education institutions to: develop sustained leadership in every sector of the community, including government, business, and higher education, to work towards building Jacksonville's intellectual infrastructure; create and implement a strategic vision that improves the quality of life in all areas of the community by co-opting the teaching, research, and service roles of universities for the betterment of Jacksonville as a whole; and build active collaborations between higher education and community institutions to carry out that vision as well as prepareJacksonville and its residents for meeting the opportunities and the challenges of the 21st century and beyond.
2017-11-13
Jessie Ball duPont Fund;
This report is focused on the heart of Downtown: Jacksonville's Northbank from the Prime Osborne Convention Center to the Stadium, from the St. Johns River to State Street.We did not include Brooklyn and the Southbank –two areas that are sometimes included in definitions of "downtown." Neither of those areas faces the level of development challenges that confront the heart of downtown.The report draws on data from a number of resources:Duval County Property Appraiser's records as of August 2017;Duval County property value data from 2017 preliminary tax roll;JEA;Duval County Tax Collector;Walker Parking Consultants Study.In addition, the study author made extensive on-site validation of property conditions.The report uses multiple measures to quantify downtown. Downtown Acres:An acre is a standard unit of measure equal to 4,840 square yards. An acre is about ¾ the size of an NFL football field.Downtown Parcels:A parcel is the unit by which properties are valued. It is a highly variable unit of measure. A parcel can be a piece of land of any size that is either "improved" (meaning it has structures on it or it has a designated use, such as a park) or vacant (meaning it has no structures nor any designated use). A parcel also can be a building of any size, even an entire city block, i.e. City Hall; or it can be a single residential or office condo unit within a building.Downtown Buildings:Though highly variable as a unit of measure, buildings are more familiar to most readers than "parcels."
2017-02-15
Jacksonville Community Council, Inc.;
For more than 30 years, JCCI has partnered with major Jacksonville stakeholders and organizations like United Way of Northeast Florida and JAX Chamber to bring our community this report. Its purpose is to give residents, leaders, and decision-makers a comprehensive look at the quality of life in Jacksonville. It uses numbers and trends to tell a story about how we live and what is changing. Some changes are welcome and are the result of focused community investment over many years, which is the case with the graduation rate. Other trend line changes are short and sharp, as seen in the two-year spike in serious bicycle accidents from 2010-12.While priorities of what to track have changed since JCCI's beginnings, some of the indicators have been maintained for three decades. The JAX2025 visioning project organized these indicators into ten targets of focus, narrowing in on goals for specific indicators to reach. For this year's progress report, we've included the longest trend lines possibleto reflect the longtime look that JCCI's indicator tracking provides.Very few communities in the U.S. have access to such long trend lines. Taken as a whole, these long-term trends show how our city has changed. Perhaps more exciting, they paint a picture of how social conditions improve, or worsen, in relation to other conditions. For example; a common belief is that crime will increase as poverty increases. This report shows that in our community, this is not so.
2005-10-30
Neighborworks America;
Spanish Oaks is a late 1960s garden apartment development in the Arlington section of Jacksonville, Florida. Originally built as market-rate rental housing, Spanish Oaks entered the inventory of the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) after the original owner defaulted. It was sold in 1995 to a partnership of two local non-profits -- Jacksonville Housing Partnership and Families First -- under the RTC's Affordable Housing Program. The development has 194 units with between one and three bedrooms. The agreement with the RTC was that 20 percent of the units (40 units) would be reserved for households with incomes at or below 50 percent of area median, another 55 percent (107 units) could have occupants with incomes up to 80 percent of area median, and a quarter (47 units) could be rented to households at any income level at unrestricted, market rents. The actual income levels of the households in 2005 are more heavily weighted towards the low end: half the units are occupied by households with incomes below 50 percent of median including 38 percent that have incomes below 30 percent of median.
2015-01-13
Nonprofit Center of Northeast Florida;
This survey tries to understand how nonprofits respond to cash shortfalls. We typically think about nonprofit organizations focusing on their mission or the services they provide to their communities. But nonprofits also must focus on the business side of their operation. Good financial health is crucial for these organizations: a broke nonprofit can't help anyone.The expansive, 78-question survey, looked at everything from revenues and expenses to real estate investments to issues of financial oversight. The upshot? The 90 nonprofits that completed the survey are generally solid financially (with a few caveats) and take a fairly traditional -- some might say conservative -- approach to managing their money.
2015-10-01
Jessie Ball duPont Fund;
This study is based on what The Reinvestment Fund calls a "Market Value Analysis" -- a tool designed to help private markets, government officials and philanthropy identify and comprehend the various elements of local real estate markets.By using the analysis, public sector officials, non-profits/philanthropy and private market actors can more precisely craft intervention strategies in weak markets and support sustainable growth in stronger market segments.The Market Value Analysis looks at communities at the Census block group level to discover the variations of housing market health, stability and opportunity in neighborhoods. It is based fundamentally on local administrative data sources.The analysis focuses on residential real estate because neighborhoods are -- first and foremost -- places where people live. The analysis then overlays other elements -- transportation, jobs, etc. -- to provide a more complete picture. The analysis is done at the Census block group level because even within discreet neighborhoods there can be significant variation. By identifying pockets of opportunity or concern early, communities can effectively "draft" on market forces or act before problems expand.
2014-06-01
Pratt Richards Group;
A comprehensive evaluation conducted of the 2013 Summer Youth Employment Initiative in Jacksonville, Florida, funded by the Jessie Ball duPont Fund ("duPont Fund") and administered by United Way of Northeast Florida("United Way"), revealed that the primary benefit to participating high school youth was the acquisition of a basic set of professional behaviors and attitudes. This skill set was not specific to any one industry or job experience but rather constituted the basic building blocks for professional success in any sector. With this finding in hand, United Way in partnership with duPont Fund staff made the critical decision to focus the program even more directly on the acquisition of these non-technical, or "soft" skills. To help further orient the program in this direction, Pratt Richards Group ("PRG") was engaged to do a cursory landscape scan of youth development programs and youth employment programs working at this intersection. In addition, PRG reviewed the relevant research on the topic. This report represents the critical findings from this effort. Specifically, it addresses: 1)Context and Definition: Who is saying these skills are important, and what skills are they? 2)Operationalizing the Work: What are the best practices in soft skill development, specifically in youth employment settings? 3)Evaluation: How does one assess successful soft skill development?
2009-09-22
Jessie Ball duPont Fund;
Just as the economic recession has taken a toll on the housing, retail and travel industries, it has taken a toll on the nonprofit industry – the sector that provides services to and sustains the civicinfrastructure of America's communities. The impact of recession has been felt in multiple ways – lower giving by individuals and foundations, reduced endowment income, reductions in the availability of public dollars to support government contracted services, increased lag times forpayments from public entities and reduced access to credit, among others. These pressures are overlaid on what for many organizations is an increase – sometimes a stunning increase – in demand for services.How have nonprofits fared under these adverse circumstances? In Jacksonville, the answer is both troubling and encouraging. Nonprofits have struggled with the economic upheavals: they have cutstaff and cut programs, reducing their capacity to serve their communities.But many organizations have exhibited what can be called "adaptive behavior." That is, they have changed the way they operate, revised business models, altered revenue streams, redefined core businesses, changed governance practices, or taken other steps to manage through the crisis rather than succumb to it.
2004-11-01
Association of Fundraising Professionals;
The Gateway City. The River City. The Bold New City of the South. Florida's First Coast. Ours is an emerging community and these changing monikers reveal much about its evolution. In the last quarter of the 20th century, Jacksonville, Duval County, and the counties that surround it began to move away from sleepy Southern traditions as they experienced unprecedented population growth. The influx of newcomers stimulated a new appreciation of the area's natural beauty and resources. And a new global economy triggered exploration of new economic opportunities. Community leaders began to think regionally, recognizing common interests and challenges best met by common effort.Philanthropy on the First Coast, likewise, is emerging. With population growth has come new wealth, and organized philanthropy in the region has grown exponentially. Of the 320 foundations located on the First Coast, almost half have been created since 1996.Philanthropy on the First Coast, however, is far from mature:Wealth, while present, is not widespread.Individual giving is below both national and state norms.Those individuals who give on the First Coast give generously, but the number of individuals who give is far lower than in other communities.Organized philanthropy, while growing, attracts less capital than in other communities.While new foundation formation is strong, the local foundation community remains dominated by three large, national foundations that are headquartered in Jacksonville. Without them, foundation assets per capita in the region would plummet almost 40 percent, from $1,082 to $656.But philanthropy is gaining traction:There is significant wealth along the water – both ocean and riverfront – and those wealthy individuals demonstrate a strong culture of giving.The area's new foundations, as yet, are thinly capitalized (as are most new foundations). But they carry the potential to be substantial philanthropic assets. Over the next 25 years:, with no additional contributions to capital, the assets of these 146 new foundations could more than double while, at the same time, they could generate almost $300 million in charitable contributions.
2012-07-05
Jacksonville Community Council, Inc.;
In 2008, JCCI began a conversation about babies' basic needs. In 2011, that conversation had expanded to explore how babies in our community can truly thrive. In these pages, we have focused our attention on the period of most rapid brain development, from birth through age three, and the impact of early learning experiences on future success. Newborns, infants, and toddlers are vulnerable and rich with developmental potential. However, in Duval County, at least 30 percent of children entering kindergarten are not passing the test that shows they are prepared for school learning; 30 percent of our third graders are not passing the FCAT; and 30 percent of our high school students are not graduating on time.By the time children reach kindergarten, if we have let the birth-through-three educational opportunity sail by, school becomes remediation. Success in kindergarten and beyond must begin with a safe, stimulating, responsive babyhood that literally shapes gene expression and brain structure for the better. Academic—and life—success requires successful brain development, healthy cognitive and physical, emotional, social, and mental development—each of which reinforces the other—from the very start. The window of opportunity opens with a newborn's first breath.Some well-meaning parents scatter the hottest blinking, beeping "learning" toys around a toddler, which is about as likely to facilitate learning as rubbing books about car repair on your forehead is to teach you how to change your transmission. If a baby does not receive responsive attention, brain growth is actually stunted. Developing brains require cuddling, eye contact and live two-way conversation—your words and their coos or babble—stories, and play.We know not to let a teething toddler gnaw on a vintage crib rail because lead paint causes brain damage. We also know to put newborns to sleep on their backs because successful campaigns have taught us that doing so lowers risks of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. How do we know whether to question a popular parenting book—or a pediatrician—advising letting a three-month-old "cry it out" for the 4 a.m. feeding, flooding the baby with brain-damaging stress hormones, impairing the baby's stress response system? Navigating a rocky sea of well-intentioned but often ill-informed advice and marketed materials is challenging, and habitual "I know best" mindsets can be problematic.Likewise, well-intentioned policies target "at-risk" families but have waiting lists or miss the many families who do not meet established criteria. We know better, so we have to do better to move our community's "bell curve"—in which a third of our community is failing at living productive lives, most are just getting by, and only a few are excelling—to a rising wave of learning outcomes, skewed toward true school readiness by kindergarten--and therefore, through to graduation and out into the workforce. We must better educate our health and child care professionals, parents and caregivers, policymakers, and community members. We must promote coordination of academic and training resources for higher standards of professional development in children's services and provide access to the best information available to parents, caregivers and healthcare providers.Through philanthropic and public funding, an awareness campaign, partnerships between local institutions and nonprofit agencies, an independent children's services council, and an independent advocate for children's issues, we can support policies and practices that create a collaborative system of care addressing the whole child's development. It is time for our community to become a place where all newborns, infants, and toddlers thrive. Jacksonville can become a child-friendly city, a community dedicated to creating the rising tide that lifts all boats, steering our children toward but lifelong success. We can all be thriving.
