JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – With a major project coming to Lot J, people outside of the downtown area say their neighborhoods need the city’s attention over a new entertainment complex.
Northside residents say they feel pushed to the side again following Monday’s unveiling of plans for the Lot J development.
Siedah Allen has lived in the Moncrief area for a few years and says not much has changed in her neighborhood.
“Honestly, it’s not enough attention being shown to us," Allen said. “I get their project, but it’s nothing being done for us in our neighborhood. There’s a lot of crime, a lot of different things going on, but nothing is being done.”
In 2016, the mayor’s office broke ground on Payne Avenue Walk to build 12 single-unit houses in what it calls “one of the city’s most vulnerable communities, plagued with crime, violence and blight.”
News4Jax asked Michole Nelson, who bought one of the homes in 2017, if she felt anything has changed.
“I don’t see the difference,” Nelson said. “We are taxpaying homeowners that deserve everything that’s right and everything that was promised with the homes. So just to go and waste of money on Lot J is nuts.”
As of Monday, only seven of those homes stand, but the city says it currently has a contract in place to build three additional homes within the next few months.
Nelson said that since she bought her home, said she has spent hundreds of dollars on air conditioning and plumbing. She showed News4Jax emails she sent to the city and the Northwest Jacksonville Community Development Corporation but says she never got clear answers or enough help. She says she even filed a lawsuit against them but lost.
“Development for Lot J, I think, it’s a big waste of money. We’ve been clearly having problems with these homes for at least two years now. So to get promised that everything is going to get fixed, the city of Jacksonville just completely ignores it,” Nelson said.
At a news conference Monday about the Lot J plans, Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry said this project won’t leave out neighborhoods like Moncrief and will give job opportunities to people on the Northside.
Residents who News4Jax spoke with on Monday say their neighborhoods need developments just as much as other parts of the city.
News4Jax reached out to the Northwest Jacksonville Community Development Corporation for comment on this project and an update on the Soul District but had not heard back as of late Monday afternoon.
The city says there are four buildable lots on the Payne Avenue Walk, three of which are under contract. Construction on one of those homes is expected to start within the next 30 days, with the remaining three to follow.
When asked if the city has taken on any other projects like this one in the last two years, it said no.