JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville City Council held the first of two workshops Wednesday to discuss the multi-million dollar deal to renovate the Jacksonville Jaguars stadium.
Councilman Rory Diamond, who has been critical of the deal, also spoke at a separate meeting.
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There was time for public comment at both meetings.
The city has already held a series of community huddles along with the Jaguars to collect input on the project. Wednesday morning’s city council workshop took a deeper dive into some of the finer details of the financial agreement.
It was explained in detail how the city plans to rework part of the Better Jacksonville Plan, that’s the ½ cent tax residents pay to fund some public works projects and eventually to pay off the pension debt. The stadium deal won’t use that tax money but by reworking the financing, it could free up millions of dollars that could be used for the stadium.
“I think we’re pretty comfortable with it. Today was just to reaffirm what we’ve already heard,” Salem said. “We’ll go through each agreement. I think the lease agreement is the most complicated agreement which comes in the third week. They’ll be a lot of discussion on that.”
That discussion will take place around the end of the month.
Beaches Watch is also holding a Town Hall at 7 p.m. Wednesday that will cover a number of topics, including the stadium deal, and Diamond is scheduled to speak.
He says he opposes part of the deal that would have the Jags and city each spend $150 million on community benefits to address things like parks, affordable housing, and homelessness.
Diamond also recently criticized a UNF poll about the deal.
“The poll was total garbage because it didn’t ask the honest questions,” he said. “Have I asked you, ‘Hey, I’ll give you $100 million for free from the Jaguars or I’ll give you $150 million. But you have to pay me $150 million,’ which would you choose? You take $100 million for free every time. So that wasn’t the question they asked.”
The Beaches Watch meeting will be at the library in Neptune Beach.
City Council president Ron Salem said the goal is to vote on the deal by June 25.