JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Every week for the last decade, Karen Simmons has left fresh flowers at her granddaughter’s gravesite. Next month will mark 11 years since Megan Simmons and her friend, 13-year-old Jazmine Shelton, were killed when an unknown person started shooting at the home they were staying in. Jazmine died at the scene. Megan died a short time later.
“I just wonder how things would be if she was still here,” Karen Simmons said. “She would be married, going to school or whatever, because she wanted to be a veterinarian. And we just, I miss her all the time.”
Tragedies like the one impacting the Simmons and Shelton families are a sobering reminder of why programs like the Jacksonville Journey were launched in the first place. Years after the Jacksonville Journey ended, a relaunch appropriately titled “Journey Forward” is now in the works.
Mayor Donna Deegan briefly talked about it in her budget presentation at City Hall on Monday. Journey Forward aims to get to the root cause of crime and pick up where the Jacksonville Journey left off.
Charles Griggs, the city’s Director of Community Initiatives, served on the Jacksonville Journey’s oversight committee for eight years. He told News4JAX that during its first four years, the city saw a nearly 40% reduction in violent crime in Duval County. Many credited the Jacksonville Journey with playing a critical role. But Griggs said investments started to drop, as was the case with many programs across the United States.
“Back in 2012, all of our cities across the country were hit by loss of revenue because of the housing crisis,” Griggs said. “That was the chief reason why the investments started to go down.”
Griggs will now serve as a leader for the Journey Forward program. He said he’s bringing what he learned from the Jacksonville Journey to his role with the Journey Forward. He said a big part of this is aligning resources across city agencies and working with the private sector.
He explained the Journey Forward will work in 3 ways: prevention, intervention and enforcement. He said early literacy initiatives will be part of this, along with community engagement. A partnership with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office will meet the enforcement aspect, and working to connect people with the right resources after they’ve come into contact with the legal system fills the intervention goal.
According to News4JAX records, the city’s homicide rate is down considerably from the same time last year.
By this date in 2023, News4JAX counted 74 homicides in Duval County. That number is now 45, a roughly 39% decrease.
Griggs said a major goal for the program is to build on this momentum and see those numbers go down even more.
“We’re happy that the homicide rate is trending down,” Griggs said. “But we’re not going to rely on that as a way to beat our chest. What we want to do is find out why that is and do more of that.”
Griggs also stressed that giving people tangible options is also a goal for the program.
“Most of the folks I hear about do not want to be in the crime business, they want to be in the choice business,” Griggs said. “If they have choices, better choices, we want to make sure that our resources are being better coordinated to provide those choices.”
For Karen Simmons, programs like this are worth getting behind.
“I hope there are solutions because, I mean, people are losing children and adults also,” Simmons said. “And it’s just sad, and they need to really do things here in Jacksonville to stop the crime.”
Following the mayor’s budget presentation, Sheriff T.K. Waters briefly commented on the launch of the Journey Forward program.
“I’m for anything that will help keep our community safe and the people in our community as safe and prosperous as possible. I’m in,” Waters said. “Whatever we need to get done, we’re going to do it.”
Griggs says legislation for the Journey Forward is coming. The city is putting together an oversight board, and the expectation is the program will be fully activated by October. The program will be funded through previous funds that were not spent.