JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Mayor Donna Deegan’s decision to remove a Confederate monument from Springfield Park, using private funds without City Council approval sparked a debate among city leaders.
City Council President Ron Salem said he wants to make sure such a move won’t happen again.
Salem and other council members got answers Tuesday from the city’s top attorney after the monument honoring Women of the Confederacy, which had been in the park since 1915, was moved to a warehouse in Brentwood.
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Council members said when the monument came down last week, they did not know it was going to happen. At a meeting Tuesday, they heard from General Counsel Michael Fackler and had the opportunity to ask questions.
Salem said he wanted answers as to why the city’s top lawyer believed it was legal for Deegan to take the action without council approval.
“[The issue] is the process that was used to take it down,” he said. “It should have come to the city council -- we appropriate the dollars -- and that did not occur.”
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For context, the mayor can veto decisions made by the council, but typically resolutions involving taxpayer money are passed by the council first.
Deegan said she consulted the General Counsel’s office before deciding she had the legal right to remove the monument because using private funds meant she did not need City Council approval.
Fackler said Tuesday that the donated money was not used to make improvements to the park so it did not need council approval.
It cost $187,000 to remove the monument -- money that was made available through a grant that the Jessie Ball duPont Fund and anonymous donors made to the group 904WARD.
Deegan shared with News4JAX the draft opinion from the Office of General Counsel that she used to make her decision.
It concludes that “the mayor has exclusive authority over the city’s parks and parks property, through the parks director, as provided in the Charter and Code... Therefore, the mayor has the power to remove a parks monument, without the use of city funds.”
Fackler said some of the things in his draft opinion might not have been accurate, such as the mayor having ultimate authority over parks, but again, this was not a final opinion. The council questioned why Fackler did not check with other departments, such as planning, to see if the statute was historical.
Fackler said he believed his advice to the mayor was correct.
Salem introduced legislation on Wednesday that would prevent mayors from using private donations to fund a city project without council approval.
If approved, it would clarify what can be done with private money and “limit the use of monetary and in-kind gifts or donations for capital improvement projects and any other purposes without council appropriation,” meaning the council would have to say OK even though the money was coming from a gift and not taxpayers.
But it also goes further by saying the money from gifts or donations can not be used to “alter, demolish, relocate, transform or in any way modify any city-owned or managed property, object, thing or anything else of substance without prior council approval.”
“This legislation is just to clarify the power of the mayor in terms of taking donations, in-kind or cash, and doing things. I think that what she did was beyond her power, personally. But this legislation will clarify going forward so that this does not happen again,” Salem said.
But the mayor is upset that the council is questioning the reason why the city’s top lawyer told her it was OK and said the legislation is just a knee-jerk reaction.
“Many times I spoke with members of this council, including President Salem about my desire and intention to take down this monument. I asked if they wanted to address it, they did not. And everyone knew because I said I was exploring every option that I had as mayor to do so. There was every opportunity for any one of them to go to the General Counsel...I don’t think that happened. I think most of them if they were really, to be honest, are probably relieved this thing is gone. But at the end of the day, I think people feel as if they have to say certain things politically. And that’s when I say politically that’s what I’m talking about. I made this decision because I believed it was the right thing to do. Not for any political reason, because I believed it was the right thing to take that Jim Crow era monument out of that Black neighborhood. I have no intention of taking away anything else. And I think they know that. But this is what happens when politics is injected,” Deegan said.
Ron Salem takes exception to that.
“And my point is, this is not politics. This is a fundamental difference. And between maybe her and I or members of the Council on her role in this and what she can do going forward, particularly on taking in-kind donations or cash for a capital project,” Salem said.
Salem said he does not want the monument back up and it is probably not going to happen, but he said that potentially the mayor could take down the Charlie Bennett statue across from city hall if she wanted to.
“I’m not suggesting she would, but this mayor or another mayor could. And that’s disturbing to me,” Salem said on Tuesday.
Watch: Press play below for uncut interview with Mayor Deegan
City Council member Nick Howland adamantly disagreed with Deegan’s decision, saying in a statement that the City Council Finance Committee specifically mandated that any funding being spent on the statue -- whether for removal, relocation, or contextualization -- must follow a Council policy decision. He said that the mandate was unanimously approved by the Council and signed by the mayor.
“Regardless of anyone’s personal opinion of this historic monument, Mayor Deegan’s actions are both an abuse of power and a blatant disregard for transparency. This was City Council’s decision to make. Period,” Howland’s statement said.
RELATED: ‘Donna Deegan is our Mayor, not our Monarch’: Councilman criticizes removal of Confederate monument in Springfield | Despite outcry, Mayor Deegan says she had legal authority to remove Confederate monument, and it wasn’t a secret
Members of the Northside Coalition and Take Em Down JAX have long been outspoken about the need to take the moments down, calling it a symbol of oppression.
“If a home structure is being remembered for the wrong parts of history, I don’t want my tax dollars used for that,” said Kelly Frazier with the Northside Coalition. “Homes and structures are considered historic for several reasons but some of that history should remain just as is. It doesn’t change history because we can’t see it. Leave it in the history books.”