Daily Record Financial News &
Friday, March 11, 2016
Vol. 103, No. 085 • One Section
35¢ www.jaxdailyrecord.com
Parking transfer can aid growth
DIA can use spaces as negotiating tools
Special to the Daily Record
By David Chapman Staff Writer
From ashes, a new home
Humane society groundbreaking in May When a fire destroyed much of the Jacksonville Humane Society’s facilities and killed 86 dogs and cats in April 2007, supporters probably didn’t think it would take a decade to rebuild the Beach Boulevard shelter. Yet a recession intervened and slowed the plans and fundraising efforts. With a better economy the past five years, and a little more than $8 million raised of the $15 million needed, the society has been rebuilding. The money is being raised through the shelter’s Campaign for a Compassionate Community, which launched in 2015. The major piece of the project — the Animal Resource Center and administrative building — should break ground in May and the entire campus should be completed in April or May 2017. “It will be the 10-year anniversary, which
was not planned but what a nice coincidence that turned out to be,” said Denise Deisler, executive director of the society. “I don’t think anyone 10 years ago realized it would take 10 years,” she said. The city is reviewing a permit application for Jacksonville-based Auld & White Constructors LLC to build the 43,260-square-foot, two-story structure at 8464 Beach Blvd. The architect is Bacon Group Architecture Inc. of Clearwater. The construction project cost for the center is listed at $12.8 million. The total project budget is $15 million. Plans show the first floor will contain the dog and cat adoption, holding, isolation and treatment center, all in a climate-controlled structure. The floor also includes offices, laundry and other uses. Humane continued on Page A-3
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I don’t think anyone 10 years ago realized it would take 10 years.
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By Karen Brune Mathis, Managing Editor
Denise Deisler Jacksonville Humane Society executive director
Real or perceived, one of Downtown’s biggest issues is urban core parking. Is there enough of it? Is it being used properly? Are people comfortable with it? Downtown Investment Authority CEO Aundra Wallace said parking was a constant theme throughout the 43 meetings that developed the organization’s business plan. The authority always could weigh in on parking issues, but didn’t have final say. Mayor Lenny Curry’s reorganization plan is changing that. Outside of re-establishing a Neighborhoods Department, one of the bigger changes in the Curry plan shifts most functions of the Office of Public Parking under DIA. “We knew this day would come at some point and time,” said Wallace. The DIA has been a small-scale operation since it was created in late 2012. Wallace came aboard in mid-2013 and leads a staff of four. The reorganization would shift about 25 employees and the almost $6.2 million public parking system under the authority’s guidance, Wallace said. It would only be the portions dealing with enforcement, infrastructure and the like — motor vehicle inspections and such are being moved elsewhere. Despite the influx of additional responsibilities, Wallace said the transition will be manageable. And the timing is right. DIA Chair Jim Bailey, publisher of the Daily Record, has pushed for the authority to have more involvement with parking. One of the bigger advantages, he said, will be the economic development aspect of using parking as part of negotiations. Citizens Property Insurance Corp. struck a deal with the city last year that brings Parking continued on Page A-4
What’s electricity worth? That’s the question JEA at odds with local solar power industry
About 500 JEA residential customers have solar panels installed on their homes and they sell electricity their panels produce, but they don’t need back to the utility.
Public
legal notices begin on page
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Special to the Daily Record
By Max Marbut Staff Writer The value of electricity produced by rooftop photovoltaic panels versus the value of electricity generated and distributed by JEA is at the heart of a controversy being played out by the solar industry and the utility. Both the industry that sells and installs home solar systems and JEA agree that solar-generated electricity will be a major element of reducing carbon emissions from producing electricity.
Both sides agree the cost to install the systems, whether on a roof or in a utility-level solar farm — such as the 100-acre facility near Baldwin from which JEA purchases electricity — is 70 percent lower than in 2009. Both sides also agree the 501 customers with solar systems and net-rate meters account for only 0.1 percent of JEA’s more than 425,000 residential electric customers The issue is net metering, which allows residential solar panel owners to transfer electric-
Published
for
26,885
ity they don’t need in their homes to JEA in exchange for a credit that lowers their bill for the electricity they purchase. Since 2009, when JEA began its net-metering program, solar panel owners receive a monthly credit per unit of electricity equal to JEA’s retail price to deliver the same amount of electricity — 11 cents per kilowatt-hour. In the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, JEA credited net-meter customers for 990,000 kilowatt hours of electricity, equal to the Solar continued on Page A-4
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