District 14 City Council candidates share thoughts at public forums
One of the most exciting electoral races this spring will be the one for the District 14 City Council seat being sought by five candidates. The incumbent, Jim Love, has served two four-year consecutive terms and, by ordinance, is ineligible to run for a third consecutive term.
The candidates who qualified by obtaining the requisite number of valid petitions include Randy DeFoor (Rep.), Sunny Gettinger (Dem.), Henry Mooneyhan (Rep.) and Jimmy Peluso (Dem.). Also filing as a write-in candidate is Earl Testy, who said he is a Republican.
To qualify via petition, each candidate needed to obtain at least 455 signatures, which is 1 percent of the 45,494 registered voters in District 14. In addition, the candidate must have resided in District 14 for at least 183 days prior to the candidate’s qualifying date.
The primary election will be held Tuesday, March 19. If no candidate obtains 50 percent plus one vote, the two candidates with the highest vote totals will be on the ballot in the general election, Tuesday, May 14.
Four of the five candidates are running for the first time.
DeFoor is a senior vice president at Fidelity National Financial, serving as their National Agency Counsel. She holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of the South and a jurisprudence degree from the Cumberland School of Law. DeFoor lives in Ortega Forest, is married and has three grown children.
Gettinger works for Google Fiber as the metro expansion lead for Florida. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a master’s in Public Policy from Harvard. Gettinger lives in Avondale, is married and has two elementary school-age children.
Mooneyhan is a retired businessman, having worked for 50 years in the transportation industry. He graduated from Andrew Jackson High School and studied transportation and logistics at Florida State College. Mooneyhan lives in Argyle, is married, and has four children and five grandchildren.
Peluso, a U.S. Navy veteran, currently works as a Naval reservist and as a government consultant. He is a graduate of George Washington University and the University of Pennsylvania. Peluso, single, lives in Riverside.
Testy, of Murray Hill, ran for the District 14 seat in 2011 as one of 10 candidates. His candidate’s statement indicates he holds a Bachelor of Arts in sociology and general science from the University of Oregon, and he said he has also studied criminal justice.
Two public forums were held in January to introduce the candidates and their platforms to residents of a district that stretches from 5 Points to Argyle Forest.
5 Points forum
All five candidates were present to gain support for their platforms on Jan. 29 at a forum hosted by Riverside Avondale Preservation and Sun-Ray Cinema, and moderated by John Citrone. The 90-minute event included a brief question-and-answer session with a standing-room-only the audience of over 200.
Three questions were thrown at the candidates, ranging from their ability to work within a strong-mayor form of mayor-council government, to the removal of the City’s three Confederate monuments and, finally, whether economic progress as regards the harbor deepening project on the St. John’s River is worth the environmental and human sacrifice.
Mooneyhan made it clear with the first question that he is striving to stay out of the friction at City Hall. “I’m not going to sign on to be Lenny Curry’s boy. If it does not benefit the people in this district, in this city, I will not vote for it,” he said. DeFoor also said she would work for the citizens, although noting “Bottom line, if you don’t work with the mayor, nothing gets done, it’s just a fact.” Testy noted he would support the mayor, especially when it concerns criminal justice and the prisons, but hoped he could say no to the mayor when he disagreed with him.
Gettinger and Peluso both took the view that a Councilmember’s job was to ask the hard questions, but Gettinger said, “You can’t be oppositional for the sake of being oppositional. The point is to get the right policies for the whole city, and we need to be much more strategic, much more critical, and we need to use data rather than politics to make decisions.” Peluso was more pointed about he called a toxic environment in City Hall, stating that as a military officer with experience in “command climates,” when leadership creates a sense of fear and instability among subordinates it leads to poor planning and poor policy.
Regarding removal of the Confederate monuments, Mooneyhan and Testy felt they should remain to help future generations understand the history behind the city’s racial problems. Gettinger and Peluso suggested they should be put in a place with context, such as a museum, while DeFoor didn’t offer an opinion, instead saying there should be a candid conversation about racism and raising awareness about Jacksonville’s black history.
After quoting the St. Johns Riverkeeper’s comments about the harbor deepening project, Citrone asked the candidates whether economic progress was worth environmental and human sacrifice, referencing the aftermath of Hurricane Irma and sea-level rise.
Gettinger said that without proof and data about the promised economic outcome of the dredging project there is not a business case for the project and she does not support it. Mooneyhan said that as a sensible project under scrutiny, deepening the harbor could regrow Jacksonville’s transportation economy. Testy said he would support dredging but that it is affecting private property along the river.
Peluso said the City needs to focus on making good on mitigating while the dredging was happening. “Dredging is a federal project that will be very difficult for City Council to get in the way and completely stop it,” he said. “We need to fight for the $50 million Alvin Brown was pushing for mitigation; we haven’t even seen a tenth of that.”
DeFoor focused on flood drainage issues, suggesting in the future property owners may have trouble getting flood insurance, loans or post-disaster assistance from FEMA if the City doesn’t address investment in that infrastructure. She also said she had never heard of a project like the harbor deepening one that didn’t involve mitigation.
Murray Hill forum
Earlier in January, the Murray Hill Preservation Association (MHPA) hosted a candidates’ forum Jan. 15 at the Murray Hill Theatre, where approximately 60 people gathered to hear how DeFoor, Gettinger, Mooneyhan and Peluso would answer questions specific to the Murray Hill community. Testy was a no-show for the event.
Jason Tetlak, MHPA president, moderated the forum, which consisted of four questions, ranging from crime, economic growth, parks, and what the candidates considered the biggest issue facing Murray Hill.
When asked how they would help small businesses in Murray Hill thrive, DeFoor’s and Gettinger’s responses took aim at Visit Jacksonville’s newest slogan “Jax. It’s easier here.” Both women noted the difficulty and amount of paperwork it took to open a small business or to obtain approval for building permits. “It’s too hard to do business in Jacksonville,” DeFoor said, “so we need to really look at that, figure out what does and doesn’t make sense.” Gettinger agreed, stating, “I’d like to see people engaging neighborhoods with their great business idea on the front end so when they go for the permit there’s no surprise or month-long hearing process.”
Regarding the biggest issue facing Murray Hill, DeFoor and Mooneyhan felt that public safety was the No. 1 issue in Murray Hill, including “soft” crimes like speeding through neighborhood streets, recommending more police officers, cameras and neighborhood watch groups to deter crime.
Gettinger said residents told her the biggest issue was about investing in the residential neighborhoods to make them safely walkable. “Safety is a key piece but it’s not just safety from crime, it’s physical safety in the things you do every day,” she said. “I would love to see us put some money in to making this a walkable neighborhood.”
Peluso indicated that growth was a benefit as well as an issue. “One of the issues I see involving growth is that a lot of residents, who have been here for second, third and fourth generations, might be getting priced out We need to be mindful that the people who live here now might be a little worried that they might be next to have to leave,” he said.
Although not a Murray Hill resident, Elaine Burnett has been active in the community for many years and shared her thoughts about the forum.
“All the candidates were able to show a willingness to be engaged in the diverse community of District 14, and their desire to help good neighborhoods like Murray Hill thrive,” said Burnett, a Riverside resident. “The most impressive were the candidates who had a community engagement approach which stemmed from asking ‘What does the neighborhood need, what is the public vision?’”
By Kate A. Hallock
Resident Community News
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