According to TECO Peoples Gas, a third-party excavator pierced a gas main in the area Friday morning.
Credit: KUSA Published: 10:26 PM EDT July 23, 2021 Updated: 10:31 PM EDT July 23, 2021
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. Crews with the Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department responded to a gas main break on Edgewood Avenue on Jacksonville s Westside Friday.
The gas main break happened near West Beaver Street and Edgewood Avenue North.
According to TECO Peoples Gas, a third-party excavator pierced a gas main in the area Friday morning.
Residents in the area had to evacuate their homes due to the incident. About nine residential buildings and 176 commercial structures were impacted.
03:50 PM EST Share The budget and $494.7 million in Capital Improvement Plan spending is backed by the gas tax and $171.8 million in federal American Rescue Plan funding.
Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry’s proposed $1.41 billion fiscal year 2021-22 general fund budget includes $494.7 million in capital spending bolstered by a jump in ad valorem and state tax revenue and federal coronavirus-related aid.
In a speech to City Council on July 20 at City Hall, Curry credited his 2015 city pension reform legislation, the recent 6-cent local option gas tax increase and federal American Rescue Plan funding for allowing the city to boost spending a year after the pandemic.
Pay raises highlighted in Jacksonville’s proposed $1.4B budget
Besides negotiated raises for union employees, the budget calls for $2,500 increases for city employees
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The Mayor s Budget
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Compensating city employees was among the items Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry highlighted Tuesday in his $1.4 billion budget proposal.
The mayor discussed pay raises for first responders and civilian employees while presenting his proposed budget during to the Jacksonville City Council and members of the city’s workforce who attended Tuesday morning’s meeting.
There are two sets of pay increases programmed into Curry’s spending plan: contractual raises negotiated as part of the city’s contracts with its unionized workforces and a separate set of installments paid for by federal pandemic funds.
$50 million for parks, pools and libraries (another $50 million planned for next year)
$54 million for drainage and resiliency issues
$50 Million to phase out septic tanks
Septic tanks are in disrepair and have become a major environmental concern. I think there needs to be more funding per year put toward that to try and get that done and finished, said Reginald Blount.
Blount, former City Council candidate and now head of Jacksonville s Black Chamber of Commerce, believes the budget is a step in the right direction, but needs improvement. For example parks and recreation, I am surprised they would put that much there because there are so many other critical needs, said Blount.