The Pensacola City Council has a goal-setting session on Tuesday, June 30 at 9 a.m. Sam Hall and Larry Johnson have shared their five goals:
Larry Johnson
~ Green Community
Encouraging green buildings. Our city leading by example with all future buildings at least silver LEEDS certified
Improving recycling efforts by recycling glass
Protecting our natural resources and environment
Adding beautification to our city’s gateways. Beautifying our city. Planting more trees.
~ Increase Effort for Economic Development
Attracting the creative class to our community and keeping them here
JOBS – JOBS – JOBS
~ Making Port Profitable and mixed uses for our Port
~ Attracting Southwest Airlines to Pensacola
~ Adding More Mixed Residential Homes
Especially affordable housing.
Increasing our city’s population which should include annexation
Sam Hall
1. Have all of Pensacola’s public waterfront (sans Port of Pensacola) accessible to public by 2015.
2. Expand Pensacola’s population by 6,000 by 2013 through aggressive/creative annexation….close all “holes” in the city’s boundary in District’s One and Two.
3. Reduce City’s inventory of vacant property by more than 50%
4. Incentivize property owners to reduce hardscape…particularly with new construction.
5. Land at least one major employer in Pensacola proper by 2012.
Popularity: 27% [?]
The port is part of FTZ #249 which also includes the airport and the Century Industrial Park. The FTZ designation is on a warehouse by warehouse basis so there is a process that needs to be completed to include additional space as part of the zone, but it is relatively simple and straight forward.
the point is that other (non-industrial) uses for the unused port property (and there is plenty) should be considered. This has been tossed around for years now but there has been no action taken.
Now at Crazy Ed’s Home Electronics and Concrete Emporium, bulk blocks of cement loaded in your vehicle and ready to roll for an outstanding $99.99 a ton! Also ask out the longshoreman’s special at the Mixed Use Buffet and get a chance to win a new iPod! It’s Crazy Ed’s at corner of Retail Boulevard and Industrial Port Street!
yeah. I dunno. I can’t understand why there’s so much wrangling over this thing to begin with. It’s a port. It’s not some big, complicated thing. Ships come in with stuff on them, you take the stuff off. Sometimes you do the reverse. Those things that were taken off need to be put somewhere, so you put them somewhere. At some point, they’ll be taken somewhere else.
Repeat until profitable.
Can I be appointed port manager for like a week please? I’ll get this mess straightened out and then ya’ll can have it back.
Warehouse, ditribution, cruise lines, and assembly facilities makes sense to me for a port, but retail? Who would go shop at a port? I know some wanting to put resturants there, but that just seems counter productive to a working port.
did the port get its free trade zone designation?
The business that located here after seeing ads by the Chamber(and reported by Rick) found that the port did not complete the requirements to get that designation.
If so, that should help draw good business to the port.
The port is also a free trade zone and as such can be used as a warehouse/distribution/assembly facility for international trade.
I think it refers to industrial shipping mixed with commercial cruise lines and some retail areas, etc… The phrase gets used so much by so many people that it’s sort of taken on a life of its own. It’s basically whatever the person selling their idea wants it to be.
What is a mixed use port? Isn’t a port a port?
I like the idea of building green. To paraphrase a pretty smart guy, “a kilowatt saved is a kilowatt earned”. We can save a significant amount of money by improving energy efficiency in our public buildings.
I get it that annexation will increase the number of city residents, but isn’t that a little disingenuous? I believe that a good annexation strategy is a must for any city, but annexation, in my opinion, should spring out of growth, not be a tool used to artificially inflate the numbers. How about we work to create a job market that draws people to the city? You’d be surprised how many of the things on this list could be accomplished if we had more high-wage jobs.
Elections were held in November, but the goal setting session wasn’t until 6 MONTHS after they took office?
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So they’ve just been flying by the seat of their pants for the past six (almost 7) months?
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Here’s a thought. Go ahead and schedule the next goal setting session for February 2011. We know there is an election in 2010. Be proactive for a change.
Has anybody discussed or considered the possibility of converting one of the empty warehouse buildings downtown into an open air/farmers’ market, perhaps open two or three days a week? This might increase traffic in the dowtown area, and also encourage consumption of foods grown by local farmers. I have not been downtown on Wednesdays to see how the market presently being run in being received.