by Jeremy Morrison
With only three months left before leaving office, Pensacola Mayor Grover Robinson is mapping out his route to the exit door. As he explained Monday during his weekly press conference, much of the remaining time will be devoted to wrapping up ongoing efforts.
“We’re not necessarily looking at taking on new projects; we’re looking at [projects we’ve been working on for some time that we want to bring forward, and we want to bring in to a landing that we spend a lot of time and energy on,” Mayor Robinson said.
Some of Robinson’s remaining time in office will also be spent “on-boarding” mayor-elect D.C. Reeves, who was elected from a four-candidate field in August. Reeves, the mayor said, will be getting acquainted with the particulars of city operations in the months before he takes office and will also be sitting in on some events, such as the next mayoral press conference.
‘We certainly will be working with him as we move forward to ensure that there’s as good of transition, as smooth of a transition as possible for the city and the citizens,” Robinson said.
Mayor Robinson also spoke about how he was pleased that Reeves had won the mayor’s race because he saw the victory as a validation of his tenure, as Reeves embraced some of the mayor’s efforts: “I couldn’t be, in a sense, more pleased ….”
“You know, there were certainly two candidates that I thought were focused on what we had done in a very positive, collaborative way, and there were two candidates that were focused in a more anti-position-that-we’d-taken, and I think it was nice to see that those that focused on more of the same lines as what we’d been doing as an administration were the ones who were successful,” Robinson said.
Mayor Robinson said that he thinks it’s essential for Reeves to go ahead and get integrated into city operations so that the transition between administrations will be as smooth as possible.
“To allow him to get integrated and see what’s going on will be important for him,” the mayor said. “It will be important to our team as well; they’ll have a chance to learn a little bit more about him and what he’s looking for.”
Unfinished Business
In these remaining months that Mayor Robinson has in office, there’s a collection of efforts that he plans to focus on. These efforts include completing this year’s budget process, finalizing projects on parcels four and five at Maritime Park, and attempting to land some oil-spill restoration funds from Triumph Gulf Coast to expand capabilities at the Port of Pensacola.
“These have been things we’ve been working on for a long time, and it’d be good to try to get those finished before we leave,” Robinson said.
Insofar as the city’s Triumph request goes, the mayor said the city hopes to fund additional warehouse spaces at the port. This port expansion, he explained, would be done to broaden the type of activities based at the port; specifically, the additional space could be used by marine research outfits or, more particularly, U.S. Sailing, which is considering basing its operations at the port as the national sailing team prepares for the American Cup race.
“We think one of those buildings will be very integral to what U.S. Sailing and the yacht club are wanting to and what we’ve talked about as a long-term vision of what we see them being potentially in our community,” Robinson said, adding that the move would prove beneficial in developing the area into a sailing-research mecca. “Anytime you put yourself in that kind of place, you’re going to create economic opportunities for people in your community.”
He continued, “But you’re always going to be at the cutting edge because you’re doing research, and I think that will be exciting. Whether it’s something like that for U.S. Sailing for the New York Yacht Club or it’s something else that looks at just things going on in the ocean, I think there’s so much research opportunity there. Our port has a unique opportunity, and those assets are very unique; they can be inside the fence line or outside the fence line. It really gives the user some flexibility to think about how they want to use those spaces.”
Defending Staff Increases
While Robinson seems to be embracing mayor-elect Reeves, the incoming mayor isn’t wild about all of his predecessor’s moves. In particular, Reeves has questioned the number of new positions being added at the city.
Mayor Robinson took a moment Monday to defend the added positions, saying that the jobs — in areas such as Parks in Rec — are necessary as the city has grown in population. He said that improving the city’s amenity offerings was internal in continuing to grow the city’s population.
“These are all reasons that people live in the city, and they’re willing to pay more because we provide those services,” the mayor said.
Robinson said he felt Reeves might reassess once he becomes more familiar with the inner workings of municipal government.
“It’s easy to say from the outside, you look at something and say, ‘well, this is important, that’s not as important’ — well, ok, how are you going to do the things you want to do and make a difference in what’s there?” the mayor said. “It’ll be good for him to come in here and see.”