The next five years are shaping up to be critical for downtown Jacksonville, and the Downtown Investment Authority's new strategic plan will play a huge role.
The DIA board will meet Wednesday afternoon to discuss adoption of an updated Business Investment and Development and Community Redevelopment Area plan.
One of the big changes being discussed: rolling out a new plan to incentivize downtown growth, which includes revamping some existing programs and introducing new ones.
Ahead of that meeting, the Business Journal caught up with DIA CEO Lori Boyer to hear what makes the new five-year plan different than the last, and which of the new incentive programs may have the biggest impact.
What are the biggest differences between the new five-year plan and the previous one?
The biggest differences in the plan reflect the growth and maturing market in downtown. This is reflected in the new discrete goals on retail and the St. Johns River, the revisions to existing incentives and the addition of new incentives as well as the enumerated redevelopment projects. There is also an effort to streamline processing times by providing clear criteria for each program.
In the current plan, our focus was to bring residential units and population to downtown. It still is the focus, but now the incentive is more selective about street-front activation, resiliency, etc. Retail and restaurants are increasingly important as we build our residential population, hence the increased emphasis on those uses that are becoming viable.
Which of the incentives mentioned in the plan are new?
The new incentives are small-scale residential, affordable housing loans (which we have made on a case-by-case basis without an explicit program), retail enhancement in non-core areas, waterfront restaurants, the Commercial Revitalization Program is completely revamped, and the boutique hotel, parking screening, and mobility credits are completely new.
If you had to pick one incentive that you think may have the biggest impact on the next five years downtown, which would it be?
It is a toss-up between the waterfront restaurant incentive and the changes in multifamily REV that require retail or restaurants on the waterfronts.
What's one thing from your perspective that businesses need to know about the new five-year plan?
The primary focus is residential growth supported by retail, and the many "off the shelf" incentive programs are designed to streamline processing time, make it easy to understand whether your project qualifies and to reduce the documentation we require from applicants.
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