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Jacksonville News

New Jax Witty

Articles, reviews, advice, and legitimate research to go along with some back-handed comments. Think of us as Jacksonville's mother-in-law.
  • Church of God the Mother at UNF
    UNF sent out an email regarding at least one of the churches that shows up on campus to talk to students. I don't attend UNF, so I don't actually know much about the situation. But I went to college, and there were sometimes churches represented near the Union, and there were sometimes heated debates. I never got involved myself, and I was only approached one time, so I'm not taking a stand on Christians on Campus or Socialists or Republicans or White Nationalists. So I'm cool with anyone except Nihilists or The Eagles showing up on campus to discuss whatever with Millennials. I'm just wondering about the name "Church of God the Mother."





    It looks like the Church of God the Mother is somehow related to the World Mission Society Church of God. This is a church out of South Korea that believes the following (Wikipedia):

    The church believes in God the Father and God the Mother,[8] claiming to be restoring the truth and practices of the early Church.[2] The church also believes that co-founder Zang Gil-ja is God the Mother, as taught by the founder Ahn Sahng-hong[9].
    The World Mission Society Church of God believes that all of its teachings are based on the Bible, as explained in the numerous books written by Ahn Sahng-hong.
     The lady in the photo is apparently God the Mother. I don't think she's supposed to be a Korean version of Mary, the Mother of God. She's just the co-founder of the church, but I'm not really sure if she's supposed to be part of the Holy Trinity or what. I looked her up, and it looks like she is considered to be God the Mother because she has fulfilled the prophecies of the Bible. Seems legit. And it makes me wonder more about the Kia Soul.

    From my extensive research, it looks like this church was hanging out at Vanderbilt, also trying to lure young women into their ranks. Some people have accused the church of trafficking women, and I saw a Charlie's Angels episode that was kind of like this, but I don't know if that's true.

    The problem with the local news is that it mixed the current church situation with video it obtained of some dude going nuts about homosexuals on campus. That's just traditional campus soapbox rhetoric. People targeting young women and trying to get them to join a church that might go all Moonie on them is kind of a different scenario. Sure, some people would say all churches are cults, but this one really does operate like something out of a Charlie's Angels episode,, at least based on some of the articles I've seen online. But you can't believe everything you read online. Except this blog, of course.

    So if you are a vulnerable young woman on a college campus (or in a Walmart parking lot--another place the church recruits), just do some research before you start praying to God the Mother. Or that God the Father dude, even if he "friends" you. Also, if you have a story about this church you'd like to share, I'd like to add it to this website, so go ahead and send me a message.


  • Arlington Renewal: Reality Check
    I'm all for reviving and renewing Arlington, as long as it's not going to wake up all cranky on us. I have enough experience in urban planning (as a college student and connoisseur) to be able to predict a few major concerns with renewing Arlington, whether or not some hot-shot Miami developer says it's going to happen. And I don't have millions of dollars or years of experience in the neighborhood. Just sense.





    The Good News
    Arlington is close to perfect as a location, transportation-wise, as is the eyesore of a hotel that's potentially being redeveloped. Where I live in East Arlington is pretty great, too. It's all manageable to downtown and a straight shot to the beach. It doesn't freeze as often on this side of town, which is a bonus, but we're still in-town, pretty much.

    The Rest of the News isn't Good
    Sticking something fancy somewhere it doesn't fit is not a good idea. Changing the purpose of one building or one mall won't do it. Forcing businesses to change signage isn't the answer. I think the technical urban planning term is putting lipstick on a pig, even though the landscape architects and planners who want to cash paychecks will keep telling you it's using design to change people and place.

    Options
    Here are some examples from my past that can speak to what Arlington is considering now:

    Capitol Court
    Case in point, when I was an urban planning student at UW-Milwaukee, one of the big projects in town was the rehabilitation of Capitol Court. It was one of the original shopping malls, back when that area of town was vibrant and expanding in the 60s. Sounds familiar, maybe. Anyhow, I grew up going to the mall. I saw ET at the theater there. Then the neighborhood turned pretty bad. People were afraid to go to the mall. It was mostly empty by the mid-90s. Then it became a planning project. Human-scale was big. Landscaping. Open areas. Seating. A Wal-Mart. Mixed use. These planners and architects actually stood in front of my class saying that their designs would be able to change how the people felt about the space, leading those people to appreciate it and behave less like felons while shopping. It probably sounded great to my classmates, but I grew up near Capitol Court, so I knew better.

    It took a little more time, and it probably looked nicer in its demise, but the Midtown Center could not really rise from the ashes of Capitol Court. Lowes, Walmart, Sears, Penneys, etc. Every anchor closed, and just a lot of open and empty space. The jobs, if that was part of the plan, are gone. Facades, archways, parking lot paths, green spaces, and trees, all make it look too good to be true, which is totally accurate. The problem with Capitol Court wasn't the design: it's like the Town Center, but on a smaller scale. The problem was the neighbors. The people who lived there weren't going to go from low-income and high-crime residents to suburban soccer moms just because the local shopping center planted some trees and slapped a new name on the building.

    Marquette
    Marquette University, facing a similar problem to Capitol Court, took a different approach. An approach that was ridiculed by some members of my mentors at UW-Milwaukee, even as it was admittedly somewhat effective. The school needed to keep enrollment up, but real or perceived crime in the surrounding neighborhoods kept students away. What could the college possibly do? Buy the surrounding neighborhoods, that's what. Marquette made no attempt to fix poverty with economic redevelopment, and it wasn't looking to use urban design to change attitudes of poverty-stricken people. No, it just bought up block upon block of buildings and kicked those folks out so that Heather and Ashley could have an apartment in a safer neighborhood next to the school.

    Brewers Hill
    Another way an area in Milwaukee turned itself around to the exclusion of the residents was in Brewers Hill. Basically, young professionals working downtown realized that they could get sweet deals on awesome old houses and fix them up, in a neighborhood just next to downtown that wasn't known for being totally safe. Enough of these people bought the houses that the area started changing, and people who'd lived there for decades weren't even able to afford the newly-assessed property taxes. It's like the reverse of what was often called White Flight or blockbusting in the North. New paint, landscaping, and a Prius in every garage. And a short commute to downtown.

    Arlington
    So what do these cautionary tales tell us about Arlington? First off, it's too big of an area to just buy up the whole thing, so it makes sense to focus on parts, which is what the local government has done. However, from what I've read, it seems that the plan is to force the businesses to make the changes that will trickle down to the surrounding neighborhoods. The problem is that it's all about the people who live and show up at those businesses. If there are payday stores, pawn shops, dollar stores, and internet cafes in an area, I personally am not going to get out and shop. But it doesn't make sense to have a Rolex store next to Section 8 apartments and dilapidated townhouses.

    Renewing Arlington starts with the residents. If we decide as a community that we live in an area that's worth renewing, then we need to treat our own homes and neighbors with respect. And we need to expect it out of our neighbors, which means taking action if there's an apartment complex that contributes to the real or perceived run-down feel. Sometimes, renewal is in the form of low or no-interest loans to resident homeowners for general maintenance, but it might also involve running out the slumlords. It might be about community policing, too. In many respects, however, it comes down to pride. It's easier to just use up your house and then build a new one down in St. Johns County, but that's a lot harder to do if you know and like your neighbors, and appreciate the convenient location.

    My own neighborhood in Milwaukee was terribly overpriced. That's because people wanted to live there, even if they could get a larger house on the northwest side of town, and even if the houses on the near north side had a lot more character. People took pride in their homes, and the neighborhood was safe, so location is what sold the homes. Easy access to the freeway and downtown were added value. Where I lived in Milwaukee has a lot of similarities to Arlington, except that area was never allowed to fall apart. Still, not all hope is lost if the smallish, oldish Arlington homes are seen as being in the best location near downtown and the beaches. 

    New business development does play a role in fixing Arlington, as does the maintaining of current business. However, putting a few bushes outside the adult entertainment club or store, while ironic, isn't going to fix the problem of having businesses that cater to the people who live here. You're not going to see any pawn shops in Ponte Vedra because they'd go out of business or be run out of town. And that's not because rich people never need to pawn stuff to pay for their mansions; it's because their mansions aren't worth as much if there's a pawn shop down the road.

    Planning Points

    Jobs
    My old neighborhood in Lenexa was just outside of Kansas City, not even as close as Arlington is to Jacksonville. It saw the opportunity along the 435 and 35 for being a great place for national headquarters and distribution centers. That worked well for the town, and it's frankly more sightly than used tire and rent-a-rim shops. Doing that, however, is all about infrastructure, making sure trucks can get in and out easily. By contrast, the 295 corridor in Arlington seems to have been established as new single-family homes, along with typical urban-sprawl big-box retailers nearby. Sure, that works as long as everyone who lives there works downtown, but Arlington should also push for more than retail chains alongside vast subdivisions.

    We get excited about the new Wawa or Starbucks, but I'd get a lot more excited about a legitimate business park. Honestly, many businesses can operate outside of the main downtown areas, and once St. Johns County realizes this, we'll see more and more CEOs pushing for their commutes to be shorter. All of Jacksonville's inner-ring suburbs should be trying to establish working-wage jobs in the area before those jobs leave the county altogether. Where was Arlington's proposal for the new JEA headquarters? Does Arlington even propose anything on its own, or is it all just part of some trickle-down development system that favors downtown and sprawl rather than redevelopment?

    Crime
    I looked at a crime map of Arlington, and one trend was clear: one of the most concentrated area of assaults and robberies stems from right around University and Merrill. Even though JU is right down the road from us, I have not even considered it for my kids, and that's why. If that's not a simple concept for the highly-educated staff at JU, then I feel bad for them. UNF, almost no crime, so that's the direction I'll be leaning when my kids ask me which local college is best. JU certainly has a stake in cleaning its neighborhood up, just like Marquette did in Milwaukee.

    Another trend that is impossible to miss is that crime is centered around apartment complexes that, when you view them on Google Streetview, look like apartment complexes where crime would take place. I know, it's sad that people maybe moved to Arlington to escape crime in another part of town, but if the crime kind of follows those people, then it's our problem now. If I was an alderman for part or all of Arlington, I'd look at the crime near these apartments, but I'd also look to see where the victims and perpetrators live. Forcing the rental company to fix some leaks won't make the crime go away, and neither will extra police presence near the crimes (we've been mapping crime for decades, so there's already more presence there). What makes it go away is lack of access, meaning the places where the victims and criminals live no longer exist in Arlington. Someone out there is crying that these people need to live somewhere, but Arlington would be better off raising a sales tax to help build these new apartments in some other part of Jacksonville. Or even a property tax surcharge. I'm serious, if people who live here knew all the stats, many of them would jump on board. Even if some of the crime is committed by someone who crosses a bridge to get to Arlington, it's generally to visit someone who lives here before going on the crime spree.

    Home Ownership
    Arlington suffers from a rental problem, and not just in the apartments. I understand that the military personnel are going to rent, and they're good tenants, from what I understand. I know some renters in my neighborhood who do a good job taking care of their places. However, nothing makes someone care about property values more than actual home ownership. Some kind of Own Arlington initiative could play a large role in turning the community around. Again, it might take low-interest loans or a unique rent-to-own arrangement, but if we can get a larger percentage of our residents to own their properties, then they will care more about the signs at the local mini-mall and the crime near the local apartment complex.

    Infrastructure
    The Arlington Expressway seems to be a 70s solution to road widening, and I have to wonder if it's considered best practices in planning today (or ever really was). The insane on and off-ramps, one way and sometimes two-way frontage roads, and obvious disrepair along it all mean that a redevelopment of an old hotel into an apartment complex will result in another money pit waiting to happen. Someone, somewhere must have come up with a better way to handle this stretch of road by now.

    Since the 295 is up for road work and toll-installation, it's a good time to consider elements that can help in creating the proper infrastructure for Arlington's future. For example, there's a lot of underutilized commercial land along St. Johns Bluff near the airport that has easy access to the 295 and the small airport. More forest along Monument, as well. These areas need to be looked at as real business opportunities rather than more retail malls or apartment complexes. Places that might pay wages that will allow people to purchase homes in the area.

    Arlington First
    Do you think the folks over in Avondale consider Arlington when they want something done in their area? Does downtown worry about us? St. Johns? Of course not. People in Avondale live in wonderfully overpriced homes because they've maintained a nice neighborhood near downtown. In fact, most of us in Arlington are just as close to downtown (time-wise). But those folks need to spend twice as long on the road to get to the beaches. The people down in St. Johns need nice, wide expressways to get to downtown in a hurry, but that should not concern us in Arlington. In fact, if we could ensure our roads stay fast and safe, people might decide that 45 minutes from Nocatee to downtown is too much executive time in the German touring sedan, opting to return to Arlington. This has happened in the Milwaukee area with a suburb named Wauwatosa. It's become fashionable to move back to Tosa from the outer-ring suburbs because people realized they could have a small-town feel in a house with character, decent schools, and a real downtown within five miles of the lakefront and downtown Milwaukee. Wauwatosa didn't worry about how Milwaukee or West Allis or Brookfield or Wales felt about drawing young professionals to its thriving downtown.

    Arlington was once the place to go. You could move out of the older Jacksonville homes elsewhere, closer to the beaches, with open spaces all around, and a nifty new mall. Now it's mostly developed and partially decaying, but it's not hopeless by any means. Arlington is just a hard sell to get someone to buy a 1,500 square foot cinder block home in the heart of an area where crime stats are peppered with batteries and property crime. People see Clay and St. Johns with less crime and higher property value. Plus, those areas don't have a dead mall and sketchy retail stores. Mainly, Arlington hasn't made a play to stay relevant as a place people want to embrace as a long-term home. There isn't a discernible downtown or riverwalk, and there aren't people riding their bikes on miles of off-street trails. No farmers market or free concerts. Still, we have a good base of quality housing in a great location, so it can still happen. When it does, we will have the advantage over the new sprawl going in too far from the city. The investment has to come from the people who want to live here, however, and that does not seem to be a trendy way of planning development in Northeast Florida.  


  • Grammar Police Issue Warrant for Pablo Creek Library
    I don't expect a whole lot out of the general public when it comes to grammar. I kind of think that the English language is generally a stupid language. We could do so much better, but we're not going to change to Esperanto in the near future, so we just have to deal with it. Like I said, I can understand when someone at the local gas station calls it the Ladie's Room or Lady's Room or Mens' Room. I can look past it when someone in marketing says, "A winner must claim there prize immediately." Errors, all of them, but those are just normal, everyday people. I'm an English teacher, so I see all the mistakes; I just don't tend to give them much thought. However, when I see some questionable grammar at the local public library, that's when it's time to put on the old badge.


    Technically, I'm not even the best with identifying the rules for all of the grammatical mistakes I encounter. I just know they're wrong, and the heading for the Pablo Creek Library Valentine's Day display is wrong in so many ways. Let's count.

    BOOKS ARE LIKE A BOX OF CHOCOLATES YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT YOUR'E GOING TO GET 



    1. IT'S IN ALL CAPS.
    Not a big deal, really, but it feels a little harsh for a holiday about love.

    2. It's comparing more than one book (books) to one box of chocolates.
    I might go with, "A book is like a box of chocolates," or "Books are like boxes of chocolates." Or maybe even say that a library full of books is like a box of chocolates. Also, the point of the display is that the books are about love, and those books also have descriptions on the back cover. Also, most boxes of chocolates tell you what you'll be eating, so you only don't know what you're going to get if you don't real the label.

    3. It lacks punctuation.
    I'd go with a colon or a dash after "chocolates." A colon tells the reader, "and that is." Without punctuation (and foreknowledge of the Forrest Gump quote), the sentence reads as, "Books are like a box of chocolates you never know." That's a perfectly legitimate sentence, and it makes sense if you don't read the books on the rack. Some people would be tempted to use a semi-colon, but that would be wrong, as would a comma (it creates a comma splice). I guess you could use parentheses around the definition. Oh, there should also be a period at the end, I suppose.
    BOOKS ARE LIKE A BOX OF CHOCOLATES: YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT YOUR'E GOING TO GET.

    4. It's a misquote. Maybe the most misquoted misquote of our time. Besides "Play it again, Sam."
    Since the sentence is from a movie, and most of us know that, I'd probably go with the more colloquial "gonna" instead of "going to." Technically, Forrest also says that his momma always said life was like a box of chocolates, but this part of the expression has been misquoted for years, since we want to change it to the present tense. I suppose that's because we think it's a valuable lesson somehow (which it isn't).

    5. There's a misplaced apostrophe.
    It's "you're," as in you are. Not "your'e," as in your he? Which isn't even correct, either, and it's not a contraction we use. Or it ain't one.  It's just wrong.

    6. The context is odd.
    This one's debatable, but Forrest does say the following: "I'm not a smart man, but I know what love is." The problem is that love, to Forrest, is basically unrequited and fairly unhealthy by our standards. He's more like a loyal puppy dog than a hero of a typical love story. And based on his own childhood, I wonder how he could know what love is. But the actual quote of life being like a box of chocolates is a lot like saying we have nothing to fear but fear itself. Kind of dumb and naive, like our English language.


  • Gunshots, Babies Crying, and Screaming - Jacksonville
    It's my first mayoral race here in Jacksonville, but I assume it will be a fun one. Two candidates who don't like one another. Anna Brosche's attack ad seems to be a metaphor for her distaste for Lenny Curry, but a lot of people also called the ad itself distasteful. If it was for a local ice cream shop, I'd totally agree, but when we're talking politics, then you can use the gunshots, crying babies, and screaming without crossing the line. Fear is the top emotion for local news, home security sales, and political ads.


    Imagine a news teaser like this: "Next at 11, a local teen is accused of meeting people online in order to help clean up the lawn for the elderly couple next door." Or, "Police officers pulled a man over and issued him a warning for speeding." We might say that's the kind of news we want, but we also wouldn't watch the news if there wasn't video footage of cars running into parked buildings or disturbing police body camera footage just before someone was gunned down. Or gangs. Fear and anger are always top stories, with maybe a few :15 community interest stories thrown in. And we eat it up.

    When we moved in, a home security guy showed up and asked whether I preferred to save a few dollars a month or put my family in danger. That was our welcome wagon to Jacksonville, besides some coupons the home improvement stores sent through the post office. He seemed surprised when I said I'd prefer to put my family in danger because I live life on the edge. Sure, he was expecting me to say I'd think about it, that I absolutely must sign an immediate contract for free installation, or that we just didn't have the money right now. A lot of the Youtube channels for security systems have feel-good ads, but the ones they run on TV tend to be more like the ones in the embedded video, stoking fear.



    So Anna Brosche used fear when attacking Lenny Curry. I looked back at Lenny's ads from the last election (that were available on Youtube), and it seems as if he didn't use attack ads. I really have no way of knowing if that's accurate, since I didn't live here. Maybe people were moved by the whole "keeping our streets safe" positive message.
    Anna wants to attack the platform for Curry's #1 Priority in the last election. Based on statistics, the "streets" aren't safer. Actually, it could be an excellent scientific study here, as our city has hired more police officers AND had a booming economy WITHOUT the streets getting safer. Those are always the arguments--from the right: we need more cops; from the left: we need more jobs. So what gives? I am sure it's frustrating for Curry. The formula is supposed to work.

    Of course, scare tactics or not, Brosche probably does not have a better formula than more police officers and more jobs. I know she opposed the sale of JEA, the money from UAE, and Confederate monuments, but I just can't find a plan for fixing the crime issue. In fact, if I was running, I don't know if I'd challenge someone on crime who has tried so hard to fix it. There's a chance she might win, and then she'll have the same #1 Priority.

    If I was Anna, I'd focus on the seemingly shady JEA deal. And being the first female mayor at a time when women are winning elections. Really, anything other than crime, since that's not something that just stops when you take office.

    An interesting side note is that one of our past mayors was named J.E.T. before jets were invented. And another mayor "transitioned" while in office (he began as a Democrat and left as a Republican). Oh, and racism: for a few years, the city charter was changed so that Jacksonville's own citizens couldn't elect the mayor because they'd elected a Republican. Instead, the city council (members appointed by the governor) elected the mayor. Could you imagine not having a direct say in your mayor, let alone your city council? But we do have a say, which is why Anna Brosche wants to scare up some support.


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