"Imagine It. Build It. Reach It." says the cover of Jacksonville Community Council Inc. (JCCI) JAX2025 Vision Report, which was unveiled this weekend in front of a large crowd at EverBank Field. The report focuses on 10 areas and targets for the city to reach by the year 2025.
It comes after several months of community visioning events where area residents gave their thoughts about what Jacksonville's priorities should be, and where they would like to see the city in 12 years time. Some of the main areas of focus include education, the economy, a vibrant downtown and improved neighborhoods.
"My favorite part about this has been the number of people who came together to say, 'I want to have a voice in the future of Jacksonville, and then I want to lend a hand to make it happen'," JCCI president and CEO Ben Warner told WJCT's First Coast Connect this morning. "And I think that's what we saw this Saturday, is people rolling up their sleeves and saying, 'We imagined it, now it's time to build it'.
"They came together throughout the first part of this year to not only tell us what the priorities were, but the vision statements [in the report] were crafted by the people of this community. And the measures of success, they crafted those for us, and they said, 'Here's what we want to do.' And the strategies for making it happen were also crafted by the people who came together to make it happen. Our job was just to facilitate, and make sure that we had plenty of hot coffee in the morning for the people who came together. The people of this community really wrote this report."
JCCI is now moving into the "Build It" phase of JAX2025 with an implementation orientation on Wednesday, June 26th, at the WJCT studios.
You can learn more about the report, as well as volunteer opportunities, at the JAX2025 site.