Monday on First Coast Connect we spoke with local civil rights activists Ben Frazier and Wells Todd about the NAACP Legal Defense Fund investigating how Jacksonville police hand out tickets for jaywalking (01:00).
We spoke with Jacksonville’s Director of Neighborhoods Stephanie Burch and Director of Blight Initiatives Denise Lee on the upcoming Neighborhood and Community Summit (30:26).
We heard about the upcoming A Night at Roy’s to raise funds for the Monique Burr Foundation with Program Director Stacy Pendarvis (38:18).
Cole Pepper talked about a busy week for the Jaguars and the latest regarding the Armada (46:00).
Walking While Black NAACP
The NAACP Legal Defense Fund is now investigating whether legal action is necessary when it comes to how Jacksonville police issue tickets to black pedestrians.
It’s an outgrowth of the Walking While Black investigation by ProPublica and the Florida Times-Union that found police hand out disproportionate numbers of pedestrian citations in the city, to African-Americans.
Sheriff Mike Williams of the JSO disputes some of the data in the report but has acknowledged the issue of implicit bias could be affecting the way tickets are written.
Neighborhood and Community Summit
The City of Jacksonville Neighborhood and Community Summit is coming up this Saturday at the Prime Osborn Center.
There will be workshops set up on everything from public safety in your neighborhood to mythbusters about affordable housing, and much more.
A Night at Roy’s
It’s your chance to meet celebrity chef Roy Yamaguchi, and support the work of a great organization - the Monique Burr Foundation.
A Night at Roy’s is coming up at Roy’s Restaurant in Jacksonville Beach.
One of Northeast Florida’s most widely attended charity events, last year’s event was an enormous success with more than 400 attendees and $55,000 raised to help keep children and teens safe through the MBF Child Safety Matters Prevention Education Series. These primary prevention programs address the most common types of victimization experienced by children and young adults, including bullying, abuse, digital dangers, and more.
Cole Pepper
It’s a busy week for the Jaguars ahead of next week’s NFL Draft. On Monday they’ll hold the retirement press conference of Paul Posluszny, Tuesday is the beginning of offseason conditioning, Thursday is the annual State of the Franchise which will include the latest on the Shipyards and Lot J developments and the release of the new uniforms and helmets.
The Armada is going through preseason training. Their first season in the National Premier Soccer League begins April 28.
Kevin Meerschaert can be reached at kmeerschaert@wjct.org, 904-358-6334 or on Twitter at @KMeerschaertJax.
