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JAX Chamber’s ‘Longest Table’ Seeks To Bring Community Together

JAX Chamber

As shootings continue to rock the Jacksonville community, the JAX Chamber hopes breaking bread helps the community come together.

Thursday night’s Longest Table is set to be Jacksonville’s largest community banquet in the heart of downtown.

Roughly 500 people from all around Jacksonville will sit together at a dinner stretching down Independent Drive near the Jacksonville Landing.

JAX Chamber Chair Audrey Moran said the way tickets were doled out ensured people from all of the city’s neighborhoods are represented.

“The Chamber wanted to be very intentional about making sure we got a cross-section of people from our 800-square-mile city. The only way to do that is to divvy up the tickets by ZIP code,” she said.

Moran said Jacksonville politicians — including Mayor Lenny Curry, City Council members and Sheriff Mike Williams — will be there too, visiting every section of the table.

Tickets for a seat and a plate are sold out, but Moran said members of the public are still welcome to mingle with attendees, starting at 5:30.

Reporter Ryan Benk can be reached at rbenk@wjct.org, at (904) 358 6319 or on Twitter @RyanMichaelBenk.

Ryan Benk is a former WJCT News reporter who joined the station in 2015 after working as a news researcher and reporter for NPR affiliate WFSU in Tallahassee.