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Jacksonville reaches settlement over money-losing parking garages

Metropolitan Parking Solutions built a parking garage for the Duval County Courthouse in a 2004 deal with the city of Jacksonville. The Downtown Investment Authority is posed to take over control of the garage.
Will Dickey
/
Florida Times-Union
Metropolitan Parking Solutions built a parking garage for the Duval County Courthouse in a 2004 deal with the city of Jacksonville. The Downtown Investment Authority is posed to take over control of the garage.

Three downtown parking garages that have been money pits for Jacksonville taxpayers will be taken over by the city's Downtown Investment Authority in a complex legal settlement with their owner.

The city and Metropolitan Parking Solutions tentatively reached the new arrangement during court-ordered mediation after each accused the other of defaulting on terms of a 2004 deal.

The city and MPS originally touted the venture as a win-win brand of public-private partnership, but it turned into a cautionary tale about relying on overly optimistic financial assumptions that came back to bite the city.

Read the rest of this story at WJCT News partner The Florida Times-Union.