Council members gather ahead of planned special meeting on attempted JEA sale

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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – City Council members Brenda Priestly Jackson and Randy Defoor attended a meeting Tuesday afternoon to discuss the change, work and legislative recommendations results from the Special Investigatory Committee on JEA matters.

The gathering comes ahead of a special meeting called for Wednesday of the Jacksonville City Council’s JEA Investigative Committee. Council President Terrance Freeman said a week ago he’d be reopening the committee on the attempted sale of JEA after emails and text messages that contradict statements by sitting Councilwoman LeAnna Cumber recently surfaced.

Cumber is a Republican currently running to become Jacksonville’s next mayor. She and one of her opponents, Republican Daniel Davis, have been firing shots at each other in campaign ads, pointing fingers at their role in the saga surrounding the attempted sale of the utility.

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The committee will meet Wednesday to determine if Cumber withheld information about her role and her husband’s role in that attempted sale.

Some members on Council who support Davis want to see this investigation, while others claim Council is just getting caught in the middle of a political game.

Jackson and DeFoor called the meeting to basically explain that, suggesting the meeting Wednesday is taking the wrong approach. They headed up the original Special Investigatory Committee, which concluded more than two years ago.

In a nutshell, they don’t believe Council members should be investigating other Council members. They’re also concerned that the two members who made a complaint, Rory Diamond and Nick Howland, are leading the committee.

Council member Joyce Morgan, a Democrat, attended the Tuesday afternoon meeting.

“The most difficult part of this for me was that after allegations were lodged against one of our colleagues, the two people that lodged the allegations, that did not seem like that was the proper thing to do, and it did not seem that that would produce a fair and impartial outcome,” Morgan said.

Councilman Aaron Bowman sent a statement to Bowman that News4JAX obtained Tuesday night. It reads:

President Freeman, given the recent allegations by my fellow colleague that I have been hiding information regarding the ITN process and potential sale of JEA, I am submitting my disclosure as attached. I believe that her attempt to deflect guilt to me is an extremely distasteful and sad state of affairs.
As previously stated, I have nothing to declare. I thought it was extremely poor judgement by the initial Special Investigative Committee that Council should ever engage in selecting items that other Council members or their families should be subjected to answer. That is why I never responded. Council is not trained or equipped to be an investigative body and everything is subject to sunshine open communication which can severely hamper an investigation. Would a football team call in their plays over the loudspeaker? Investigations are best suited to be conducted by professionals (IG, SAO, Ethics, etc.) who have the tools and resources to talk to people discretely and with authority. Allowing a group of Council members to decide what they can ask their colleagues is a recipe for targeting and I hope never again happens in our history of Jacksonville.
I am submitting this now because I believe it will enable the mission of the reformation of the SIC to not be distracted and bring their investigation to quick closure.

Aaron Bowman

The committee meeting Wednesday is scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. News4JAX plans to be there. Cumber has said she will not attend.