Jacksonville, Duval County | featured news

A proposed distribution center for Jacksonville’s Cecil Commerce Center would be the latest in a string of recent successes for the city as it develops land at the former naval air station.
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BEALE AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. | A pilot who died after ejecting from a U-2 spy plane that crashed in Northern California was identified as Lake City native Lt. Col. Ira S. Eadie.
He spent time flying in Jacksonville during his stint in the Navy. He was stationed at Jacksonville Naval Air Station for about eight months in 1999, according to his service records.
Eadie graduated from Columbia County High School in 1989 and joined the Navy in 1996 before transferring to the Air Force in 2010, according to the Lake City Reporter.

Crowdfunding has become one of the go-to choices of funding for startup entrepreneurs who need some financial help getting their businesses off the ground. But that approach has become rife with potential conflicts about who has control and what investors are owed if a business succeeds.
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Jacksonville’s Main Street Bridge will be shut down this weekend for repairs, according to the Florida Department of Transportation.
The closure was originally planned for last weekend, but the threat of rain caused the contractor to postpone the work.
The shutdown, weather permitting, will start at 6:30 p.m. Friday and end at 6 a.m. Sunday, as improvements are made to the span’s mechanical, electrical and structural systems. Contractors will sandblast and paint structural portions of the bridge and install electrical system components.

Testimony Thursday on Capitol Hill about the problems at Eureka Garden and other subsidized housing complexes highlighted not only deplorable living conditions allowed by the owner but also poor oversight from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
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The University Club in Jacksonville is hosting a fundraiser Saturday to benefit a local nonprofit organization that assists veterans and their families as well as a nonprofit that focuses on ALS research.
The 10th annual ClubCorp Charity Classic kicks off at 5:30 p.m. at the club on the Southbank of the St. Johns River in the 27th floor of Riverplace Tower, 1301 Riverplace Blvd.
All proceeds from the event will benefit the National Association for Veterans and Families, Augie’s Quest and ClubCorp’s Employee Partners Care Foundation.

A new effort to bring awareness of the challenges facing at-risk girls in Northeast Florida will soon appear on local television, print and social media platforms.
The Delores Barr Weaver Policy Center unveiled its new See the Girl campaign at a Thursday luncheon attended by more than 300 people at the Jesse Ball DuPont Center. Guests, including State Attorney-elect Melissa Nelson and City Council President Lori Boyer, heard directly from the girls and women who receive services from the center and are featured in the new campaign.

The Florida Department of Health in Duval County and The Justice League of Fitness celebrate World Heart Day by hosting the Family, Fun and Fitness 5K Walk/Run at 8:30 a.m. Saturday at the Emmett Reed Community Center at 1093 W. 6th St.
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Anyone hoping to speak at the Duval School Board’s Special meeting Friday morning will have to get there early. District officials said members of the public must show up early and fill out blue “comment cards” in order to be allowed to speak. Then, after the meeting starts at 10:30 a.m., only those who have turned in the cards will be allow up to three minutes each to address the Board. Anyone arriving after 10:30 will not be allowed to speak.
The meeting will be in the first-floor auditorium at district headquarters, 1701 Prudential Drive.

Libertarian vice presidential candidate Bill Weld said, being more fiscally conservative than Democrats and more socially inclusive than Republicans, “we don’t feel guilty about offering the alternative.”
Weld, the former Massachusetts governor on the ticket with presidential candidate Gary Johnson, spoke to The Times-Union editorial board on Thursday afternoon and was scheduled to speak in the evening at a town hall hosted by Jacksonville University’s Public Policy Institute.