Rick Mullaney

1. In recent years, the mayor and City Council have used a mix of revenue
increases and cuts in expenses to balance the city budget. Do you agree?
If not, what would you do differently?

I will approach our budget changes differently. I will look not just at the $995
million general fund, but will address the entire $1.7 billion operating budget
(which includes the general fund and all other funds (enterprise funds, special
revenue funds, etc). Second, I have a plan to cut spending and get our city’s
financial house in order by undertaking the most comprehensive restructuring of
city finances in the history of our consolidated government. My plan includes, but
is not limited to: pension reform, public employee salaries, healthcare costs,
purchasing, procurement, contract awards, administration and oversight of city
contracts, technology, privatization, consolidation and other areas. Third and
finally, I will not raise taxes. With double-digit unemployment, the worst recession
in a generation, and small businesses and families struggling to make ends
meet, raising taxes is the wrong thing to do. It is also bad public policy, because
tax increases become a substitute for financial reform, efficiency, and
productivity. Ultimately, raising taxes perpetuates inefficiency.

2. Do you support the Jacksonville Journey? Explain your answer.

I support the concept of addressing the three elements of prevention,

rehabilitation and deterrence, and I applaud the efforts of the leaders who have
devoted their time and talent to the Jacksonville Journey. Their commitment
shows the extraordinary level of civic spirit and private sector involvement our
city can bring to bear on its challenges. However, there needs to be
measurement and accountability for every taxpayer dollar spent on every city
program to ensure that we are doing our core business and doing it well. In the
context of the spending cuts and financial restructuring I propose, future funding
for Journey and other programs will depend on measurement, accountability and
results. We should expand private sector participation in much of this effort. In
the long run, growing jobs and the economy and improving public education are
a large part of the solution to Jacksonville’s public safety challenges.

3. What endorsements have you received?

I have received broad-ranging endorsements from leaders in the business

community, the health care industry, our not-for-profit sector, the legal
community, and a large cross-section of local businesses. As you are aware,
I have declined to seek the endorsement of the public employee unions because
I believe the mayor needs to be independent of the unions to get our city’s
financial house in order.
4. How much civic activity do you perform outside work?

I have always devoted substantial time to civic activities outside of work.

Currently, I serve as Chairman of the Board of Directors for the St.
Vincent’s Foundation and Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of Gateway
Community Services. I am a member of the boards of St. Vincent’s Healthcare
System and the Timucuan Trails Parks Foundation, and also a member of the
Regional Council of the ALS Association. Finally, I have participated in
Leadership Jacksonville and Leadership Florida. I’m not the only one who is
involved in the community. My wife, Lynn, is very involved with the American
Cancer Society and Dreams Come True, and my children also volunteer.

5. How do you intend to comply with Florida’s public records and

government in the sunshine laws? If you saw an elected official breaking
the sunshine law, what would you do?

Elected officials have a solemn responsibility to protect the interests of the

taxpayers, and if I am elected mayor, my administration will focus on restoring
public trust in government. That includes transparency and fully complying with
the sunshine laws. All too often, citizens do not know where to go to make a
public records request, or their requests are not fulfilled in a timely manner. With
the goals of increasing transparency, responsiveness and convenience for the
public, I intend to centralize the process, utilize technology to be more responsive
and timely, and put more and more records online for easier access. I have never
personally witnessed a violation of the sunshine law, but if I observed an elected
official inadvertently breaking it, I would bring it to their attention and encourage
them to be aware of and follow the sunshine law. If I observed an intentional
violation, I would report it to the appropriate authorities.

6. What can you do to help support the clean-up of the St. Johns River?

The 8t. Johns River is one of our city’s greatest assets and the city should play a
key role in improving its quality. 10 comprehensively address issues including
pollution, we need to recognize’ that. 80 percent of the pollution in the 310-mile
St. Johns comes from downstream. As mayor, I will provide regional leadership
to bring together all 13 counties in the river’s watershed to address the cleanup.
In addition, I will work with Sen. Thrasher and the river caucus in the Florida
Legislature to make the St. Johns a priority for the legislature. We must actively
work to maintain this incredible resource.

7. How can you become engaged in the city’s high murder, infant mortality
and suicide rates?
As a prosecutor for 10 years -- and heading up the State Attorney’s Homicide
Unit for five years -I worked closely with State Attorney Angela Corey, and
I have worked with Sheriff Rutherford as a prosecutor and as General Counsel
for many years. Together, I believe we would be one of the best crime- fighting
teams to ever serve the people of Jacksonville.
However, reducing crime in the long term is about far more than providing
adequate resources to law enforcement. Like infant mortality and suicide rates,
crime is closely tied to socioeconomic factors such as unemployment poverty
and lack of education. The best thing I can do as mayor to address these three
issues is to grow jobs, turn our economy around and improve public education.
Since the collapse of Lehman Brothers, we have been in the worst economic
crisis of a generation, and the economic playing field has changed dramatically.
Along with it, Jacksonville’s strategy for growing jobs must change. We must
approach job growth in a way that leverages our unique assets and in which we
have a competitive advantage, and create defining industries that will grow jobs
and the economy. We have unique assets and a competitive advantage in many
areas, including: 1) healthcare jobs, the number-one employer in North Florida;
2) port jobs, including logistics, international trade and transportation; 3) aviation
jobs at Cecil Field, where we inherited $2 billion in assets from the Navy; and 4)
military jobs -- we are the third-largest Navy town in the nation. We not only need
to attract new companies to Jacksonville, we also need to focus on helping
existing businesses to succeed by creating a business-friendly community and a
business-friendly government. We need to have fiscal and regulatory policies that
encourage job growth. Finally, we must make improving public education our top
long-term priority. As I mentioned earlier, lack of education is strongly correlated
with poverty, which in turn contributes to infant mortality, suicide rates and a host
of other issues, including crime. Jacksonville’s mayor does not have the
constitutional and statutory education authority of many big-city mayors.
However, our strong-mayor consolidated government uniquely positions the
mayor, to bring together public, private and other stakeholders to improve public
education. As mayor, I will work to bring stakeholders together to reform and
improve public education

8. Has consolidation been a good or bad deal for Jacksonville? Please

explain your answer.

Consolidation has been a very good deal for Jacksonville. Consolidated

government gives us a competitive structural advantage over the other 66
counties in Florida and over other local governments around the country.
Among others, it provides the following seven advantages: 1) lower taxation
relative to the rest of the state; 2) economic development can be done on a
countywide basis; 3) allows us to be less bureaucratic, less regulatory and more
streamlined in both economic development and government operations; 4)
minimizes or eliminates intra-government litigation; 5) allows us to adopt public
policies on a countywide basis, and leverage public and private assets for that
purpose; 6) provides us with “clout” by leveraging our size; 7) a public safety
advantage in having one sheriffs office with countywide jurisdiction and providing
better training and relationships with the state attorney’s office.