Green spoke for about an hour to the Northeast Florida Regional Council about a controversial plan to draw 262 million gallons of river water daily in order to quench rapid growth in the Orlando region.

While there was no voiced opposition to the plan at Thursday’s meeting, regional council members asked Green to promote water conservation while keeping an eye on how the draw down could affect business interests, including Jacksonville’s port system.

Water supply throughout the district - a chunk of Northeast and Central Florida roughly the size of Maryland - is a concern over the next 20 years, but planners have turned immediate attention to Central Florida.

Important to note here is that these projections are for growth that is projected to occur, but has not yet happened.  It is possible to have “too much of a good thing” - but if the resources for a particular path of growth are simply not available, or place an undue burden on others, then it makes sense not to do that.  Orlando’s thirst was discussed previously as causing increased salinity in some areas of the river and generally not being good at all for Jacksonville.  While we should all practice water conservation (as annoying as low-flow faucets may be), Orlando’s growth seems to be the chief cause of the problem.  If they want to grow beyond the capacity of the state’s resources to handle it, then they should find their own means to support it - such as building a desalination plant, shipping water in, or some other means.  Otherwise, it’s possible they should consider the alternative of controlling the growth that they can’t support.

Wise said Saturday night that Peyton’s idea is a good one and the mayor is correct in attempting to shift the focus back on academic achievement.

“At the end of the day, students are in this and our focus on students has to be the prevailing interest,” Wise said.

Board member Kris Barnes said she also felt the mayor’s request was reasonable. Vicki Drake and Betty Burney declined to comment; Martha Barrett could not be reached.

Tommy Hazouri and Priestly Jackson echoed the concerns that Broner raised. Hazouri said the board doesn’t need to slow down.

“We’ve had a ‘cooling off period’ for the last several weeks, and hopefully now we’re coming to a resolve,” he said. “And we’re going to do it in a deliberate manner because the public expects us to do our job.”

Priestly Jackson said the mayor might have overstepped his boundaries in making the request, which bordered on being offensive.

“This has been a very methodical board that has gone above and beyond in terms of being rational and reasonable,” she said.

Most of this seems to be unfolding rather quickly. While the mayor doesn’t officially have much authority over the school system, he is nevertheless blamed or congratulated when both criticism and praise come in regarding the Duval County schools. It only seems natural, then, that he would move to mediate a dispute that threatens the performance of an institution that reflects on his office. With the executive and legislative branches of the school system at odds, there is no one else currently in a position of authority to undertake this sort of responsibility. Although Mr. Hazouri and Ms. Priestly Jackson may be correct in principle, further conflict will solve nothing. Ultimately, the purpose of the Superintendent and the Board’s jobs are not to win an argument, but to serve the schools in a way that best educates students.

Anyone who looks at a map of Jacksonville can see that the existing school board building, while on “valuable waterfront property”, is nevertheless as centrally located as is possible to be, without floating on a barge in the middle of the river. It’s basically located in Jacksonville’s navel, equidistant from all regions. This is equally accessible for parents and students from any part of the county to attend meetings, and it is readily served by public transportation downtown. All this, while still being in an area that people feel relatively safe walking around in after dark.

If Governor Crist really wants to get government into the business of buying and selling real estate, maybe he should take the lead…have the state sell the big fancy Capitol building and move into some more humble digs, like an old warehouse on the outskirts of Tallahassee. No more walnut paneling and marble floors - just wooden walls and concrete floors and legislators sitting in folding metal chairs. Maybe they could rent it out on the weekends. This proposal probably wouldn’t go over too well, and Crist might point out how it would end up costing more than it would save once he begins to contemplate actually making such a move.

Reducing income is a good way to quickly motivate reducing spending - it forces people to cut from overstuffed pet projects, and begins to scale things back to a reasonable level. The governor should not lose focus, though - concentrate on cutting program budgets that ballooned during the property boom, and not assets that have been around since the Carter administration. Recent projects are new and have not yet become the bedrock for other projects. Reorganization is also a possible strategy, within limits, as many services are redundant and can be combined into a single department or contract. One way or another, Florida needs long-term, comprehensive solutions to scaling down our budget, and not a series of tiny fixes to make everything more complicated.