JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 Jacksonville City Council is taking an axe to Mayor Donna Deegan\u2019s affordable housing agenda, slashing more than $7 million out of her proposed budget aimed at the programs, according to the city\u2019s leading affordable housing official.<\/p>\n
But there\u2019s a debate over how much the city is really spending on what local voters recently described as their top issue<\/a>.<\/p>\n Council Finance Chair Raul Arias (R-District 11) pushed back on the idea that the council isn\u2019t doing enough to address housing affordability.<\/p>\n \u201cWe funded just last week alone over $23 million right towards this. So, to say that we\u2019re not funding these is quite frankly a false narrative,\u201d said Arias.<\/p>\n [DOWNLOAD: <\/b>Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/b><\/a>]<\/b><\/p>\n But that claim has been contested by Jacksonville\u2019s Affordable Housing Administrator Joshua Hicks.<\/p>\n \u201cThey cut all local funding to address housing costs \u2013 more than $7 million \u2013 and then wrongly took credit for state funding that is implemented by the Jacksonville Housing Finance Authority, an independent authority,” said Hicks in an emailed statement.<\/p>\n Among the programs cut were $2.5 million for an affordable housing development fund, $1.5 million for a downpayment assistance program, $750,000 for a utility tap-in fund and half a million for rental assistance and eviction diversion.<\/p>\n Arias argued many of those programs would have cost a lot of money and only benefited a few dozen residents.<\/p>\n \u201cTo have money allocated for just those 30 people, it begs to ask the question, who are those lucky lottery winners?\u201d said Arias.<\/p>\n Instead, Arias has pushed for a $13.4 million property tax cut, which would amount to a little more than a dollar-a-month in savings for the average homeowner.<\/p>\n Mayor Deegan has argued that money would be better served funding targeted programs like the ones she had initially proposed.<\/p>\n \u201cWe knew coming into this budget that this was a finance committee that was gonna try to take an axe to a whole lot of stuff, and so I think our hope is that as we continue down this path that we\u2019ll end up being able to put some of those things back in,\u201d said Deegan.<\/p>\n The finance committee closed out its last meeting Friday with a grand total of $29 million in budget cuts to date.<\/p>\n Arias said there\u2019s likely more to come, and given the State DOGE team has its eyes on Duval<\/a>, it\u2019s unclear how much of that the mayor\u2019s team will be able to claw back.<\/p>\n