{"id":25555,"date":"2025-06-29T22:19:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-29T22:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/25555\/"},"modified":"2025-06-29T22:19:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-29T22:19:10","slug":"outgoing-council-president-randy-white-reflects-on-term-praises-fire-chief-mayor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/25555\/","title":{"rendered":"Outgoing Council President Randy White reflects on term, praises fire chief, mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla.<\/strong> \u2013 As his term as Jacksonville City Council president comes to a close, District 12 Councilmember Randy White reflected on accomplishments, challenges, and the future of city leadership on this week\u2019s episode of This Week In Jacksonville<\/a>.<\/p>\n

RELATED: <\/b>Kevin Carrico and Nick Howland sworn in as Jacksonville City Council\u2019s new leadership<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

White, who spent 32 years with the Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department, said one of the major wins during his presidency was addressing retention and recruitment challenges within JFRD and the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

Under his leadership, both agencies received the largest raises in their histories and secured a new retirement option. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn 2027, they\u2019ll have the option to keep [their current plan] or join the Florida Retirement System, which is a defined benefit plan,\u201d White said.<\/p>\n

He also reflected on his working relationship with Mayor Donna Deegan. \u201cWe did not always agree, but we would talk about it; and the things we didn\u2019t agree on, we respectfully disagreed and moved on,\u201d he said. \u201cOne thing we do have in common \u2014 I love this city. And she does too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan vetoed a bill on Tuesday that aims to block city funds from being used to support undocumented immigrants. (Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n

On a recently vetoed immigration-related bill,<\/a> White said, \u201cWe did not have the votes to overturn the veto. So I\u2019m going to move on [from] that subject.\u201d <\/p>\n

While some characterized the mayor\u2019s veto as making Jacksonville a \u201csanctuary city,\u201d White disagreed with that premise. <\/p>\n

\u201cI am not worried about this city becoming personally a sanctuary city with the sheriff that we have in place,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Looking ahead, the outgoing council leader acknowledged that the city\u2019s financial forecast will present tough decisions as Jacksonville faces an estimated $100 million deficit over the next three years. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf that number is correct, there\u2019ll be some hard decisions to make,\u201d White said, adding that public safety and infrastructure should remain top priorities.<\/p>\n

Finally, White praised outgoing Fire Chief Keith Powers, whose last day is June 30. <\/p>\n

Fire Chief Keith Powers address the officials in attendance for the Station 76 groundbreaking. (News4Jax)<\/p>\n

\u201cKeith Powers ranks up as high as any of the leaders we\u2019ve ever had,\u201d he said. \u201cHe now has a rescue unit in every fire station\u2026 [and] we\u2019re the largest class one fire department in the world. That alone has saved between $300 and $400 million a year for the homeowners in their insurance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s done a great job and he\u2019s going to be missed,\u201d White continued. \u201cHe\u2019s going to be hard to replace.\u201d<\/p>\n

The full interview with White can be seen below.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 As his term as Jacksonville City Council president comes to a close, District 12 Councilmember…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":25556,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[5229,5310,3188,723,7310,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-25555","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-city-council","10":"tag-fl","11":"tag-florida","12":"tag-jacksonville","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-united-states-of-america","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","17":"tag-us","18":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114768980755799058","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}