Latest news with #DCReeves
Yahoo
30-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Mayor D.C. Reeves postpones Fricker Center meeting after backlash from Black residents
Pensacola Mayor D.C. Reeves postponed a second public input meeting on the Fricker Center renovation – a day before it was set to take place – after the city was met with anger from some Black residents over gentrification in the city. The newly scheduled meeting at the Fricker Center will be at 8 a.m. Aug. 13, instead of at 6:30 p.m. July 31 as originally planned. Reeves said the purpose of moving the meeting was to ensure the meeting was about feedback on the community center and not other issues, which he said can be addressed at a town hall he will host on the evening of Aug. 26 with Councilman Delarian Wiggins. The location hasn't been set yet. 'This is a rescheduling of an event,' Reeves said. 'It's not the cancellation of an event. We've just given you the dates, and certainly folks can go there, or they can go to a town hall as well and share some of those issues." Gentrification fears: Fricker Center renovation sparks tension as Black residents tell city: We don't trust you Pensacola has $9.5 million in state grants to fund a renovation of The Fricker Center and held a public meeting on July 23 to get feedback on the center's renovation. A large portion of the meeting was dominated by concern about the gentrification of historically Black neighborhoods, anger over the mayor's absence, and several commenters who voiced distrust of the city's motivation for renovating the center. 'I've never seen the city of Pensacola dump $9 million into the Black community," Pensacola resident Jermaine Williams said at the July 23 meeting. The share of Pensacola residents who identify only as Black has fallen from about 30% of the city in 2000 to about 21%, according to the most recent Census estimates. 'Anybody bringing any concern that they have with the city, it is important to allow that opportunity,' Reeves said. 'But I think in this specific case, there were things that might be more relevant as a town hall discussion and a larger discussion about the community at large, and concern about the changing community and what does or doesn't cause that.' Reeves also pushed back on the idea that there was some ulterior motive behind the renovation. 'I don't take it personally when someone says it's hard to believe that the city is going to just come in and put in $9.5 million and there's not be some ulterior motive,' Reeves said. 'We have no ulterior motive other than we want to take a facility that has been left behind – the same way we've done with the Cobb Center, that's about to take on $1.7 million, so it wasn't going to need to be on the list of being in danger – because we want these to stay. We want these to thrive." Reeves said if the community doesn't want $9.5 million spent on their center to be renovated, then he would 'take heed to that.' 'The community as a whole, not one or two people,' Reeves added. Reeves also pointed to the benefits of a renovated community center for current neighborhood residents, which will upgrade the center's classrooms, restrooms, playground, kitchen facilities, computer lab, and add a senior center that will be a health education and outreach facility with Baptist Health Care. 'There can be no better definition of the actual term community center than what's being discussed right now,' Reeves said. Reeves said he would put his track record of engaging with the community in public meetings and town halls over that of any previous Pensacola mayor. 'In almost three years I've been here, I think we're up at over 100 on every project,' Reeves said. As far as moving the meeting to the morning, Reeves said that most public input meetings happen at different times, so people with varying schedules of work can attend. He said the Fricker Center meetings happening back-to-back a week apart at the same time is an unusual schedule compared to most public meetings. "We thought we had some limiting factors with the Florida (Department of) Commerce to have it done by Aug. 1, but with some of the condition issues we're looking at in the building right now, we have an extension on that,' Reeves said. 'So we were able to not have to jam these in, two within eight days.' This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Mayor D.C. Reeves postpones Fricker Center meeting after backlash Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
21-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
PPD Chief Eric Randall resigned after rank and file lost 'confidence' in leadership
Pensacola Mayor D.C. Reeves asked Pensacola Police Chief Eric Randall to resign after multiple years of declining employee engagement within the department. Reeves explained the reason for Randall's departure, which he described as a 'mutual' decision, during a press conference at the PPD on July 15 after several days of rampant online speculation over the chief's unexpected departure from the department. 'While I understand this decision may have seemed abrupt externally, if you know me well, we don't make decisions flippantly or without data,' Reeves said. Randall abruptly resigned on July 10, and Captain Kristin Brown was named acting chief. Reeves said if police officers 'aren't confident in the directions of leadership' and 'show up consistently unengaged,' then the city and his administration are not serving the public. The city has conducted employee engagement surveys since at least 2020, when former Mayor Grover Robinson implemented them, to measure confidence in leadership, job satisfaction and understanding of the city's direction. Reeves said he had conversations with Randall about expectations for PPD and the levels of trust and confidence in leadership that are reflected in those annual surveys. 'Those expectations set inside the building (Pensacola Police Department) had not been met to the agreed-upon standard over months and years of time, and we mutually agreed to part ways last week,' Reeves said. Randall was hired as police chief in 2021 after a nationwide search. He is a Pensacola native and a U.S. Navy veteran, but his law enforcement career had been entirely in the Newport News, Virginia, police department until he was hired for the PPD job. The search took place in the wake of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protest, in the aftermath of the police killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. Those nationwide protests left PPD and the city grappling with community outrage over a 2019 police killing of Tymar Crawford by a PPD officer, who was ultimately fired but not charged with a crime. Those events led to the creation of a Citizens Police Advisory Committee, which held meetings to review the operations of PPD while the city conducted a search for a new police chief. Randall came on board and was tasked with implementing the recommendations of the advisory committee, which had been dissolved after producing a report of recommendations, and led an organization that had historically been led by a chief who had come up within their own ranks. Randall focused much of his attention on community outreach and crime reduction efforts. One of his first high-profile acts as chief was to remove the Confederate flag from PPD badges and patches and require SWAT team members to wear body cameras. Reeves acknowledged that building trust within an organization like a police department as an outsider is a tough task, and he believes Randall was given "ample runway" to make a change. "I will say, as we made clear with Chief Randall, that we provided accommodation for that," Reeves said. "In terms of how quickly we would normally react to employee engagement numbers versus how quickly we reacted, this department was an outlier among all 18 other city departments. In terms of having a consistent need for improvement there, and we allowed that to prolong a little bit longer because certainly I sympathize with being an outside person trying to come in and build trust inside a building, especially in public safety, a very fraternal organization." Reeves said the decision does not change his respect and appreciation for Randall and the work he did with the PPD. However, after days of rampant and growing speculation in the community, Reeves said he had to comment on his departure. "Any theories out there, I've heard them all over the last four days, that it has anything to do with ICE, that has to do with anything else — absolutely not,' Reeves said. 'There's no ill will, nothing below board that took place under Chief Randall. He's a good man, and my goal honestly is to certainly preserve a good man's dignity.' Reeves said being the PPD chief is a difficult job. 'I have the utmost respect for him, and I certainly want him to have great success in his future,' Reeves said. This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: PPD Chief Eric Randall resign at request of Pensacola mayor DC Reeves Solve the daily Crossword
