 Speaking of housing Monday the city council rules committee with drew a proposal that would impose a 1 to 2% tax on food and beverages sold by businesses such as hotels and restaurants the additional funds were sought to aid homeless initiatives across the city. Do we know who proposed this bill. I think it was Jimmy Paluso was it not. Was he not the sponsor. Jimmy Paluso and Michael Boylan co-sponsored it. Um. Nate what ways would these funds have aided homelessness the homelessness initiative. I mean I think the kind of main point was that this was a potential tool and a sustainable funding source that could have been used in a lot of different ways. I think the advocates of this plan kind of deliberately did not get too specific because part of their argument was. Look, this is a bill that this is a this is legislation that we're that is necessary for us to ask the legislature to allow us to later levy attacks. Right so I mean I think they were trying to not get too far ahead of the of the debate that didn't really work. So I mean I think it probably best viewed at this point as a tool that they wanted on the table and it's not going to be on the table now. You can join the conversation at 5492937 you can tweet us at FCC on air first goes connect the wjct.org you can find us on Facebook Instagram and YouTube you know where to find us reach out we want you to join the conversation. To your point Nate do you think that the lack of specifics is part of the reason why it was pulled. You know, I just think that this city council, and its current composition is not a council that is eager to pass any kind of tax or fee increase, we've had a few in the last few years, both on the city side and on our public school and I even absent those things I don't think these guys would go for a tax increase and I think it was as I read the debate just kind of a bunch of fear monitoring about taxes and that's why it was called. I mean I don't think it was even necessarily specific to homelessness or homelessness initiatives in fact, some of the council members not in support of this seems pretty sort of self aware of about the fact that they might be perceived as shooting down help for you know our homelessness problems so I mean I just think it's a simple matter of the council not wanting to pass a tax increase. That's it that's interesting I think Nate's dead on in that regard I mean anytime you mentioned the militant Jacksonville people going to palpitations so any sort of discussion of tax increase, whether it's whether whatever the source of the revenue is met with stern resistance. But what I found interesting about this particular bill was it was actually bipartisan. You got Michael Boylan from Mandarin. Yeah, Jimmy Paluso with Democrat. I was thinking that that like it seems like a very opposite. Perspectives or just yeah perhaps. But yeah, I mean, I thought that was positive to be perfectly honest with you I thought it was it was kind of like as Nate was saying this is kind of like more of a placeholder I remember years back when we had to do something about indigent health care we had to go to Tallahassee and get approval for get the legislature to approve a local tax or whatever. And it failed, much like this one did. But it did. I don't want to say this was necessarily a placeholder but it was kind of it did it did define the issue though and I think there you know I think it opens the door for additional dialogue as to you know what are the needs. You know what's to find the needs and what is the funding source. What are we going to do to address the situation. We talked about downtown development and I think there is a clear and obvious need for a dedicated funding you know a persistent funding source to deal with the homelessness issue. I will say talking to enough restaurant owners though. The really hard time to be a restaurant owner I mean post COVID frankly the business has not come back the breakfast and brunch places actually have kind of bounced back but if you're a higher end restaurant, your food costs have gone up your labor costs have gone up and hiring people is difficult. And they will say oh and yes they're talking their own book I get that but but they will say that anything just 1% more added to a bill is going to hurt hurt their bottom line and it's not a high margin business. It's a tough business and in some ways they're a sympathetic group when you say you know we're going to raise taxes and they're like no don't they they can get they can sway public opinion because you know it is a hard thing that they're doing. You know it was a fight that I'm not I'm not actually surprised that those opposed to the tax one but I will say there needs to be a dedicated source because that's how we deal with the problem. To be clear we like this term dedicated funding source in the town that means tax. That is it's a euphemism for tax that there is no other thing that can be a dedicated source except the tax anything less than that is just, you know the council can set discretionary spending gear after year for things but that's not dedicated that could change at any moment. So like just, you know we love to deploy that term but it means the tax. So, just wanted to put that out there. Yeah, to Tim's earlier point, we had a roundtable here with restaurant owners in the downtown core and we didn't talk about this tax specifically but we talked about the trials and how hard it is for them to keep their business going. But you know, one of my favorite restaurants went out of business black sheep specifically because everything is going up in cost. So, you know, I do think it's fair for them to flag the fact that this tax would hurt them. But then to Nate's point, the only way we can get through this issue and and try to figure something out as if there is a dedicated source, which as Nate so eloquently said is a tax. So, is there anything else before the city council that we know of where they're looking for ways to address this issue? Well, the council, the last council passed the bill that prohibits you to actively stand on a median and do things and that mainly is aimed at people who are trying to get money or like the guy I see almost all the time who's weaving these crosses made out of, you know, palm leaves. Which is a dedicated for now. And I have seen less people standing on medians but it's still there so I don't know if JSO is actually out there citing but that is a negative attempt to control. Right. And that that is a that is that loss specifically to cater to people who have homes, right? What I guess what I'm asking is, is there any movement to help people who are unhoused right now? Because clearly we can see on the same can not be on the same stuff the city's been doing for years. I mean, much like it in the development world with renderings, the city is very, very good at putting out impressive exciting reports that then just never really get acted on. And that's kind of where this issue is. Twitter said rent is still too high and residents are eagerly waiting for proposals and how to deal with the problem. Again, like this is not a scientific survey that I've done, but I know that we're in a housing crisis. And yet when I drive through different parts of town, I see for rent signs up everywhere. So I'm wondering if like if if Mike is like hitting on the exact thing that like we are in a housing crisis, but also the rents are high and people can't afford it because wages haven't gone up in like forever. Right. So like if the rents go up and you're still making the same thing that you were making, you know, eight to ten years ago, how are you going to afford it? And so the question is, what is the city council going to do to end the mayor's office to address that? And then that's part of the problem is that it is a complicated sort of thing. So you talk to landlords, you know, one of the reasons rents are going up is because property insurance is going up. So, you know, that seems like we're talking about homelessness and rents and property insurance. You know, there's a whole line there and you can't just you can't adjust as one dial. So when people say deal with homelessness, to some extent what they're saying is the state has to do more to deal with the property insurance market. Because that can trickle into actually rents being low or more properties being developed or things that increase the housing stock that will deal with homelessness. If that, in fact, is the case, I mean, again, I mean, the market is the market. We got more people coming to the state. We got more people coming to the city, right? So the answer to before, we don't have enough housing, right? So again, it's a basic supply and demand. I mean, the price, the cost will go up and it makes a question. I mean, when we're, and I think maybe that was one of the issues that arose with this particular bill was this the, you know, again, what, what are we funding? Homelessness. Okay. All right. Great. Let's define what we're actually talking about. Is it affordable housing? Is it getting people off the medians? I don't know. I mean, these are issues that we would have to address from a policy perspective before any definitive legislation was enacted. And Clay County, as well as Jacksonville, both enacted those medians to try to, I believe, stop homeless people from, from being out on the street. Don't forget, too, that if you start charging a 2% tax on food and you don't have tourists, you don't get a lot of money. Say in August, St. John's County, that's a tourist-based economy. Here, I don't know, you'd be hitting Joe Sixpack who's going out to dinner with the family. Yes. You can join the conversation at 5492937. You can tweet us at FCC on air. First Coast Connect at WDateJCT.org. You can find us on Facebook, Instagram and on YouTube.