JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The Duval DOGE Special Committee officially convened for the first time Tuesday afternoon and laid out hundreds of millions of dollars of city spending that might warrant a closer look in the upcoming budget season.
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Duval DOGE committee members began their work digging into potentially unnecessary city spending by taking a look at 88 capital improvement projects.
22 of those projects have been designated as complete but have a combined total of almost $11 million sitting untouched.
Auditors explained four JFRD projects identified on the list do still have outstanding expenditures, but members plan to further scrutinize the remaining 18 projects that have unused funds totaling more than $5 million.
Additionally, members were shown a list of 66 projects totaling almost $91 million that have been funded by the city but haven’t expended any dollars since at least October of 2023.
Duval DOGE Chair Ron Salem (R-Group 2 At-Large) said the committee intends to find out why that is, and whether the funds are still necessary.
“I’m not suggesting all $90 million are dollars that we can reallocate, but if we got 10 percent of that, that’s $9-$10 million,” said Salem.
Auditors also showed members a breakdown of how city departments have been funded relative to expected growth. Overall, citywide departments saw a 7.1 percent funding increase over the past five budget years, which is higher than the anticipated 5.4 percent increase.
“We’re definitely spending more than we should be spending and we need to address that by about 3 percent,” said Councilmember Raul Arias (R-District 11).
Salem explained decisions on department funding will not be made by Duval DOGE, but the information the DOGE effort has compiled will help inform council spending decisions during the regular budget process.
“I said from the very beginning this would be surgical. We’re not looking to whack departments or anything close to that,” said Salem. ”We’re looking at savings such as the CIP. Very surgical where dollars appear to be sitting there and can be used in other places.”
The committee will continue meeting to delve through the projects and possibly even other cost savings recommendations at least through June.
Some possible ideas floated Tuesday included limiting overtime, updating to the city travel policy, and creating new whistle-blower protections for reporting waste, fraud, and abuse.
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