The JEA scandal trial got off to a big start.  Eye was not surprised to hear that Mayor Lenny Curry’s office used bully tactics to force the resignation of Paul McElroy, JEA CEO after a solid and prestigious 16-year career with the utility.

I knew Paul when he was the CFO at JEA and he was an upstanding person with an eye for detail and a professional attitude about the job he was entrusted with.  After Jim Dickenson’s retirement, Paul was offered the CEO position and he deserved it.  He served the city well. 

There was no reason for Mayor Curry’s office to send a message for him to “resign immediately, otherwise things could become very difficult for him” other than they had a plan for something to occur.  Maybe that plan was for Zahn, appointed to the JEA Board by Lenny Curry, to take over as CEO and that is exactly what happened.  Zahn was unqualified yet somehow was given one of the biggest and highest paying positions in Jacksonville’s city government by the JEA Board.  Those board members made a terrible decision and should never serve on a board again.

In the years that Curry was our Mayor, we received calls about threats from people within his administration to others in the community.  People lived in fear of what the administration might do to their business or ability to work in the city.  It was a terrible time to live in Jacksonville under the shroud of corruption and cronyism.

We even sent Lenny Curry a good-bye letter documenting his bullish tactics.  You can read that letter here.

The taxpayers of Duval County are ready for justice and hopefully this trial will give us that.  Unfortunately, it appears the Curry administration will go unscathed with this scandal and Zahn and Wannemacher will be the low hanging fruit, fall guys for the biggest scandal in Jacksonville in our lifetime. The trial expects to take 4 weeks and it will be a nail-biter for sure.  Stay tuned and pray for justice.  We sure as heck need some!