JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — There’s a call for Jacksonville City Council President Kevin Carrico to temporarily step down from his leadership post.
City Council member Jimmy Peluso made that statement during an interview with Action News Jax’s Ben Becker on Thursday morning in the wake of Carrico receiving a subpoena.
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“The fact that the State Attorney’s Office is even looking into this shows how serious this is. I think that’s why I’m doing the actions I’m doing. Because we should take this seriously and we should all be holding each other accountable,” Peluso said.
Peluso also put his request in writing to Carrico:
Becker was the first to break the story on text messages sent by Carrico that led to the investigation.
Peluso said Carrico should step down just until the State Attorney’s Office determines if there was any wrongdoing or not, with the texts Carrico sent.
Carrico bluntly responded to Peluso’s call to temporarily step down:
“This is nothing more than political theater from the biggest Drama Queen on the City Council. My office is fully complying with the State Attorney’s requests and will continue to do so. While Mr. Peluso chases relevance, he has established himself as the least effective member of this Council and has neglected his district for most of his term.“
We obtained the subpoena sent to Carrico. The SAO is requesting all electronic communications from January 1 to February 24 between Carrico and a number of people. It includes any mentions of board appointments or JEA’s CEO.
We told you last week that Carrico texted JEA board member Arthur Adams regarding his board seat on February 5.
In the text, Carrico wrote to Adams, “I owed a big favor to a friend and opted to put him on the JEA board as your term is expiring.” He went on to say, “Not sure if you wanted to stay, but I needed to do this for my guy.”
Carrico wanted to put Paul Martinez, his boss at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida, on the JEA board. Martinez has since removed himself from consideration for that appointment.
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After we reported on the text messages, Carrico accused JEA CEO Vickie Cavey of racism and creating a toxic culture at the utility.
Mayor Donna Deegan’s office called the comments about Cavey a smear campaign. JEA’s board gave Cavey a vote of confidence on Tuesday and did not discuss the Carrico text controversy.
We asked the 18 other City Council members for comment, but only four (including Peluso) responded. All four were critical of or troubled by the words Carrico used, including Council member Matt Carlucci.
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“I think it’s a black eye. It’s a black eye and another black eye for the JEA, and it’s another black eye for the Council. And we just need to get out of the drama, you know? There’s just too much drama,” Carlucci said.
Carrico said the following Wednesday evening about the subpoena:
“Our office fully complies with and respects all records requests. We are cooperating and will respond to any additional requests as needed.”
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