Things heat up as key Jacksonville city council race goes to runoff election

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Things are getting heated now that a key Jacksonville city council race has gone to a runoff. Two candidates are vying for the late Tommy Hazouri’s At-Large, Group 3 seat: Democrat Dr. Tracye Polson, and Republican Nick Howland.

The two candidates came out on top in Tuesday’s special election, which yielded a close race. Of 80,693 votes recorded by the Duval County Supervisor of Elections, Polson received 36.72 percent of the votes, and Howland pulled in 35.94 percent of the votes.

The race is getting nasty, though, with the Republican party of Duval County making unsubstantiated claims against the Democratic contender. On Tuesday night the party accused Polson of buying support from voters who have “once again rejected her”, despite Polson pulling in slightly more votes than Howland. The party also called her a “radical ‘woke’ Democrat and hypocrite” who supports defunding JSO.

Polson dismissed the claims and told Action News Jax her focus is on the real issues. ”The real opponents here are poverty and inequity and flooding after a rainy day and the number of people that are going to be evicted at the end of this pandemic. Let’s keep our eye on the ball and what’s really important and leave the name-calling to other people,” Polson said.

She added she wants to bolster JSO’s Co-Responder program, ensuring mental health professionals accompany officers on calls. She says it would curb unnecessary jailings -- ultimately saving the city money. Action News Jax asked Polson if her plan would eliminate officers. While she didn’t answer directly, she said it’s up to JSO to manage its budget.

Polson also countered the Duval GOP’s accusation of buying votes by spending “over a million” on her campaign. ”Our campaign used our budget and our volunteer network to push out the vote yesterday, and that’s what made me the top vote-getter of the four candidates,” she said.

Action News Jax reached out to Howland on Wednesday to see if he agrees with his party’s messaging about his opponent. Howland could not be reached for comment by news time. This is what Howland told reporters Tuesday night: ”It’s obvious from the results today that what the city of Jacksonville is looking for are safer streets, backing our police, stronger public safety, also more jobs and servant leadership in the city council,” he said.

Because no candidates reached 50 percent of the vote Tuesday night, Polson and Howland are headed to the runoff election which is set for Feb. 22.

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