County Manager says Mayor Ward’s revival of Friendship 7 as “GNV Next” has created “confusion and concern”
BY JENNIFER CABRERA
ALACHUA COUNTY, Fla. – Alachua County Manager Michele Lieberman has sent a letter to the members of the original Friendship 7, criticizing Gainesville Mayor Harvey Ward’s recent attempt to “revitalize” the group as “GNV Next.”
As reported in Alachua Chronicle, Mayor Ward invited representatives from Alachua County, Alachua County Public Schools, the University of Florida, UF Health, Santa Fe College, the Community Foundation of North Central Florida, and the Greater Gainesville Chamber of Commerce to a lunch meeting that was ultimately held on December 18.
The presentation at the lunch meeting proposed naming the new group “GNV Next” and considering topics such as community engagement, workforce growth, the environment, innovation and research, public safety, talent cultivators, civic life, infrastructure, wellbeing, economic development, homelessness, arts and culture, healthcare, affordable housing, and educational attainment.
Friendship 7 was a county-wide initiative
Although Alachua County Commission Chair Ken Cornell was invited to the meeting, he did not attend, and Lieberman has now sent a letter to the original Friendship 7 institutions. In her letter, she said Friendship 7 “originated as a staff-level collaboration among chief executives… It was never constituted by elected bodies, nor was it designed to advance a single jurisdiction’s policy agenda.”
Lieberman agreed with Ward that economic development is “the central shared challenge facing our community,” but she held that “this work must be coordinated, strategic, and inclusive of all municipalities and unincorporated areas, not solely Gainesville.”
Lieberman said that organizing a group focused on Gainesville is “entirely within the City’s prerogative,” but “conflating that effort with Friendship 7 has understandably created confusion and concern, particularly as the initiative appears city-centric, politically led, or misaligned with county-wide economic development initiatives.”
Lieberman indicated that the County would be willing to lead a staff-level county-wide collaborative effort, but the group would need to have “clarity on purpose and structure.”
Read County Manager Lieberman’s letter here.
“Lieberman indicated that the County would be willing to lead a staff-level county-wide collaborative effort, but the group would need to have “clarity on purpose and structure.”
It should be abundantly clear by now….their main goal is to waste taxpayer $$$.
“They’re our minorities, not yours.”
Fools fighting over a funding stream
Newberry woke up, now Gainesville and Hawthorne is waking up to the fact that the do-nothing BoCC cares nothing about economic development, so don’t look for any meaningful leadership from them if you are serious.
Funny to watch Ward get called out for feeding the sheep 🐑 at taxpayer expense.
I agree. I don’t want my county taxes going to Gainesville’s self-caused, never-ending, and never-solved problems.
If economic development is concern #1, when are the city and county going to start? I remember Leveda Brown shooing away potential projects.
Why don’t we swap the two new downtown courthouses with the eastside Sheriff’s office and the closed eastside Food Lion shopping center buildings? The Sheriff’s office deserves to be in a prominent downtown brand new building. Public attorneys and judges deserve to be in old shopping centers, so they can see the blight they fostered for decades leading the ACLUSPLCDNC Party 🤡💩👿👺👹
I can’t wait to see in a couple years. What these idiots are going to do when we no longer have to rent our property from the government I might want to start saving money now instead of wasting it
Nice for Lieberman to acknowledge, “organizing a group focused on Gainesville has created confusion and concern, particularly as the initiative appears city-centric, politically led,…”
If Harvey “Two Face” has anything to do with it, you can bet it’s politically led. All this time he, and other liberal loons, have been complaining about the President’s “America First” policy, yet they’re perfectly happy to push a “Gainesville First” agenda when it suits their own power.
Looks like the county manager is posing for a dating site, not her professional photo.
Looks like dangle balls has the hots for the county manager. boy you don’t have a chance.
Reading all the comments several people chose to use fake names…
So disregard those .
Bookers are not newspapers.
But any improvement for growth and possibly 🤔 more debts.
Chilly thoughts when friendship has potential to help people and environment 🤔.
Happy new year 2026
First we should all read the report prepared by the original group https://www.bebr.ufl.edu/sites/default/files/Research%20Reports/ri1_baseline_report.pdf
Second given what it says WHY hasn’t there been more urgency in addressing those issues, city and county governments and NAACP are letting us down!
Finally the county manager states “If there is interest among the original institutions in re-establishing a staff-level, countywide
collaborative forum, I believe that effort should:
1. Remain executive and staff-led
2. Focus on countywide economic development and related operational issues
3. Respect each entity’s governance structure, legal constraints, and institutional mission
4. Be clearly distinguished from any single-jurisdiction initiative or branding
If there is interest, I would also welcome a discussion about whether additional community partners
should be included, recognizing that the composition of any such group should be intentional, aligned
with a countywide purpose, and supportive of effective collaboration”
Clearly there is the need and why hasn’t the county or city moved sooner regardless of the group name?
gobbledygook doublespeak.
Sounds like more of the same politicians saying we need to form a group to come up with a plan to accomplish nothing, but we want the appearance of doing something.