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Ideas from Jacksonville

New Jax Witty

Articles, reviews, advice, and legitimate research to go along with some back-handed comments. Think of us as Jacksonville's mother-in-law.

Retiree Guide to JAX

Jacksonville just made the Top 10 in some list of places to retire. The only problem is that the city isn't really in the Top 1000 for people who are actually looking to retire, so maybe it's time New Jax Witty works on putting together a local guide for folks who no longer have to work.

Connections

I'm not some kind of Jacksonville lifer who knows all the ins and outs of life in Northeast Florida. You'll want to identify some of these people, maybe who attend your church of choice, to help with some of the important decisions, like where to get your dog groomed. I'll keep this more basic so that it helps you understand why Jacksonville made the list of top places to retire and whether or not it's right for you. The difference in Jacksonville compared to an expensive retirement community is that you won't have a network of people organizing activities and actively supporting your forever spring break, so you'll have to figure out what works for you and how to achieve retirement bliss on your own.

Climate

This isn't Miami. Three months over 90, and a lot of 80s as highs. Perfect weather in late fall and early spring. A winter that will freeze (just barely) a dozen times or so overnight. Unless you're from California, you'll recognize the curve. It was the same kind of deal when our family moved from Milwaukee to Kansas City. If you can stand three months in the 90s or plan on snowbirding, it's a great climate. If you want to shovel a few times but get fewer months of cold, then try the line from KC over to Virginia. A friend of ours retired to Tennessee from Jax because he wanted all four seasons. I personally like it better here than in Wisconsin for a good portion of the year, especially in winter. And if you're retired with a condo, you won't have to mow your grass in the summer, which is pretty much as bad as the snowblowing I had to do in Milwaukee.

Cost

Northeast Florida is cheaper than Southeast Florida for retiring, at least when it comes to housing. And especially if we’re talking Jacksonville itself as opposed to St. Johns County. You can get a place in Nocatee or World Golf Village, but then you’re paying for all the fanciness without being in The Villages or Miami. Jacksonville’s neighborhoods are diverse enough that you can find whatever it is you want, whether it’s a waterfront property or a large lot for your RV or a condo. That said, it’s still one of the youngest cities in the state (there’s a large military presence), so there will be kids around. If you’re good with living in a normal neighborhood rather than a designated retirement community, then the money you need to buy into Jacksonville is lower than places that advertise themselves as places to retire.

Coast

If the ocean matters to you, Jacksonville has nice beaches. They are not special, but they exist. You won’t find beaches in Orlando or The Villages. You can buy a trailer home in Central Florida for $10,000 and shoot at bottles in the woods, but you can’t go to the beach without driving half the day. Jacksonville’s only had a handful of hurricanes hit over the years, and retired folks can just drive to safety for the week when one does come around. During the work week, you can meander on the beach all day with only a few other people, since Jacksonville simply is not yet the tourist destination of other cities in Florida. The area along the river isn’t as refined as downtown river walks in other cities, but it’s also not something you’d get a chance to experience in smaller towns.

City

Near the aforementioned river walk, you’ll find art and theatreoptions, along with sports and museums. This is a real city with a population nearing 1 million, so there’s some culture to be had. Minor league and way off Broadway, to be sure, but a lot of it is fairly affordable. And it’s better than watching the retirement community pickleball championships. From what I can tell, the top high school football and soccer teams come from this part of the state, so you could always attend one of those games, too. You could even audit a class at one of the local colleges. Because it’s a large metro area, you’ll get decent shopping and dining options when compared to planned retirement communities.

Crime

The biggest problem I have with crime in Jacksonville is that it’s not as relegated to a certain part of town like it was in Milwaukee. The crime rate isn’t really any higher than any other large city, but even the parts of the city that feel like the suburbs experience crime. Granted, the crime on my side of town tends to be unlocked cars getting rummaged through and porch piracy. The point here is that retirees should not have to feel like it’s unsafe in their retirement community. The city is working to improve the crime numbers, mostly to get re-elected, and there are plenty of gated communities, but you still have to venture out to the Walmart parking lot every now and again. In my area of Jacksonville, it seems crime is less east of the 295 towards the Intracoastal and beaches.

Color

If you’re from a typically-segregated Rust Belt city, you will notice the difference in Jacksonville. If that bothers you, then The Villages in the whitest place in America. More than likely, some of your best friends are Black. I think that’s great. In Jacksonville, you’ll also be able to live right next door to that best best friend of color. If you’d rather just be best friends with that person on Facebook and not next door, then St. Johns or Clay might be better for you.

Care

We’ve got a Mayo Clinic here. That might be enough for some retirees. Besides that, Baptist Health has been adequate. However, it seems like our doctors have a lot of conflicts, possibly with tee times, so be prepared for rescheduled appointments. That’s not a huge deal for retired folks, I suppose. Jacksonville also spent a lot of money adding ADA sidewalks, even though there’s really no place to walk to in such a vast city.

Community

The Jim Fortuna Senior Center is in Ed Austin Park, very close to where I live. I probably have to wait a few years to use it, but the Google reviews are good. You also have all kinds of golf courses on this side of town. Some of these golf courses would be for members only, while others allow anyone to play, so check that out. Within 30 minutes of my house: Hidden Hills, Blue Sky, Queen’s Harbour, Atlantic Beach CC, Jacksonville Beach CC, Jacksonville Golf and CC, UNF Golf Complex, Glen Kernan Golf and CC, Windsor Parke, Deerwood, Pablo Creek Club, Marsh Landing CC, and someplace called TPC Sawgrass. If you don’t like golf or places with an extra “u” in harbor or an extra “e” in park, then Jacksonville has real libraries and whatnot. You can also babysit someone’s kid in your condo unit. Since it’s a real city, you can develop community rather than have a program director create it for you. Use Nextdoor or Meetup. There are plenty of real volunteer opportunities in the area that can make a real difference in the lives of your neighbors, too.

Conservatives

I know The Golden Girls was supposed to be in Miami, and there are plenty of retirees down there, but there are also all kinds of liberals in that area. If you’re a Conservative who likes to spout off at the mouth, Jacksonville is a safer place to do that than any other large city in Florida. In fact, in 2015, Jacksonville ranked as the 5th most conservative city in the nation, behind Colorado Springs, Virginia Beach, Oklahoma City, and Mesa. It’s an especially wonderful city for retired military, since we appreciate both those who serve and who have served. Wear your MAGA hat and slap an American flag sticker on your car. However, you do have to realize that there are still some liberals in Jacksonville, so it’s not a free-for-all.

Concerns

Crime is #1. Similarly, there are plenty of scammers in every part of Florida, as it’s kind of a weekend job for most Floridians. The city isn’t walkable at all. The summers are very hot. But it’s 85 degrees in February as I write this, with snow or ice in 42 of the 50 states.

Conclusion

If you’re looking to retire to an area that has all the amenities you’ve come to expect living near a large city, then in or near Jacksonville is a good choice. Transfer that residency to save on state income taxes. Home prices are rising fast, so it might be time to get in before it’s too late. Here’s a realtor who sometimes reads this blog and can help you (especially vets)--be sure to say New Jax Witty sent you. I also know two realtors from my church who can help if you contact me.
A Funny Story From Our First Spelling Bee
My son participated in his first spelling bee this year, making it to the finals of his school and then filling in for the champ at the Duval County written spelling bee, which he did well enough on to get to be one of the 26 finalists. That's pretty cool, and it's further than I ever got in a spelling bee, even though I was pretty good at spelling. Just not in front of people. The event itself was an interesting experience, and one that's as much a lesson for parents as the kids. Problem is that not all the parents learn the lesson, apparently.

The spelling bee took place at a local high school, which is probably fairly typical, so if your kid makes it to the final round, that's where it will likely be. Prior to the contests (one written and then this oral one), we were provided with an initial list of words that didn't help much for the written test, though it does seem as if most of these words were used on the finalists. That's an important item to note, as it means the kids have had the opportunity to study at least some of the words being used. My son had seen the word he missed, and he spelled it correctly a couple weeks earlier. I blame myself a bit there, since I went and downloaded a list of words for him to study that had nothing to do with the list being used--just stick with the official company and its list if you're looking to study.

The high school that hosted the event had a nice-looking auditorium. However, the acoustics were horrendous. Since it's not like a huge crowd shows up for these events, I'd recommend using a library rather than an auditorium. A public library might even provide a nice Duval Schools outreach event. I used to run a talent show for many years for the high school at which I taught, and we used the library very successfully until the event grew too big. But I also made sure that when we transitioned to the auditorium, the acoustics were acceptable, since the talent show was at least partially about reading poetry. The main problem in the spelling bee case was the fact that the microphones were awful, and it was just hard to hear in the nearly-empty auditorium.

But hold on a second, since it took a good 20 minutes just to get into the actual spelling bee itself. We were introduced to the local celebrity judge panel, all of whom had a full bio read to the audience. We were introduced to the organizers. We were introduced to the principal of the school. We watched as the main organizer was thanked and received a token of appreciation, etc. And then we were introduced to each and every kid. None of that's a big problem, and after the first round, I understand why it was done early on (most families of kids who missed the first word left at that point, including us). This extended introduction provided the opportunity for someone, anyone, to notice how poorly the microphone setup was in order to provide a solution. Instead, we trudged on.

When the word reader person was introduced as a native of Georgia, I wondered whether my kid (a native of Wisconsin) would be able to understand what she was saying, but it wasn't really about that in the end. I knew it was going to be a struggle when she first grabbed the mic and the audience was treated to just about the worst microphone feedback in the history of bad sound hookups. Here's the science-y reason why from Science ABC:
To put it in simple words, feedback is a high-pitched sound that comes out of speakers when something about the arrangement or the calibration of the audio system is not suitable for the desired setting.
Testing a system out before the event is usually a good idea. Based on the number of problems with people hearing the speakers, I'd say the stage crew at this local high school had never worked on a spelling bee before. The person reading the words (who we'd learned earlier loves her pets and walks on the beach) was sitting down in front of the stage, and her positioning might have been in the wrong location relative to the speakers.

This is how I'd assess the general sound requirements of a spelling bee: the kids need to understand the words coming out of the word giver's mouth. If that means the parents not hearing everything or the students standing right next to the reader, then so be it. Instead, it seemed important for the parents to hear all. It was also apparently important for parents to understand all kinds of rules when it came to them filing a protest, which I thought was just a formality. Apparently not.

So the deal was that none of the kids could hear this speaker all that well. She had a little bit of an accent. The venue was not the best, but it was fair because everyone had to deal with it. My son claimed after his misspelling that he thought he heard a different word, but that word did not exist nor was it on his list. So he imagined a different word. And he might not have been alone. A few kids confidently spelled their words wrong, while others asked for more details about the word before messing up the spelling. But only one kid was the "rivulet" kid. And only one family failed its kid in that first round.

Like I said, everyone had the list. Rivulet, or maybe rivulets, was on the list. I remembered it when I heard our word mistress say it. Riv-u-let. The speller, who seemed to be even more socially awkward than the average spelling bee kid, needed it again. And again. Over and over. Definitions, origins, used in a sentence. Pronounced again, etc. He just refused to spell anything because he could not figure out what exactly he was hearing. Again, everyone had the same woman speaking, and everyone had access to the same list of words. But we all had to feel bad for this kid for nearly 10 minutes. I'm not lying; it felt more like 10 hours. Finally, he said the word and spelled it incorrectly. A collective feeling of relief followed from all of the parents who still had kids in the contest. At least that kid would be out of it.

But wait, the kid who obviously had not studied the list, couldn't figure out the word, refused to give it a shot, nearly started crying in front of the whole room, and failed in a way that no kid wants to fail, got a reprieve. His parents were the only ones who successfully challenged the ruling, rewarding the Rivulet Kid with another chance to embarrass himself. The only kid to advance to the second round without even spelling a word correctly. Obviously, the rule should be that he'd have to spell something correctly. He didn't even spell an actual word. After 10 minutes and a couple dozen repeats of the word, he chose to spell a word that did not exist. If he'd spelled amulet or river inlet or livery, I'd have had some compassion for the kid.

I have to admit I felt anger that Rivulet Kid's parents protested and won. I even said it out loud, not caring that they sat a few feet away. It was as easy a word as anyone had in the first round. Everyone was dealing with the same audio problems and the same Southern Drawl from the same speaker. Everyone had the same list to study or not study. But this kid was allowed to continue. The squeaky wheel getting the grease, once again.

Don't get me wrong, I'd rather deal with parents who want their kids to succeed than parents who just want to blame teachers for their kids' failure, but when parents who want their kids to succeed ALSO blame the teachers, that's a disaster. All the other kids who missed their first round words were sad, though (I hope) supported by their families. Those kids were allowed to fail, since we all could have complained about the acoustics. The problem is that we all had to explain to our children why Rivulet Kid was allowed to keep going. I just told my son it was because his parents were jackasses.

In all, my kid wanted to win, even though he got bounced in the first round. I told him that if he really wants to win next year, it will take some dedication to learning words that no one cares about, like rivulet. However, and this is important, I told him that he would never be getting a protest from us in order to make up for his deficiencies. We don't make excuses to his teachers at school, we don't hound his coaches for more playing time, and we don't try to force people to let him win when he's lost.
Church of God the Mother at UNF

UNF sent out an email regarding at least one of the churches that shows up on campus to talk to students. I don't attend UNF, so I don't actually know much about the situation. But I went to college, and there were sometimes churches represented near the Union, and there were sometimes heated debates. I never got involved myself, and I was only approached one time, so I'm not taking a stand on Christians on Campus or Socialists or Republicans or White Nationalists. So I'm cool with anyone except Nihilists or The Eagles showing up on campus to discuss whatever with Millennials. I'm just wondering about the name "Church of God the Mother."

It looks like the Church of God the Mother is somehow related to the World Mission Society Church of God. This is a church out of South Korea that believes the following (Wikipedia):

The church believes in God the Father and God the Mother,[8] claiming to be restoring the truth and practices of the early Church.[2] The church also believes that co-founder Zang Gil-ja is God the Mother, as taught by the founder Ahn Sahng-hong[9].
The World Mission Society Church of God believes that all of its teachings are based on the Bible, as explained in the numerous books written by Ahn Sahng-hong.
The lady in the photo is apparently God the Mother. I don't think she's supposed to be a Korean version of Mary, the Mother of God. She's just the co-founder of the church, but I'm not really sure if she's supposed to be part of the Holy Trinity or what. I looked her up, and it looks like she is considered to be God the Mother because she has fulfilled the prophecies of the Bible. Seems legit. And it makes me wonder more about the Kia Soul.

From my extensive research, it looks like this church was hanging out at Vanderbilt, also trying to lure young women into their ranks. Some people have accused the church of trafficking women, and I saw a Charlie's Angels episode that was kind of like this, but I don't know if that's true.

The problem with the local news is that it mixed the current church situation with video it obtained of some dude going nuts about homosexuals on campus. That's just traditional campus soapbox rhetoric. People targeting young women and trying to get them to join a church that might go all Moonie on them is kind of a different scenario. Sure, some people would say all churches are cults, but this one really does operate like something out of a Charlie's Angels episode,, at least based on some of the articles I've seen online. But you can't believe everything you read online. Except this blog, of course.

So if you are a vulnerable young woman on a college campus (or in a Walmart parking lot--another place the church recruits), just do some research before you start praying to God the Mother. Or that God the Father dude, even if he "friends" you. Also, if you have a story about this church you'd like to share, I'd like to add it to this website, so go ahead and send me a message.

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