It's more important than ever for Gainesville to be welcoming of new neighbors
If we want more Democrats to live in Florida, we need to center our Democratic cities around policies that help people live here
If you make the unfortunate decision to dive into the comments section of a post about apartments on the Gainesville Word of Mouth Facebook group, you’re likely to see a comment or a few about how Gainesville is full and people need to stop coming. That is such nonsense. Now more than ever, we need to reject that kind of messaging. We need more people who want to come to Gainesville to feel welcomed here. And not a hollow welcome of words or empty gestures, but a “oh we can afford to live here and it feels great to be here” sort of welcome. The good news is that the City Commission has recently taken steps to encourage the development of smaller starter homes, which should have a long term effect of increasing housing inventory and cooling off prices. It’s a good start, but there’s more work to do.
In case you haven’t noticed, Florida is a bright red Republican state at the moment. It’s not purple. It’s not a swing state anymore. There are six counties in the state that went for Democrats this election - Alachua, Broward, Gadsden, Leon, Orange, and Palm Beach (barely). That’s it. When people move to a new place, increasingly one of the more important factors is finding a like-minded community with shared values. If Democrats want to move to Florida – and despite our state politics, there are a lot of great things about our state – there’s a good chance they’ll want to move to Alachua County. I made a similar decision back in 2021. It was a great decision! Let’s make it a no-brainer for folks.
Gainesville is great, and it should be a poorly kept secret at this point. Having the University of Florida nearby means Gainesville residents have access to world class cultural and sporting events. We’ve got some pretty good restaurants in town, and most importantly, we have a robust community of folks who care deeply about this place and work hard to make it better. People should want to live here!
We have a chance to make Gainesville a progressive beacon in bright red Florida if we can manage the will for it. We have some pretty good leaders in both the county and the city. Seriously, compare someone like Harvey Ward, who has been on the whole a pretty darn good mayor, with someone like Mayor Eric Adams (lol) of New York City. Democrats seem to really suck at running big cities, Karen Bass of LA excepted as it’s bit too soon to tell there and there’s some early promise. I wish it weren’t true, but name the last great Democrat to be a big city mayor. I can’t wait that long.1 But it doesn’t have to be that way with small cities, and Gainesville, our Gainesville can show the way here. We can continue to build a welcoming community that centers people and their needs. We can make it easier to build more housing of all types including and especially affordable housing. We can make our streets safer for pedestrians, cyclists, and children and our transit system more reliable and equitable, so that those without a car don’t have to feel left behind or unsafe. We can continue to build great parks and community gathering spots, especially in the populous southwest part of town that is starved for quality parks.
A lot of Republicans moved to Florida during the pandemic. The state made it attractive for them to come here, and the people who moved found communities where they could live comfortably. If we want to have even a hope of making Florida a more progressive and better state to live in, we better do the same on the city level. Yes, that means bigger cities like Orlando, Miami, and Tampa have work to do. But don’t sleep on our city too. Don’t sleep on Gainesville. The elements are here to make our bluest of dots in Florida that much bigger. But we’re going to need to want it, and we’re going to need to be bold in making our city more welcoming of new neighbors.
Mike Bloomberg was a Republican and then an independent so he doesn’t count. He also had some fairly reprehensible policing policies.
Trying to be hopeful. This article helps. Thanks for the positive outlook.