First Coast Connect

A student group at Flagler College takes a deep dive into the effects of political misinformation and media bias in a campus event dubbed a “Civic Revival.” The event features John Gable, cofounder and CEO of AllSides, a technology company that aims to puncture political illusions based on mis- or disinformation, and to break through cultural silos that prevent civic engagement and community connection. The forum, “The Understanding Crisis: Why We All Can’t Seem to Get Along,” will be held in Lewis Auditorium at 6 p.m. Wednesday and is open to the public.

Resources for conducting insightful and respectful community conversations can be found at Living Room Conversations.

Guests:

• John Gable, cofounder and CEO of AllSides
• Gabriel James, founder and president of Pathway America

Former Jaguars linebacker Lonnie Marts Jr. is the father of five kids, but when he was growing up, his own father was not around. The experience inspired him to found Level the Playing Field Leadership Academy, a program designed to offer young men academic and emotional support while increasing their exposure to opportunities for cultural enrichment and character development. The program is open to boys ages 10-12, and participants remain in the program through age 21. We talk to Marts and a program participant about the power of male role models and the role the larger community can play in offering young men a helping hand.

Guests:

• JaQari Matthews, program mentee and First Coast High School senior
• Lonnie Marts Jr., former Jaguars linebacker, CEO and founder of Level the Playing Field Leadership Academy

The legacy of late Jacksonville silent filmmaker Richard Norman is celebrated in a new documentary project by students at The Performance Academy. Norman, a white director and producer who earned fame and fortune creating so-called “race films” featuring all-Black casts, has only one surviving film, The Flying Ace, from 1926. But he continues to inspire young filmmakers. The students’ short film Mute merges silent film traditions with modern themes. We discuss it ahead of the film’s premiere at the Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville at 6:30 p.m. Friday.

Guests:

• Jackson Boatwright, director of Fade to Black and Mute
• Nathan Boatwright, actor portraying Richard Norman
• Dylon Berryhill, executive producer of Fade to Black and Mute
  Kathryn McAvoy, executive director of The Performance Academy

A legend in the music business, musician and producer Don Was has made records for and performed alongside greats like the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Bob Weir, Iggy Pop, Bonnie Raitt, John Mayer, Willie Nelson and the B52s. In addition to winning six Grammys, including for Album of the Year in 1989 and Producer of the Year in 1994, Was spent decades crafting sonic landscapes for himself and others. He has also been a steadfast voice for the power of artistic vision and individuality. “The thing that makes you different isn’t a marketing problem,” he says. “It’s an artist’s superpower.” Was brings his talents to the First Coast with his newest project, the jazz/soul sounds of Don Was and the Pan Detroit Ensemble, for a local performance as part of the Fort Mose Jazz Blues Series. We listen to some of the classics he helped shape and ask about his process when working with the industry's most iconic musicians.

Guest: Don Was, Grammy-winning producer, musician and president of Blue Note Records

Museums have the power — and sometimes the obligation — to preserve and shape the stories that define us. That job has gotten far more complicated in an age of DEI backlash, as elected officials try to reshape or even whitewash those stories. The challenge is no different for the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee, which was established in 1991 at the Lorraine Motel, where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968. Dr. Russ Wigginton, the museum’s current president, noted in a September 2025 op-ed that Black history museums around the country face challenges due to “sweeping federal oversight.” He writes: “This isn’t just a polarized disagreement. It’s a calculated campaign to rewrite, repress and reframe America’s racial history into what some might consider a more comfortable or easier-to-digest narrative.” Wigginton explains how his museum is responding to bureaucratic challenges and shares his own family's history with racial activism ahead of his presentation at the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens.

Guest: Dr. Russ Wigginton, president, National Civil Rights Museum

Despite the famous aphorism that “all politics is local,” it increasingly seems like all local politics are national. Whether it’s the effect of federal ICE enforcement, the president’s push to federalize elections or an audit by Florida “DOGE,” national headlines are dominating First Coast politics. We get expert analysis about how it’s affecting local policy, governance, finances and possibly even the midterm elections with attorney and author Chris Hand. We also discuss why a St. Johns school official partly blames school vouchers for the district's budget deficit.

Guest: Chris Hand, local government expert, attorney and co-author with the late Sen. Bob Graham of America, the Owner's Manual

Fundraising, running a nonprofit and leading an arts organization poses a different kind of triple threat in an era when both public financing and cultural capital are experiencing retrenchment. But it’s just the latest challenge for Steven Libman, who’s spent 40 years running arts organizations, from ballets to regional theaters to, now, the Jacksonville Symphony. We ask him how the organization is adjusting to the current, often challenging reality and what changes may be in store to prepare for the road ahead.

Guest: Steven Libman, president and CEO of the Jacksonville Symphony 

A hybrid concert marries two passionate art forms: opera and classical sitar. The progeny is “The Sound of Love,” a concert featuring two local musical masters. The special Valentine’s Day performance will be held at the historic Karpeles Grand (the former Jacksonville Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum) in Springfield. The 70-minute concert will be Feb. 12 and offer two distinct experiences: a standard seated ticket, or the "Laydown" version, which promises a DIY "soundbath" for guests who bring their own mats, blankets and pillows.

Guests:

• Mariette Aida Anzueto, soprano, opera singer and subconscious coach
• Arvid Smith, sitarist

Each Friday, our media roundtable dives into the biggest stories of the week. Among our topics this week:

• Jacksonville officials are having a hard time confirming all of the “waste, fraud and abuse” identified in a Florida DOGE audit.
• A vanishing hologram: The mayor’s controversial airport video box is no more. 
• Duval schools scramble to find emergency contacts for students after ICE detains their parents.
• Florida drivers must now be English speakers under new licensing requirements that take effect Friday.

We’ll talk about all that and take your calls, questions and comments on our Friday Week In Review.

Guests:

• Robin Lumb, former Jacksonville City Council member
• Mike Mendenhall, City Hall reporter and associate editor at Jacksonville Today
• Riley Phillips, weekend anchor and reporter, First Coast News
• Megan Mallicoat, education reporter at Jacksonville Today

A gender inversion of a Broadway classic. Following the success of his Tony-award winning classic Lend Me a Tenor, comic playwright Ken Ludwig (also author of The Three Musketeers and Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express) created a character reversal in which the women take the lead in a similarly madcap comedy. We meet the director and cast of Amelia Community Theatre’s production of Lend Me a Soprano. 

Guests:

• Janet Hild, director of Lend Me A Soprano
• Anthony Rodriguez, actor playing Jerry
• Regina Torres, actor playing Elena Firenzi 
• Carlos Semidei, actor playing Pasquale 

An estimated 16,000 HIV and AIDS patients in Florida could lose their current access to medication and health care services under sweeping cuts to state programs. The Florida Department of Health announced changes to its AIDS Drug Assistance Program, lowering income-based eligibility thresholds and ending coverage of some retroviral medications. The Health Department says the changes are needed due to budget shortfalls, but the announcement Jan. 8 blindsided patients and health care providers. The changes will take effect March 1. This comes at the same time that new federal laws limiting Medicaid eligibility and eliminating Affordable Care Act subsidies stand to put health care out of reach for millions around the country — including those with HIV.

Guests:

• Dr. Mobeen Rathore, founding director of the University of Florida Center for HIV/AIDS Research, Education and Service
• Justin Bell, advocate, CEO and founder of Friends of The Quilt; former chair of the Northeast Florida World AIDS Day Committee
• Clintess "Cece" Benson, linkage to care specialist, AIDS Healthcare Foundation

Themes of home, belonging and migration emerge in a timely new exhibit in St. Augustine. We talk to the artist behind the exhibition — Roots, Return and the Weight of Memory — at Flagler College’s Crisp-Ellert Art Museum. Artist Kendra Frorup’s mixed media pieces draw on her Afro-Caribbean roots and incorporate prints, metal and concrete castings, even coconuts and other found items. We ask her about teaching, finding inspiration and her “ongoing exploration of Caribbean material culture and diasporic identity.”

Guest: Kendra Frorup, artist and associate professor of art and design at the University of Tampa

Local celebrations of Black history continue this weekend with the city's first-ever LaVilla Black History Market. The event, held at Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing Park at 120 N. Lee Street, is a partnership between the Ritz Theatre and Museum, The Florida Fish Pepper Co. and the Vibrant Places Collective, which manages programming at the new city park. The market gets rolling at 2 p.m. Saturday and includes multiple vendors, a fashion show, food trucks and interviews with local historians, authors and civil rights activists including Dr. Rodney Hurst Sr. and Carol Alexander. The event is free and open to the public.

Guests:

• Carla Mechele, curator, Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing Park
• Trey Ford, curator, LaVilla Black History Market
• Toni R. Settles, vendor and founder of Well Read Child

A Southwest Florida college and an ICE child detention center both see new measles outbreaks, part of the largest wave of infections since the disease was declared eradicated a quarter-century ago. Three cases are reported in Northeast Florida — two children and one a person in their 20s. Can we still say the U.S. has "eliminated" the highly contagious disease? Our resident doc, Mayo Clinic neurologist Dr. Joe Sirven, host of WJCT’s program and podcast What’s Health Got To Do With It? discusses that and other recent medical headlines in his monthly House Call.

Guest: Dr. Joe Sirven, Mayo Clinic neurologist and host of WJCT’s What’s Health Got To Do With It?

How are our choices today affecting local water quality, coastal resilience and even the effects of sea level rise? A panel of experts discusses local actions that have global implications. “Environmental Town Hall: The Impact We Make On Our World” will be held in the Lewis Auditorium at Flagler College from 6:30-8 p.m. Wednesday. It features Matanzas Riverkeeper Jen Lomberk, former First Coast News Chief Meteorologist Tim Deegan, Surfrider Foundation Florida Policy Manager Katie Bauman and Todd Osborne, professor of estuarine and wetland biogeochemistry at UF Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience. The event is free and open to the public, and a livestream is available.

Guest: Katie Bauman, Florida policy manager, Surfrider Foundation

If you’ve ever ridden an e-bike on the streets of Jacksonville — or nearly been hit by one — you probably have some thoughts about their safety. And you’re not alone. The mayors of Duval County’s three Beaches communities asked the North Florida Transportation Planning Organization to conduct an e-bike safety survey to help guide future policy. The TPO survey runs through Feb. 10 and is open to residents of or visitors to Atlantic, Neptune and Jacksonville beaches. We discuss the survey and safety of e-bikes on the First Coast.

Guest: Thalia Fusté, transportation planner, North Florida Transportation Planning Organization

Arrested in 2022 for his vocal opposition to the Russian war against Ukraine, dissident scholar Vladimir Kara-Murza was sent to one his country’s harshest prisons and placed in solitary confinement. His scheduled release date: April 21, 2047. That sentence was cut short in August 2024, however, when he became part of the largest East-West prisoner exchange since the Cold War — a deal that included the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. Kara-Murza’s release came just a few months after he won a Pulitzer Prize for columns he wrote for The Washington Post while behind bars. He will talk about advocacy, democracy and human rights as part of the Florida Forum Speaker Series on Tuesday at the Jacksonville Center for the Performing Arts. The event is hosted by The Women's Board benefiting Wolfson Children's Hospital. Money raised will go to create an enclosed outdoor space for children receiving behavioral health care

Guest: Vladimir Kara-Murza, Russian political prisoner, Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post columnist

From congressional fealty to Supreme Court deference to dispatching military-style deployments to American cities, President Trump has upended norms, constitutional law and the bounds of traditional governance. But is his amassing of executive power and privilege truly unprecedented, or does it have its roots in decades of legal and political groundwork? Four Jacksonville University scholars examine the historical roots of the current presidency. Matthew Corrigan, professor of political science; Rick Mullaney, director of the Haskell Institute of Public Policy; Jacksonville University School of Law Associate Dean Courtney Barclay; and Collin Schumock, assistant professor and lead researcher of the Haskell Public Policy Institute, discuss and debate the issue, President Trump and Executive Power: Too Far or Historical Artifact?, on Wednesday in JU’s Gooding Auditorium.

Guest: Matthew Corrigan, professor of political science at Jacksonville University

What have the trickle-down politics of Donald Trump meant for the First Coast? A local reporter examines how the political trends that have reshaped the Republican Party and recalibrated its value system on a national level now inform municipal level decision-making. The Jan. 31 episode of the investigative podcast Reveal with Al Letson recounts the Jacksonville City Council’s epic 14-hour budget meeting last September, where lawmakers were riven by disagreements over diversity, equity and inclusion spending. According to the podcast, “What became clear as the budget debate crept into the wee hours of the morning is that many local Republican elected officials are no longer taking their cues from their constituents or even deep-pocketed civic and business leaders who once held enormous sway over city elections. Instead, they are marching to the beat of — and appropriating — national politics.”

Guest: Trinity Webster-Bass, investigative journalism fellow, The Tributary

Though just 26 years old and performing jazz for less than a decade, Samara Joy has already been recognized as one of the strongest voices in the history of the genre. Joy has won six Grammy awards, including two in 2023 for Best New Artist and Best Jazz Vocal Album (a category she claimed again this year). Joy has performed at the Newport, Monterey and Montreal jazz festivals and at such storied venues as the Apollo, Carnegie Hall, the Village Vanguard and Lincoln Center. Now, jazz fans in Northeast Florida have a chance to see her as part of the Fort Mose Jazz & Blues Series. We talked to Joy about her meteoric rise and what to expect at her upcoming show.

Guest: Six-time Grammy Award-winning jazz singer Samara Joy

Can HOA tensions lead to murder? The author of a new novel explores the politics of a gated community set in the eerily familiar “Costa Verde” community along Coastal Highway A1A. From the Lilly Pulitzer dresses to the English pub north of St. Augustine “in the middle of nowhere,” there are local touchstones aplenty. We ask the author how the fictional discovery of a bloodstained body opened up a path to explore the politics of insular suburbia.

Guest: Shelley Marsh, author of Dying to Live Here

Each Friday, our media roundtable dives into the biggest stories of the week. Among our topics this week:

• A sustained ICE storm of a different kind strikes as immigration enforcement affects everything from campus life to local restaurants.
• Jacksonville lawmakers consider extending nightclub hours even as a beloved brewery closes.
• State health officials are criticized for waiting a week to disclose local measles cases.
• The Museum of Science & History delays construction on its new museum even as its old home is slated for demolition.
  

We’ll talk about all that and more with our panel of journalists on our Friday Week in Review.

Guests:

• Mike Mendenhall, associate editor and City Hall reporter at Jacksonville Today
• Anthony Austin, investigative reporter and anchor, First Coast News
• Frank Powers, former assignment manager at News4Jax
• Obi Umanna, attorney and political consultant

Piano prodigies compete to perform at the 2026 Lift Every Voice and Sing Festival. For the second year, The Friends of the Brentwood Library is hosting the James Weldon Johnson and J. Rosamond Johnson Youth Piano Competition, honoring the legacy of Jacksonville’s most famous songwriting siblings. The event commemorates the 126th anniversary of Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing, also known as the Black national anthem, which was written by James Weldon Johnson and scored by his brother for a celebration of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday. The deadline to enter the competition is Feb. 3. The pianists compete at 10 a.m. Feb. 7 at the Jacksonville Main Library.

Guest: Sharon Coon, founder and president, The Friends of Brentwood Public Library

In a state considered a hub for human trafficking, Jacksonville leads the way. Though the city ranked just third-highest when it comes to overall human trafficking cases, it recorded the highest number of commercial sex ads in Florida in 2024, with more than 58,000 documented solicitations. Experts and advocates say the figure demonstrates “a severe, localized demand for commercial sexual exploitation.” We talk to two experts and a survivor-advocate about what's being done to disrupt sex trafficking on the First Coast and what additional efforts are needed.

Guests:

• Kristin Keen, founder and chief executive officer, Rethreaded
• Ruby Peters, Northeast Florida Human Trafficking Coalition ambassador and human trafficking educator with Catholic Charities Bureau Inc., Diocese of St. Augustine 
• Jamie Rosseland, advocate and member resource manager, Arize Together

Then, improv comedy on the First Coast? We say yes, and … ! The founders of Jacksonville’s first ever brick and mortar improv club discuss their shared love of the comic form and why they chose to bring the fast-paced performance art to the area. Alex and Madelaine Grindeland met doing improv in Seattle in 2020, before moving to Jacksonville in 2021. They are now the married owners of First Coast Comedy, which hosts live performances every Friday and Saturday from its renovated Mayport Road digs. We ask them what’s so funny about it.

Guests:

• Alex and Madelaine Grindeland, co-owners and managers, First Coast Comedy

And, how old is sunlight? Our resident spaceman says by the time it reaches earth, it’s pretty ancient — despite the speed of light. Although it takes just eight minutes to travel the distance between the sun and Earth, light’s journey starts much earlier. Because it originates deep in the core of the sun, the light we see and feel is tens of thousands of years old, if not hundreds of thousands of years. Starman Eddie Whistler helps us wrap our head around the science.

Guest: Eddie Whisler, director of planetarium and outreach, Museum of Science & History