Skip to Content, Navigation, or Footer.
We inform. You decide.
Friday, March 29, 2024

Harvey Budd’s campaign emphasizes innovation, equal opportunity

<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Harvey Budd&nbsp;</span></p>

Harvey Budd 

Harvey Budd is good with numbers.

He ran an accounting business with other students out of a small office during his junior year at UF then graduated from the Fisher School of Accounting in 1969. Since then, he’s started his own accounting practice, built a motel and founded two TV broadcasting companies “before it was cool,” he said.

Budd, 67, knows what it’s like to be a business owner in Gainesville.

Now a candidate for city commissioner at-large, Budd aims to provide equal opportunity for all Gainesville residents, to re-evaluate Gainesville Regional Utilities management and to help young professionals launch their businesses.

Budd, sporting an orange Gator T-shirt, sat at Bagels Unlimited in late February describing his platform.

His first mandate, he said, is lowering — or at least leveling off — GRU rates.

“There’s a lot of outstanding issues that people are fighting over right now about the viability of the utility in general and whether we can afford to have a biomass plant,” he said.

He wants to establish an advisory board to serve as a layer between GRU management and the commission. The five to seven advisers would analyze the situation based on best utility practices in the state and provide recommendations.

He also wants to bring manufacturing jobs to East Gainesville. He wants to provide vocational training and employment to the portion of the population for which college may not be a viable option.

“We desperately need jobs for everybody, not just the tech community,” he said.

Mark Goldstein, former Gainesville city commissioner and mayor, grew up with Budd in Gainesville and shares many of his views.

“He’s always had a sensitivity and concern for less advantaged people,” Goldstein said. “His commitment for the public interest has always impressed me.”

Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox

Budd has served on the Alachua County Planning Commission for 14 years, the city’s plan board for five years and on the cultural commission for three. He’s a member of the Alachua County School Board One Mill Oversight Committee and is involved with the Hippodrome State Theatre, UF Hillel and the Congregation B’Nai Israel synagogue.

The list goes on.

“The big thing is giving back,” he said. “That’s the secret of success by me: Give more than you take.”

Budd said he also wants to help young entrepreneurs through crowdfunding. If elected, he would choose one business or idea a month, market it and ask the community to donate to that particular business.

“It would be basically for innovators — anybody in the community that has a good idea,” he said. “Rather than struggle with that good idea or sell it off to somebody else who steals it, they’d have a chance to develop it and stay in Gainesville.”

[A version of this story ran on page 8 on 3/11/2015]

J. Wayne Reitz Union

655 Reitz Union Drive, UF Campus, Gainesville, FL 32611

Phillips Center for the Performing Arts

315 Hull Road, UF Campus, Gainesville, FL 32611

Florida Museum of Natural History

3215 Hull Road, UF Campus, Gainesville, FL 32611

SFC Center for Innovation & Economic Development

530 W. University Ave., Gainesville, FL 32601

Thelma Boltin Activity Center

516 NE Second Ave., Gainesville, FL 32601

Doyle Conner Building

1911 SW 34th St., Gainesville, FL 32614

Paramount Plaza Hotel

2900 SW 13th St., Gainesville, FL 32608

Early voting is through Saturday at: 

Cone Park Library

Millhopper Branch Library                

Supervisor of Elections Office

Harvey Budd 

Support your local paper
Donate Today
The Independent Florida Alligator has been independent of the university since 1971, your donation today could help #SaveStudentNewsrooms. Please consider giving today.

Powered by SNworks Solutions by The State News
All Content © 2024 The Independent Florida Alligator and Campus Communications, Inc.