After sitting long vacant on the Northbank, the former JEA headquarters at 21 W. Church St. is on track for a full-blown reinvention. Live Oak Contracting plans to turn the 19-story tower and adjacent buildings into The Jewel at 21 West, a mixed-income redevelopment with roughly 180 apartments, ground-floor restaurants and rooftop amenities that aims to bring real day-to-night life back to downtown.
Sale approved and what’s included
On Feb. 24, JEA’s board voted 6-0 to sell the three-building, 2.47-acre campus to Live Oak for $1 million, sending the deal to City Council for final approval, according to the Jax Daily Record. The property includes a 347,811-square-foot office tower, a 248,220-square-foot customer service center, the 421 Laura St. parking garage with more than 500 spaces and a below-grade deck that previously served the headquarters. The Jax Daily Record also reported that Live Oak posted $100,000 in earnest money and can reclaim that deposit during a 365-day inspection period.
What Live Oak is proposing
In a Sept. 12 announcement, Live Oak Contracting and its partners, operating as The Jewel at 21 West LLC with Lone Pine Development and design by Gensler, laid out an adaptive-reuse plan that would convert the tower into about 180 residential units. The former customer service center would become a hub for food, wellness and creative office uses. Developer materials call for structured parking, a central plaza and activated alleyways, and project estimates point to more than 300 construction jobs and over 100 permanent positions. Live Oak president and CEO Paul Bertozzi has cast the project as a mix of historic preservation and downtown revitalization, with an eye toward making the old utility campus feel like a true neighborhood anchor.
Financing, timeline and mixed-income language
The development team is branding the project as mixed-income while it lines up money to make it pencil out. The Jacksonville Business Journal reports that Live Oak and its partners are working to secure financing, complete due diligence and phase construction between the tower and the customer service building before breaking ground. The Business Journal story also shared a new Gensler rendering and relayed Live Oak’s comment that the schedule will depend heavily on public-private financing and the availability of tax credits. Until lenders and public partners lock in their terms, the construction start remains a moving target.
Price, cost gaps and public support
The $1 million sale price is a fraction of a 2025 formal appraisal that pegged the campus at roughly $15 million and a Duval County Property Appraiser figure near $30 million, while independent estimates have put renovation costs in the tens of millions, the Jax Daily Record reported. Live Oak’s bid outlined a capital stack of about 65% debt, 20% private equity and 15% public funding, and the Downtown Investment Authority has signaled the deal could need a multi-million dollar completion grant to close the financing gap. How City Council, the DIA and nearby stakeholders respond to those funding requests will shape whether this vision actually gets built.
What’s next
With the JEA board’s approval in hand, the sale now heads to City Council for sign-off while Live Oak continues talking with lenders and potential public partners, according to the Jacksonville Business Journal. Community outreach, permitting and historic-preservation reviews are expected to follow, and the one-year inspection window gives the development team time to complete its due diligence before any major construction begins. Coverage of the project’s initial selection last fall noted that public hearings and any incentive requests will be key milestones as The Jewel at 21 West moves through the approval process.
