JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Six hundred new jobs are coming to Mayport this week.
The Navy will open a $16 million building on Friday in which sailors and civilians will perform those new jobs.
Action News Jax's John Bachman got exclusive access to what will be classified space. He also learned how the new littoral combat ships will help the 3,000 local employees working in the area's billion-dollar ship repair industry.
The new combat ships are the future of the Navy and Mayport. Navy ships still fill the basin, but instead of 20-plus ships home-ported in Mayport, it's down to about 14. Fewer ships means fewer shops along Mayport Road.
"Most of this is closed up for a year or more. It's just kind of dead end. Little restaurants usually close up," Mayport resident Lisa Strickland said.
"A year ago we were very concerned. The FF6 are going and we didn't have anything in sight. All we saw was workloads dropping," said J. Michael McGrath of the Jacksonville Area Ship Repair Association.
McGrath represents 61 Jacksonville area ship repair businesses and 3,000 local employees. The frigates are leaving, but the littorals are coming. In February, Action News Jax exclusively showed the Wisconsin shipyard building the eight ships headed to Mayport in the next 5 years, bringing the number of ships in Mayport by 2020 back up to about 20.
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"If you've got 20-21 ships, you've got work. Yeah, you've got work," McGrath said.
In fact, in the next year, McGrath and a ship repair company general manager both said the workload will be "phenomenal."
"We were able to hold on and now (we're) starting to head up the other side of the mountain," McGrath said.
"If they do come in, it will do amazing. People don't realize how much Navy and Navy dependents build up a town. We keep a lot of small businesses in business," Strickland said.
"This will hold about 20-30 crew and staff," said Capt. Paul Young, LCS fleet commander.
Before it opens Friday, Young gave us an exclusive look at what will be classified space in the new fleet headquarters.
The $16 million building opens in just a couple of days. Early on, there will be about 200 people working inside. When it's full, there will be 600 people. That's 600 jobs for Mayport, which doesn't include the jobs created when the littorals need repairs.
"The impact of Mayport on our group is probably $1.8 billion a year," McGrath said.
The jobs are coming back with the ships, and the shops are coming back, too. A leasing agent for property in the area said business is rebounding even before the first littoral arrives.
In December, the littoral USS Milwaukee, which we showed you in Wisconsin in February, will arrive for several months of testing.
In about a year, the USS Little Rock, Mayport's first littoral, will arrive.
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