Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Identifying Local Opportunities



“Smokin’ Tailpipe isn’t good”

This article from The Florida Times Union is a story about a man’s car that he has had since new but now has smoke coming out of the tailpipe of his car while driving it. AS he tries to find a quick fix for his problem the newspaper article goes on to explain there is not likely a cheap fix and it will end up costing a decent amount of money to be repaired. In this case its likely he ran the car out of oil at one point, damaged the piston rings, and then now there is no easy or cheap fix for this. The problem in the story is that the owner of this car bought it brand new and its always run fine but dude to a lack of preventative maintenance, his car is starting to give him problems as it gets older. The man that owns the car in need of repair is obviously the one who has the problem. However, the real group of people that have the problem are ones that want to own a car for a long period of time however are not aware enough about maintenance on a car which will lead to big problems down the road.


Urgency is a must for Downtown development”

In this story it details Jacksonville’s downtown areas and how they need to be re-developed in order to keep up with the town’s growing population and changing culture. The local governments are slow to act toward change and have yet to put a sense of urgency behind revamping Jacksonville’s aging downtown areas. The problem in the story is that the older areas of Jacksonville need to be re-done or re-developed however there is no one that has any sense of urgency to actually do it. In turn, this hurts the people of Jacksonville that live in these areas or nearby them. In addition, it hurts the City of Jacksonville since redeveloped areas could bring in additional income for the city and attract new residents.


“Scooter companies battle logistics issues”

This story details how scooter companies are doing incredibly well, experiencing large growth and getting investors however they are starting to face major logistical issues when it come to bringing their product to a large urban market in cities. There are many different challenges they face such as charging stations for scooters, rental locations and what people do when they are done using the scooter. The issue here is that these scooter companies have a great product and concept however they are struggling when it comes to solving the problem of hanging them in big cities with thousands of users. Furthermore, local city legislators are not in favor or making a big change to their cities for a company that provides easy transportation. This becomes a problem of the city’s residents when they are either unable to use these scooters or become restricted in their use due to a lack of charging stations, parking and other things necessary for a fleet of electric scooters.


“Internet Cafes are Frequent Site of Violence”

This story discusses how there has been a recent spike in crimes involving internet cafes and arcades around the city of Jacksonville. Such violence includes armed robbery, drive-by shootings and homicide. While local authorities are doing what they can, it is clearly not enough to keep these areas safe for their citizens. The problem here is that violent crimes continue to occur in areas where the shouldn’t and even though police are doing what they can, there needs to be some additional protection for innocent people. This problem most effects the citizens that visit these places or live nearby them. However, it also poses a problem to the police force and how they can work to make the city safer.


“Business Owners deal with worker thefts”

In this newspaper article a small business owner has to deal with her former employees trying to steal from her. The two employees gave their notice to quit, however even after quitting their accounts for the business were still active, allowing them to go into the company database and use it to steal money away from their former employer. By the time they were caught it cost the company an estimated $70,000 to $80,000. The problem here is that for small and medium size business it can be much harder to prevent and detect theft from an employee, especially if there are very few employees and only one owner. In small businesses like this, the owner must be able to trust the people they employ in order to advance their business. In this case the group with the problem is the thousands of small business owners that are vulnerable to theft from within their company since they can’t necessarily afford the protection and financial checks that most large companies operate with.


3 comments:

  1. Hey Matt! I was very impressed by how you were so easily able to concisely find or figure out who the persons that were being directly affected was. Even though there were a significant of other factors and others that were affected by the same problem there is always that one entity who actually owns the problem. One of the only observations I have is that in the fourth article I think those places that are saturated in crime have a much tougher problem to fix than just simply adding more protection. I believe the only way in fixing those areas with high crime rate is to start implanting the right ideas to the youth of those communities.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey Matt! I applaud you on your ability to identify such prevalent local issues. I personally relate to the second story, “Urgency is a must for Downtown development,” as Jacksonville is my hometown and I have witnessed the never-ending construction that ultimately slows traffic every single day. Your focus on transportation and crime as themes throughout your identification of local opportunities should prove helpful if you ever decide to pursue such opportunities due to the ongoing importance of both themes.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hey Matt,
    You are very clear cut with your writing and reading about these summary of new articles made me very interested. The first story is very funny because maintenance is very key in keeping a car running that reminds me let me go check my oil... You did a great job at identifying local issue and locating the what and who was the problem.

    ReplyDelete