Mosaic Installation for Pleasant Street in Gainesville

Alachua County Board of County Commissioners (hereinafter, the “County” or “Alachua County”) is seeking proposals from qualified individuals or entities (hereinafter, referred to as "Artist”) for the provision of Mosaic Installation for Pleasant Street in Gainesville an outdoor mosaic installation for the State Attorney’s Office building to celebrate the transition between Downtown and the Historic Pleasant Street Neighborhood.

This project is funded by the Gainesville Community Reinvestment Area.

Location: Alachua County is located in North Central Florida. The County government seat is situated in Gainesville. Gainesville is located 70 miles southwest of Jacksonville, 129 miles southeast of Tallahassee, 140 miles northeast of Tampa - St. Petersburg and 109 miles northwest of Orlando. Alachua County has a population of over 250,000 and a regional airport. The County itself consists of a total area of 969 square miles.

Form of Government: Alachua County is governed by a Board of five (5) elected County Commissioners and operates under the established County Manager Charter form of government. In addition to the five County Commissioners, there are five elected Constitutional Officers: Supervisor of Elections, Sheriff, Clerk of the Court, Tax Collector, and the Property Appraiser. The Alachua County Attorney also reports to the Board.

Alachua County Arts Council: The Arts Council of Alachua County (ACAC) serves as a resource for local artists and arts agencies, including all municipalities, throughout Alachua County. The Arts Council prepares applications for state and federal grants and re-grants eligible grants to local artists and local arts agencies. It prepares applications for eligible state and federal grants to provide enhanced resources for local artists and local arts agencies, and educates and advocates at the state and federal level on issues affecting the arts.

The mission of The Arts Council of Alachua County is “to enhance the quality of the visual environment in Alachua County, thereby adding to the quality of life and the level of citizen awareness of the importance of aesthetic experience in their everyday lives.”

The State Attorney’s Office is charged under Florida law with being the chief prosecuting officer for his judicial circuit and the counties in it. Florida statutes and criminal rules define those duties, which are primarily focused on criminal offenders. The State Attorney, with his appointed Assistants and other staff, appears in the courts to represent the interests of justice and of the people.

The Pleasant Street Historic District is significant as the first and most important black residential neighborhood in Gainesville, Florida. Founded immediately after the Civil War, the area represented a transition in the status of black people in Alachua County from that of slave laborers supporting a rural plantation economy to one of freedmen seeking to establish a new existence of economic independence and cultural self-determination in an urban environment. The district also demonstrates the often-curious ambiguity and contradictory social relationship that existed between black people and southern whites that allowed close physical proximity, since the southern part of the district is a historically white residential area.