JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – For two years Jacksonville won’t be home to the annual matchup between the Florida Gators and the Georgia Bulldogs as EverBank stadium undergoes renovations.

The game will be played in Atlanta in 2026 and Tampa in 2027.

Enrique Hinojosa, a Georgia fan, said the announcement was bittersweet.

“Not because of the locations just because it’s not RV City,” Hinojosa said. “The friends and family we made here over the years probably won’t reunite there. And what we do here you can’t do there. So we’ll probably skip out those two years.”

On another side, other people didn’t mind it.

“We’ll be in Atlanta at Mercedes Benz in 2026 and Tampa in 2027,” Randy Stone, a Georgia fan said.

“I started thinking how am I going to get my RV down there,” Richard Dean, a Florida Fan. “Where are we going to park the RV… “We’ll get there. We’ll figure it out.”

The games not being played in Jacksonville in 2026 and 2027 aren’t a first.

In 1994, the game was played in Gainesville, and in 1995 it was played in Athens.

Stone said he’s just glad the decision-makers chose a neutral site for 2026 and 2027.

“If they take campus to campus, I don’t think it’ll ever comeback to a neutral site,” Stone said.

This game is one that brings in a lot of money to our area.

According to Katie Mitura, chief marketing officer for Visit Jacksonville, the estimated economic impact the game had on our area in 2023 was nearly 38 million dollars.

Their chief marketing officer broke it down even further and said the direct cash spent, or money spent on things like hotels and other businesses was nearly 22 million dollars last year.

In 2022, the economic impact was nearly 40 million dollars.

While the direct cash spent was almost 23 million dollars.

The game not being here could mean a loss of money for the area.

News4JAX asked Visit Jacksonville if they had a statement about the game not being here and the potential loss of money for the area.

They said, in part. they are “really excited about the new stadium in 2028…and we are doing a lot of work to fill in the gap for the business holes during those years.“

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KKTV) – A couple is behind bars is Lee County, Florida this week after officials say they defrauded two women in Monument out of millions of dollars. Philip and Nicole Scolaro are now facing five felony charges.

One of the victims was blind and elderly at the time of the alleged scene. She’s now dead and was not able to find justice while alive.

“It happens way too often. I think a lot of it is again they don’t know that it is a scam,” said Annie Hewitt, the Director of Health and Wellness at Silver Key Senior Services.

The Scolaros told their victims they were the owners of a working gold mine in Africa. Over the course of three years, the pair stole more than $4 million from two women, according to a 17 page grand jury indictment from the State of Colorado.

The Scolaros were arrested in Lee County, Florida at the end of October.

The pair reportedly asked for investors to help extract, secure, and transport gold from their so-called mine, with a promise of a return of their investment. That money in-turn was used for their own personal expenses, buying properties and luxury cars.

According to the indictment, one of the victims, Martha Larson, was an at-risk person during the scheme. She transferred over three properties to the Scolaros totaling more than $2.1 million. The second victim, Leslie Cohen, gave them more than $800,000.

“It’s really sad when that happens because to be able to recover from that, it’s almost impossible,” said Hewitt.

The indictment also details this would not be Philip’s first offense. The court papers detail that he has a lengthy criminal record dating back to 1987 in New Jersey.

Philip is also facing criminal charges in Florida, including grand theft and fraud of less than $20,000.

No word yet on when the couple will be extradited back to Colorado.

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