By Lynn Jones
In a Northside neighborhood too often associated with crime, poverty, struggling schools and blight, one Jacksonville businessman is betting on something different: investment, young people and ice cream.
Demetrius Burroughs recently opened a neighborhood ice cream shop at Moncrief Road and Rowe Avenue, turning a once-vacant property into a business serving sweet treats — and a larger message about the value of the Moncrief community.
Burroughs arrived in Jacksonville from Fort Lauderdale about 20 years ago and began investing in real estate before settling with his family in the Washington Estates neighborhood. When he considered downsizing his portfolio, a friend suggested transforming the vacant Moncrief property into an ice cream shop, noting few similar businesses nearby. Now you see Scoops across from the St. Thomas Family Life Center and it is his second installment of an ice cream parlor with the first being on Main Street in Springfield.
As renovations began, Burroughs said he repeatedly heard the same question: “Why Moncrief?”
His answer: “Why not?”
The shop offers 18 premium ice cream flavors and 10 varieties of water ice, also known as Italian ice. But Burroughs, who is also active in community service through Grand Lodge 27 Masonic Lodge, wants the business to serve more than desserts.
Students at Ribault Middle and Raines and Ribault High schools who earn A’s and B’s can bring their semester report cards to the shop and receive a free scoop of ice cream.
The incentive reflects Burroughs’ larger goal of rewarding achievement while demonstrating that neighborhoods frequently overlooked for new businesses deserve investment, too.
For Burroughs, every scoop represents a small challenge to the narrative that has followed Moncrief for decades.
And when people continue to ask why he chose Moncrief, his response remains unchanged.
“Why not?”