Meet Doug Benefield
Doug Benefield III, a lifelong OP resident and licensed CPA, began first grade at St Johns Country Day School, where he met his wife Cary in seventh grade. Now 37 years old, they have two sons who enjoy camping and spending their free time together.
Home Town Leader
In business Benefield was employed by BDO, one of the world’s largest accounting firms where he specialized in corporate audits. Today he operates his own CPA firm locally with his office inside the city limits on Kingsley Avenue.
Before being appointed to the council, the CPA answered the call to volunteer on the Town of Orange Park’s Budget and Finance Committee and the Police Pension Board.
Hobbies
Doug serves as Vice President of the Stanton Rowing Foundation. Rowing has always been a passion as he competed in rowing during his time at St Johns Country Day where he graduated.
Rowing gave Doug the opportunity to spend afternoons on the waters of Camp Echockotee after school according to Owene Courtney who was Benefield’s 7th grade history teacher.
We have known Doug and his family for many, many years. I taught Doug in the seventh-grade, and he was a great friend of my sons.” said Courtney. “He is just the kind of young person we need to take Orange Park to the next level. He is bright, calm and wise.”
Values
Investing in our youth is becoming a tradition for Doug’s family.
Doug’s wife Cary is the Pre-primary Director at the Episcopal School of Jacksonville’s St. Mark’s campus. Cary’s mother, Mary Helen Cauthen, is the former Headmaster at St. Johns Country Day Lower School where Cary’s sister, McCall, is a teacher.
Doug Benefield III, Doug Benefield II, and Doug Benefield I, have passed down their values that service and sacrifice in our armed forces are important to our great flag.
Doug’s grandfather, Air Force Colonel Doug Benefield I, was killed in a test-flight while piloting the Air Force’s new B-1 Bomber during the cold-war era. During the crash, his co-pilots survived when they ejected the aircraft, but sadly, Benefield perished in the cockpit.
Aboard the USS Nimitz, Doug’s father, Captain Doug Benefield II, was an Aircraft Carrier Fighter Pilot. Upon retirement, Benefield II purchased the property known by Orange Park locals as the “old Huntley House” located at corner of Plainfield and Winfred – it is the house where Benefield III grew-up through High School.
Now, Doug is teaching his son, Doug Benefield IV, the value of hard work, and the cost of freedom in America.
The quality of living here in Orange Park is not just important to the residents I serve on the town council, but also to me and my own family.” said Benefield.
Goals
Future goals and objectives during Benefield’s tenure as a public servant, if elected by Orange Park voters, include neighborhood safety with traffic control on various cut-throughs in the town. Arteries such as Plainfield, River Road, Holly Point, Bellair and Debarry Avenue could potentially have what Benefield calls “budget friendly control devices” causing vehicles to slowdown or avoid the cut-throughs altogether by discouraging non-residential motorists from using the neighborhoods as primary thoroughfares.
Areas where kids play, neighbors walk, and squirrels dash for acorns, are not intended as a high speed transportation corridor.” Said Benefield.
The CPA believes that rubberized speed bumps, which allow emergency vehicles to go straight through but discourage outside traffic from cutting through these local neighbors, will make them safer for the local residents, kids and retired folks who live there and just want to bike, walk, and enjoy their own neighborhoods safely. The kind of amenities offered through the experience and passion of Orange Park’s newest councilman could be considered by local voters as “The Benefits of Benefield.”
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