SARASOTA – It’s no surprise immense growth is coming to downtown Sarasota, but the comprehensive picture of new hotel and residential development entails staggering increases headed to the heart of the city in coming years. City economic and planning leaders detailed planned development for the Downtown Sarasota Condo Association on Tuesday night, amid several questions from…
After decades as a sprawling big-box and strip center shopping area, Butler Plaza will soon get into the mixed-use business with development of the Butler Town Center with apartments over first-floor retail and restaurants, a seven-story Hyatt hotel and higher-end specialty shops around walkable, landscaped main streets. The town center has long been planned as…
Contractors seeking to help build the University of Central Florida’s downtown campus are expected to meet with university officials April 5 to glean more details on what is likely to be a $65 million project. The centerpiece of the project will be an academic building with about 165,000 square feet and include classrooms, library/study spaces, offices,…
Pieter Bockweg asked Miami commissioners Thursday to let him continue to serve as the city’s $150,000 director of the Omni Community Redevelopment Agency, or at least conduct an open search for his replacement. They would do neither. Commissioners voted Thursday to fire Bockweg and replace him with Jason Walker, the village manager of El Portal. Bockweg,…
ST. PETERSBURG — More than a dozen consultants want a chance to help the city redevelop Tropicana Field — with or without the Tampa Bay Rays. By Friday afternoon, 15 consultants from cities such as New York, Los Angeles and Dallas, and closer to home, from Orlando, Tampa and St. Petersburg, had responded to a…
Miami’s newest city commissioner is flexing his muscle as the chairman of an anti-blight district by moving to replace the agency’s head with the top administrator at the Village of El Portal. Commissioner Ken Russell recommended in a memorandum last week that his colleagues support him in removing Pieter Bockweg as the $150,000-a-year executive director…
New restaurants, stores and cultural offerings are flocking to the neighborhoods south of Okeechobee Blvd. in and around the main Dixie Highway thoroughfare in West Palm Beach. So, time for more new homes, too. A townhouse project called Park Slope is planned for 1200 Lake Avenue, across from Howard Park. The development is in historic…
The next step in bringing Tampa Bay Lightning owner Jeff Vinik’s $2 billion vision for the redevelopment of Tampa’s urban core to life comes in the form of road work. Strategic Property Partners, the real estate firm owned by Vinik, and capital investment firm Cascade Investments LLC signed a $35 million contract with Tampa’s Kimmins…
MADEIRA BEACH — Strong opposition is brewing to two proposed hotel-condominium-marina developments that could reshape the city’s downtown. Despite the objections of many in an overflow crowd at last week’s marathon five-hour meeting, the City Commission, with little discussion, approved rezoning the first of the two projects in a 4-1 vote. A final vote for…
NEW PORT RICHEY — The city is again investing significant dollars in the Greater New Port Richey Main Street program to try to revive the often controversial and struggling non-profit. New Port Richey’s assistance, however, will come in the form of a different business model than in past years with the hiring of a Main…
SARASOTA – As city leaders debate how to continue their redevelopment agency after its funding expires in September, they have realized their long-running discussion overlooked some basic math. The city and Sarasota County agreed in 1986 to allocate tax revenues resulting from rising property values in targeted areas of the city every year for 30…
HIGH SPRINGS, Fla. — After years of what seemed to be a code-less city, members of the High Springs code enforcement board met this month for the first time in four years. Their next move? Clean up blight that spans blocks of the city’s neighborhoods. “It’s a hazard,” resident Bill Richards says referring to the abandoned…
