APPROVED – Rezoning Petition: Benderson – University And Shade

On October 22, 2024 The Sarasota County Commissioners voted 4-1 to approve Benderson’s petition to amend the County Comprehensive Plan and the University Parkway Corridor Plan to allow the rezoning of a residential lot to Office and Professional use.  The only “nay” vote was cast by Mark Smith, the Commissioner for our district.  Commissioner Neunder declared his intention to oppose the rezoning, which would have killed the petition since it required a supermajority.  At that point the Benderson Bend representative stood up and asked to speak, even though the Public Hearing had been closed. Chair Moran not only allowed this, but after consulting with the County lawyer, reopened the Public Hearing to allow Benderson and the other Commissioners to counter Commissioner Neunder’s arguments and pressure him into changing his intention.
What Chair Moran did to put pressure on Commissioner Neunder was unusual, and while defensible legally, was morally reprehensible. It was overt, transparent favoritism for Benderson.
PREVIOUS UPDATES
10/16 Update!  Neighborhood meeting location is confirmed – Northminster Presbyterian Church meeting hall, today 9/16 at 6:30pm
Benderson has modified their Binding Development Concept Plan and have removed the small park at the corner of 61st and Shade Ave (Plan on this page still shows it)
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The documents supporting the hearing for Tuesday 10/22 are at this link.
(Note: file is 228 MB, and the rezoning material starts on page 2711)
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HOLD THESE DATES
  • 10/16/2024 – Wednesday @6:30pm – Neighborhood meeting at Northminster Presbyterian Church at 6:30pm
  • 10/22/2024 – Tuesday – County Commissioners Hearing and vote.  Location: MOVED TO SOUTH COUNTY –

    Robert L. Anderson Administration Center, County Commission Chamber, 4000 South Tamiami Trail, Venice, Florida

Please check back for updates. We are following up to find out if Benderson has modified their plan based on the denial by the County Planning Commission. As of 10/13/24, that information is still not public.

We know that strong representation by concerned residents does carry weight with the Commissioners. Please consider speaking up to oppose the precedent of rezoning a residential lot outside of the University Parkway Corridor Plan area to non-residential use.

If you cannot attend in person, please tell the Commissioners why you oppose this Rezone by writing a letter in an e-mail to these addresses:
desotoacresassociation@gmail.com
(We ask that you copy us so that we can reference the number of replies when speaking at the Commission hearing)

 

August update

On August 15th, The Sarasota County Planning Commission voted 4-3 to recommend denial of the petition by  Benderson Development to develop 3 lots at the corner of Shade and University. Many thanks to the 19 Desoto Acres residents who spoke at the hearing.  Based on comments by the Commissioners, the large presence and specific reasons given in opposition to the project were influential in the vote.

The ball is now back in Benderson’s court. It is likely that they will bring the project forward to the Sarasota County Board of County Commissioners for a final vote.

Benderson may also choose to modify their project to take into account some of the observations of the Planning Commissioners, but for the moment the project still looks like this:

The problem for Desoto Acres residents is that this project will require the rezoning of a residential lot to commercial use, which will open the door for other residential lots to be rezoned to commercial use. The lot on the corner of 61st and Shade needs to stay zoned as RE-1 Residential Estate in order to avoid setting an inappropriate precedent.
If you are a Desoto Acres resident and have never received an e-mail about Developers projects that affect our neighborhood, please send an e-mail to desotoacresassociation@gmail.com  and ask to be added to our e-mail list.
Planning Board presentation package is at this link:
638587333380830000 (scgov.net)

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