Sarasota to give developers four times the density if some units are affordable housing

A large downtown Sarasota project east of U.S. 301 could see some of the first affordable housing units built by a private developer using a new incentive program that would allow four times the number of units typically allowed in exchange for the developer including some below-market-cost housing in the project.

The city has attempted to encourage developers with incentives, known as density bonuses, to build more affordable residences by allowing more of them in exchange for a share of the units renting or selling below market value, but with little success so far.

Officials say no units have been built using a 2018 zoning change, which allowed up to 100 units per acre in the Rosemary District in exchange for 25% of the units in a project being set aside for affordable housing.

In the meantime, rents and property values have skyrocketed, leading many community leaders to describe the current situation as a housing crisis, making it harder to find workers and pushing them to live farther and farther from their jobs.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau's most recent American Community Survey, 56.8% of Sarasota renters pay more than 30% of their household income in rent — a percentage that housing advocates describe as rent burdened.

But soon, developers could be submitting proposals that could increase the number of below-market units, while drastically boosting the scale of what is allowed in Sarasota after a monumental change to the city's zoning code early this month.

The City Commission unanimously agreed to quadruple the allowable density in downtown zoning districts if private developers set aside 15% of the bonus units for affordable housing. The units would have to be affordable for a minimum of 30 years.

For example, the base density allowed on one acre of property zoned Downtown Core is 50 units per acre. Under the new zoning rules, if a developer provided 22 affordable units, they could build 200 total units on an acre.

At least three developers, according to city officials, have indicated they plan to use the density bonus on upcoming projects.

Up to 1,728 residences potentially allowed for emerging Park District in Sarasota

William Merrill, an attorney representing a development application for one block in the 8.6-acre development east of U.S. 301 being developed as the Park District, said he anticipates the project will use the bonus density if the City Commission approves the zoning text amendments, which will be considered for final approval Sept. 5.

The project — on land zoned Downtown Core — has already received partial signoff from the city's Development Review Committee for its first phase.

In the Park District, the density bonus could see the property's base density soar from 430 units to a scale previously unseen in Sarasota: 1,728 units. Of those, 1,298 would be considered bonus density, requiring the applicant to build 194 affordable housing units dispersed throughout the project, if the project were built to the maximum density.

The Park District will be built over several phases, according to documents submitted to the city, so the ultimate buildout isn't clear.

Merrill told the Herald-Tribune that section of downtown has been underused for years, but the new rules will transform the area and produce what he described as an "awesome project" for downtown Sarasota while also producing affordable housing.

Documents submitted to the city's Development Review committee note the first phase of the project would see 331 residential units built on a 1.87-acre property with its northern border at Fruitville Road, its western border at Fletcher Avenue and its eastern border at Wallace Avenue.

The project would also have 7,772 square feet of commercial space for retail or restaurant uses.

The developer, Park District Manager LLC, describes the project as a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments.

Those plans are slightly under the maximum density allowed using the bonus, which would be 374 units, with 42 required to be affordable.

While the documents do not include how many affordable units would be required at the planned density, an application of the zoning code with the bonus density would be 35 units.

Without the bonus density, the project would have a maximum of 93 units.

There are no immediate plans to redevelop a 62,000-square-foot office building on the property's first block, but after phase one, the Park District — which would run along Fruitville Road from the Chase Bank building until Audubon Place — would still have almost six acres of mostly underdeveloped property and about three-fourths of an acre where the office building remains.

The development potential for the remaining property using the density bonus could see 1,345 units produced with 151 of those units rented at below-market rates.

How much affordable housing is enough?

Some commissioners seemed unimpressed with the low affordable unit count given the low percentage of total units set aside for below-market costs.

City Commissioners Debbie Trice and Jennifer Ahearn-Koch pushed for a greater percentage of affordable units during discussion, but ultimately voted in favor of the zoning text amendments after other board members did not support increasing the percentage.

Both Trice and Ahearn-Koch also pushed for required "nonbinding" community workshops on the plans, but could not gain support from the other three commissioners on that topic either.

Mayor Kyle Battie resisted the idea because luxury downtown projects do not have to go through a community workshop and he felt it would be discriminatory to hold mandatory workshops only for projects that include affordable housing.

Ahearn-Koch argued that it wasn't the affordable housing aspect that triggered a need for more community discussion between a property owner and nearby residents, but the vast increase in density from what had been allowed before.

Ultimately, all commissioners supported the zoning changes, as nearly every community in Florida continues to battle rising rents and increasing property values, a problem that has grown more difficult to solve given the state's new limits on what municipalities can require from the private sector in regard to mandated affordable housing.

The bonus density proposal is also likely to be much more attractive to developers than the recently approved Live Local Act, which also aimed at increasing affordable housing in Florida, but required under one provision that 40% of a project's units be affordable.

Discussions about creating the recent density bonuses in Sarasota stretch back to 2021 when former Mayor Hagen Brody spearheaded a growth plan change that paved the way for the recent zoning change.

He hosted an educational town hall meeting last summer, among other community outreach methods, to explain the need for the increased density.

Without density bonuses, the current code encourages development of large, luxury units, he said. He notes that as the bonuses do not add more height to a project, the units should be smaller and potentially less expensive.

"Even the market rate units that are developed will be much more affordable than what is being produced today under the current code," he said.

Brody said that communities throughout Florida have struggled with the issue of affordable housing and commended the current commission and city staff for "following through on this challenging yet critical change."

Battie underscored the need for more units in Sarasota during the recent meeting, while calling the current housing market "in a crisis right now."

"People can't even rent houses now because those houses are being AirBnB'd," he said. "Whatever we can provide and whatever incentives that we can give developers, or what have you, to get them to provide us with some affordable housing, we need to do."

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This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Sarasota offers developers high housing density if some are affordable