Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Municipal Infrastructure topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Planning Commission approves land-use and zoning changes for 10.25-acre site on Buckeye Loop for city water-department facilities
Summary
The Planning Commission recommended approval to reassign future land use and rezone a 10.25-acre city-owned parcel on Buckeye Loop Road to institutional/PI to accommodate future City of Winter Haven water-department administrative offices and warehouse; staff described a conceptual layout and buffer standards.
The City of Winter Haven Planning Commission on Oct. 7 recommended approval of case PD-25-34 and PD-25-35, forwarding to the City Commission a request to change the future land use on a portion of a city-owned parcel from Neighborhood Suburban and Neighborhood Support to Institutional and to rezone a portion of that parcel from Single-Family Residential Small Lot (R-2) and Conservation (CN) to Public Institutional (PI). The area subject to the requests covers approximately 10.25 acres on the east side of Buckeye Loop Road, about 1,100 feet south of Oakhurst Drive.
Planner Sean Byers told commissioners the land is currently a citrus grove and pasture and was acquired by the city in December 2023 as part of a larger purchase to create surface-water storage and recharge areas identified in the water master plan. Byers said the water department proposes a conceptual project including a 36,750-square-foot administrative office building, a 24,699-square-foot warehouse and associated parking and operations areas. Byers described the current drawing as conceptual and said detailed engineering and site design have not been completed.
Commissioners asked about landscape buffering and ingress/egress. Byers said code would require a 10-foot Type C buffer along Buckeye Loop Road for the road frontage and that more intense buffering would be required only where the property directly abutted residential subdivisions. He said the main vehicle entrance is shown opposite a wooded area and that a separate truck entrance is shown near the northern edge of the site across from a single-family residence; Byers said the configuration could be revised during engineering and coordination with utility staff to reduce residential impacts.
Byers said there is sufficient water, wastewater and roadway capacity at present to support the proposed office and warehouse facility, but that concurrency and permitting would be addressed at site-plan stage. Commissioner disclosure statements were made: one commissioner noted an adjacent property interest and disclosed work ongoing on nearby land; the commissioner said the relationship was disclosed and did not preclude participating in the matter. No public speakers addressed the request. The commission approved forwarding the amendments to the City Commission for final action.
