Developer urges rezoning in Northwest neighborhood to allow duplex housing

At the commission’s public-comments period, developer and resident Ida Ruf Sharif urged the City of Lake Wales to rezone a set of small parcels in the Northwest neighborhood to allow duplex construction.

“I have a duplex project on D Street that's currently on hold due to zoning issues,” Ida Ruf Sharif told the commission. She said most recent rental-unit projects she completed met market demand and that rezoning several small C1 lots to CR2 would allow construction of two new affordable housing units. “The C1 is a mixed residential and commercial use, but these lots are small and they're not big enough to have any multifamily residential on them,” she said, and recommended keeping two lots north and two lots south of Lincoln Avenue as C1 while rezoning the rest to CR2.

Commissioner Gillespie urged Sharif to present the matter to the Planning and Zoning Board, saying that body could address zoning technicalities and that public meetings there were educational for developers and residents. Commissioner Williams asked Sharif to contact the city manager for staff direction. The city manager was asked to have staff reach out to Sharif to connect her with planning staff; that outreach was offered during commission comments but no formal motion or rezoning action was taken at the meeting.

Sharif requested the commission consider a more flexible zoning solution to streamline planning and enable development of small-lot housing; no specific timeline or application for rezoning was submitted during public comment.