Commission rejects proposed changes to CRA alternative-compliance process; board declines to adopt amendment to Article 12

The Board of County Commissioners voted on April 22 to deny a proposed ordinance amendment that would revise Article 12 of the Land Development Regulations governing alternative compliance requests in Community Redevelopment Areas (CRAs). The rejection followed hearings before staff, the CRA board and public commenters and a divided public debate over notice, technical standards and which advisory bodies should decide requests.

Deputy County Attorney Elise Elder and Susan Korras, manager of the CRA program in Growth Management, presented the ordinance change. Their proposal would have replaced the current administrative alternative-compliance review (handled by the growth management director) with a public hearing process for many requests, sent some matters to the CRA board and adopted variance-style criteria mirroring Florida law for architectural and dimensional requests. Korras said the change was intended to increase transparency and to align CRA alternative compliance criteria with the rest of the county.

Tammy Mazzotta, a public commenter and NAC participant, urged the board to retain neighborhood advisory committee (NAC) involvement, saying the proposed language "effectively removes the neighborhood advisory committees from the process of approving alternative compliance" and criticized a lack of prior notice to NACs. Several commissioners raised questions about frequency and complexity of alternative compliance requests and whether volunteer NAC members would have the technical training to adjudicate complex, quasi-judicial questions.

Commissioners debated timing and process. Growth management director Paul Schilling said the change would introduce a public decision element for requests that are today decided administratively by staff, and cautioned the board that adding public hearings could delay routine building-permit-related alternative-compliance decisions by weeks or months. Commissioner concerns included (a) infrequency of applications (staff cited roughly six minor site-plan alternative-compliance requests in 2023 and 27 building-permit level items in 2024), (b) difficulty of NACs meeting cadence (NACs meet every other month), and (c) whether the CRA board had sufficient technical expertise.

After an extended exchange, County legal advised that, because a prior motion on the amendment had failed to receive a second, the board should move to deny transmittal. The board then voted on a motion "not to approve" the transmittal of the Article 12 amendment. The motion to deny carried 3to1 (Commissioner Campey dissented, Commissioner Vargas was absent), and the proposed changes will not be forwarded to state reviewing agencies for transmittal.

The transcript shows public input both supporting more transparency and urging retention of NAC involvement. Staff said they will continue using the current process, which gives the growth management director the authority to approve certain alternative-compliance applications while allowing staff discretion to refer matters to public advisory bodies when appropriate.