Port Richey planning board backs comprehensive plan update emphasizing coastal resilience, tourist‑accommodation registration

PORT RICHEY, Fla. — The Port Richey Planning and Zoning Board voted to forward a comprehensive plan update that extends the city’s planning horizon to 2045 and replaces the conservation and coastal management element with new policies aimed at flood resilience, infrastructure hardening and post‑disaster recovery.

Tammy Vrana, an on‑call city planner with Vrana Consulting, told the board the rewrite responds to a 2023 state evaluation and appraisal and to state requirements that local plans include “peril of flood” policies. “The purpose of the public hearing is to review particularly the goals, objectives, and policies for certain elements of the city's comprehensive plan for which we found some inconsistencies with the latest state statute,” Vrana said.

The changes adopted in concept by the board include a complete replacement of the conservation and coastal management element; policies to assess and map flood risk; strategies for retrofitting or upgrading critical public infrastructure to improve flood resilience; and a package of multilayered land‑development code measures such as…