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Board discusses broad 2025 code amendments: alleys, trees, ADUs, Main Street and temporary signs
Summary
City planning staff presented a package of potential 2025 amendments to the Land Development Code and Code of Ordinances covering alley access, tree protections, accessory dwelling units, Main Street design standards, temporary signs and other items.
City planning staff and the Safety Harbor Planning and Zoning Board reviewed a wide-ranging list of potential code amendments on Jan. 8 that staff said were being prepared for a Feb. 24 workshop with the City Commission.
Carol Strickland, the city's community development director, summarized proposed topics staff grouped for 2025: technical corrections and clarifications to tree‑protection rules (including a definition for "boundary tree" and treatment of certain species), changes to alleyway access and improvement requirements, allowing daycare in the M‑1 light industrial district as an employee retention measure, resolving an internal inconsistency on accessory structure size limits versus accessory dwelling unit (ADU) limits, clarifying front‑porch setback rules (especially for two‑story porches), and a slate of Community Redevelopment Area (CRA) amendments covering retail food accessory uses for microbreweries, parking/landscaping rules in the Main Street Marketplace district and destination‑resort design standards.
Strickland said staff also will examine temporary signage rules — including requests related to a business that uses a balloon as a registered trademark during Third Friday events — and will revisit food‑truck/mobile vendor regulations and a "wet zone" alcohol implementation used for Third Friday special event permits. She told the board that some amendments are being advanced because they are required by state statute and were not completed in 2024.
On alleyways, Strickland said current code requires property owners who use an alley for access (for a rear garage or ADU) to improve and maintain the alley, and that Public Works completed an alley inventory. "Based upon...what does the City Commission want to do in terms of assuming responsibility for development and maintenance of alleys, that would drive some code changes," she said. She added the CRA encourages alley access for ADUs and rear garages, so the alley policy affects development choices in that district.
Board members offered several areas of emphasis: some urged the city to prioritize alley improvements by demand (guided by building permit applications) rather than requiring the first user to be responsible in perpetuity; others urged protections for mature trees amid accelerating infill redevelopment; comments also encouraged design flexibility to preserve consolidated open space, consider step‑backs or height variances to allow resilient construction in flood‑prone areas, and avoid encouraging parking lots on Main Street.
Board members also asked staff to consider whether allowing retail food accessory uses should be limited to microbreweries or be available to any compatible business in the service corridor, and whether temporary sign allowances for destination‑resort events should be adjusted for seasonal needs.
Strickland said the City Commission asked for a Feb. 24 workshop to get input from the board and public; staff will draft code language based on that direction and return for formal public hearings as required.
The discussion was advisory; no formal motions or zoning changes were made at the Jan. 8 meeting.
