Commission hears initiation request to allow Eternal Light Cemetery expansion and a new Chabad site in Ag Reserve; staff recommended not to initiate

The Planning Commission heard a privately initiated request to amend agricultural reserve policies so Eternal Light Cemetery could expand and so Chabad of West Delray could establish a permanent five‑acre civic site. The applicant asked the Board of County Commissioners to initiate a text amendment that would allow, in limited cases, a reduction in the Ag Reserve preserve requirement from 60% to 50% when a project provides at least 10% of gross acreage as public or private civic uses (above the current 2% requirement). Staff recommended not to initiate the amendment, and commissioners and the public debated the proposal; no final initiation vote was recorded in the portion of the transcript provided.

Applicant Jennifer Morton of J. Morton Planning and Landscape Architecture said the amendment is narrowly written to permit Eternal Light, a long‑standing cemetery approved decades ago, to be rezoned into the Whitworth AGR PUD…