Boca Raton reviews interim master plan for government campus; council seeks direction on green space, tennis and civic uses

City staff and the developer team presented an interim master plan for the downtown government campus at a May 27 Boca Raton City Council workshop and asked council members for policy direction ahead of a June 10 meeting to formally acknowledge the plan’s direction.

The plan, prepared by the developer team (presenting as Tara/Terra Frisbie) with consultants and CBRE, proposes a civic-focused “governance” city hall downtown, a community center with flexible meeting space and recreation, and a central public green that staff recommends be larger to support walkability and activation. Staff identified two near-term calendar dates: May 29 for city comments to the developer on the interim plan and June 10 for the council to give more formal recognition of the plan’s direction.

Why it matters: the interim master plan shapes where the city will locate core civic services, how downtown open space will be used, and how existing recreation—especially tennis courts—will be relocated or retained. Council direction will also steer negotiations on a future Master Partnership Agreement and related ground leases, zoning changes and interlocal agreements that will govern construction, park relocations and long-term operation.

Most of the discussion focused on five policy points staff identified: the mix of uses and development intensity; the general layout of the plan and open-space balance; community center programming; size and function of a downtown city hall; and mobility/multimodal facilities near the Brightline station. On density, the developer team reported a net reduction of roughly 217 residential units from earlier concepts, from about 1,100 units down to about 912 units.

Staff recommendation and design updates Staff and the Tara/Frisbie team described three design options presented in the interim plan (a green-space‑focused option, a tennis‑focused option and a balanced option). City staff said they…