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Planning board backs changes to Planned Unit Development rules to give staff and applicants more flexibility
Summary
After weeks of discussion, the board recommended forwarding amendments that would remove a minimum acreage requirement for PUDs, broaden qualifying public‑benefit criteria and allow certain deviations from site‑design standards, while directing staff to add roadway‑standards language.
The Fernandina Beach Planning Advisory Board voted Aug. 14 to recommend that the City Commission adopt proposed amendments to the city’s Planned Unit Development (PUD) rules that would expand when and how PUDs can be used by property owners and developers.
Planning staff said the draft changes focus on three primary areas: eliminating a minimum acreage required to apply for a PUD, expanding qualifying criteria that define public benefit for a PUD, and allowing deviations from some minimum site design requirements. The board debated whether loosening those requirements would increase density; staff and several members said the PUD is a tool to allow flexibility while still requiring public vetting and compliance with many standards.
"There are 3 primary areas that the proposed language changes, and that is in the elimination of any minimum acreage to apply for PUD, expanding the qualifying criteria, and allowing for more deviations from the minimum site design requirements," Planning staff said during the presentation. Staff emphasized that the PUD process opens additional public hearings and review steps for applicants.
Legal and practical limits were discussed. The city attorney reminded the board that the city cannot impose contract zoning (conditions on a rezoning that bind the property owner) because "contract zoning" is illegal in Florida, and that the Live Local Act constrains what local governments may require for some multifamily projects. Board members asked staff to add general roadway standards language to the draft PUD text (allowing flexibility on aisle widths, paving materials and other design choices where safe and appropriate) while keeping or adding standards that cannot be waived (for example, sidewalks and certain buffer protections).
Following public comment and edits to the draft, a motion to recommend approval of PAB case 2024‑0010 (the LDC amendments for PUDs) as revised was made and adopted unanimously. The board instructed staff to incorporate agreed language changes (including correcting a Greenway name and adding roadway‑standards language) before forwarding the draft to the City Commission.
