A proposal to build thousands of apartment units and hotel rooms in the Shingle Creek watershed hit another wall last week, when Orange County’s Planning and Zoning Commission recommended denial of the Tuscana project. Earlier this month, the county’s Development Review Committee also voted not to recommend approval of the proposed development.
The proposal from Kobo Development could still be either approved or denied by the board of county commissioners, which is slated to consider the project on May 20.
RELATED: Orange County committee votes against proposal to build in Shingle Creek
The Tuscana project seeks to develop some 200 acres of land, including some wetlands, just west of the 1,750-acre Shingle Creek preserve managed by the South Florida Water Management District. Current plans call for nearly 1,300 hotel rooms and more than 4,800 multi-family apartment units: a significant drop from developers’ original plans, according to Development Review Committee Chair Nicolas Thalmueller.
“A planned development is a negotiation,” Thalmueller said Thursday, addressing county planning commissioners. “This request was submitted in 2022. It has gone through many, many iterations … [There] were steps towards that negotiation.”
Along with a substantial reduction in the number of units planned to be built, the team behind Tuscana also reduced some 60 acres of proposed wetland impacts from the project, Thalmueller said.
Still, Development Review Committee members ultimately didn’t feel comfortable enough with the project to recommend it for approval, due in no small part to concerns from the county’s Environmental Protection Division.
“This was a very, very tricky analysis,” Thalmueller said.
Environmental Protection Division staff said earlier this month they remain unconvinced of the project’s overriding public benefit, and would like to see the applicants continue to explore possible alternatives to currently-planned environmental impacts, especially for wetlands. On Thursday, planning commissioners echoed those concerns about wetland impacts.
“An island in the middle of a wetland, to me, is not buildable, period,” said Planning Commissioner David Boers. “An island with a water table six inches under the surface is not a buildable piece of land.”
Boers expressed concern that building over wetlands, which naturally filter pollutants from water, could harm water quality, along with his fear that it could make area flooding worse. Members of the development team emphasized the analyses they’ve done to address that concern, saying they’ve verified the project would create no additional off-site flooding.
“The data shows that this project actually will improve the flooding situation,” said real estate attorney Dan O’Keefe, a member of the development team. “We store more acre-feet of floodwaters on the property after the property is developed, [with] the [stormwater] ponds and the storage areas.”
But for Boers and other planning commissioners, the developers’ analyses weren’t reassuring enough.
“Floodplain compensation is not perfect, by any means … It’s not a perfect science, ever,” Boers said. “All your offsite flows sometimes become uncalculated, and what you think you're going to store sometimes does not work.”
RELATED: Here’s how wetlands help control flooding in Central Florida
Prior to planning commissioners’ discussion Thursday, people spoke for and against the Tuscana project during a public comment period. Those speaking against it mentioned flooding concerns, as well as the need to protect area wildlife, including several species of endangered plants and animals.
Speaking in favor of allowing the Tuscana development to move forward was Kim Sewell, representing 176 property owners in the Shingle Creek watershed who she said would be directly impacted by the county’s decision. Thirty-five of those property owners live in the Orlando area, with the rest split between Canada and many different locations throughout the United States, Sewell said.
“The history of the ownership of these platted tracks in the Shingle Creek area dates back to the ‘60s, when many of the owners’ grandparents purchased the property from advertisements and military magazines, Reader's Digest, and other promotional materials touting the dream of living in Central Florida,” Sewell said.
Today, those privately-owned parcels of land are within a larger subdivision east of International Drive, known as the Munger tract (or Munger plat), where developers hope to build the Tuscana project.
SFWMD also owns nearly 600 acres of land within the Munger tract. Much of that land was previously turned over to the District by Orange County, as required mitigation in exchange for building the county’s convention center.
But managing those nearly 600 acres of land for preservation has proven challenging, according to the District and the Tuscana team’s project manager Dan DeLisi, a land use planning consultant who previously worked for SFWMD.
“They're unmanageable,” DeLisi said of the land parcels held by the District. “You can't go in there, you can't do controlled burns, you can't do any exotic clearing.”
That’s because many of those parcels of land are non-contiguous: scattered throughout the area and bumping right up against other, privately-owned parcels. Since those private lots are so dispersed, they also can’t be easily developed themselves, DeLisi said.
“What we find is that if people aren't able to develop their property, they use it for something else,” DeLisi said. “They use it for poaching, they tear up the wetlands with ATVs (all-terrain vehicles).”
The goal of the Tuscana project, then, is to consolidate and contain more intense development to one part of the Munger tract, while also setting aside other land within the tract for conservation: about 300 acres in all, according to developers.
“Because this private development group was able to get together and, as one, do a consolidation of interests, it makes it a whole lot easier for the public sector to then acquire land within this plat and then preserve it,” DeLisi said.
The proposed Tuscana project would also be built in an area with some of the highest-density land use designations included in the county’s comprehensive plan, according to the development team.
“I think people should zoom out and understand that this is just south of International Drive,” DeLisi said.
DeLisi and others behind the proposed development insist approving the Tuscana project is the only feasible path forward for preserving any part of the larger Munger tract.
“Let me just tell you: if it's not in public ownership, it is not preserved,” DeLisi told planning commissioners Thursday.
But planning commissioners remained unconvinced and, affirming county staff’s decision earlier this month, voted unanimously not to recommend the Tuscana project for approval.
“Really, the marketing on this is phenomenal,” said Planning Commissioner Evelyn Cardenas Thursday, referencing the maps and materials provided by the development team. “But the dissonance for me is the property, it is the wetlands. It is the location of where we're trying to put this.”
“Because it is hard. It’s possible, but it is hard to build on wetlands,” Cardenas said.
For his part, despite voting against the project, Planning Commissioner Eric Gray said he appreciated developers’ efforts in trying to find a workable solution for all involved entities and landowners.
“I don't know that I've ever seen a more complicated land-weaving type of situation,” Gray said. “Thank you for putting your best foot forward. I appreciate it.”
Gray said he’d commit to spending some time analyzing the Munger plat himself, and brainstorming other potential solutions for it.
Along with the St. Johns River Basin, the Shingle Creek Basin is one of two vulnerable areas Orange County is currently evaluating for potential special protections, with a kick-off discussion slated for Wednesday evening. You can learn more about that process on the county’s website.
