The Alachua City Commission voted down a preliminary plat and planned development plan for Schmidt Farms, a 120-acre proposed subdivision on Turkey Creek, during a regular commission meeting on Monday.
The split 3-2 vote came after a lineup of public commenters, many of whom live on properties abutting the Schmidt Farms property, located south of US Highway 441 and west of NW 43rd Street, southeast of the Turkey Creek Preserve and touching the Brooke Pointe and Staghorn neighborhoods.
Timothy Boehlein of JBrown Professional Group submitted the application on behalf of property owner DM Alachua Investments, LLC, and Jay Brown, president and principal engineer, made the presentation to the commission on Monday.
Due to the number of meeting attendees, city attorney Marian Rush recommended that the commission hear first from affected parties, those who live adjacent to the proposed development. Those residents spoke first, with unlimited time, and could pose questions for the developer to answer.
The proposed development would have split the property into 188 single-family lots ranging from about 2,613 square feet to about 15,681 square feet, with most being 6,098 square feet or larger.
A large portion of Turkey Creek forms the border of the property, and the developer had planned a buffer zone of at least 50 feet, averaging 75 feet, around the creek, in addition to a large conservation area at the center of the property, where migratory bird species, including killdeer, and state-regulated plants, including the Florida spiny pod (Matelea floridana) were observed.
The developer agreed to nine conditions set forth by the city regarding the conservation area, but public commenters said the developer should demonstrate compliance before beginning construction, not after.
Public commentors also took issue with the traffic impact of the development, which would have two access points connecting to US 441, the first to be constructed during Phase 1 and the second to come in Phase 2.
The first ingress/egress point would be directional, allowing a right turn in or out, and a left turn in, but no left turn out. The second connection would be right-in, right-out only.
Brown said the Florida Department of Transportation is “very sensitive” about left turns out, certain that they are a significant safety problem. Though Brown said a roundabout may be a possibility sometime in the future, the development plan would have required residents to take a right turn out, then pull a U-turn, if they want to leave the subdivision and drive toward Alachua.
Multiple nearby residents took issue with this plan, saying it was unsafe. The neighbors also raised questions about the developer’s plan to mitigate flooding, and to make sure that Schmidt Farm’s runoff does not worsen the situation of surrounding neighborhoods.
The developer also planned to have further phases for a different portion of the property. Monday night’s meeting addressed a portion zoned Planned Development – Residential, but there is a different portion zoned Planned Development – Commercial. Some of that land would be mixed-use, and Brown said the intention was to use it for light commercial with residential units above.
The commercial portion would also come with a connection to 43rd Street.
One of the affected parties who commented, Bryce Burger, is also a landscape architect who has worked with Brown. He said the city needs to ask more of developers to get ahead of flooding problems.
“We know this watershed on the east side of town,” Burger said. “We’ve talked about this, and these guys are going to do the best, exceptional stuff, but unless we address the problem we have here and ask for initiatives, and reach out to these guys, we’re going to have more of the same, I believe.”
The affected parties were followed by several more commentors with a similar general concern for the city’s progression, asking mostly for more specifics and sooner action on conservation efforts, and better plans for traffic and flooding.
“I have no confidence in what I’m hearing tonight, and you all should be dedicated to sustainability, and for the future of future generations,” resident Karen Arrington told the commission. “And constant, intense development will not allow for this. You need to deny this development. And if you do, it would be a miracle: something I’ve never seen in the city of Alachua.”
Arrington got her miracle on Monday, when Commissioner Shirley Green Brown’s motion to approve the preliminary plat and PD plan, seconded by Commissioner Ed Potts, failed 3-2. Green Brown herself voted against the motion in the end, along with Commissioners Jennifer Ringersen and Dayna Williams. Potts and Mayor Gib Coerper voted in favor.
Coerper responded to commentors, saying the city has put over 2,000 acres into conservation and it updates its comprehensive plan and land development regulations frequently as a matter of course, not to “bow down to developers.”
“I don’t want to hear that we don’t think about that or hear about it,” Coerper said. “We do. And if it’s the right time, we do it, and if it’s the wrong time then we have to work with people to get things done.”
Editor’s note: Karen Arrington’s name spelling was corrected.
Kudos to Karen Arrington (not Errington) for her ongoing efforts to protect that area from unbridled development!
Overwhelming the locals by bldg rentals.
There is a city commission election in I believe early April. Gibby Coerper and Potts are up for reelection. If the opponents of this development want to keep it that way, they MUST find and qualify two candidates SOON and vote Gibby and Potts off the commission. If they do not, I predict this issue will come back before the commission the week after the election and pass 5-0.
It is how they do things in Alachua. Commissioners pretend to be for the people the week before an election, then shaft the people the week after election and vote for the real estate developer cartel that runs Alachua.
How could they DO this?!? Don’t we WANT to look like Central Florida? I mean, after all, Orlando (the sprawl of Orange County, Seminole County, Osceola County, etc.) is “the city on the hill,” where we all desire to live, so that we, too, must drive two hours to get to the next block.
Real Citizen: Congratulations on living in Alachua County. The County Commission, county government staff, and the county manager are 100% all in on promoting the “development of the future”, the model of what they envision as a Perfect Development: Celebration Pointe.
Tes, the one that even with hundreds of millions of taxpayer subsidies, is such a horrid unsustainable business concept and bad design that it went bankrupt in only 8 years. Yet the county government is all an unpaid lobbyist for all things Celebration Pointe.