- November 26, 2024
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The developers of Tomoka Reserve are pushing the button on the "nuclear option."
Two weeks after the Ormond Beach City Commission opted to send the development proposal for the former Tomoka Oaks golf course back to the Planning Board for review, the attorney representing developers Carl Velie, Ray Barshay, Sheldon Rubin and Emily Rubin notified City Attorney Randy Hayes on Tuesday, Nov. 21, in a letter stating that they were withdrawing their development order application in favor of pursuing a rezoning request to R-2 "Single-Family Low Density."
This request, which the developers filed on May 4, had been waiting in the wings as they waited to see the outcome of their development order request, which proposed the construction of 272 homes on the 147-acre golf course. City Commissioners at their Nov. 7 meeting echoed the same concerns voiced by the Planning Board: The development was too dense, would generate too much traffic and the proposed lot widths were incompatible with Tomoka Oaks, the existing neighborhood that borders the golf course.
In light of this, the developers issued a statement on their website that stated they "have concluded that the commission’s decision to remand their application back to the Planning Board — despite their stated objections — for the purpose of negotiating a 'significant reduction' in the number of residential lots would be an exercise in futility."
"Accordingly, the property owners will be moving forward with their pending application ... to re-affirm their legal right to develop their property consistent with the published development standards and criteria associated with the city’s R-2 zoning district," the statement reads.
Under an R-2 zoning, the zoning the golf course property had before it was rezoned to a PRD in 2006, the developers could build about 300 homes on 100-foot-wide lots. But, the previously proposed 50-foot buffer would become a 6-foot buffer instead, and the developer won't pursue the addition of a stoplight at Nova Road or improvements to the diamond intersection at St. Andrews Drive and Tomoka Oaks Boulevard.
This was coined as the "nuclear option" at the first Planning Board hearing for the development in July by Dennis Bayer, the attorney representing the volunteer Tomoka Oaks Homeowners Association.
The developers requested that their R-2 application be considered at the Jan. 11, 2024 Planning Board meeting.
"Per the statutory directives of the Community Planning Act, the Florida Legislature has expressly directed all local governments in this state 'to recognize and respect judicially acknowledged or constitutionally protected rights,'" the letter to Hayes states.
Jim Rose, Tomoka Oaks HOA golf course committee chair, said the developers decision to pursue an R-2 rezoning wasn't unexpected. The HOA has been anticipating it.
"We've been preparing for it," Rose said. "We think we have a case against them not being able to proceed with the R-2 zoning as they seem to think is inevitable. and we're looking forward to going before the Planning Board and the City Commission."
One of the big issues with the R-2 from the HOA's perspective is the loss of the 50-foot buffer. Rose, who lives on the golf course, questioned if the developers truly wanted to build homes so close to Tomoka Oaks.
"They're building these modern homes and we've got 50-year-old homes in [Tomoka Oaks]," Rose said. "It seems to me that going back to the Planning [Board] would be better, but the density is just too much."
The now-withdrawn development order had proposed two types of lots: 60-foot by 120-foot lots in the interior of the subdivision, and 80-foot by 125-foot lots along the perimeter of the property.
The irony, Rose said, is that the HOA has been asking the developers to build 100-foot-wide lots — which Tomoka Oaks has — from the beginning.
"They said they can't do it because they won't sell," Rose said. "So now what they're proposing is to put 310 100-foot-wide lot homes, so I think the irony is rich."
He expects this application to move at a more expedited pace. Depending on the outcome of the public hearings, the HOA anticipates future litigation.
The HOA has been vocal about what it wants Tomoka Reserve to look like, if it's built.
"It's not a mystery," Rose said. "So it's been kind of a game-playing thing from my perspective and now we get down to the nuts and bolts of it. We'll see where it goes."
