Land-Use Change Would Allow 5K New Homes In Eastern Sarasota County

SARASOTA COUNTY, FL — A major land-use change could increase the density of more than 4,000 acres in a northeastern section of Sarasota County, a rural area that’s currently home to ranches and farms.

The Sarasota County Commission voted Wednesday in favor of rezoning the land, which stretches from Fruitville Road to University Parkway. This would allow Schroeder-Manatee Ranch to build up to 5,000 new homes to be built in the area and create a new planned community, Lakewood Ranch Southeast, according to the Observer Media Group.

Schroeder-Manatee Ranch is the parent company of the existing Lakewood Ranch master-planned community, which spans more than 33,000 square feet in Sarasota and Manatee counties, according to the community’s website.

The proposed amendment to the county’s long-range plan, the Sarasota 2050 Plan, which was adopted two decades ago, would create a new zoning designation, the “Village Transition Zone,” according to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. This new designation would serve as a transition between “village” and “hamlet” zoning.

Wednesday’s approval is just the first major hurdle for the project, though. On Oct. 25, the commission will vote on the project a second time. If given final approval, it heads to the state Department of Economic Development for approval, WUSF reported.

Dozens of residents of the area, known as Old Miakka, spoke out against the development, according to reports.

"I feel like if we let this plan go through and make a change, it will just snowball and it will go farther and farther out east, and what we all love about Sarasota is going to go away,” one resident, Deb McCabe, said.

Becky Ayech, president of the Miakka Community Club, told the Herald-Tribune prior to the vote, “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. This Village Transition Zone is lipstick that they’re putting on the pig known as urban sprawl.”

Another resident, Charles Gauthier, told commissioners, according to Sun News Media, “This amendment is problematic. It punches a gaping hole in the fundamental planning Sarasota County has had for years for its rural areas.”