PANAMA CITY BEACH — The Panama City Beach Council threw out a land use change request for a portion of the planned unit development “La Borgata” Thursday after it was met with disapproval by a property owner within the development.
City Attorney Doug Sale said that without the consent of all of the property owners within the PUD, the council should terminate the request.
“The council does not have the authority to proceed under the land development code as written without consent of the third owner,” Sale said.
The council first addressed the issue at a quasi-judicial hearing in November after the property owner appealed a city planning board decision to deny the request.
The request intended to rezone a 2.68-acre parcel within the 22-acre development from a business and professional service designation to a retail sales and service designation, which would have expanded the types of businesses allowed at the parcel.
But at the council’s November hearing, area residents opposed to the change questioned the validity of the request under the city’s land development code, in particular a clause requiring approval from all property owners within the plan.
Legal representation for Nashyork, which owns 13 acres within the development, said his clients opposed the request due to lack of information about what would or could be constructed at the site.
Resident Luby Woroch said those living around the development did the best they could have done to prevent the request from moving forward.
It’s not their first time speaking out against changes to the 2005 PUD either. In 2011, developers came with a request to convert the La Borgata plans from an upscale residential town center to a luxury RV park.
“This should have never been brought to the floor,” Woroch said following the hearing. “My question to the lawyer is, where was he? Isn’t that his job? Unfortunately, I did it for free.”
Thursday’s hearing sparked concerns from council members, who requested city staff to look at developing conditions in which they could allow changes within PUDs without consent from all property owners.
Mel Leonard, director of the city’s building and planning department, indicated that while the consent clause was in the city’s old land development code, it was omitted in the new code adopted last year. Currently, the city has five active PUDs that were developed under the old zoning ordinance.
“I think we’ve all been confused about what we can and cannot do,” said Mayor Gayle Oberst. “We have several PUDs and this issue could arise for anyone at anytime.”
Sale said that while the transition to the new code has been smoother so far than he anticipated, city staff will get a full glimpse of the code in action as development picks up.
“The new land development code is much more specific and in some ways more flexible than the old zoning ordinance, but it is different,” Sale said. “As development picks up, those differences will become more and more apparent to more and more people.”