Welcome to a meeting of your planning commission, the official local planning agency for the cities of Tampa, Temple Terrace, Plan City, and Unincorporated Hillsborough County.

For more information about the Planning Commission, please call eight one three, two seven two five nine four zero.

Follow us on social media or visit our website at PlanHillsboro.org.

Welcome everybody to the March 9th, 2026 public hearing of the Planning Commission on City of Plant City Comprehensive Plan Amendments.

We thank you for attending this meeting.

Your comments and participation are encouraged.

For those attending in person and wishing to speak on any agenda item, please sign the register at the rear of the room and turn off any devices that may be a distraction.

To minimize feedback in the audio, all online participants in the meeting will be muted until it is their opportunity to speak.

Planning commissioners should unmute themselves to indicate that they would like to speak.

Please be sure to state your name at the beginning of your remarks for the benefit of the clerk.

There will be an opportunity for members of the public to provide comments when your name is called.org.

For those of you who are not familiar with our process, the meeting will be conducted as follows.

The agenda item will be introduced.

Staff will give their presentation with a 15-minute time limit.

The applicant will be given the opportunity to make a presentation with a 15-minute time limit.

Following presentations, members of the public may address the planning commission when recognized by the chairman.

Public comment will be heard for three minutes per person.

The applicant will be afforded a three-minute period for rebuttal or response.

Planning commissioners will then ask questions.

Public comment will be closed, then upon a motion, a second and discussion of what will be taken.

To all participants, please note that tonight's hearing concerns proposed changes to the comprehensive plan.

Presentation should not include matters related to zoning applications and site plans that are not before the commission.

Zoning conditions are not relevant to plan amendments and may not be considered by the planning commission.

The planning commission's purview in making a recommendation is limited to consistency or inconsistency with the comprehensive plan.

With that, I'd ask the clerk to please call roll.

Cardines.

Lincas.

Here.

Lauk.

Here.

Here.

Orton.

Here.

Mary?

Here.

Joseph?

Here.

You have a quorum, sir.

Thank you.

All right.

Our first and only agenda item is 2A, PCCPA 25 08.

Comprehensive plan map amendment 2502 2508-2600 East Sam Allen Road.

And the presenter is Yanika Mills.

Good evening, Yanika Mills Planning Commission staff.

I'm here to present PCCPA 2508, located at 2502-2508 and 2600 East Sam Allen Road.

This is a privately initiated uh plan amendment, small and scales, a little over nine acres, and the applicant is requesting to change their future land use designation from Hillsborough County Residential One to Plant City Commercial.

Here is a uh general location map.

Um, the subject site is located within the northeastern portion of Plant City along Sam Allen Road.

It's also located within the Northeast Plant City area master planning area as well as the economic opportunity overlay.

Here is an aerial of the site.

The site is outlined in pink.

We have Sam Allen Road just to the south, Park Road to the west.

We have Wilder Road to the east.

Uh, with Plant City being to the west of that line and unincorporated Hillsborough County being to the east of that line.

The aerial shows uh subject uh sites to the west as well as to the north uh as vacant.

Those are properties that are owned by Hillsboro County School Board.

Then we have a presence of single family uh to the east, and we have the uh newly built South Florida Hospital on the south side of uh Sam Allen Road.

Here is uh the subject site looking uh north uh from Sam Allen Road.

Um this is looking toward if you're familiar with Plant City uh North Park Alles subdivision.

This is uh another site uh subject uh another photo of the subject site uh looking north again toward uh North Park Isles.

This is looking west toward Paul Buckman Highway.

The subject site is uh kind of out of frame to the right.

And this is looking east toward Wilder Road, the subject site is off to the left.

And again, this is the newly developed South Florida Hospital, uh, just to the south of the subject site.

And uh this is a single family residential uh that's representative of um to the east of the subject site.

And again, the site is located within the Northeast Plant City Area Master Plan.

Uh we updated the preferred land use scenario map uh in 2024.

Uh we designated this site as uh commercial.

Uh the vision map is adopted within the plant city comprehensive plan and visions uh that the northeast portion of Plant City develop um in the manner of the vision.

The subject site is also again within the economic opportunity overlay, which when enacted will allow consideration for higher density as well as intensity.

This is the adoptive future lane use map.

The subject site is shown in white because it has already been annexed within Plant City, however, it's not received a plant city feature lane use classification as of yet.

Uh the underlying feature lane use classification of the site is Hillsburg County Residential One.

Other feature land uses in the immediate area include uh plant city residential six in the yellow, and then uh we have plant city commercial in the red directly to the south, as well as uh light commercial office in this light pink color to the south, and then we have a presence of residential 20 also to the south in the dark brown.

Some of the Hillsburg County future lane uses in the immediate area include um to the east, the light green here, and then we have a little pocket of residential four to the north along Wilder Avenue.

Again, the applicant is proposing to change the future land use designation to plant city commercial under the adopted future lane use of residential one.

The site can be considered for up to nine dwelling units or over a hundred and seven seven thousand square feet of commercial uses, of course, subject to locational criteria.

Under the proposed commercial designation, the site may be considered for up to 31 dwelling units or over 150 square feet of commercial.

Uh the commercial designation would result in both an increase in density as well as commercial intensity.

We did send uh this request out for agency review, did not receive any objections for the request.

However, the school board did note that Marshall Middle as well as Plant City High are projected to be over capacity.

While formulating our recommendation, planning commission staff did consider policies relating to the design of commercial sites.

However, staff arrived at using policies on the preceding slide to find the requests consistent.

Staff found the request to be consistent with policy 2.1.2, which speaks to locating commercial uses along arterials and collectors.

Sam Allen Road is designated as a collector.

Policy 2.4.1 speaks to supporting commercial activity centers.

Objective 2.5 states to support hospitals as a major employment center.

The request is also consistent with policies 2.6.1, 2.6.2, 2.6.3, and 7.1.4, which instructs planning commission staff in conjunction with plant city staff to convict conduct vision studies, which we did last year, the updating the Northeast Master Plan.

And as noted earlier, both staffs work to in conjunction to do that.

And the Northeast Master Plan sees this subject site as commercial.

And finally, request supports objective 2.7 and 2.7.1, which speaks to having a cohesive strategy for annexations into Plant City as well as future annexation should mirror the adopted vision map.

Based on those considerations, Planning Commission staff recommends that the proposed map amendment be found consistent with the goals, objectives, and policies of the Plant City Comprehensive Plan, and I stand for any questions that you may have.

Thank you.

Is there an applicant and an applicant presentation?

Come on down.

My name is Catherine Coyle.

I'm the director of planning for Boggs Engineering representing Atticus Retail Development.

I do have a very low tech presentation because I had some major PC issues.

It died on me last week.

So this is on.

Oh yay.

I won't belabor too many points because Ms.

Mills did an excellent job summarizing everything and was fantastic to work with through the process.

Really quick, as I mentioned, Abacus Retail South Shore LLC is the applicant.

Quick overview and of the request.

Sorry.

Thank you.

As Ms.

Mills noted, the location of the property.

There are three parcels, 2502, 2508, and 2600 East Sam Allen.

I've provided the folios.

It was annexed in 2022, and it lies on the north side of Park Road.

I'm sorry, the north side of Sam Allen between Park and Wilder.

Just briefly, she already went through the different aerial, but I highlighted the hospital to the south and the streets.

You'll notice that to the north, I believe, is that North Park Isles subdivision.

There's a lot of residential that has gone in in the county to the north and to the northwest.

There's some additional planned to the northeast over in this area.

And then scattered throughout.

There is a large car dealership, Stingray Chevrolet, right here at the interchange with I-4 going up park.

Sam Allen is the first major east-west collector going north from the interstate.

And this property, as the crow flies, is approximately three quarters of a mile from the interchange.

I think I have that backwards, but oh I'm sorry.

Flood zone.

According to the flood zone, it's actually in flood zone X, and I did speak to Miss Mills about that as well.

Her report notes that it's AE.

There's a little piece right here that looks like it's come comes in.

The property line actually is south of that.

So the property actually has a flood zone of X.

Looking at the existing future land use, it allows one dwelling unit per acre under Hillsburg County's Res 1 and a 0.25 FAR.

The increase that we're asking for to the commercial in line with the Northeast Master Plan allows a 0.35, so it's only a change of a 0.1 FAR, which is approximately 42,000 square feet.

And uh 16 units per acre is much more than one per acre.

However, there is there's an effective rate that actually gets populated because there's a 20% cap on residential and the plant city plan.

So in fact, it comes out uh as mentioned to 31 units, and when you divide that over the 9.86 acres, it is an effective rate of only three units per acre.

So it's only an increase of two units per acre compared to the current category.

Looking at consistency with the comp plan and the master plan.

You saw this map already.

Uh, we're simply just trying to follow along with the master plan that was put into effect.

This lies within the economic overlay, opportunity overlay, and it is that commercial north of the hospital along Sam Allen.

As I mentioned, there you can see even the plat lines here for all the residential and some on this side, the hospital's right here.

Uh when you go up into this area, if you haven't been there, um, a lot of residential, a hospital, a lot of green land that hasn't been developed yet, and no commercial.

There's literally nothing.

Um last week we actually got a copy sent to us of the latest survey that was done for the plan update, and it was all the comments that came in.

I think it was uh over 1,600 or so comments.

I read only through the first few pages of it because it was a lot of comments, but one of the common themes was all the shopping is down on James Redmond.

It's a long way south from here, so there's a lot of traffic.

There's literally nothing up here for these folks.

So, which speaks to why it was expanded through the Northeast Master Plan.

Um, and that's really the intent here is to provide some of those hospital support services where the old hospital was surrounded by medical offices, surrounded by little restaurants.

There's a lot of entrepreneurship in Plant City.

I don't know if you spent any time there.

Uh a lot of small businesses, a lot of people run their own engineering firms, doctor's offices.

So we I kind of see also how this could support this new office area as well and create a whole new business center in this particular area.

Um looking at the policies themselves.

I went through and highlighted some of the applicable portions of these policies, but I would like to highlight policy 8.1.3 specifically that it's very directive.

It says give first priority to economic opportunities that are linked to existing economic assets.

And the very first policy, I'm sorry, the very first objective listed at the top, objective 2.5.

Notes that the major employment and regional attractor plant city, the hospital is mentioned as one of them.

Um so we speak we believe that the objectives in the policy speak directly to this uh transition.

Sorry if I'm out of order from what I gave you.

Um community benefits.

I did want to show this aerial as well, which I mentioned earlier.

You see the residential up here.

There's the hospital I marked in blue, and there's the subject site.

This is how far away that shopping area of James Redman is.

I work in Plant City every day now.

I can tell you I go to that area every day to get lunch or to stop at Lowe's or to stop at Walmart because I live in Seminole Heights and there's not much in life.

I usually have to drive to Carrollwood.

So I get a lot of stuff there, and it is a very busy area, and a lot of people are coming from the north.

And the time that I've spent up in the north driving the streets, it is just mostly housing, and they really do need some support services, which we think this speaks to very well.

And simply to wrap this up, uh, looking at the comprehensive plan, we do believe we are consistent.

Um, it does support sustainable development goals in the comprehensive plan.

Um, hopefully by building in that additional commercial uh and mixed use support services for the hospital and for the residential in the area.

It'll reduce greenhouse gases, it'll reduce consumption of fossil fuels, uh, which is in the plan as well.

Um, and then the implementation of this actually furthers the Northeast Master Plan.

So we request that uh respectfully request you find to recommend for approval.

And I'm available for any questions.

Thank you.

All right.

There was no one sign up for the public comment on this item, so I will turn it over to the commissioners for questions, comments, discussions.

This one.

Going once, going twice.

Commissioner Jemison.

See you moving.

No, all right.

Then I will close the public comment on this one and open it up to motions from the commissioners on this one.

Commissioner Jamison.

Motion to find PC CPA 25-08 consisting.

All right.

All right, we have a motion to consistency finding by Commissioner Jemison.

A second to that motion by Commissioner Bowden.

Comments, thoughts, or questions from the commissioners before we take our vote.

Not seeing any, then would all signify their agreement by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed.

That motion carries unanimously.

All right.

That was our only business item for that public hearing.

So I will adjourn the plant city public hearing at 6 32 p.m.

and I will read us into our Hillsborough County public hearing.

Welcome to the March 9th, 2026 public hearing of planning commission on Hillsboro County Comprehensive Plan Amendments.

We thank you for attending this meeting.

Your comments and participation are encouraged.

For those attending in person and wishing to speak on any agenda item, please sign the register at the rear of the room and turn off any devices that may be a distraction.

To minimize feedback in the audio, all online participants in the meeting will be muted until it is their opportunity to speak.

Planning commissioners should unmute themselves to indicate that they would like to speak.

Please be sure to state your name at the beginning of your remarks for the benefit of the clerk.

There will be an opportunity for members of the public to provide comments when your name is called.

You will be unmuted when it is your turn to speak.

Please wait until the chair calls on you to begin speaking.

State your name at the beginning of your comments and adhere to the time limits.

If anyone has difficulties or is watching via HTV and would like to provide comments to be included in the record for the local government hearing, please email them to planner at plancom.org.

For those of you who are not familiar with the process, the meeting will be conducted as follows.

The agenda item will be introduced.

Staff will give their presentation with a 15-minute time limit.

The applicant will be given the opportunity to make a presentation with a 15-minute time limit.

Following presentations, members of the public may address the planning commission when recognized by the chairman.

Public comment will be heard for three minutes per person.

The applicant will be afforded a three-minute period for rebuttal response.

Planning commissioners will then ask questions.

Public comment will be closed, and upon a motion, a second and discussion, a vote will be taken.

To all participants, please note that tonight's hearing concerns proposed changes to the comprehensive plan.

Presentation should not include matters related to zoning applications and site plans that are not before the commission.

Zoning conditions are not relevant to plan amendments and may not be considered by the planning commission.

The planning commission's purview in making a recommendation is limited to consistency or inconsistency with the comprehensive plan.

And with that, I'd like to ask the clerk to please again call roll.

Present.

Here ONA?

Here.

Jameson?

Here.

Kugler.

Linkos.

Here.

Lau.

Here.

Steven?

Here.

Sink.

Here.

Orton?

Here.

Barry.

Here.

Joseph?

Here.

You have a quorum, sir.

Thank you.

All right.

Our first agenda item is 2A H E C PA 25-27 comprehensive plan map amendment.

5008 through 5044 Saffold Road Urban Service Area Expansion.

And the presenter is Lillian Lynn Hann.

Good evening, Commissioners.

Lillian Lennihan, Planning Commission staff here to present HCCPA 2527, located at 5008 to 5044 Saffold Road.

This is a publicly initiated map amendment that is small in scale and approximately 19.94 acres.

It is a request to expand the urban service area, and this amendment is associated with HCCPA 2528, which is a request to change the future land use category from agricultural rule one to five to residential four.

This is the general location map, as previously mentioned, is associated with HCCPA 2528.

It is in the rural area and within the limits of the South Shore Area Wide Systems Plan and Y Mama Village Plan.

It is located north of Saffold Road and west of County Road 579.

Here is an area of the site.

The site is outlined in pink, and the blue line indicates the existing urban service area boundary.

And I would like to note that the two uh parcels adjacent to the west of the subject site were a part of recent privately initiated map amendments, uh specifically HCCPA 2519 and 2520 uh to expand the urban service area and change the future land use to residential four.

And these amendments were approved by the Board of County Commissioners on January 15th, 2026.

However, the maps in this present presentation and the one for 2528 will not reflect that um approval.

So this is looking at the subject site along Saffold Road.

This is looking across Saffold Road from the subject site.

This is also looking across Saffold Road from the subject site.

This is looking east from the subject site down Saffold Road.

This is the parcel that is adjacent to the east of the subject site area, and this is looking west along the subject site from South Fold Road.

The proposed amendment would bring approximately 19.94 acres into the urban service area, requiring at a minimum connection to public water and sewer.

The proposed amendment received no formal objectives but a full list of agency comments included in the report package.

And while formulating our recommendation, planning commission staff reviews all related policies regarding the proposed request.

The following policies were considered by planning commission staff in the evaluation of the amendment.

And planning commission staff found four main areas of consistencies.

The proposal meets the intent of Flu's Objective 1.1 and Flu's policy 1.1.9, which directs 80% of population growth into the urban service area and establishes criteria for publicly and privately initiated urban service area expansion amendments.

In this case, the subject site is adjacent and contiguous to the established urban service area.

Additionally, the site is adjacent to publicly initiated amendments that the Board of County Commissioners directed staff to initiate.

And the request meets all the required required criteria in Flu's policy 1.1.9.

Flu's objective 3.1 and policies 3.1.1 and 3.1.2 uh determine compatibility and gradual transitions of intensities and densities between different land uses.

The residential four land use designation surrounds the site, and there are low density residential developments on all sides.

The transition to residential four with an expansion of the urban service area would allow for density and intensity that is compatible with the existing area.

FLU's objective 4.4 and policy 4.4.1 seek to protect existing neighborhoods and communities and those that will emerge in the future.

The request is consistent with these policies, objectives and policies as the surrounding land use pattern is comprised of single family residential and agricultural uses.

South of Saffold Road, there are mainly public and quasi public and institutional uses, and the proposed proposed request complements the existing community character and development pattern.

The proposal also meets goal five of the Wai Mama Village Community Plan.

Goal five of the plan seeks to encourage housing to accommodate a diverse population and range of income levels.

The expansion of the urban service area and change to of the future land use of residential four increases the type of housing allowed on the subject site, as well as allows for smaller lot sizes, which can be more affordable for the residents of the Wai Mama village area.

Planning Commission staff recommends that the proposed map amendment be found consistent with the goals, objectives, and policies of the unincorporated Hillsboro County comprehensive plan.

This concludes my presentation.

I'm here if you have any questions.

Thank you.

And it's publicly initiated, right?

Yes.

Okay.

All right.

No one signed up in the public comment for this one, so I will turn it over to planning commissioners for questions, discussion.

Commissioner Owner.

This might be a dumb question, but is the landowner the public is Hillsborough County owned this land?

No, but all of the property owners were notified twice before the hearing, and the signs were all posted out there.

All right.

Any other questions or comments?

I did have a quick one flu S F L U S.

Is that future land use section?

If we've gone away from elements now, huh?

So everything gets an S now instead of an E.

Yeah, when the plan was updated, it was changed to sections.

Nobody told me I like E.

That's all right though.

All right, Commissioner Lk.

Parceling through your response to Commissioner Kona.

The landlord, the landowner, sorry, has not responded to any of the communications.

We had people like that it was certified mail, so they did have to sign and say that they received it, but no one had any objections or questions for us.

And this is publicly initiated because the adjacent parcels had been brought in to US.

Yes.

Um I'll just go back to the aerial really quick, just so I can explain it a little bit better.

Um there was a uh couple of publicly initiated amendments in uh previous cycle in 2025 that brought all of the WVR2 in this area, um, which is where you see the current blue line into the urban service area and change the future land use to residential four, and then those two adjacent parcels, it left about I think this is six total parcels that were not included.

Those two adjacent parcels were privately initiated, and when those came in, we decided to publicly initiate these last four.

So the boundary um was along Saffold Road to make the original publicly initiated amendments a little more cohesive in this area.

Okay, good good background, thank you.

From our property owner standpoint, can you briefly walk through some of what you perceive as pros and cons of this in the USA?

Um I believe because they're so close now to what was W VR2, it was changed in and there was two parcels adjacent to them that were included.

These property owners were left out because they had a different future land use and they weren't included in that publicly initiated amendment.

It now gives them more um just ability to be able to develop their property or improve it in a way that they would like to with the residential four.

Um these are like a smaller lot that you would see in this area, so if they wanted to subdivide it and put a potential accessory dwelling unit or another home on there that they could now.

Are there negative tax implications?

Not that I'm aware of, but I did not really look into that um just because of how close it is to the public previous Pokely initiated amendments.

Yeah.

Well, just to add that in the past, the property appraiser is indicated they do not make any valuations based on the future land use category.

They look more at the zoning and the existing land use of it and how it's actually utilized.

Um the county does not require when you go into the urban service area any automatic hookup to utilities.

It would only occur if they were to subdivide.

You preempted my next question.

All right.

Didn't they also put some sort of waiver or something for the amount of subdivision it require that that's required to so that if you're a small lot owner and you just wanted to like have your kids live on your property or something, it wouldn't Yeah, you can now go back to doing um up to three lots uh without connecting.

Yeah.

Commissioner Orton.

Uh just for the record, uh Morgan High School that's listed on here at 53 percent.

Uh this next coming year will be um adding the fourth year of high school right now.

It's just 9311, and then also on the same well, to the north of this property, but the same the property owner of all that.

We are purchasing at this time a site for an elementary school, and then just north of that to the east, we are purchasing property for either a middle school or a K through eight.

So lots of room.

All right.

Any other questions, comments, discussion points from the commissioners?

All right, not seeing any.

I'll go on ahead and close the public comment on this one and open it up to motions from the commissioners on this item.

Anyone commissioner Kona?

Uh motion find HC CPA 2527 consistent with the comprehensive plan.

All right, we have a motion to consistency finder from Commissioner Kona.

Is there a second anywhere out there?

Commissioner Lincoln?

Second.

All right.

Second to that motion by Commissioner Lincoln's.

Are there any questions or comments from the commissioners before we take our vote?

Not seeing any, then would all signify their agreement by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed.

That motion carries unanimously.

All right.

Our next agenda item is the other part to this.

Item 2B, HCCPA 25-28.

Comprehensive plan, map amendment.

5,000.

Was the first one a text amendment?

Or are they both map amendments?

Because it says map amendment in my little book here.

First one was a text amendment, though.

Actually, the procedures manual was changed to make urban service area amendments.

Maps.

Map amendments.

Okay.

Yeah.

All right.

Um HCCPA 25-28 comprehensive plan map amendment 5008 through 5044 Saffold Road.

And the presenter is Lillian Lennihan.

Good evening, Commissioners.

Lillian Linehan, Planning Commission staff here to present HC CPA 2528, located at 5008 to 5044 Saffold Road.

This is a publicly initiated map amendment that is small in scale and approximately 19.94 acres.

The applicant is requesting to change the future land use from agricultural rule one to five to residential four.

This amendment is associated with HCCPA 2527, which is a request to expand the urban service area.

This is the general location map.

As map mentioned in the last slide, it is associated with HCCPA 2527.

It is in the rural area and within the limits of the South Shore Area Wide Systems Plan and Wymama Village Community Plan.

It is located north of Saffold Road and west of County Road 579.

Again, here's the aerial of the site.

The site is outlined in pink, and the blue line indicates the existing urban or urban service area boundary.

The site currently has single family uses on the property with agricultural to the northwest and further southeast.

There are also single family uses to the northeast and west, and there are a few public quasi public institutional uses to the south and east of the site.

Again, these are the photos.

They're the same as the previous presentation, so I'll just go through them really quickly.

Currently, the future land use designation is agricultural rule one to five.

This category allows for one dwelling unit per five gross acres and a maximum floor area ratio of 0.25.

This designation allows for the consideration of farms, ranches, feedlots, residential, neighborhood commercial offices, industrial uses related to agricultural uses and mining related activities.

Other future land use categories shown in this map include natural preservation and residential four.

Um and while we are on this map, as previously mentioned, those two adjacent parcels that are showing agricultural rule one to five on this map are recently approved for residential four with an urban service area expansion.

The applicant is proposing to amend the future land use category to residential four.

The residential four category allows for four dwelling units per gross acre and a maximum floor area ratio of 0.25.

This designation allows for the consideration of agricultural, residential, neighborhood commercial, office uses and multi-purpose projects.

Currently, under the agricultural rule one to five future land use category, the site can s could could consider up to three dwelling units or two hundred and seventeen thousand one hundred and forty-six square feet of non-residential uses.

And under the proposed future land use designation of residential four, the site could consider up to 79 dwelling units or 217, 146 square feet of non-residential uses.

The proposed amendment would allow for the consideration of increased residential density and would not increase the potential of commercial intensity.

The proposed amendment received no formal objections, and a full list of all comments is included in the overall packet for this amendment.

While formulating our recommendation, planning commission staff reviews all related policies regarding the proposed request.

The following policies were considered by planning commission staff in the evaluation of the amendment.

Planning commission staff found four main areas of consistency.

The proposal meets the intent of FLU's objective 1.1 and policy 1.1.9.

In this case, the subject site is adjacent and continues to the established urban service area and the residential for land uses.

The residential for future land use designation surrounds the site, and there are low density residential developments on all sides.

The transition to residential four on the subject site with an urban service area expansion would allow for density intensity that is compatible with the existing area.

The proposal meets the cultural uh slash historic and economic development goals of the South Shore area-wide systems plans.

These goals seek to promote sustainable growth and development that is clustered and well planned to preserve the area's environment, cultural identity, and livability, and to analyze, identify, and market lands that are available for economic development, including residential, commercial, office, industrial, and agricultural.

The amendment is consistent with these goals as the proposed change will cluster potential development on the north side of Saffold Road while preserving the existing agricultural and natural land uses to the south of Saffold Road and further in east east and west of the site.

This also targets areas suitable for residential economic development.

I'm just joking.

And I will go on ahead and close the public comment on this one and open it up to motions from the commissioners.

We are adjourning.

Sorry, welcome everyone to the March 9th, 2026, second and final public hearing of the Planning Commission on City of Tampa redistricting.

We thank you for attending this meeting.

Your comments and participation are encouraged.

For those attending in person and wishing to speak, please sign the register at the rear of the room and turn off any devices that may be a distraction.

To minimize feedback and the audio, all online participants in the meeting will be muted until it is their opportunity to speak.

Planning commissioners should unmute themselves to indicate that they would like to speak.

Please be sure to state your name at the beginning of your remarks for the benefit of the clerk.org.

For those of you who are not familiar with our process, the meeting will be conducted as follows.

Staff will give their presentation with a fifteen minute time limit.

Members of the public may address the planning commission when recognized by the chairman.

Public comment will be heard for three minutes per person.

Planning commissioners will then ask questions.

Public comment will be closed.

Then upon a motion, a second and discussion of what will be taken.

That I'd like to ask the clerk to please go ahead and call roll.

Here.

The remaining items are the proclamation by the supervisor of elections after your approval of one of the alternatives, and we go back to the city of Tampa to inform them of the new boundaries.

Why?

Why are we redistricting?

We do it every four years because it's required by law.

There are this there's laws of Florida, but there are also two specific sections within the city uh charter for the city of Tampa, sections 2.01 and 8.03 specifically address this this process.

It is required every four years.

The next election is March 2nd, 2027.

So about a year before each election, we'll be in front of you, or somebody here will be in front of you, uh, you know, giving you uh um the ability to approve one of the alternatives.

And of course, uh at Pina Demographer, 20,000 people have moved to Florida since 2020.

So again, a bit of uh rearrangement of the furniture, if you will, is needed.

Eco population is our guiding principle.

We follow the US Constitution, we follow Supreme Court cases, we do not take into account voting age population to make uh redistricting decision or population by race.

We are sensitive to concerns within Tampa residents of you know, again, minority representation in city council, so we are sensitive to that, but our alternatives reflect the equal population principle.

We use something called range as a percentage of the mean, it's a fancy term, which is core short into the range, expresses a percentage.

Uh, but again, what we need to do is reduce that percentage from whatever it is now around 8.0 to 5%.

And we use the latest and greatest census product as of the time of the project, when the project started, which was the uh American Community Survey 2023, five years.

Again, we are trying to reduce that range from 8.36 to 5 to or less than 5.

So we're moving the prisons from the the most populous council district, which is council district seven according to census data to the least populous council district, which is council district five, again, according to census data.

We only have a finite number of moves.

We discussed it with y'all in a workshop back in October of 2025.

There are legal uh limitations, physical limitations, temporal limitations, you name it.

So again, this is a very complicated uh uh, you know, play that we have to do in order to come up with the alternatives.

And we came up with four.

So for those at home, and for those of you that are may not be familiar with you know uh the council districts in Tampa, there are actually seven council seats, but only four of those are tied to a geography.

You start with council district four, which is covers South Tampa, then you move uh east to council district five, and uh you know, if you go west towards the airport and west shore, you could you're in council district six, and the USF and Nutampa area are covered by Council District 7.

Again, the most populous, according to census data is council district seven, and the least populous is council district five.

So our goal is to move some precincts, we move the whole voting precinct from Council District 7 to Council District 5 in order to reduce the range from 8.36% to less than five.

This table you've seen it before, tons of numbers, but only a couple of insights from here.

First of all, you see the range is 8.36% right there in red.

Every alternative that we've proposed reduces that to less than five, so they're all valid from that perspective.

Now, if you want to do the math in your head, for those of you that are more number inclined, you know, it's about 101,000 people per council district.

So when we move forward, five people, five thousand people, we're moving a couple percentage points again if you want to do the math.

So we're gonna go quickly over the alternatives.

Again, you've seen this before in the previous month, and also you saw you saw that in in in January.

The first alternative move three precincts.

151, 169 in 342.

151 move from Council District 6 to Council District 4.

169 move from Council District 5 to Council District 6.

And 342 moves from Council District 7 to Council District 5.

And here's a map.

Where for here's a table that once we make those three moves, we reduce it to we obtain our lowest range at 1.9%.

So we come from 8 to 1.9.

So again, it passes less than 5, he passes the validity test.

These are the the map.

This is the map.

The first close-up map.

So you can see 342 is north, is it north of Bush Boulevard there?

And you know, uh, you know, um the you know, so it's in the northern part of Council District 5.

169 is around Cypress Street there.

And 151 is that is that it's kind of reaches out from Council District 6.

So we've been meaning to fix this this alternative for a while, but again, uh it's something that again, there's old trade-offs.

This is what it looks like when you zoom out, so you can give you a kind of whole city picture.

Okay.

The second alternative is the simplest alternative.

Only one precinct.

This is the least disruptive alternative.

345 moves from council district seven, which we've told you is the most popular council district, to council district five, which again, according to census data, is the least populous, moving around 5% or 4% there, 5,000 people.

That's what we're moving.

And when you do that, cancel district five becomes the most populous right away.

And the range is reduced to 3.97.

So you chave up around 4% of the range, which is great.

And again, only one pricing, you can see it there, it's also north of cancel of the current council district five boundaries, it's around you know, north of Bush Boulevard, you know, you know, uh uh between 30th and 15th, there for those of you that that are you know city residents.

So this is a zooming out of alternative two quickly, alternative three.

We're moving three prisons here, but as I said before, can or two, and I'll show you in the map.

249 and 250 cannot go together.

They are the 40 sales neighborhood.

They move from council district seven to cancel district six.

Because you move to council district six now, and you need to give up a precinct, and that will be 320, which goes from council district six to council district five.

And again, it reduces to the second highest range of 3.78.

So again, 249 and 250, you've seen them before, they add the oddly shape because the city, the city boundary is right there, and then also again the 40 sales neighborhoods.

So again, those two gotta come together.

And 320, of course, once you load up this council district six, it needs to give up a prison and it is a precinct 320.

This is up when you zoom out.

Lastly, alternative four.

Three precincts, 141, 207, and 345 are all moving under this alternative.

141 moved from council district six to council district four, two or seven from five to six.

In 345, yes, you've heard that right.

That's also from alternative two, it's the same pricing moving from seven to five.

But because we're moving more pricings along with 345, we obtain the second lowest range at 1.95%.

This is what it looks like.

Uh, you know, the the close-up map.

Again, 345 is north of Bush Boulevard, and between 15th and 30th there, then 207 is north of Main Street, and around Armenia there, and then 141 is around you know, Swan, Morrison, Kennedy Boulevard.

We deployed a comprehensive outreach strategy.

Letters were sent to stakeholders, council members, NAACP, Hispanic Services Council.

Briefings were provided to council members individually and collectively, and they helped us by amplifying this this and putting them, blasting them in the newsletter.

So people that would have subscribed to the newsletter saw this.

Uh over 3,000 emails target directly to high frequency voters, neighborhood associations, and political parties.

If you had a presence in the in in in Hillsborough County as a political party, we were able to find you, we send you an email letting you know.

Nearly 1,700 projects, you know, site visits, 170 completed preference forms, alternative two is the most preferred once you do the waiting and everything.

Six public open houses, these are not required by law.

Only two things are required by law, which is the two hearings.

This the public, the open houses, we follow a tradition of engaging the public, and we have always done at least six of them.

So that is this, you know, the second time I'm doing this, and we don't six.

Over 100 participants.

We were blessed to have a lot of people really interested in this.

Uh more than 3,000 impressions through social media.

So we actually paid ads.

So if you were within a mile, if you if you had your location on and cross within a mile of one of these precincts, you were targeted, and you were looking at IG, or you're looking at Facebook, or you're looking at LinkedIn, you were targeted for the social media ads.

So that's what happened.

This uh hearing was advertised legally in three newspapers, and so were the previous one.

Uh, we are also several print and televised media interviews who we have benefited tremendously from the controversies around in that district.

We were able to harness that for good in order to get you know people interested in this.

Uh, and again, we were also invited to a number of uh you know community organization meetings, such as good trouble Tampa, West Tampa CDC, etc.

Public ranking alternatives.

Once again, for those of you that may be newer, this is not a referendum, this is not an election.

So these are just preference expressed for our staff, you know, to take into account and for you to take into account in your decision matrix.

Now, the gray table there chose the actual votes, then this is where we waited.

Why are we waiting this results?

Because it's a preference.

You you say, I would like alternative two is my most preferred.

So I put one there.

Then alternative, you know, four will be my second most preferred.

That's why you have to wait them out.

When you do the calculations, and again, all the numbers are there for you to come up with it.

Name the numbers in the chart, the alternative two is by far the most preferred that either rank second or first most consistently.

Staff recommendation.

We are keeping it simple this year.

Three precinct 345, alternative two is the only one that we're recommending for approval in front of this body.

Why are we doing this?

Because again, we've been telling you, Council District 7 is most populous, council district five is least popular.

So, and they have a border.

Let's just move the precinct.

And this precinct achieves the goal of reducing that range from eight to less, you know, less than five percent.

So that's it.

Least disruptive.

We are with a lot of upheaval right now, so we want to keep things calm and keep going.

Now, the other thing is that people love this alternative.

They could hide they consistently ranked it highest.

And also, we receive people.

You saw the gentle lady here last time giving uh you know, saying that she wanted this option to go forward and to be approved.

And we all the comments we receive are positive.

We receive no negative comments in terms of 345.

All the precinct, other alternatives we have received pluses and minus in terms of comments.

So again, this is what it does.

Uh 3.97.

This is the table.

You've seen this is the second time you see this table now.

Again, the map, okay.

345 from Council District 7 to Council District 5.

Just moving there, and this is when you move up again.

This affects the least amount of people.

So again, if you are a voter going to prison 345, you're going to continue to vote in the same place.

All you're gonna see is that the council members in which you're gonna be voting come March 2027 are going to be different than the last time you voted.

Next key dates, these dates do not apply to you.

This is your last date.

It is your final hearing.

So this applies to staff and the supervisor of elections.

By April 1st, we need to have the proclamation in uh supervised of elections.

We have Miss Kramer here for to answer any questions if need be.

And uh in September, uh, is is the is where we need to go before September 3rd to the city of Tampa to give them a uh you know an update.

That's it.

Thank you very much.

All right, thank you very much.

We had a couple people sign up in the public comment for this one.

So I will start uh with the one individual who signed up virtually, is Michael Randolph on the line.

Uh yes, can you hear me?

Yes, please go ahead, sir.

You have three minutes.

Thank you so much.

My name is Michael Ray Gall.

And I'm speaking on behalf of the West Tampa Community Development Corporation.

As we approach the upcoming registration, bro.

Our community is unified.

We have one conclusion.

Alternate two is the only man that protect political uh political power, black power while maintaining heavy legal requirement.

Almost two makes the smallest change possible.

Moving this one precinct, please say three four five to 10%.

It does not touch West Tampa or Eastern.

It does not split the Bruler Baptist community.

One of the strongest black voting blacks in the city.

It keeps the David Blacksdale seeing a setting setting, seeing senator voters together, conserving trusted relationship with council representative.

Any case churches unify instead of scamming conservations across multiple districts, alternate one, three, and four, most three districts.

Alternate one splits the Brule community across three districts.

Alternate three.

This map keeps up the community O stable and representative.

And finally, Alternate 2 also has a positive impact on District 4 this seven.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

All right.

Next up, we have three individuals in person, and I will start with Rashima McCoy.

Good evening.

My name is Rishima McCoy, and I'm in the Sulphur Springs area.

And I also sit on the Selfur Spring Action Board of Action League.

And we are in favor of option two, alternative two.

So I'm not going to wait to keep your time up too much.

We also welcome precinct 345.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, Fran Tate.

Good afternoon, board members.

Good evening.

I am Fran Tate, and I'm happy to be here this evening.

I see familiar faces in the room, and I want to thank you also very much for your presentations.

I know it took a lot of time and effort, a lot of your evenings spent coming out and explaining all of the maps to us.

We had a lot of questions, very intense, and I know uh it wasn't easy, but um we really want to understand everything about the maps and redistricting because to some of us it was the very first time we participated as such a very, very important decision in our neighborhoods.

So I am Fran Tate, and I am the founder and the president of Jackson Heights Neighborhood Association.

I started with a um community crime watch over 20 years ago in Jackson Heights, and it took off and it just kept growing and growing, and it developed into a neighborhood association.

We are 35 homeowners and their families, and we're very, very active in the community.

We've even won several awards through the county and the city, and we just appreciate everyone so very much for recognizing us.

We're a very active city council and the school board.

Uh we've ever we've even come to the county meetings um sometimes.

Um, tonight I just want to talk about the uh redistricting maps.

Um we came to the meeting that was at the um city center, and we studied and we asked a lot of questions, and um my members and several other uh members in the co in the room were concerned about um they were concerned about Bueller Baptists and they were concerned about the upcoming um museum that I think Commissioner Myers is trying to construct over in the West Tampa area.

So we decided that um alternate map uh number two, I think it's altern map number two, was the one that we decided was the best map, even though when I look at some of the math on here, I thought maybe we were losing some of our voting power, but I side along with the majority of the community because I am the president, but I represent the community that voted me into my seat, and that is what they decided that they want to go along with map number two, and also first church of God.

We welcome them into the um district, and uh we just want to just uh enjoy everything and want to work with everybody and we want to train everybody and activate everybody to get out and vote, please.

Thank you so very much for your time.

I am Fran Tate.

Thank you.

All right, last but not least, we have Delphine Jones.

Delphine Delphine.

Good afternoon.

My name is Delphine Jones.

I'm with West Tampa CAC Advisory Committee, although I'm not representing all of them.

vote please thank you so very much for your time I am for Ann Tate thank you all right last but not least we have Delphine Jones Delphine Delphine good afternoon my name is Delphine Jones I'm with West Tampa CAC advisory committee although I'm not represented in all of them I also am a vice president of West Wimmerfront Crown Watch group so my area is right by the University of Tampa Beular Baptist is in that area first Baptist and we want to keep that as a voting area because that's the most popular um I was concerned about East Tampa and West Tampa diminishing black votes uh because Tampa's getting so heavily populated now so it kind of to do anything else but alternative two would advance the black votes in East Tampa and West Tampa the highest populated uh of uh black um people in the area just pigging back off of what Michael Randolph explained and that's it thank you so much all right thank you very much Mr.

Gonzalez you get a three minute period for response if you wanted to say anything no all right enough hi you're done all right I will turn it over to the commissioners then at this point for deliberations questions comments thoughts on all of this see Commissioner Lauk moving just want to say compliments to staff on a job well done I know it's uh a Herculan effort every few years when we when you when you take this up so well done well explained and I appreciate it that's uh that's a big kudos there commissioner Lauk was was one who needed a little convincing at the start of this thing so that's a that's a slam dunk for you you cert there any other questions thoughts or comments from the commission commissioner bowden well I want to uh amend the staff as well because um I do move around the community where some of those changes were uh position or they would discuss it and uh from your outreach and everything I see that uh people feel a lot better about the the alternatives and the actual final uh option option two was one that a lot of people actually uh see as the best choice the the minimum re uh disruption and changes so congratulations all right I did have a quick question actually for you sir just a curiosity on my part when we do this again next time it's only if it goes above five percent do we have to make changes right if it comes four years go by and none of them are above the the five percent threshold and we don't necessarily have to make changes again correct we we do still have to announce that you know we did the the calculations right and then we just go and announce that you know there's no changes necessarily okay yeah but we do have to go through the the process yes yeah okay all right any other comments discussion items not seeing any then I will close the public comment on this one and open it up to the commissioners for motions on this item commissioner Kona yeah motion to approve alternate map two as the approved city of Tampa um redistricting map commissioner laut second all right we have a motion to approve alternative number two by commissioner cona second to that approval by commissioner lauk are there any comments statements from the commissioners before we take our vote and we'll all signify their agreement by saying aye aye those opposed that motion carries unanimously all right great work mr gonzalez thank you again all right and that is it for tonight ladies and gentlemen at 757 p.m this public hearing is adjourned