Good morning and welcome to the September meeting of the Local Planning Agency for Pinellas County, Florida. Today's public hearing by the Local Planning Agency, or LPA, is being held to review a proposed amendment to the Pinellas County Future Land Use Map and a proposed development agreement. The Local Planning Agency is an independent advisory board charged with reviewing and making recommendation to the Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners on cases to be heard today. The Board of County Commissioners will make the final decision on each item at a separate public hearing currently scheduled to be held on October the 27th, 2026 at 6 p.m. The Board of County Commissioners' meeting will be held at 333 Chestnut Street in the Palm Room. The procedure for today will be as follows. First, staff will make a brief presentation, not to exceed 20 minutes. We will then hear from the applicant, who will present their case again, not to exceed 20 minutes. We will then hear from proponents, who will be given 3 minutes each, unless representing a group of 5 or more, in which case they will be given 10 minutes. Non-speakers must be present and waive their time to get the 10 minutes. We will then hear from opponents, who likewise will be given 3 minutes each, unless representing a group of 5 or more, in which case they will also be given 10 minutes. Again, non-speakers must be present and waive their time to get the 10 minutes. We will then hear from the applicant, who will be given the opportunity to close, answer questions, or respond to any concerns raised by the opponents or proponents for a period of time, not to exceed 5 minutes. Before your presentation, please give your name and address for the record. All testimony needs to be under oath, so if you have not been sworn in already and you plan to testify, please rise now and be sworn. Also, please fill out the slip on the table and present it to the clerk before you speak. There will not be continuing rebuttal, so please try to present all information while you are here at the podium. If you plan to provide letters, written comments, studies, or other documents in response to the LPA's findings and recommendations, those must be received by the zoning section 7 days prior to the Board of County Commissioners' meeting in order to be included in the record that will be transmitted to the Board of County Commissioners. With that, we will move into the agenda. And at this time, we will hear the quasi-judicial statement. Thank you. Good morning. Assistant County Attorney Kirby Kreider. The matters heard by the local planning agency are quasi-judicial in nature. Please note that only competent, substantial, fact-based testimony or evidence may be considered by the local planning agency deciding the matters before it. Peer speculation or opinion not based on competent, excuse me, peer speculation or opinion not based on competent, fact-supported evidence cannot be considered by the Board. Lay testimony with fact-based support, including but not limited to meeting minutes, surveys, engineering reports, et cetera, may be considered competent and substantial evidence. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Kreider. We'll now move to Item 3, approval of the minutes for the August 12, 2026 LPA hearing. Do I have any comments on the minutes before I entertain a motion? All right. Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion on the minutes. So moved. Motion by Everett. Second. Second by Cataldo. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. The motion passes unanimously. That brings us to Item 4, A1, FLU 26-02. Staff, is this a companion case with DVA 26-02? Yes, they're companion cases, so they will be presented together, heard together, but separate votes. Okay. And will you need time for both cases or just time for one presentation? Just one presentation. All right. And is the applicant acceptable with that arrangement? And I'm getting a yes. Please proceed when ready. Thank you, Madam Chair. Ladies and gentlemen, the local planning agency, I'm Scott Swearingen. I'm the county's long-range planning manager. It's a pleasure to be before you again this morning, and I appreciate your time, so I'll try and make this brief. Before you, the presentation, two cases. It's a future land use map amendment, that's FLU 26-02, followed by a development agreement, DVA 26-02. And I would note, and Michael, please correct me if I'm wrong, the development agreement, these are separate voting items, but the development agreement would not be able to take effect unless the future land use map amendment were approved. Yes. The subject property is approximately 4.82 acres. It's located on the west side of U.S. Highway 19 North in unincorporated Clearwater. The current future land use designation is residential office retail for 4.16 acres for the majority of the property, and there's preservation land use on a property as well on 0.66 acres. And the requested amendment is to change that land use to commercial general, which would cover 4.12 acres, and then the remainder would remain as preservation with a slight increase to 0.7 acres. The zoning of the property is commercial parkway, however, there is no zoning change being proposed along with this. No zoning change, just a future land use map amendment and the development agreement. And that agreement includes certain building limitations and conservation easement. I'm going to get into that in just a second. The applicant, their expressed intent for the property is for a self-storage facility. The development agreement portion of this package, so we have, you can sum it up with the following three restrictions. So the property shall not, or shall be developed substantially in conformance with the non-buildable area exhibit D to the development agreement, and I'll show you that in just a moment. So non-buildable area, this is the non-buildable area, it represents the non-culverted section of Curlew Creek. Curlew Creek runs across the property, kind of from the northwest to the southeast. So it's that non-culverted portion, which will remain preservation on a future land use map, and it generally includes a 25-foot wide setback or buffer, if you will, on either side, from the top of the bank on both sides. It's approximately 30% of the subject property. So that's what the non-buildable area that is referred to in Exhibit D. And those areas, again, depicted in Exhibit D, and any additional areas mutually agreed upon by the developer and the county during the site plan process will be placed under a conservation easement. So that would become, in effect, a conservation easement that would ride with the property. And then finally, the maximum impervious surface ratio is being capped by the development agreement at 0.7. This is in Exhibit D to the development agreement. This is a binding exhibit to that agreement, and this shows the non-buildable area. I also want to include, and this is a part of your packet as well, the applicant has prepared a concept plan, and again, this is a conceptual-level plan. It is non-binding. It's not a part of the development agreement. But they have submitted this to show kind of their intent for redevelopment of the property. So it gives you this kind of very kind of glossy overview of how they would envision that they could be able to develop that property from the site plan level, showing the creek that goes through storage area more to the west of the property near the residential, just on the west side of the property, and the development mean pushed more toward US-19. And again, this is non-binding with the application. So the subject property, again, is an unincorporated Clearwater. It's on the west side of US-19, which you can make out there. And then Curlew Avenue, which is a very minor roadway. The surrounding character, US-19, is mostly, you know, office, strip commercial. You can see the mobile home parks right around there as well. And to note, the mobile home park that is adjacent to the west side of the subject property. So the map on your left shows the current future land use map with a subject property designated as residential office retail. And then the change would move on the right side of your map to commercial general. We do have a growing precedent, if you will, for commercial general along the corridor. They are pretty similar in land use types. I'll go into that in just a moment. But you can see that most of the corridor is residential office retail and then the residential categories. You can start to come about as you move on either side of the corridor. And no zoning component to this case, but the property is zoned commercial parkway, as are the majority of properties along US-19 in this area. And then similar to the land use map, you can see in the zoning map, some of the more residential zone districts start to come about on either side of the corridor. Residential medium, residential plan development, R2 single family, those kinds of things. Give you some orientation of the property a little bit. So this is the subject property. It's looking north from Boy Scout Road. Boy Scout Road is at the south end of the property. And so looking northward, you can see you might be able to make out US-19 a little bit, kind of on the middle right side of the photo. And then looking in the opposite direction, this is looking south along on the subject property, US-19 to the left. And this is the old, the former Hamburger Mary's property or building. This is looking northwest at the subject property. This is a vacant office building and is currently on site that is scheduled to be, the applicant has expressed that they would like to remove this building. And then finally, this is on the subject property near the west boundary or border of the subject property, obviously looking westward. And you can see you have the fencing that's between the mobile home park and the subject property there at the far west side. The current LANG use designation, the ROR designation, allows a wide range of uses from residential, office, personal service, office support, commercial service, retail. It also allows some light manufacturing and some research and development, light research and development. And verbatim, per our comprehensive plan, this category is generally appropriate in locations where it would serve as a transition from more intensive non-residential uses or major roadways to residential, office, or public, semi-public uses. These areas are typically in close proximity to and served by the arterial roadway network. The residential density that is permitted by this category is 24 dwelling units per acre with a 0.5 FAR and a 0.85 impervious surface ratio for non-residential uses. That impervious surface ratio is important as we get into understanding the limitations of the development agreement. So that is what is currently on the property today. And then that change to commercial general, mostly the same set of uses are permitted. However, commercial general does permit storage warehouse, which is the reason why the applicant is seeking the change, because they would like to redevelop the property with a self-storage facility. That is not permitted under the ROR. It is permitted under the commercial general. And for our comp plan, this category is generally appropriate in areas of the county that are now developed or appropriate to be developed in a manner designed to provide the community or region with commercial goods and services and in areas in proximity to and with good access to major transportation facilities. Similar to the ROR category, 24 dwelling units per acre are permitted. A 0.55 FAR, which is the same FAR. However, the impervious surface ratio gets bumped up to a 0.9 for non-residential uses. Note that the development agreement that is being included with this would cap that ISR at 0.7. So it wouldn't be at the 0.85 that it is currently today, nor would it go up to the 0.9. It would be capped at 0.7. So we would have a lower impervious surface ratio on this property. And the preservation category, that's really kind of along the Curlew Creek per our comp plan. These are areas determined in environmental significance and recognized in the Pinellas County Conference of Plan, as you might have guarded, including wetlands, 25-year floodplains, natural drainage ways, habitat and dangerous species areas, generally appropriate to areas of major ecological functions, a 0.1 FAR and a 0.2 ISR for non-residential uses. So you can imagine those are kind of like support facilities that may be necessary in those preservation areas. And then finally, the current land use, which will continue to be land use. That's proposed is probably not the most accurate word there. Commercial Parkway. It provides for a wide range of commercial and office uses, including self-storage facilities. And it also, to note, allows residential in certain circumstances. Should be conveniently located with access to arterial highways and transportation facilities, either directly or by service roads. The maximum building height is 75 feet, but note that it is limited to 45 feet when 50 feet of residentially zoned property. And again, no zoning change is being proposed. Traffic impacts, from a land use, and I always like this disclaimer, this is like a 20,000-foot analysis of traffic. Traffic at a more granular level would be looked at during site plan review. But at least from this level, the actual traffic volume could be slightly reduced simply because the amount of the commercial category with the change would be slightly reduced. But it's pretty much null as far as traffic impacts. I will note, however, that US-19, as many of you are probably very aware in this segment, has a level of service F with a vehicle-to-capacity ratio of 1.817. And for those of you who may travel this road, I'm sure you're very aware that it's currently under construction. And that future cross-section of this roadway and that future function of this roadway, if you think of what you have south of Clearwater, so it's going to more of a limited-access highway as opposed to kind of a strip commercial highway as it is today. So that's going to be the ultimate – that will be how US-19 will be ultimately. And how that level of service changes, I am not sure, but, of course, we will see. With regard to flood risk, this property is neither within the coastal high hazard area or the coastal storm area. However, it does lie within a 100-year floodplain and partially within a 25-year floodplain. In conclusion, staff supports the proposed amendment to the future land use map and the associated development agreement. The land use amendment does not significantly alter the uses permitted or change the potential impact from development. The use categories themselves are pretty similar. With the exception that the commercial general would allow for the intended use of the property by the applicant, which is a self-storage facility. Included with the development agreement, that's included. What it essentially does, it better protects Curlew Creek and reduces impacts in the floodplain per the development agreement. Reduces the maximum potential impervious service allowed on site. We talked about that. It would be actually lowered to 0.7. And it effectively pushes development away from the residential dwellings on the west of the property closer to U.S. 19. And that happens in part by that Exhibit D, which puts that kind of a setback buffer area, creates that conservation area that's more toward the west side of the property, and effectively ends up pushing that development to the east, so further away from the residential as it exists today. One thing is that the amendment will allow cleanup of the property and redevelopment in line with the county's development regulations in a more appropriate manner. You also saw the site photos that we took of the subject property. We find the proposal compatible with the area's mixed-use character and consistent with our comprehensive plan. Staff recommends approval. The Board of County Commissioner is scheduled to hear this item on October 27th in their evening, 6 p.m. agenda. That is all I have in my presentation. I appreciate your time and thank you. And if you have any questions, I'd be happy to try and answer. All right. Board members, any questions for Mr. Saringen? Yes, I have a question. Yes, ma'am. Vice Chair. Good morning. Good morning. I was just wondering how that impervious surface area ratio, did I get all that right, is going to be achieved? And where will the parking area be, and what is the access from the highway? So access from U.S. 19 would come, I believe, directly off U.S. 19. However, there is also Boy Scout Road that's adjacent to the south that could be used for access. We don't delve into that level of detail at the land use amendment phase. The development agreement speaks to that as a pervious surface ratio. Now, however they have to figure out their parking and loading and those kinds of things and where that building goes, that's on them. But they are not allowed to have impervious surface greater than 70% of the subject property. Okay. I think you had a third question, did you? No, you covered it. I think the parking, the access, and the impervious ratio. Okay. That was pretty quick. Thank you. And I'll just add for the access that U.S. 19 is a FDOT roadway, so any access will have to get permitted through the DOT. The road on the south, Boy Scout, is a county road, so it would be a lesser designated roadway. We would allow access there, but then the permitting for any driveway access on U.S. 19 would come from DOT. And down the road when the U.S. 19 construction is finished and it's probably going to become an overhead road with side roads? Yeah, yeah, service roads. And then that wouldn't be an issue any longer for the truck? No, usually when it's a service roads, it's easier to get a driveway access on those because you have lower speeds. Board members, any other questions for Seth? All right. Thank you, manager. Thank you. Please state your name and address for the record. Good morning. Kevin Reale, 401 East Jackson Street in Tampa, and I have been sworn. Appreciate all of your time this morning. I'll suck up for just a moment. I just finished a term on a board in St. Petersburg, and, you know, you're here for only items, so thank you for reviewing and being here because I know this is a volunteer position. Now, jumping into the actual application, I don't have a presentation because I just would have shown the same pictures that staff showed, so I'm going to talk a little bit about some of the items that staff talked about and then answer any questions that you all. We have our planner, the applicant, and an engineer here if you have specific questions, but I'll try and cover most of those as I discuss with you all. So, again, we're coming to the board today with a use in mind, but this application doesn't request a specific use. It's just that that's the impetus of the application. So it wouldn't technically limit to the self-sorage use, but that is what is desired under the current development scheme. But what really brings us here is the ISR and stormwater and floodplain limitations. So the site was developed, of course, with the office building you all saw, and then there's a restaurant and parking. And so that was all built before the stormwater regulations and the floodplain was as stringent as it is today. And so redeveloping the site is going to be more challenging because there'll need to be more floodplain compensation and there'll need to be less pavement, essentially. And so that's why you're essentially having three developments become one because repeating the same development is impossible. And so the future land use change is sought to add the use that we're interested in. But honestly, from a bigger picture, ROR considers office uses, well, there's office uses there, and they're not viable anymore. And as US-19 becomes a limited access highway, those retail uses of strip retail is not going to be viable in the same way anymore. And so a warehouse or more commercial use, including self-storage, we think is more appropriate for the site. And so that's the impetus of what's behind the application. Now, how we achieve that, to the vice chair's question there, is essentially it's less development, right? There's three areas of development that exist today, and it's going to ultimately become the one development because most of the – I don't want to say exactly, so let's talk broadly. So almost the west half of the property is going to end up being either preservation, as it exists today, or floodplain compensation. So it'll be much less pervious area. And the way that you achieve the development is to go vertical. The proposal is for four stories, which is within the limitations of the Code and the Comprehensive Plan. And there'll also be a significant buffer because the west half of the property is not going to be developed because it'll have to meet those stormwater requirements. And so the other thing, too, for transportation and for parking and those things, the use we're proposing is forgiving on those. It's not a big traffic generator, and it doesn't require as much parking. And so uniquely would be okay, but if that was to change, again, because this application doesn't tie us to a use, if that was to change, we'd still be limited on where we can develop. And so if a different use went in there, the development would be limited by where we can put pervious development and what we could fit. And if it required more parking, you'd have less development. So that would all come later. As staff also noted, there's no change in zoning. So, you know, the zoning map has the same consistency and compatibility that it has today. And the New York staff talk about compatibility, and we have a letter in the record talking about the compatibility of this future land use category with the adjacent. There's some precedent across the street, but more importantly, the uses are largely the same otherwise, and so the compatibility is maintained. And as far as access goes, access isn't proposed to be changed, so there are access points there, and so there will be an access off of 19 and then off of Boy Scout. With that, we do have our team here. If there are more specific questions that I didn't cover from the questions you all asked before, we're happy to answer them, but otherwise we'll request your consideration and approval. Thank you. Board members, any questions for the applicant? All right. Seeing none, we will now hear from the public. Is there anybody in the room who wishes to speak in support of applications FLU 26-02 or DVA 26-02? Seeing none in the room, do we have any online? I'm going to take silence as a no. Okay. We'll now hear from opponents. Is there anyone in the room who wishes to speak in opposition to FLU 26-02 or DVA 26-02? All right. Seeing none, I'm going to assume there's nobody online either. It comes back to the applicant. Do you have any closing remarks? No. I'll just point out that I didn't mention the development agreement in my short discussion, but the development agreement does limit development more. It's more limiting than what is there today, but frankly, with floodplain compensation requirements, that's acceptable because I think a 0.7 FAR would be hard to achieve even as it is, let alone the 0.85 or 0.9. So we're comfortable with that limitation, and we've agreed to that. Thank you all. Thank you. All right. Any final questions from the board for staff or the applicant? I have one question for staff. With the non-buildable area on Exhibit D, I see that there is the, I'm just going to say it's a smoke shop, but the commercial retail overlaps that. Is that a situation where if they're going to redevelop the property, they didn't really address that in that corner in their high-level overview, and that just continues like a non-conforming use, or will redeveloping the property require that to be demolished? The proposal is to demolish the buildings. They identified during our discussions with the applicant that the buildings are all, you know, obsolete. They've been vacant. There is no plan to use them. I can let the applicant speak further on that. But, yeah, that would, if it's redeveloped, yeah, that would end up either being a non-conforming if it was to stay the same use. Okay. It wouldn't be able to expand. Otherwise, it would have to be demolished. So they could take this through site plan and maintain that building as non-conforming? Yeah. As you can see in the building in the back, too, as well, it covers a portion of that. Okay. Understood. Thank you for clarifying. All right. Any other questions for staff or the applicant? Seeing none, it comes back to the board. Do we have any, I'm willing to entertain a motion on application FLU-26-02. I move to approve case number FLU-26-02. Motion by Oliveri. Second. Second by Hamilton. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. Motion passes. I will now entertain a motion on DVA-26-02. I move approval of DVA-26-02. Motion by Hamilton. Second. Second by Larry Johnson. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. The motion passes. So. All right. That brings us to the end of our cases. Staff, do you have any remarks for us before we adjourn? A couple of items to update on. I brought you before that we're looking to switch over, getting rid of paper packets and going to tablets. We've got approval. So we're in the process now of acquiring the tablets and hopefully we'll have those at your next meeting. And speaking of your next meeting, we don't have any items right now, so there probably will not be a meeting next month. So we'll see you in November. Understood. All right. Well, I hope you all have a good October if we don't see you. Definitely happy to serve as the citizens in the U.S. With that, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved. Motion by Larry Johnson. Second. Second by Hamilton. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. The motion passes unanimously. You too. Well, me and Kelly. I can't even really think about that yet. It's coming. It's coming faster than I do. You too. Okay.