New residential construction to be allowed for first time in 20 years

BY PRU SOWERS

KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER

Despite the often frantic pace of residential construction in Key West, there have been no new residential building permits issued in the past two decades.

Most of the permitted construction has been renovations – sometimes involving a complete demolition – of existing property. Worried about the impact of a growing population on limited resources such as water, sewer capacity and storm evacuation routes, state legislators began controlling residential construction in Florida in 1993. Other than limited affordable housing and beneficial use allocations, as well as redevelopment, no new residential or transient development has taken place in Key West in 20 years.

That is about to change. Tuesday, Sept. 2, is the deadline for developers to submit applications to grab permits to build 91 units recently made available for new residential structures. A unit consists of two bedrooms, two bathrooms and developers have been encouraged to use the units in any configuration as long as it meets environmental sustainability goals and includes a prescribed number of affordable housing units.

You might think that developers would be jumping on this opportunity. But construction projects need time for planning, design and budgeting. As a result, the number of applications will total about what is available, according to Alison Higgins, the city’s Sustainability Coordinator.

“We had a lot of people ask questions early. But not a lot of people set pre-meetings [with city planners], which were required, until the last few weeks. I think we’re going to be right at or below [the 91 permits] this cycle,” she said.

City planners are expecting more demand in fiscal 2016, which will be the second year in a 10-year program where Key West will have a total of 910 units – 91 each fiscal year – of new market rate, affordable and transient residential construction that will be allowed. The permits became available when the state updated its hurricane evacuation route in 2012 and found that more residents than expected could safely get to the mainland during a storm warning. Then the Florida Land and Water Adjudicatory Commission in 2013 signed on to allowing limited new construction in Monroe County and Key West updated its Comprehensive Plan, which set out the goals and process of awarding the newly-available building permits.

City officials have taken steps to ensure that any new development meets significant environmental goals. The prerequisites for a developer to even be considered include a “heavy emphasis on green building, sustainable development and anticipating climate change,” according to the bid requirements. Key West is the first local government in the Florida Keys to adopt such policies in its new building permit allocation system (BPAS).

Not only does any new residential development need to be green-building certified, the structures need to be at least 1.5 feet above the flood plain established by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). And the new structures need to include a fresh water cistern that is at least 10,000 gallons or larger: One gallon for each square foot of roof.

“This is just one of the ways the city is intending to go greener and become more resilient to sea level rise,” Higgins said. “This is just the first project out of the chute.”

Higgins said there are multiple environmental and affordable housing add-ons that developers can include in their plans to gain an advantage over their competitors. The winning developers will be ranked on a point system and extra points are awarded for including more affordable units than required under the current regulations or raising the structure more than 1.5 feet over the FEMA flood plain.

“Everybody is doing more than the minimum,” she said.

So far the applications range from large – the proposed redevelopment of Sunset Marina has an application requesting 50 units over the next two years – to two, eight-unit developments to a single new residential unit proposed for over an existing commercial building.

“It’s a very good variety of what’s possible, especially for both sides going through a new process. It feels like we’ve done a good job setting up a new system,” said Higgins.

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