ORLANDO-With a decaying Downtown and a shrinking tax base, elected officials in tiny Groveland, FL (Pop. 3,100) have decided the time is right to grow the 120-year-old citrus-growing town by annexing a total 1,574 unincorporated acres and allowing residential, retail and commercial development to begin.
But city council members, who voted 4-1 for the annexation in early September, await a mid-October clash with environmentalists and local residential activist groups who oppose the municipality's plans to double the population by adding 3,000 homes in an historically rustic area, 25 miles west of Downtown Orlando.
The city has to agree on the annexation at two more public sessions before sending the measure to the Florida Department of Community Affairs, the final arbiter on area growth plans in the state.
For the city, the annexation would mean a budget surplus of $2 million and an opportunity to bring Downtown into the modern era, planning/zoning staffers at Lake County government tell GlobeSt.com.
Groveland officials couldn't be reached at GlobeSt.com's publication deadline to learn if the planned 1,574-acre annexation size might be reduced after hearing residents' protests. The three tracts involved are 750 acres, 667 acres and 157 acres.
Levitt Homes of Fort Lauderdale, FL already is proposing a 999-home, gated community on 750 acres, according to a published report. Other developers are monitoring the political tussle associated with the town's planned growth surge.
Groveland remains one of the last bastions of non-growth communities in Florida, even though it is only seven miles from Clermont, FL, one of the hottest commercial, retail and residential hubs in Florida with over $1 billion in planned projects expected to come off the drawing boards in the next 24 months.
Preliminary conceptual development plans for Groveland call for a town center, an undetermined amount of retail and commercial to service the new shelter components, a public park and a new school.
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