Tiny City Gets $5M Developer Offer

MINNEOLA, FL-It’s an offer that most Florida municipalities would find hard to ignore. But elected officials in this tiny municipality of 6,000 permanent residents with a land area of only 3.1 square miles are taking their time in responding to a $5-million carrot being dangled in front of them by Leeds Holdings Southeast Co. The city is in the center of an agriculture belt, 25 miles west of Downtown Orlando.

Leeds officials have told Minneola’s council members the Orlando-based developer is prepared to give the city $5 million worth of amenities in exchange for a formal approval on Founders Ridge, a planned multi-million-dollar, 963-townhome and single-family subdivision near Grassy Lake Road. The project would include 240 townhomes and 723 single-family residents and would be completed within seven years.

The offer is believed to be the largest of its kind in Lake County development annals, area brokers familiar with the south end of the county tell GlobeSt.com. The offer was made after numerous Central Florida towns and cities began having second thoughts of approving new subdivisions that would tax the area’s school population and utilities’ reserves.