Just more than one year into its two-year mandate to develop and recommend an update to the 2020 Downtown Sarasota Master Plan, the direction the 13-member City Commission panel remains unclear.
In the midst of the ad-hoc committee’s work, the Downtown Sarasota Condominium Association assembled a panel to discuss with its membership what they believe the outcome should be. The general consensus of four of the five panelists speaking to DSCA members on April 9 at that Sarasota Garden Club — excluding Capital Projects Manager Alvimarie Corales, who represented city staff — was thus:
- The administrative approval process for development within the downtown zone districts is flawed.
- City commissions since the plan was implemented 26 years ago have lacked the courage to say no to developers.
- Sarasota is no longer the low-key “summer resort” absent commercialism it was originally planned to be.
- Land planner Andres Duany’s New Urbanism approach to the master plan is idealistic but often in conflict with real world application.
- All of that has resulted in the façade of a boomtown that was once a jewel, as described by panelist and local historian Jeff LaHurd, that was allowed to be damaged and desecrated by overdevelopment, namely condo towers.
That last point elicited a round of applause, ironically, from the condominium owners.
“First of all, I’d like to say, ‘Welcome to Sarasota,’” LaHurd said. “The good news is you’re here. Bad news that you got here too late.”…