City of Apopka Planning Commission — May 13, 2025

Meeting Overview

Type: Regular Meeting Quorum: Yes (7 of 7 voting members present) Duration: 103 minutes (called to order 5:30 PM, adjourned 7:13 PM)

Attendance

• Present: Chairperson William Gusler, Howard Washington, Robert Ryan, Eric Mock, Wes Dumey, David Woods, Mary Norwood
• Absent: Orange County Public Schools (non-voting representative)
• Staff Present: Bobby Howell (Planning Manager, acting Community Development Director); Jun Sohn (Planner II); Amer Hamza (Planner I); Andrew Hand (City Attorney, Cliff Shepard's office); Vladimir Simonovski (City Engineer); Kelly Robertson (Content Administrator); Marta Schwarz (Content Specialist); Erin Arnold (Executive Assistant)
• Members of the public signed in: Genevieve Labuda, Nancy Brown, Bobby & Jessica Sanders, Kevin Roberson, Nick Diangelis, Jeffrey Manso, Virginia Perez

Agenda Items

Item 1: Approval of Minutes — April 8, 2025

• Type: Other (procedural)
• Action: Approved
• Vote: 7-0 (motion by Washington, second by Norwood)

Item 2: Special Exception — Child Care Facility in RSF-1A — 4410 and 4420 Chandler Road

• Type: Special Exception
• Case Number: [not available — noticed as "Special Exception request to allow a Child Care Facility in the RSF-1A (Residential Single-Family Estate) Zoning District"]
• Location: 4410 Chandler Road and 4420 Chandler Road
• Applicant: Camila Neira (owner: Richard Chandler)
• Request: Special exception use permitting a commercial child care facility within the RSF-1A residential district, without rezoning or amending the future land use
• Current Zoning: RSF-1A (Residential Single-Family Estate)
• Proposed Zoning: None — special exception only
• Project Manager: Jun Sohn, Ph.D.
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Approved
• Vote: 6-1 (motion by Dumey, second by Washington; nay: Robert Ryan)
• Conditions: (1) the existing building is demolished; (2) all roads on the property are upgraded for egress and access per City Code; (3) the building returns to the Planning Commission for review before it is built; (4) no access is granted to Chandler Road
• Notable Discussion: The applicant stated the facility would be 15,000 square feet with a maximum capacity of 250 children under DCF's 35-square-feet-per-child indoor standard. Commissioner Ryan argued repeatedly that a building of that scale "sounds like a commercial building" and should be zoned commercial; City Attorney Andrew Hand distinguished the proposed commercial daycare from a home-occupation family day care home and stated there is "no overarching state regulation" barring the use in residential zoning. Chairperson Gusler articulated the board's containment logic: under a special exception, if the daycare closes the parcel remains residential and "nobody can use it for a commercial use," whereas commercial zoning would admit any commercial operation. Richard Chandler described Chandler Road as a one-mile-long, 15-foot-wide easement; Ryan objected to granting the project access to it. Commissioner Dumey's first motion died for lack of a second before the access and demolition conditions were added.

Item 3: Ordinance No. 3098 — Small-Scale Future Land Use Amendment — 2501 Rock Springs Road

• Type: Comprehensive Plan Amendment (Small-Scale FLU)
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3098
• Location: 2501 Rock Springs Road
• Applicant: Miguel Kaled (owner: BSC-Rock Springs East LLC); Elizabeth Crane appeared on behalf of the applicant
• Request: Change Future Land Use from "County" Rural to "City" RVLS (Residential Very Low Suburban)
• Density: 2 DU/A (maximum 19 single-family units allowed)
• Project Manager: Jun Sohn, Ph.D.
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Recommended approval
• Vote: 7-0 (motion by Mock, second by Woods)
• Notable Discussion: The parcel sits inside the Wekiva Study Area. Staff confirmed Orange County had emailed requesting the Wekiva special condition; the applicant's representative said the development would mirror an existing project at 2600 Rock Springs Road and that no homes would back onto the Wekiva protection area.

Item 4: Ordinance No. 3099 — Change of Zoning — 2501 Rock Springs Road

• Type: Rezoning
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3099
• Location: 2501 Rock Springs Road
• Applicant: Elisabeth Crane (owner: BSC-Rock Springs East LLC)
• Request: Change zoning from Transitional to large-lot single-family
• Current Zoning: T (Transitional)
• Proposed Zoning: RSF-1B (Residential Single-Family District — Large Lot)
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Recommended approval
• Vote: 7-0 (motion by Washington, second by Ryan)
• Notable Discussion: The applicant disclosed 18 single-family homes on 85-foot-wide lots at a price point of $850,000 per home. A neighbor on Faye Street objected that the count had risen from 14 to 18 and asked about perimeter fencing and tax effects. Planning Manager Howell stated the Comprehensive Plan caps the site at 2 dwelling units per acre because it is in the Wekiva, and that because the project is under 25 dwelling units the Land Development Code does not require a public hearing — it proceeds to DRC-level approval, with only the plat returning to the Planning Commission.

Item 5: Ordinance No. 3101 — Rewrite of the Comprehensive Plan

• Type: Comprehensive Plan Amendment (full rewrite)
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3101
• Location: Citywide
• Applicant: City of Apopka
• Request: Recommend approval of the rewritten Comprehensive Plan and authorize transmittal to the Florida Department of Commerce
• Project Manager: Bobby Howell, AICP and Jun Sohn, Ph.D.
• Staff Recommendation: Recommend approval (of approval or denial) so staff can proceed to City Council and state transmittal
• Action: Recommended approval of the rewrite in its entirety with the exception of the Transportation Element, and authorized staff to transmit to the Florida Department of Commerce
• Vote: 6-1 (motion by Mock, second by Ryan; Wes Dumey recorded as the dissenting member "due to the need to address the open space green space contiguous area and harmonize with Orange County")
• Notable Discussion: Mid-presentation, staff disclosed newly passed legislation — Senate Bill 180 — and turned the item over to City Attorney Andrew Hand. Hand's on-the-record reading: the bill cites the federal disaster declarations for Hurricanes Debby, Helene and Milton, which together cover every Florida county, so although the bill is not written as a statewide law it operates as one. It bars any municipality or county from adopting a moratorium on construction, reconstruction or redevelopment of hurricane-damaged property, and from adopting "more restrictive or burdensome" amendments to a comprehensive plan or land development regulations, or more restrictive procedures for site plan, development permit or development order review. The restriction is retroactive to August 1, 2024 and runs through October 1, 2027. A separate forward-looking provision imposes a one-year restriction on any local government within a future disaster declaration area. Howell named the specific policies at risk: raising open space to 30%, the one-dwelling-unit-per-acre limit north of Sebastian Springs Lane, removal of the HDR-25 high-density-residential policy allowing 25 du/acre, a proposed mandatory-annexation policy for contiguous properties on city utilities, and the resiliency and sustainability element. Commissioner Dumey pressed to raise open space from 20% to 33-35% to harmonize with Orange County and objected to approving the plan without it; Commissioner Mock replied that such an increase "could easily be construed as burdensome and restrictive at this moment," and recommended approval so the board could revisit the question after the restriction expires rather than risk litigation exposure. Howell: "the legislature has the upper hand and we are at their mercy."

Item 6: Ordinance No. 3103 — Small-Scale Future Land Use Amendment — 438 North Park Avenue

• Type: Comprehensive Plan Amendment (Small-Scale FLU)
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3103
• Location: 438 N. Park Avenue
• Applicant: Nicholas Diangelis (owners: Nicholas and Stephanie Diangelis)
• Request: Change Future Land Use from County Low Density Residential to Commercial
• Intensity: 0.25 maximum FAR (maximum 7,147.4 square feet)
• Project Manager: Amer Hamza
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Recommended approval
• Vote: 7-0 (motion by Norwood, second by Mock)

Item 7: Ordinance No. 3104 — Change of Zoning — 438 North Park Avenue

• Type: Rezoning
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3104
• Location: 438 N. Park Avenue
• Applicant: Nicholas Diangelis (owners: Nicholas and Stephanie Diangelis)
• Current Zoning: T (Transitional)
• Proposed Zoning: C-C (Community Commercial)
• Intensity: 0.25 maximum FAR (maximum 7,147.4 square feet)
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Recommended approval
• Vote: 7-0 (motion by Norwood, second by Woods)

Item 8: Oaks at Kelly Park, Phase 3B — Replat

• Type: Other (replat)
• Location: 2747, 2753, 2759 and 2765 Arbor Dune Avenue
• Applicant: Genevieve LaBuda (owner: DRP 5 FL LLC)
• Request: Replat of four existing lots
• Acreage: 0.668 +/- acres
• Project Manager: Bobby Howell, AICP
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Approved
• Vote: 7-0 (motion by Washington, second by Ryan)

Public Hearings Summary

• Number of speakers: 5 (Nancy Brown, Jeffery Manso, Angela Messina, and the applicants Camila Neira and Elizabeth Crane speaking to their own items; Richard Chandler as property owner)
• General sentiment: Mixed — no organized opposition, but neighbors on Faye Street questioned unit counts and buffering on the Rock Springs Road project, and a neighbor questioned residual residential rights on the Chandler Road parcel
• Key concerns:
  • Unit count on 2501 Rock Springs Road rising from 14 to 18 homes without a further hearing
  • Perimeter fencing and privacy buffering between new subdivisions and existing homes
  • Traffic load of a 250-child facility on a 15-foot-wide private easement (Chandler Road)
  • Whether special-exception approval leaves the parcel open to later residential construction

Key Signals

• Senate Bill 180 landed in the middle of Apopka's comprehensive plan rewrite, and the city recommended the plan anyway — minus its Transportation Element. This is the earliest recorded municipal reaction to SB 180 in the corpus. City Attorney Andrew Hand walked the board through it live on May 13, 2025: retroactive to August 1, 2024, running through October 1, 2027, and effectively statewide because the Debby, Helene and Milton disaster declarations cover every Florida county. Anyone tracking SB 180's downstream effects in Lake County should note Apopka's version arrived first and was read into the record by counsel, not discovered later.

• The bill's chilling effect is documented by name, before any ordinance was written. Staff listed the specific policies now at risk: 30% open space, the one-du-per-acre cap north of Sebastian Springs Lane, restoration of the HDR-25 policy allowing 25 dwelling units per acre, a mandatory-annexation policy for contiguous properties on city utilities, and the entire resiliency and sustainability element. Every one of these is a restriction the city drafted and then could not adopt. The mechanism is not a veto — it is a two-and-a-half-year freeze on the direction of change.

• Apopka's open-space fight starts here and is still unresolved fifteen months later. Commissioner Dumey cast the lone dissent because the rewrite left open space at 20% rather than raising it to 33-35% to match Orange County. Commissioner Mock's rebuttal — that raising it "could easily be construed as burdensome and restrictive at this moment" — is SB 180 working exactly as written. "Open spaces" is item 2 on the Land Development Code workshop the same board scheduled for September 8, 2026.

• The board chose a use permit over a land-use conversion at 4410 Chandler Road, and it held that line for thirteen months. Chairperson Gusler's stated reasoning — that a special exception leaves the parcel residential if the daycare closes, while commercial zoning would admit any commercial use — is the same reasoning the board used on June 9, 2026 to deny this applicant's Office future-land-use and rezoning requests unanimously. The May 2025 approval carried four conditions including mandatory return to the board before construction; the applicant withdrew in January 2026 and came back with the conversion route instead.

• Projects under 25 dwelling units disappear from public view. Howell stated on the record that the Land Development Code exempts sub-25-unit developments from a public hearing: they proceed to DRC-level administrative approval, and only the plat returns to the Planning Commission. The 18-home, $850,000-per-house Rock Springs Road subdivision inside the Wekiva Study Area is entitled at this meeting and then vanishes from the public record. Four months later, Ordinance 3128 removes the plat step too.

Raw Notes

• Meeting ran 103 minutes, the longest in the harvested Apopka record. In New Business, Chairperson Gusler asked that Comprehensive Plan discussions be moved to the end of future agendas because three applicants had to sit through an item irrelevant to them; Howell explained the agenda is ordered by ordinance number.
• The minutes' recorded vote on Ordinance 3101 is internally inconsistent: six members are listed casting aye votes, the tally is given as "(6-1)," and the following sentence reads "Aye vote was cast by Wes Dumey due to the need to address the open space green space contiguous area and harmonize with Orange County." Dumey stated on the record that he was against the item. The tally and his stated position both indicate a nay; the word "Aye" in that sentence appears to be a transcription error in the source minutes. Recorded here as 6-1 with Dumey dissenting.
• The Chandler Road access discussion involved two separate Chandler Roads: Howell clarified that the Chandler Road improved through the Chandler Hills project is off Kelly Park Road, while this property is off Jason Dwelley Parkway. City Engineer Simonovski described a request for a cross-access easement between the two subject properties and two properties to the west for public-safety reasons; White Dahlia was identified as the unrelated public road wrapping into the subdivision.
• Applicant Camila Neira initially declined to commit to demolishing the existing house, prompting Dumey to note his motion had assumed a cleared lot; she then agreed to demolition, which became condition 1.
• Commissioner Mock stated he had "15-18 pages of questions" on the comprehensive plan draft and would deliver them to Howell separately.
• Source: minutes embedded at pages 4-16 of the August 12, 2025 agenda packet (CivicClerk apopkafl, agendaId 1249, fileId 2856). Apopka publishes no standalone minutes documents; the May 13 and June 10, 2025 minutes were both approved at the August 12, 2025 meeting because no July 2025 meeting was held. Agenda: agendaId 1211, fileId 2739.