City of Apopka Planning Commission — September 9, 2025

Meeting Overview

Type: Regular Meeting Quorum: Yes (6 of 7 voting members present) Duration: 42 minutes (called to order 5:30 PM, adjourned 6:12 PM)

Attendance

• Present: Chairperson William Gusler, Howard Washington, Robert Ryan, David Woods, Eric Mock, Wes Dumey
• Absent: Mary Norwood; Orange County Public Schools (non-voting representative)
• Staff Present: [not itemized in the minutes; Cliff Shepard and Andrew Hand of the City Attorney's office presented Ordinance 3128 and the state planning law overview]

Agenda Items

Item 1: Approval of Minutes — August 12, 2025

• Type: Other (procedural)
• Action: Approved
• Vote: Unanimous (motion by Washington, second by Woods)

Item 2: Ordinance No. 3118 — Land Development Code Text Amendment — Town Center Overlay District (Wyld Oaks)

• Type: Text Amendment (Land Development Code)
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3118
• Location: Southwest corner of Kelly Park Road and SR 429
• Parcel IDs: 13-20-27-4300-01-000; 13-20-27-9480-01-000; 13-20-27-9480-00-001; 13-20-27-9480-08-000; 13-20-27-9480-00-002; 13-20-27-9480-02-000; 13-20-27-9480-03-000
• Applicant: Lowndes, Drosdick, Doster, Kantor & Reed, P.A. c/o Tara L. Tedrow, Esq. (owner: Kelly Park VB Development, LLC)
• Request: Establish a Town Center Overlay District within the KPI-MU (Kelly Park Interchange — Mixed-Use) zoning district
• Acreage: 304.28 acres
• Density: Minimum 0 du/gross acre; maximum 27.5 du/gross acre (approximately 4,675 units across 170 acres); bonus to 30 du/gross acre where at least 30% open space is provided
• Intensity: Minimum 0.1 FAR district-wide; maximum FAR not fixed, regulated instead through building height (up to 10 stories), block and street standards, and open space distribution
• Current Zoning / FLU: Existing FLU Mixed Use; existing use vacant
• Proposed Zoning: KPI-MU with Wyld Oaks Town Center Overlay District
• Project Manager: Jean Sanchez
• Action: Pulled from the agenda
• Vote: No vote taken
• Notable Discussion: Chairperson Gusler stated the item had been pulled. This is the first of three pulls of the Wyld Oaks ordinances; both Ordinance 3118 and its companion Ordinance 3150 were pulled again on January 13, 2026 for advertising errors before both were recommended unanimously on February 10, 2026.

Item 3: Ordinance No. 3121 — Small-Scale Future Land Use Amendment — 155 M A Board Street

• Type: Comprehensive Plan Amendment (Small-Scale FLU)
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3121
• Location: 155 M A Board Street
• Applicant: Amr Gawad (owner: Magic Houses LLC)
• Request: Change Future Land Use from Residential Medium to Mixed-Use
• Density: 15 DU/A
• Project Manager: Jun Sohn, Ph.D.
• Staff Recommendation: Approve
• Action: Recommended approval
• Vote: Unanimous (motion by Dumey, second by Ryan)
• Notable Discussion: Public comment period opened and closed with no speakers.

Item 4: Ordinance No. 3128 — Platting and Expedited Permitting

• Type: Text Amendment (Land Development Code)
• Case Number: Ordinance No. 3128
• Location: Citywide
• Applicant: City of Apopka
• Request: Amend the City's platting and replatting procedures to establish an administrative approval process; establish a process to expedite issuance of building permits for residential subdivisions prior to recording a final plat; update model sales home regulations and definitions
• Presented by: Cliff Shepard / Andrew Hand, City Attorney
• Staff Recommendation: Recommend approval
• Action: Recommended approval
• Vote: Unanimous (motion by Dumey, second by Washington)
• Notable Discussion: The staff report states the ordinance is compliance-driven. Senate Bill 784 (Chapter 2025-164, Laws of Florida) requires that certain plat and replat applications be approved administratively, and Section 177.073, Florida Statutes requires local governments to establish a process to expedite issuance of building permits for residential subdivisions before a final plat is recorded. To comply, Ordinance 3128 establishes preliminary and final platting requirements "by removing the approval authority from the Planning Commission and City Council and authorizes administrative approvals." The ordinance amends Article 2 of the Land Development Code, including Table 2.2.1, the summary table of development review responsibilities. The public comment period opened and closed with no speakers.

Item 5: Items for Discussion — Legal Department Overview of New State Planning Laws

• Type: Other (informational)
• Presented by: Andrew Hand, City Attorney
• Action: Discussion only; no motion or vote
• Notable Discussion: The minutes record the item's title and presenter but no substance of the briefing.

Public Hearings Summary

• Number of speakers: 0 — the public comment period and each item's public hearing opened and closed with no one wishing to speak
• General sentiment: [not available]
• Key concerns: None recorded. A citywide amendment removing plat approval from two elected and appointed bodies drew no public comment.

Key Signals

• Apopka's Planning Commission voted unanimously to remove its own plat approval authority. Ordinance 3128 strips preliminary and final plat approval from both the Planning Commission and the City Council and converts it to administrative staff approval, amending Table 2.2.1 of the Land Development Code — the table that defines which body decides what. The board recommended it without dissent and without a single public speaker. The effect is verifiable in this corpus: plats and replats appear on the Apopka Planning Commission dockets of May 13, 2025 (Oaks at Kelly Park Phase 3B replat) and June 10, 2025 (Crossroads at Kelly Park Phase 2B, 90 lots) and then never again through the August 11, 2026 agenda.

• The driver is state statute, not local preference — which matters for how the corpus reads the same move elsewhere. The staff report names Senate Bill 784 (Chapter 2025-164) and Section 177.073, Florida Statutes as the compulsion. Lake County's Planning & Zoning Board made an identical move on June 3, 2026 — plat approvals out of public hearing and into staff-level administrative review — nine months after Apopka. The Board Abolition Over Board Override pattern currently reads the Lake County plat delegation as authority consolidation; Apopka's record supplies a statutory explanation that competes with that reading. Delegation of plats is a statewide compliance event; the dissolution of an appointed board is not. The two should be scored separately.

• Expedited permitting shifts risk downstream to buyers. Section 177.073 compliance means residential subdivision building permits now issue before the final plat is recorded. Homes can be permitted and built on lots that do not yet legally exist as recorded parcels. Combined with the plat delegation in the same ordinance, the entire back half of Apopka's subdivision process moved out of public view in one vote.

• The Wyld Oaks Town Center Overlay's first pull begins a five-month procedural delay. Ordinance 3118 — 304.28 acres, up to 4,675 units, ten-story height at the SR-429 / Kelly Park Road interchange, with Lowndes Drosdick's Tara Tedrow representing — was pulled here, pulled again with its companion Ordinance 3150 on January 13, 2026 for advertising errors, and only recommended on February 10, 2026. The corridor's largest entitlement was held up by public notice defects, not by contest.

• Downtown-adjacent density arrives quietly at 15 units per acre. The 155 M A Board Street amendment converts Residential Medium to Mixed-Use at 15 DU/A with no public speakers and no discussion recorded. It is the same conversion pattern later applied at 171 W. Orange Street (5 to 15 du/ac, April 2026) — small parcels stepping up to Mixed-Use one at a time inside the existing residential fabric.

Raw Notes

• The minutes format changed between the August 12 and September 9, 2025 meetings. Through August, minutes recorded each motion with named aye and nay votes and narrative discussion. From September 9 forward they use a compressed outline listing mover, seconder and "Motion carried unanimously," with named vote breakdowns appearing only on split votes. Individual member positions on unanimous items are no longer recoverable from the record after August 2025.
• Staff attendance is not itemized in the September 9 minutes; earlier and later minutes list staff by name and role.
• The agenda lists Ordinance 3128 as presented by "Clif Shepard, City Attorney"; the minutes list "Cliff Shepard/Andrew Hand, City Attorney." Both spellings appear in city documents.
• Ordinance 3128 full text, including the amended Table 2.2.1, appears at pages 775-792 of the September 9, 2025 agenda packet.
• The "Legal Department overview of new State Planning laws" discussion item is recorded by title only. Its substance is not in the minutes, and no attachment for it appears in the packet. This is the second consecutive cycle in which state legislative changes were briefed to this board without a recorded summary — the May 13, 2025 SB 180 briefing was captured in narrative detail only because the old minutes format was still in use.
• Source: minutes embedded at pages 2-3 of the October 14, 2025 agenda packet (CivicClerk apopkafl, agendaId 1262, fileId 2944). Ordinance 3128 staff report and ordinance text from the September 9, 2025 agenda packet (agendaId 1261, fileId 2906). Agenda: fileId 2905.