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Meetings · Eustis

Eustis Local Planning Agency — April 2, 2026 minutes

City of Eustis Local Planning Agency — April 2, 2026

Meeting Overview

Type: Regular Meeting Quorum: Yes (5 of 5 members present) Duration: 5:45 PM – 6:14 PM (29 minutes) Location: Eustis City Hall

Attendance

  • Present: Chair Emily A. Lee, Vice Chair Gary Ashcraft, Mr. Michael Holland, Mr. George Asbate, Mr. Willie L. Hawkins
  • Absent: None
  • Staff Present: Sasha Garcia, City Attorney; Mike Lane, Development Services Director; Christine Halloran, City Clerk

Prior minutes: February 19, 2026 minutes approved (moved Holland, seconded Hawkins), 5-0. The March 19, 2026 meeting was cancelled.

Agenda Items

Item 1: Approval of Minutes — February 19, 2026

  • Type: Other (procedural)
  • Request: Approve the February 19, 2026 LPA minutes.
  • Action: Approved
  • Vote: 5-0 (moved Holland, seconded Hawkins)

Item 2.1: Ordinance Number 2026-20 — Land Development Regulations amendment prohibiting Medical Marijuana Treatment Center dispensing facilities

  • Type: Text Amendment (Land Development Regulations)
  • Case Number: Ordinance Number 2026-20
  • Location: Citywide
  • Applicant: City of Eustis (presented by the City Attorney)
  • Request: Amend the Land Development Regulations to impose a citywide prohibition on new medical marijuana treatment centers (MMTCs), allowing the two existing MMTCs to continue as legal non-conforming uses.
  • Current Zoning: N/A (citywide). Under the current LDRs, MMTCs are classified as pharmacies and are permitted or conditionally allowed in every district where pharmacies are permitted.
  • Proposed Zoning: N/A
  • Acreage: N/A
  • Staff Recommendation: Recommend transmittal to the City Commission
  • Action: Recommended for transmittal to the City Commission
  • Vote: 4-0-1. Moved Holland, seconded Hawkins. Yea: Hawkins, Holland, Ashcraft, Lee. Recused: Asbate.
  • Conditions: Motion cited consistency with the comprehensive plan, protection of neighborhood character, administrative clarity, and the presence of sufficient MMTC access in surrounding jurisdictions
  • Notable Discussion:
    • Procedural posture: Garcia noted first reading before the City Commission scheduled for April 2, 2026 and second reading April 16, 2026, and that a Business Impact Estimate was prepared under § 166.041, F.S.
    • The statutory binary, restated: under § 381.986(11)(b), Florida Statutes, a municipality may either allow dispensing facilities — in which case they must be treated consistently with pharmacies — or prohibit them within its jurisdiction. The City's authority "is limited to land use regulation"; patient eligibility, physician certification, medical treatment and availability are preempted to the State.
    • The planning finding that supports the ban: Garcia determined MMTCs are not functionally equivalent to pharmacies because of controlled access, enhanced security, restricted entry including limits on minors, and distinct traffic and parking patterns, which create different land use impacts and compatibility concerns.
    • The policy history on the record: 2017 — Ordinance 17-11 prohibited MMTCs. 2020 — Ordinance 20-46 reversed the ban and classified MMTCs as pharmacies in the LDRs. April 2025 — the LPA reviewed the options and reached consensus to reinstate the ban. This ordinance continues that direction.
    • Non-conforming status, not conditional use: existing MMTCs may remain but cannot expand, relocate, or intensify, though they may rebuild if damaged under certain conditions. Garcia explained why conditional use was unavailable: a conditional use designation would require applying the same standards to pharmacies, which state law does not permit unless MMTCs remain classified as pharmacies. Board discussion raised long-term property rights, potential legal challenges, and impacts on existing investments; Garcia flagged effects on rebuilding timelines, business continuity and future ownership changes, and said the City would work with existing operators within standard non-conformity provisions.
    • Lane commented on non-conforming versus conditional use classification and highlighted the vesting process.
    • Conflict of interest: Garcia noted a potential conflict was identified for one member who owns property leased to an MMTC, and that member — Asbate — recused himself from the vote.

Public Hearings Summary

  • Number of speakers: 1 named (hearing 6:11 PM – 6:13 PM)
  • General sentiment: Clarifying rather than opposed
  • Key concerns: Public comments sought clarification on relocation restrictions, availability of regional facilities, and regulatory distinctions. Daniel DiVenanzo commented on conditional use.

Key Signals

  • Eustis will have exactly two medical marijuana dispensaries, permanently. The ordinance bans new MMTCs citywide and freezes the existing two as legal non-conforming uses that cannot expand, relocate or intensify. Note the arithmetic against the April 2025 record, when staff told this same board three dispensaries were operating in the city. Somewhere between April 2025 and April 2026 the count fell by one, and the ban locks the remainder in place. For a commercial landlord, an in-place MMTC lease in Eustis is now a non-replicable asset; for an operator, the site cannot be moved without extinguishing the use.

  • The legal engine is the pharmacy equivalence, and the City had to disprove it to act. Section 381.986(11)(b) gives municipalities two options: ban, or treat dispensaries exactly as pharmacies. Garcia's finding that MMTCs are not functionally equivalent — controlled access, enhanced security, restricted entry, different traffic and parking — is the planning record that supports choosing the ban. Conditional use was legally unavailable, because any condition would have attached to every pharmacy in Eustis.

  • A board member who leases property to a dispensary recused, and the city attorney put the conflict on the record before the vote. Asbate's recusal is disclosed with its reason. It is the second ex parte or interest disclosure in the Eustis LPA file within the coverage window, after Hawkins's disclosure of a prior meeting with an applicant in August 2025. The board declares rather than avoids, and the clerk records it.

  • The policy has now reversed twice in nine years: banned 2017, allowed 2020, banned 2026. Each reversal was a land use classification change, not a change in state law. Operators siting in Eustis are pricing a municipal policy that has flipped roughly every three years, and the current instrument is a non-conforming-use freeze rather than a prohibition that clears the field.

  • The motion cited "sufficient MMTC access in surrounding jurisdictions" as a supporting finding. That is Eustis explicitly externalizing a land use to its neighbors — Mount Dora, Tavares and Leesburg absorb the demand. The finding is defensible and also a marker: north Lake County municipalities are now making land use decisions against each other's inventories.

Raw Notes

  • Source: minutes PDF at https://mccmeetings.blob.core.usgovcloudapi.net/eustisfl-pubu/MEET-Minutes-8e12cfa699ce46e8b32af8d21d376805.pdf (3 pp.), retrieved 2026-08-15. The standalone minutes PDF is a low-quality scan. A clean-text copy appears in the April 16, 2026 agenda packet (MEET-Packet-e07df9ce13824f8084c89b96b0afcc54.pdf, Item 1.1, PDF pp. 2–4) and was used to verify every citation, ordinance number and statute reference above.
  • Minutes stamped "APPROVED 4/16/2026" (the scan renders it "4/L612026").
  • The scan renders the 2020 ordinance number as "2046"; the packet copy gives 20-46. The scan renders the statute as "381.986(11Xb)"; the packet copy gives § 381.986(11)(b).
  • The vote is recorded as "Voting to Recuse: Mr. Asbate" — a recusal, not a nay.
  • The three-dispensary figure is from Lane and Carrino at the April 3, 2025 LPA meeting; the two-dispensary figure is Garcia's at this meeting. The minutes do not explain the change.
  • Meeting noticed for 5:45 PM and called to order at 5:45 PM — a departure from the board's usual 5:30 PM start.

Connected records

1 connected record

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