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Minneola Planning & Zoning Commission
June 2026

7 items on the agendaConvened June 1, 2026
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THE READINGmeeting record

City of Minneola Planning & Zoning Commission — June 1, 2026 (Agenda)

Meeting Overview

Type: Regular Meeting (Amended Agenda) Time: Monday, June 1, 2026, 6:30 PM EDT Location: City Hall, City Council Chambers, 800 N Highway 27, Minneola, FL 34715 Packet: 510-page agenda packet (CivicClerk tenant minneolafl, event 256). Reporting staff: City Council — Councilor Flinn; City Planner — Joyce Heffington, AICP.

Note: This is the AMENDED June 1 agenda — a seven-item docket. It supersedes an earlier six-item draft. The Minneola Commercial project now carries BOTH a site-plan recommendation (Item 5) and a preliminary subdivision plat (Item 6); the CR-455 annexation is to Agriculture (AG), not commercial; and the Data Centers ordinance is Item 7.

Agenda Items

Item 1: Approval of Minutes — May 4, 2026

  • Type: Minutes approval
  • Action: Pending
  • Cross-reference: The May 4 meeting approved the Citrus Ridge Commercial PUD package 4-0 (Ord 2026-02 / 2026-03 / Res 2026-01 — Tara Tedrow / Lowndes Drosdick for Crittenden Howey LLC), the Camp Lake Industrial Park preliminary plat 4-0, the adult congregate living facility special exception 4-0, and recommended the golf-cart ordinance to Council 3-1 (Rose dissenting). See knowledge/minneola/2026-05-meeting-PZC.md.

Item 2: Site Plan — Pine Ridge Amenity Center (Quasi-Judicial)

  • Type: Site Plan Review (Quasi-Judicial) — recommendation to City Council
  • Project name: Pine Ridge at Sugar Loaf Mountain Primary Amenity Center
  • Location: Intersection of Mountain Crest Way and Autumn Breeze Loop, northeast end of the Pine Ridge subdivision
  • Applicant / Team: Tri Pointe Homes (developer; contact Bobby Wanas) · Pape-Dawson Consulting Engineers (Marc D. Stehli, PE — civil) · Kimley-Horn (landscape/hardscape/irrigation) · Inspire Placemaking Collective (Eric Raasch / Thomas Grimms — city planning review)
  • Request: Approve a 0.74-acre amenity center serving 178 homes — a 23-ft-high, 1,905 sq ft open-air covered pavilion with tables/benches, a playground (Jungle Dome, Parkour 4, double swing combo), an outdoor recreation area, and a fitness court; 8 parking spaces with vehicular entrance from Autumn Breeze Loop.
  • Acreage: 0.74 acres
  • Staff Recommendation: Approve (staff recommends approval of the Pine Ridge Amenity Site Plan)
  • Action: Pending
  • Conditions: Outstanding/resolved review items — playground curb/mulch encroachment into the 12-ft utility easement deemed acceptable by Public Works (Fred Miller); Florida Water Star irrigation certification affidavit deferred to construction completion; parking calculation revised after staff objected to citing City of Orlando's 2.5 spaces/1,000 SF community-center standard (Minneola has no parking criteria for in-subdivision park facilities); Tetra Tech engineering review found no technical objection.
  • Notable Discussion (forward signal): This is the second residential-PUD amenity-center site plan in three months — Whispering Winds Amenity Center went 3-2 (Rose/McCoy dissent) on March 2. Watch whether amenity-center reviews keep producing bloc-formation votes on the 4-member board. The parking-standard friction (no City code for amenity parking) is a small but real code-gap signal.

Item 3: Ordinance 2026-09 — Annexation & Rezoning — 20197 County Road 455 (Quasi-Judicial)

  • Type: Annexation + Rezoning (Quasi-Judicial)
  • Case Number: Ordinance 2026-09
  • Location: ~4.88± acres generally located north of Bear Spring Road and west of County Road 455, Lake County (Lot 2, Highland Reserve Sub, Plat Book 41 Pg 88). Addressed as 20197 CR-455. (Packet contains a minor internal inconsistency — one WHEREAS clause reads "east of CR 455" while the title reads "west"; verify at hearing.)
  • Applicant: Judith A. and David Yeager (owners)
  • Request: Annex 4.88± acres into the City under §171.044, F.S. (non-contiguous, annexed via the Interlocal Service Boundary Agreement among Groveland, Clermont, Howey-in-the-Hills, Leesburg, Mascotte, Minneola, and Lake County) and rezone from Lake County "Agriculture District (A)" to City of Minneola "Agriculture District (AG)."
  • Current Zoning: Lake County Agriculture District (A)
  • Proposed Zoning: City of Minneola Agriculture District (AG)
  • Acreage: 4.88± acres
  • Staff Recommendation: Approve
  • Action: Pending
  • Notable Discussion (forward signal): This is ISBA-enabled non-contiguous annexation — the city reaching across a gap to capture a CR-455 frontage parcel via the interlocal agreement, not a contiguous extension. CR-455 is the scenic corridor already flagged above capacity and not slated for widening (Kevin Carey testimony, Sept 2025). Notably the parcel comes in as Agriculture (AG), a low-intensity rezoning — this is jurisdictional position-taking on the scenic-highway edge, not (yet) a development play. Paired with Item 4 (comp-plan amendment) as a multi-instrument package — Minneola's standard incoming-county architecture.

Item 4: Ordinance 2026-10 — Comprehensive Plan Amendment — 20197 County Road 455

  • Type: Comprehensive Plan Amendment (paired with Item 3)
  • Case Number: Ordinance 2026-10
  • Location: Same parcel as Item 3 (Lot 2, Highland Reserve Sub; 4.88± ac north of Bear Spring Rd, west of CR-455)
  • Applicant: Judith A. and David Yeager (owners)
  • Request: Amend the Future Land Use designation from Lake County "Rural" to City of Minneola "Agriculture." (Note: the ordinance title and Section 1 say "Agriculture," but the staff-summary narrative inconsistently states "Single Family Residential Low Density" — the ordinance text governs; flag for clarification at hearing.) Transmit per Chapter 163, F.S.
  • Current FLU: Lake County "Rural"
  • Proposed FLU: City of Minneola "Agriculture"
  • Acreage: 4.88± acres
  • Staff Recommendation: (blank in packet summary; Item 3 companion recommends approval)
  • Action: Pending
  • Notable Discussion (forward signal): The Rural→Agriculture FLU shift confirms this is a hold-the-line, low-intensity annexation rather than a development upzoning — at least at entry. The staff-summary's contradictory "Single Family Residential Low Density" phrasing is a drafting error worth watching; if SFR-Low is the actual intent, the entitlement profile changes materially.

Item 5: Site Plan — Minneola Commercial (Quasi-Judicial)

  • Type: Site Plan Review (Quasi-Judicial) — recommendation to City Council
  • Project name: Minneola Commercial (7-Eleven Site #42759 / Grocer Site #11894)
  • Location: ~21.55 acres on the west side of U.S. 27 between Vino Road (north) and the Caliber Collision Center (south); near Willow Oak Loop and Burgundy Drive to the west. Lake County Parcel ID 01-22-25-0001-000-00200.
  • Applicant / Team: Blackfin Partners Investments, Inc. (developer; Seth Swisher) · Kimley-Horn and Associates (civil engineer Derek E. Ramsburg, PE; landscape Ray Lopez, PLA) · Interplan LLC (architect Nicole Weir) · Basepoint Surveying · owner William Kendall Bosserman Non-Exempt Trust
  • Request: Approve a phased commercial site plan: a 4,852 sq ft convenience store (7-Eleven) with 6 fueling stations fronting U.S. 27 (access via internal private right-of-way), a 48,162 sq ft grocery store, and a 3,000 sq ft liquor box. Three stormwater ponds at the rear, discharging to the Lake Spencer Outlet.
  • Current Zoning: B-1 Business District
  • Current FLU: General Commercial
  • Acreage: ~21.51–21.55 acres
  • Staff Recommendation: (not explicitly stated in summary; full review packet attached — Kimley-Horn response letter 5/13/2026, TIA methodology 4/24/2025, two US-27/Vino traffic-impact-study volumes)
  • Action: Pending
  • Notable Discussion (forward signal): This is the cycle's institutional-capital US-27 commercial anchor for Minneola — a Palm Beach Gardens private-equity developer (Blackfin), a national C-store brand (7-Eleven #42759), a 48K-sf grocer, Kimley-Horn engineering, and a multi-volume traffic-impact-study package. The "Vino Road" frontage explains the "US27_Vino_TIS" document naming. The parcel already secured a grocery variance and a convenience-store-with-fuel special exception. A gas-station-with-fuel use on US-27 is exactly the program the corpus's bellwether-gas-station pattern tracks — but here it arrives bundled inside a 21.55-acre commercial center under B-1/General Commercial entitlement, not as a standalone CUP fight.

Item 6: Preliminary Subdivision Plat — Minneola Commercial

  • Type: Preliminary Subdivision Plat (commercial)
  • Project name: Minneola Commercial (US Hwy 27 & Vino)
  • Location: West of US Highway 27, south of Vino Road (same 21.55-acre parcel as Item 5)
  • Applicant: Derek E. Ramsburg, PE (Kimley-Horn) for the William Kendall Bosserman Non-Exempt Trust
  • Request: Approve a 10-parcel commercial subdivision of the 21.55-acre site. The property has been granted a variance for a grocery and a special exception for a convenience store with fuel.
  • Acreage: 21.55 acres → 10 parcels
  • Staff Recommendation: Approve on condition that all applications, reports, and permits are submitted/approved and all review comments addressed. Inspire Placemaking (Eric Raasch, AICP) review (Case 255, dated June 1, 2026) lists open Chapter 126 plat items — tract-boundary dimensions, plat book/page, typical lot size, topographic map incorporation, stormwater/water/waste statements, protective-covenant drafts, preliminary concurrency confirmation, and buffer dimensions.
  • Action: Pending
  • Notable Discussion (forward signal): Subdividing the 21.55-acre US-27 frontage into 10 commercial parcels signals a multi-tenant pad-site retail program (C-store + grocer as anchors, eight more pads to lease/sell). This is corridor-densifying commercial — the kind of US-27 buildout the quiet-revolution-highway-27 pattern describes — entitled under existing B-1/General Commercial, so it advances without a rezoning fight.

Item 7: Ordinance 2026-05 — Data Centers (Text Amendment)

  • Type: Text Amendment (Land Development Code, Chapters 82, 102, 106)
  • Case Number: Ordinance 2026-05 ("Data Centers")
  • Applicant: City-initiated (City Attorney Scott A. Gerken / staff). Note: the May 4 board roster showed Jennifer Cotch as City Attorney; the Data Center ordinance is signed for form by Scott A. Gerken — counsel transition or co-counsel worth confirming.
  • Request: Add "Data Centers" as a Special Exception Use within the Industrial District (I-1); add Chapter 82 definition(s); prohibit Data Centers in the B-1 district; and create new Chapter 106 subsection 106-2(g)(51) with supplemental development standards. THE CORPUS'S FIRST EXPLICIT DATA-CENTER TEXT AMENDMENT.
  • Staff Recommendation: Approve
  • Action: Pending
  • Two competing drafts in one packet (the live governance choice):
    • Draft A — "Data Centers P & Z" (restrictive / prescriptive): Hard numeric caps. 2,500-ft minimum separation from sensitive uses; target 1-mile spacing between data centers; max building 10,000 sq ft, 35 ft height, 4 buildings/acre, 1 acre/data-center max; power capped at 5 MW from the provider (anything more must be self-generated by renewables, plus an on-site backup generator); reclaimed water only, ≤50,000 gpd, City must retain ≥25% reuse availability after consumption, mandatory direct-to-chip and/or immersive cooling; prohibited in residential/commercial/institutional areas; no audible sound outside buildings; Dark Sky lighting; EMF shielding required, underground construction "preferred"; heat-island mitigation; no-irrigation landscaping.
    • Draft B — "Data Centers (004)" (performance-based / development-friendly): Frames data centers as positive economic-development infrastructure (cloud, AI, commerce). 500-ft setback from residential / 1,000 ft from schools/parks; cumulative-impact consideration; enhanced articulation for buildings >75,000 sq ft; mandatory utility-infrastructure analysis (electrical demand, transmission, substations) with denial authority where utility impacts harm public infrastructure; water-demand and conservation plan (reclaimed water "strongly encouraged," not mandated); acoustical analysis with generator-testing limited to 8 AM–6 PM weekdays; full-cutoff/dark-sky lighting; screening of generators/transformers/substations; applicant bears burden of proof; optional Chapter 163 development agreement for substantial infrastructure.
  • Notable Discussion (forward signal): See Key Signals. The juxtaposition of a hard-cap draft and a performance-based draft in the same packet is the actual decision in front of the board — how aggressively to throttle data-center scale, power, and water versus how to channel them as managed industrial economic development.

Public Hearings Summary

Agenda document — meeting has not yet occurred at harvest (June 1, 2026 is three days before the June 4 harvest date; minutes not yet available). Items 2, 3, and 5 are quasi-judicial (due-process protections apply).

Key Signals

  • Ordinance 2026-05 is the corpus's first explicit Data-Center land-use code — and it is PRE-EMPTIVE coding with no application on file. Minneola is writing the rulebook before any data-center developer knocks. This is the same defensive-precoding mechanism the corpus already documented for SB 954 Recovery Residences (Clermont + Leesburg + Lake County PZB all coded within an eight-week window) and SB 180 form-based codes — now generalized to data centers. Cross-corpus watch: if a second corpus city files a parallel data-center ordinance within ~90 days (window closes ~2026-08-30), the recovery-residences-regulatory-precoding pattern's mechanism is confirmed as generalizable infrastructure-precoding, and data-center-cross-corpus-propagation resolves toward "active."
  • Two competing data-center drafts expose the live policy fork: hard caps vs. performance standards. Draft A (P&Z) is among the most restrictive municipal data-center frameworks one is likely to see — 5 MW power ceiling, 50,000 gpd reclaimed-water-only, 10,000-sf building cap, 2,500-ft separation, mandatory chip-level cooling, EMF shielding, underground "preferred." Draft B (attorney "004") is performance-based and explicitly pro-economic-development. Whichever the board recommends tells you whether Minneola intends to effectively zone data centers out (Draft A's 5 MW / 10K-sf caps are below hyperscale viability) or channel them as managed industrial users (Draft B). For anyone tracking Florida's grid-and-water-stressed data-center siting wave, this is the leading indicator. The binding constraints — power (5 MW cap) and water (reclaimed-only, 25% reuse-retention floor) — directly invoke the minneola-wastewater-capacity-wall watch.
  • Minneola Commercial is the cycle's institutional-capital US-27 anchor — and it is splitting into 10 pad parcels. A 21.55-acre commercial center on the US-27/Vino frontage with a 7-Eleven + fuel, a 48,162-sf grocer, and a 3,000-sf liquor box, developed by Palm Beach Gardens PE firm Blackfin Partners, engineered by Kimley-Horn (Derek Ramsburg), already holding a grocery variance and a convenience-store-with-fuel special exception. The paired Item 5 (site plan) + Item 6 (10-parcel preliminary plat) means anchors-plus-eight-pads multi-tenant retail. This is quiet-revolution-highway-27 in commercial form, advancing under existing B-1/General Commercial entitlement — no rezoning fight, just site-plan and plat.
  • CR-455 annexation is jurisdictional position-taking, not a development play — for now. The Yeager 4.88-acre parcel comes in via the ISBA as non-contiguous annexation and rezones to Agriculture (AG) with a Rural→Agriculture FLU shift — deliberately low-intensity on the scenic-highway corridor already flagged above capacity. The voluntary-annexation-jurisdictional-tool pattern at its quietest: claim the parcel, hold it agricultural, decide intensity later. Watch the staff-summary's contradictory "Single Family Residential Low Density" language — if that is the real intent, the entitlement profile is very different from what the ordinance text says.
  • Pine Ridge Amenity Center is the second amenity-center site plan in three months — and a code-gap surfaced. Following Whispering Winds (March 2, 3-2 with Rose/McCoy dissent), this Tri Pointe Homes / Pape-Dawson / Kimley-Horn amenity site serves 178 homes. Notably, staff rejected the applicant's use of City-of-Orlando parking standards because Minneola has no parking code for in-subdivision park/amenity facilities — a small but real LDC gap as master-planned-community amenity centers proliferate. Watch whether the 4-member board's amenity-center reviews keep splitting (commission-board-philosophical-inversion, hoa-municipal-interface).

Raw Notes

  • Source: Minneola CivicClerk tenant minneolafl, event 256; 510-page amended agenda packet harvested June 4, 2026. Staff reports extracted via page-range pdftotext (the packet is mostly engineering plan sheets; the data-center ordinance with both drafts is on packet pages 500–510).
  • Seven items, not the six in the prior draft agenda — the Minneola Commercial preliminary plat (Item 6) was added alongside its site plan (Item 5), and Data Centers moved to Item 7.
  • Data-center ordinance numeric anchors (Draft A): 2,500-ft separation; 1-mile inter-data-center spacing target; 10,000 sf / 35 ft / 4 bldgs-per-acre / 1 ac max; 5 MW power cap; 50,000 gpd reclaimed-water-only with ≥25% reuse retention; direct-to-chip and/or immersive cooling mandatory; EMF shielding; underground "preferred." Draft B: 500-ft residential / 1,000-ft school-park setbacks; >75,000 sf enhanced design; utility + acoustical analyses; generator testing 8 AM–6 PM weekdays; Chapter 163 development-agreement option.
  • Minneola Commercial team: Blackfin Partners Investments (Seth Swisher), Kimley-Horn (Derek E. Ramsburg PE #88965; Ray Lopez PLA), Interplan LLC (Nicole Weir), Basepoint Surveying (Robert Lazenby IV), owner William Kendall Bosserman Non-Exempt Trust. Utilities: City of Minneola water/sewer, Duke Energy electric, Lake Apopka Natural Gas, CenturyLink/Lumen. Drains to Lake Spencer Outlet.
  • CR-455 / Yeager parcel: Lot 2, Highland Reserve Sub (PB 41, Pg 88). Mayor Pam(ela) Serviss / Clerk Kristine Thompson / City Attorney Scott A. Gerken on the ordinance signature blocks (note: May 4 minutes listed Jennifer Cotch as City Attorney on the dais — confirm counsel status).
  • Pine Ridge: Tri Pointe Homes developer (Bobby Wanas); Pape-Dawson civil (Marc D. Stehli PE); Kimley-Horn landscape; Inspire Placemaking city review (Eric Raasch / Thomas Grimms). Construction-plans dated May 1, 2026; landscape last revised March 9, 2026.
  • All quasi-judicial items (2, 3, 5) carry substantive due-process protections; the May 4 board showed it will table rather than decide an applicant-absent quasi-judicial item.