“I’m not comfortable with doing nothing”: Gainesville City Commission passes minimum lot size ordinances on first reading with a vote of 4-3
BY JENNIFER CABRERA
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – During the evening session of their July 18 meeting, the Gainesville City Commission voted 4-3 to approve the first readings of two ordinances implementing a controversial proposal to reduce the minimum permitted lot size.
The two ordinances were presented together by Lead Planner Brittany McMullen, who said, “We’re really excited about it… It’s all about housing for us tonight. For this one in particular, this item is all about single-family zoning, and it’s all about lot sizes, where the house can sit on the lot, and kind of how far away it needs to be from the property line.”
“One tool in the toolbox”
McMullen said the need for more affordable housing led to a recommendation to reduce the minimum lot size, although that “is not the ultimate solution to all housing needs. It’s one tool in the toolbox, so to speak.” She said the proposal “increases the overall supply of housing, and it supports economic growth and expands the City’s tax base.”
The proposal consolidates all single-family zoning districts into one single-family district, with a minimum lot size of 3,000 square feet and 35 feet in width. McMullen emphasized that the proposal does not require lots to be that size but allows for flexibility. The current single-family zones, RSF-1 through RSF-4, permit 3.5 to 8 units per acre; the new zoning permits 12 units per acre. Houses would have a minimum 10-foot setback in the front, 20 feet in the rear, five feet for a rear accessory structure, five feet on the interior side, and five feet on the street side of a corner lot.
The ordinance also allows for homes to be built around a centrally-located green space, known as a cottage neighborhood.
About 21.5% of the land in the city is affected by the change. McMullen showed a map of vacant lots that could be split under the ordinance; she said there are about 115 lots that could be affected.
McMullen said larger developers are currently able to build “cluster subdivisions,” which have reduced lot sizes and reduced setbacks, and this proposal makes that flexibility available to smaller developers who just want to build a few houses.
The City Plan Board recommended approval of the ordinance but recommended a rear setback of 10 feet instead of 20 feet.
Public comment
Mayor Harvey Ward decided to take public comment on both ordinances together.
During public comment, members of Gainesville Neighborhood Voices proposed several “guardrails” to ensure the lots would be used for starter homes, including requiring at least one parking space, setting the maximum building size to 1,400 square feet, and only allowing one ADU (accessory dwelling unit). They also recommended mirroring the County’s cottage neighborhood ordinance and retaining the existing single-family zoning categories; they said this would make the modifications easier to undo in the future, if desired.
Other commenters said the ordinance would lead to a loss of trees and expressed concern about unintended consequences.
Former Mayor Mark Goldstein said, “This room has been the site in the last 10 years of some of the most magnificent blunders made in America. We are going to pay for it for 30 years. Some of you were here and voted for it; others weren’t. You’re about to consider the next one under the theory that somehow we’re going to create affordable housing, and the marketplace doesn’t exist… This is a blunder of magnificent proportions… You’ve got a few new people on the commission that came up with a new idea. It’s a theory like the last theory – that we can burn trees and make money.” He said he feared developers will come in from out of town and build “20-unit rooming houses in every neighborhood.”
Joy Glanzer, Chair of the Public Policy Committee of the Gainesville/Alachua County Association of Realtors (GACAR), said, “While it’s not the be-all and end-all, it is a great tool in our box that we need to add affordable housing to the inventory in Gainesville.” Matt Umanos from GACAR added his endorsement of the ordinance: “This will allow for the missing middle housing that is clearly needed… I also wanted to read one of the quotes that was in the staff presentation: ‘While large minimum lot sizes are often defended on the basis of preserving neighborhood character or the property values, their impact has been perpetuated patterns of economic and demographic segregation of historical disadvantaged and vulnerable communities.'”
Overall, 10 people spoke in favor of the ordinances, eight people spoke against them, and 10 people supported the modifications proposed by Gainesville Neighborhood Voices.
Eastman: “You’re talking about much more nuanced, smaller-scale changes than anything that was recommended from before.”
After public comment, Commissioner Bryan Eastman said Gainesville Neighborhood Voices had brought forward a “very reasonable proposal,” but “homeownership has gotten out of reach for just regular everyday people… We’ve completely lost [that affordability].” He said everyone who opposed the single-family zoning proposals that were passed in 2022 and reversed in 2023 should consider the current proposal a “win” because “we aren’t having a conversation about the large scale, very massive changes that we were talking about in 2022, I believe it was, where we’re talking about a quadruplex on every lot. We’re now talking about preserving single-family zoning… You’re talking about much more nuanced, smaller-scale changes than anything that was recommended from before.”
Chestnut proposes a pilot program
Commissioner Cynthia Chestnut said she is an “incrementalist” and was concerned that the proposal was city-wide and “has the potential to destroy the whole city, and you can’t do anything about it once you open the door.” She suggested that a neighborhood should “step forward” as the site for a pilot program for 3-5 years and added, “You’re not really going to be providing starter homes. You’re going to have student housing all across the city.”
Commissioner Ed Book said he didn’t support converting all single-family lots to the same zoning and that he didn’t believe the change would address affordable housing. He said the feedback during workshops on the proposal was “largely not in support of the proposal.” He said that the staff presentation only laid out the benefits of the proposal, and he asked McMullen about any potential disadvantages.
She said that was “a hard question to answer” because “we can’t predict the future.” She said infrastructure improvements might be required, but “I don’t know if you would consider that a potential disadvantage or not.”
Duncan-Walker: “I am much more at ease with taking a scalpel instead of a sledgehammer approach.”
Commissioner Desmon Duncan-Walker said she was “terrified” of the proposal because there is “no recourse, no ability to pull back.” She also supported a pilot project in a limited area: “I am much more at ease with taking a scalpel instead of a sledgehammer approach.”
Ward: “None of us, myself included, should ever make the mistake of thinking that the group of folks that talk to us the most are the folks who represent everybody, because they never do.”
Ward said, “None of us, myself included, should ever make the mistake of thinking that the group of folks that talk to us the most are the folks who represent everybody, because they never do. There are always folks who don’t feel comfortable coming out and talking, and some of those folks may be terrified of this, and some of those folks may be terrified of inaction.” He said the City’s zoning has been “wonderful for some people, but it’s resulted in us being the 18th most expensive city to live in,… to buy a house or to pay rent, in the United States.” He said that happened “because we stuck with land use and zoning decisions that were made in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and said, ‘These are perfect, and this is where we shall stay.'”
Ward: “I’d be very comfortable with some of those recommendations. I’m not comfortable with doing nothing.”
He said he agreed the Commission should be careful, but this proposal came forward 15 months ago. He thanked Gainesville Neighborhood Voices for their “interesting ideas… I’d be very comfortable with some of those recommendations. I’m not comfortable with doing nothing.” He said the current zoning benefits large developers who can “play the game as it currently exists.”
He said someone on Facebook would accuse him of “lecturing” and continued, “These are things that are real, that are happening. It is also okay and real to be afraid of neighborhoods changing. That’s real, too. I get it – your experience and your family investment goes into that and the idea that that might change is scary. I get that. I hear you, but something’s got to give here.” He said the proposal was “far smaller” than previous proposals and “not radical… I’m asking folks to please put aside some rhetoric – on both sides – and let’s make an effort at something that extends a hand to the next generation out.” He said he would like to hear more from Gainesville Neighborhood Voices, but “I will not vote for nothing tonight.”
Willits: “I want to get to yes on housing”
Commissioner Casey Willits strongly opposed the idea of a pilot project because banning something in a large part of the city causes people to “rush” to the other areas: “It’s just not how public policy should work when we talk about land use… I want to get to yes on housing – similar to the Mayor, I want to get to yes. I want to be a pro-housing city. I am pro-housing. I want to get there.”
Willits brought up a “fearful example” mentioned by commenters: a three-story building with 36 rooms that would be rented by the room. He asked McMullen, “Can you do that, currently?”
McMullen replied, “You could.” Willits said we’re not seeing that now, so there’s no reason to think it will happen after the zoning change. He asked Eastman if anything from Gainesville Neighborhood Voices or the setback adjustment from the Plan Board was interesting to him.
Ward interjected that there aren’t many “salespeople good enough to sell somebody a house that doesn’t have parking if they need parking. That’s a reality. You’re not going to buy a house that doesn’t have parking if you’ve got two cars.”
Ward then allowed Robert Mounts to ask a question, and he asked whether there was any reason they couldn’t take “30 or 60 days” to negotiate with Gainesville Neighborhood Voices. Ward replied, “For a very simple reason: we’ve already waited since spring of 2023, and for you and I, who already own our homes, that’s no big deal.”
Eastman: “I would prefer to just go forward with the proposal as it currently stands”
Eastman said there was nothing in the Gainesville Neighborhood Voices proposal that is “completely nauseous,” but he said the proposal is in line with what other cities have done, and “to put kind of more standards around people that are just trying to build single-family homes – I mean, one of the goals of this is to try to make it more flexible for single-family homes… I would prefer to just go forward with the proposal as it currently stands, that is what is the best practice across the United States, I’m seeing other cities implement this. So I think that’s the best way forward.”
Motion on first ordinance
Eastman made a motion to approve the Land Use Category ordinance to implement the proposal on first reading, and Commissioner Reina Saco seconded the motion.
Chestnut said to Willits, “You don’t need to degrade [the idea of doing a pilot project]. You may disagree with me, but you don’t need to degrade it.” She asked staff whether there was anything they could do that would be “not as massive, not by right, not as destructive as this proposal appears to be for the city… I think when staff brings any proposal to us, we need the advantages and the disadvantages as a part of any proposal.”
City Manager Cynthia Curry said staff would need to do research and bring those proposals back to the Commission, but she thought the staff recommendation was “reasonable. I think that the presentation that Ms. McMullen gave this evening was very thorough and very good; however, it did not include [the disadvantages], and so we do need to go back and probably do some additional homework.”
Ward asked staff to bring back potential advantages and disadvantages of the proposal when they hear the second reading of the ordinance.
The motion passed 4-3, with Book, Chestnut, and Duncan-Walker in dissent.
Second ordinance
The Commission next took up the Land Development Code Amendment to implement the same proposal.
During a brief public comment period, one person requested an impact analysis and one person expressed a fear that her neighborhood would be “inundated” with students.
Saco: “I think where we are now will not up-end the city, salt the earth, burn down every house.”
Saco said, “I think where we are now is a good step. I think where we are now will not up-end the city, salt the earth, burn down every house. It won’t do that. I think I heard those same arguments when we did ADUs. And I think by last count, over 40 years, we got maybe 40. Some of them were already in existence. They just became legal.” She predicted that only “maybe [a] couple dozen” properties would take advantage of the new zoning.
Motion on second ordinance
Saco made a motion to pass the ordinance on first reading, “as is.” Eastman seconded the motion.
The motion passed 4-3, with Book, Chestnut, and Duncan-Walker in dissent.
Ward: “If you want specific things to be different about this before the second reading, call your commissioners.”
Ward concluded the agenda item by saying, “I would say, if you want specific things to be different about this before the second reading, call your commissioners. I would say, read the room with any individual that you’re trying to convince, read the room… I would like to see some things a little bit different with this, but I had to see something move.”
The Commission then took up Inclusionary Zoning ordinances, which will be covered in a future article.
They want to allow new buildings on a 3,000 square foot lot. Let’s put this in perspective…one acre is 43,560 square feet. With this proposed plan you could squeeze 14 new buildings in one acre.
Nope.
My bad…”the new zoning permits 12 units per acre”, not 14.
They can still go f themselves
You can downvote all you want but that does not change the facts. Progressive idiots are the true pandemic.
Trailer parks always worked fine for high density housing. Most also had enough room for 2-3 cars in the drive/carport. GNV is also pretty low risk for damaging high winds.
Yes, but understand that they would need 35 ft of street frontage, so that 1 acre would have to be 500′ wide and 90′ deep. I understand your point, but it’s unlikely more than 6 would ever be feasible on an acre.
“I’m not comfortable with doing nothing.” The WORST statement an elected official can make. That’s exactly why Poe and Ward have really hurt this community. They’re soooo liberal, they think constant change is necessary / required even if it’s radical and potentially very harmful. Unabated, these idiots, and those DEC nuts like them (Chief Bothcher their leader) are slowly destroying this community. Making it a place only homeless, very poor, or UF connected folks would live in. Why not buy national TV add asking homeless, poor and illegals to come here?
Amen, Jeff.
Preserving the character and charm of neighborhoods is more important than trying to house every charity case or illegal alien that somehow winds up here. Poe’s non-profit is already begging for money for his refugees.
Poe begging too since he doesn’t have a “real job” after being fired from his history teaching of HS kids in dual enrollment. As mayor, claimed to be an economics professor (LOL!!!!) that only had a BS in history. Probably why he is full of BS, his many lies.
Yep he was my middle school history teacher, what an idiot
Ward isn’t lecturing, he’s harv-splaining. Trying to educate the peons that surround him
That’ll never happen. They’re idiots. Village idiots.
Finally! A commission that actually wants to fix the problems here. No more nonsense, let’s get this done.
Lol @ new commenter – we aren’t dumb. We can see straight thru your fake junk. Go home and figure out what gender you are.
You believe this group?
You’re far from rational – gullible would be more descriptive.
Let’s go! We need to lock this up and get the problems here fixed.
No one is going to take you idiots seriously! 🤣 stop trolling son!
Such a poor attempt at getting attention. Whiny little bit€hes.
Interesting, the city wants to reduce lot size, for more housing, and the county is buying up tracts of vacant land to prevent more housing and development. They are missing the boat on what makes housing affordable. No impact fees, lower building permit fees, and lower property taxes would be a good start.
Affordable housing means government assisted , free housing, or section 8. Not houses that are affordable.
First, Mayor Ward and Brian Eastman, over many years, supported policies that ran GRU over the financial cliff leaving GRU customers paying sky high utility bills.
Now, they appear to be trying to bamboozle the public on a reckless so-called affordable housing scheme.
Citizens have an opportunity to push back on second reading of the ordinance.
It should be tried in limited sections first, as the dissenters suggested. But they don’t want to make Sophie’s Choices and tell us our hoods are the guinea pigs.
Still, developers should be required to only build owner-occupied or landlord-on-site units in these cases. If they insert more rentals and Airbnbs in the middle of SFRs, the existing neighbors will simply move out of the city. Then the city declines.
Gainesville, this is what you get when you elect mindless , souless regressives that are just downright reckless.
“I’m not comfortable with doing nothing”
We’re not concerned with your so called ‘comfort’ we want you control freaks to leave us the hell alone and stop trying to control our lives!
I’d be happy with them just leaving. For good.
Hopefully the next election will produce a commissioner who votes with Book_Chestnut_Duncan-Walker on such matters, making their faction the majority. It’s tiresome and dangerous how the comparative normies are so consistently outvoted by the looneys.
Great comment. I suspect, purely a guess, that a non-miniscual number of voters have in the past and will continue to vote with their feet to high springs, Newberry, and alachua.
I never understood all the nonsense about “low income housing”. There’s thousands of apartments for low income types to live. If you are poor, you can’t afford a house (maintanance, taxes, etc) just like I couldn’t until I got it together. This is just another ploy to pack their voters in. As usual it will turn into section 8 and anyone with a brain will avoid those areas.
Ward interjected that there aren’t many “salespeople good enough to sell somebody a house that doesn’t have parking if they need parking. That’s a reality. You’re not going to buy a house that doesn’t have parking if you’ve got two cars.”
And yet here he and the other $0€i@li$ts are, selling the idea of tenement housing projects to any idiot who believes them. Apparently there’s a bunch of those out there…idiots, not salespeople.
Most wish they would rather do nothing, it causes less damage to the community.
The most long term damaging thing approved since biomass debacle imo
Look on the bright side, buying/refinancing the biomass fiasco started the 30 years all over again in 2018, we only have 24 more years to pay for that tree burning heat and carbon producing giant!
Eastman and Saco are so disrespectful to the other commissioners. They all have a role to represent their constituents but the these far left so-called progressives are condescending and arrogant. The sooner the African American commissioners realize that every comment they make in dissent will be taunted and ignored by their so-called progressive allies the more they will realize the anti-blackness of their own coalition. Stop thinking these people value your thoughts. It was very rationale to propose a pilot on a new large scale redrawing of single family zoning … until the progressives thought y’all needed to be quiet. Wake up Chestnut and Duncan Walker – wake up!
Saco’s Miami MAGA parents must be constantly mortified by the behavior of their devil-daughter.
“I’m not comfortable with doing nothing” sounds like something Harvey says to his refrigerator every time he goes in the kitchen.
Saco must be a very sickly person if she has to wear that face diaper..
Saco and Eastman care most for those like themselves. College educated and indebted who want to live in SFR hoods but cannot afford the current zeitgeist. I don’t blame them, but I sympathize for the rest of existing homeowners.
Tiny houses will once again litter the landscape. Look at the early 20th century in the Porters, Pleasant street, 5th ave, Duval and Lincoln areas. Tons of small 5-800 square foot houses stacked together due to lack of affordability back then.
Currently people can’t afford larger 1600+ sq ft homes or the property they are built on much less the taxes, GRU rates, insurance, and maintenance. The tiny homes concept allows people to avoid being priced out of Florida for now.
Do I think packing 12 homes on a one acre site is acceptable? I don’t but if it is so expensive to even live here then I see little alternative. Florida is quickly becoming the new California where only the rich can live comfortably.
They are moving toward everyone living in BlackRock-owned dormitories. The self-driving car will pick you up every morning to take you somewhere, hopefully to work. Be ready to go, on-time.
The city already has a department of doing nothing. They call it city hall.
I don’t think that it’s happened yet, but I can’t wait for Jake Fuller’s cartoon on the ridiculous joke-of-a-Mayor’s statement “I’m not comfortable with doing nothing.”
Totally suprised that Jazzbuilders has not weighed in on this issue. Maybe Eastman may have a clue?
These Commissioners could care less about the poor or affordable housing. It’s all about getting rid of single family homes that are privately owned because those are the one that usually qualify for Homestead Exemptions. What people don’t realize is that little ADU they thought they could make a few extra bucks renting, will decrease the value of their property that qualifies for a Homestead Exemption. The ADU (unless occupied by a family member over 62 yrs old) will be subject to the full property tax rate and the property value for the ADU will no longer be limited to the 3% per year valuation cap.
Sorry, but really? Get the female(?) in a mask a mental health eval. at this point you are either mentally ill or just plain ignorant to still be wearing a face diaper. Oops, I forgot virtue signalling….
I wonder how many Airbnb/VRBOs we have in Alachua County. Outlaw them so that the owners will have to turn them back into long-term rental properties that people who have lower incomes can afford to rent.
Stop building more cheap homes, crammed together on zero lot lines to create neighborhoods that will soon fall into disrepair.
Usually if there isn’t a requirement to verify the income of the person using the housing that is created the over whelming majority will not be for households earning less than 80% of the AMI. Zoning changes like this are successful when there is income testing, without it the ” marketplace” will fail to perform. On the other side if developers were honest and explained their housing math, we’d all understand that regulatory relief isn’t sufficient to create housing for most of the workforce.