Infill and Redevelopment Tools

⇒ Community Redevelopment Agency ⇒ Development without Displacement ⇒ Greyfield Development ⇒ Incentives for Infill and Redevelopment ⇒ Neighborhood Conservation District ⇒ Vacant Property Program

Infill and redevelopment planning tools enable communities to direct more of new development, and the accompanying investments into existing urban and suburban areas that already have services. They do that by developing, redeveloping, and re-using existing sites and buildings in neighborhoods, and commercial corridors and centers. Communities use infill (which applies to filling in vacant parcels) and redevelopment (which applies to constructing new development on previously developed land) to make more efficient use of existing infrastructure, such as streets, water, and sewer lines, and to lower the cost of public services, such as fire, police, and emergency service providers. Infill and redevelopment are also used to provide affordable housing, to reduce pressures to expand urban and suburban areas further into the countryside or nearer to environmentally sensitive lands, and to reduce traffic congestion by shortening commuting distances or eliminating the need to commute by providing houses closer to jobs. Infill and redevelopment programs also help to revitalize downtowns.

Use Planning and Development Tools

⇒ Compact Building Design Design Guidelines Whether they are large or small or ⇒ located in an urban, ⇒ Design Institutes and Centers suburban, or rural location, Florida ⇒ Form-Based Codes communities are increasingly employing a variety of ⇒ Historic Districts land use planning and development tools to grow more ⇒ Incentive Zoning efficiently and to achieve the type of communities their ⇒ Mixed-Use Development citizens want. Those tools, described in this section, ⇒ Neighborhood Conservation Districts address not only the use of land (whether it is used for ⇒ New Urbanism housing or shops or jobs or open space) but also the ⇒ Overlay Zones pattern, character, and form of development – where the ⇒ SmartCode development is located, what it looks like, and the ⇒ Urban Growth Boundaries livability of the places ⇒ Walkable Neighborhoods it creates. They address the way Florida communities have grown, resulting in increased traffic congestion, more time spent in cars, and loss of community identity and open space, often Rosemary Beach putting at risk environmentally Located near Panama City, 105-acre Rosemary Beach is a compact sensitive lands that are important traditional town development that offers a wide variety of housing to the state’s water supply and types within walking distance of a town center featuring a mix of wildlife habitat. (A number of shops, services, and public spaces. Contributing to the compact design, Florida organizations serve as a Rosemary Beach offers 12 housing types, including studio flats, lofts, resource on land use and development live-work units over attached ground floor commercial space, carriage planning tools. They include the Florida houses, and family cottages. In addition, residential units are offered Chapter of the Congress for the New above the retail space, typical of traditional Florida downtowns, and Urbanism apartments called granny flats are over many of the garages. (More (www.cnuflorida.org), the Florida information is available from www.rosemarybeach.com and from A Guidebook to Chapter of the American New Urbanism in Florida 2005, published by the Florida Chapter of the Congress Planning Association for the New Urbanism [www.cnuflor.org].) (www.floridaplanning.org), the Florida Planning and Zoning Association Transportation Planning Tools

√ Context Sensitive Solutions √ Complete (Walkable) Streets √ Corridor Plans √ Interconnected Street Network √ Road Diets √ Traffic Calming √ Transit-Oriented Development

Transportation planning issues are a top of the mind concern for many Florida residents and businesses, as well as those in the Emerald Coast. Because of growing traffic congestion within and between communities, Floridians are spending more and more time in traffic and driving greater distances for jobs, housing, and basic services. Adding to the concern is the recognition that transportation investments play a powerful role in shaping the location and character of development in a community and in determining a community’s livability and economic vitality. The way communities plan for development (what land uses go where and how they connect) has a powerful influence on transportation and travel mode choices and on equitable access to jobs, housing, and services. As a result, transportation and land use planners are increasingly coming together to incorporate land use and accessibility consideration when planning transportation investments and to create new planning tools that broaden the range of transportation choices, create roads that enhance the surrounding community, and make roads more desirable for cars and bikes.

Military Growth Community Planning Tools

√ Comprehensive Growth Management Plan (GMP) √ Conservation Partnering Authority

√ Economic Diversification Plan √ Joint Land Use Study Program (JLUS)

Florida’s Emerald Coast is home to eight (8) military installations that are a major contributor to the regional economy and quality of life. The bases include the largest air force base in the world, Eglin Air Force Base EAB), which covers 724 square miles within the reservation. In the next four years (by 2009), Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) training, as well as the Army’s 7th Special Forces Group, will be realigned to Eglin AFB, and that will significantly increase the number of military and civilian personnel and their families to Okaloosa, Walton, and Santa Rosa counties. The Office of Economic Adjustment (OEA) is the U.S. Department of Defense's primary source for assisting communities that are impacted by such Defense program changes. The OEA has experienced staff to help communities put together an adjustment program that can be used to plan for the growth from the expansion of a military base installation. The OEA also offers a number of planning tools and related grants. Those tools and grants provide a way for a local government to work in partnership with a local military base installation to assess the potential impacts of growth on the community (for example, off-base community services and facilities and off-base housing); develop an adjustment strategy and plan; and implement the plan using local, state and Federal resources. (Information about Office of Economic Adjustment Planning Tools is available at www.oea.gov/oeaweb.nsf)

Housing Tools

√ Community Land Trusts

√ Employer Assisted Housing √ Housing Linkage Program √ Incentives for Affordable Housing √ Inclusionary Zoning

A daily scan of headlines across Florida highlights what is increasingly a common occurrence: the price of a house has far outpaced incomes and the gap between incomes and housing costs grows larger each year. In many communities, the cost of housing has become a principal issue for employers who are finding it more and more difficult to hire and keep workers because they cannot afford a home near where they work and cannot afford longer and more costly commutes to distant locations that offer more affordable homes. The problem applies to most professions needed to keep a community going, such as firefighters, law enforcement personnel, teachers, health care and emergency care workers, and government employees. The magnitude of Florida’s housing problem was documented in a recent report by the Florida Housing Coalition, Florida Priced Out Report: 2005 Findings: since 2003, median home prices in Florida have increased by 77 percent, while incomes grew by 1.4 percent. (Information on the report is available from the Florida Housing Coalition, www.flhousing.org.) In 2006, the Florida legislature responded to the housing affordability crisis by passing several programs (discussed below under Incentives for Affordable Housing) that create incentives for producing affordable housing. Those incentives build on existing state Growth Management and Land Development Regulations that require communities to include a Housing Element in their comprehensive plans. The Housing Element must show how a community will meet the housing needs of its existing and projected population, including those with special needs and low incomes. In addition, a community’s future land use map must show sites for affordable housing, and, through the Development of Regional Impact process, large commercial developments are required to provide affordable housing for the employees they generate. (Complete information on housing affordability and housing programs and requirements in Florida is available from the Florida Department of Community Affairs [www.dca.state.fl.us], 1000 Friends of Florida [1000fof.org], and the Florida Housing Coalition. Additional information about removing barriers to affordable housing is available from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development's Office of Policy Development and Research [www.regbarriers.org].)