Sarasota County’s trust fund for land purchases needs a recurring source, Jon Thaxton says.
By Johannes Werner
Original Air Date: April 11, 2025
Host: Sarasota County is not even close to solving the affordable housing crisis. Quite the opposite: The scissors between affordability and availability keep opening up wider. And the commission is not doing everything within its power to prevent that. Case in point: A developer this week started tearing down one of the biggest retail properties in the county—Sarasota Square Mall—to redevelop it with housing. But they will not build a single affordable unit. So on Tuesday, one of the foremost affordable housing advocates in Sarasota gave commissioners a thumbs-up after they unanimously moved along a big project with the biggest batch ever of attainable apartments built by a commercial developer. But Jon Thaxton didn’t let them off the hook easily. We have the details.
Draft plan for Gracewater Midtown.
Johannes Werner: The reason for Thaxton’s praise was the Gracewater Midtown mixed-use project. In September, the county sold 113 acres near the northeastern city limits to a commercial developer. The developer is proposing to build close to 1,500 apartments, one-fourth of them—370 units—attainable.
The developer’s lawyer described Gracewater Midtown as the biggest batch of private developer-produced attainable units in the history of the county.
At the meeting on Tuesday, the commissioners unanimously approved several changes requested by the developer, after a bit of scrutiny.
Jon Thaxton, a former commissioner himself who chairs a panel that advises the county commission on affordable housing, gave the five commissioners a slap on the back.
Jon Thaxton
Jon Thaxton: We were working on that one back in 2005, and it’s so great to see it coming to fruition. I want to compliment the commission on its really astute review of the changes to that. That was reassuring to hear.
JW: But then, it was Thaxton time. The former county commissioner and long-time advocate for affordable housing presented a set of recommendations from the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee.
He pointed out that the problem is getting worse, and that there’s no simple solution.
JT: It’s very clear that the challenge of affordable housing persists, and the delta between the availability of supply of affordable housing and demand continues to grow.
JW: The committee’s recommendations include setting aside a percentage of property tax growth from new development for the county’s affordable housing trust fund. This could be used to buy land, among others. The committee also suggests using $12 million from a surtax to buy land.
Also, every land-use meeting should weigh the impacts of that project on the affordable housing supply, Thaxton said.
JT: This one is really kind of elementary, but it’s not done. When you make a decision for land use, you should be thinking about, “Is this going to be good for affordable housing, negative, or is it going to have no impact?” We do not have that discussion.
JW: Most contentious for developers is mandatory inclusionary zoning. Some opponents have said that a relatively new state law blocks that.
JT: Florida statute—I’ve given you a copy of the 125 excerpt, and it says very clearly the county may adopt a mandatory inclusionary zoning.
JW: Finally, Thaxton suggests that, when developers want to produce housing on commercially-zoned land such as aging malls, the county must insist that affordable housing be included when they grant a rezone.
Decision making always falls within the commissioners’ discretion, Thaxton pointed out. In other words: You make it happen, or you don’t. So far, the commissioners have ignored many of the committee’s previous recommendations.
In what was probably the most direct response suggesting buy-in to Thaxton’s report, Commissioner Teresa Mast urged her peers to set aside “significant dollars” to purchase land for affordable housing.
When Commissioner Ron Cutsinger said that Sarasota County “leads the way” when it comes to spending federal dollars for affordable housing, Thaxton did not let him off the hook.
He said that the federal assistance was one-time disaster relief funding. What is really needed, he suggested, is a recurring source of dollars under the county’s control.
Johannes Werner, reporting for WSLR News.
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