Source: Miami Herald
The Miami-Dade County Planning Advisory Board will meet Monday morning to issue its final recommendation on the application by Shoma Homes to change the master plan and build homes on the east golf course in Fontainebleau -- which is not currently designated for residential use.
Monday's meeting will be the last step before the Miami-Dade County Commission issues its final decision in May -- a decision that has long been awaited not only by Shoma, but by two rival resident groups involved in a year-long saga that has divided the Fontainebleau community.
The site plan up for approval would allow for 1,890 units to be built, including 1,176 units on the east golf course and a 200-foot buffer between new and existing buildings -- a plan proposed by Shoma Homes and agreed to by neighbors in the Keep the Bleau Green Committee after a year of negotiations.
''We have a proposal we negotiated with the owner of the golf course, and we're just going to the meeting to support what we had agreed on,'' said Jesus Carcasses, leader of the Bleau Green Committee.
But a rival resident group, the Fontainebleau Federation, doesn't agree with the agreement.
The group -- which wants no more than 1,300 units to be built on the site -- touched on its concerns at a November Miami-Dade County Commission hearing about heavy traffic and flooding that would be generated from the new homes.
It also protested the way the Bleau Green Committee represented Fontainebleau's 25,000 residents in an agreement, accusing the committee of scare tactics, secret meetings and manipulation.
The Fontainebleau Federation's leader, Robert Lorenzo, said that neither he nor his neighbors were notified of Monday's meeting, and he does not plan to go to speak against the application, as he and his organization have for every other hearing.
''It's just going to be a recommendation, that's all,'' Lorenzo said. ''I don't think there should be any surprises.''
In separate meetings last year, the Westchester Community Council and the Miami-Dade County Planning Advisory Board recommended that the Miami-Dade County Commission send Shoma's request to the state for review, pushing the application along in the planning process.
Last November, the County Commission heeded their advice, and the Shoma Homes application was sent to the Florida Department of Community Affairs for its objections, recommendations and comments.
This report, along with the final recommendations of the Planning Advisory Board, will be taken into consideration in the final decision by Miami-Dade County Commissioners in May on how much -- and where -- Shoma will be allowed to construct on the site. If its application is approved, Shoma will submit more detailed plans for the golf course.
The hearing will begin at 11 a.m. in the County Commission Chamber, 111 NW First St.