St. Lucie County Ordinance No. 2013-43 Allowing Administrative Extensions to Site Plan Approvals

W. Lee Dobbins

Attention St. Lucie County Land Owners:

On December 17, 2013, the Board of County Commissioners of St. Lucie County enacted an Amendment to their Land Development Code to allow administrative extensions to site plan approvals. This Ordinance was modeled on legislation passed by the State of Florida in 2009, 2010 and 2011 to provide two year extensions to land development approvals in response to the economic downturn.

The St. Lucie County Ordinance provides that any approved site plan which has an expiration date of January 1, 2013 through December 31, 2014 may be extended for a period of two years after its previous date of expiration. This extension applies to all site plans expiring during this timeframe, regardless of previous extensions granted. In other words, the extension is available even if the site plan approval was previously extended pursuant to one of the Florida Statutes passed in 2009, 2010 or 2011. The administrative extension does not apply to any site plan held by an owner determined by the County to be in significant non-compliance with the conditions of the site plan.

In order to qualify for the extension, the holder of a site plan expiring between January 1, 2013 and February 27, 2014 must notify the County in writing prior to February 28, 2014. The holder of a site plan expiring after February 27, 2014 that is eligible for the extension must notify the County in writing prior to expiration. In either case, the holder must identify a reason for the extension and the anticipated timeframe for acting on the site plan.

If you have a site plan approval in St. Lucie County to which this Ordinance may apply and would like to discuss this Ordinance, please contact Lee Dobbins at ldobbins@www.deanmead.com or (772) 464-7700 for further information.