Florida Construction News staff writer
As Miami Beach prepares to celebrate the 100th anniversary of its world-renowned Art Deco architecture, city officials are voicing strong opposition to proposed state legislation they say could jeopardize decades of historic preservation and permanently alter the city’s character.
“We respectfully call on the Florida House, on the Florida Senate, to fix these bills before it is too late, because if they don’t, Miami Beach as we know it will be lost forever,” Commissioner Alex Fernandez said at a press conference on Tuesday.
At issue is the proposed expansion of Florida’s Live Local Act, a state initiative aimed at boosting affordable housing by easing local zoning restrictions. While the Florida House has amended its version of the bill — House Bill 943 — to protect historic districts, the Senate’s version, SB 1730, currently lacks those safeguards.
City officials held a press conference on Tuesday, sounding an alarm that the Senate bill could pave the way for the demolition of historic low-rise buildings in favor of modern high-rises, some potentially reaching 500 feet tall. That includes many of the 2,600 historic structures across Miami Beach, roughly 1,800 of which fall into the Art Deco, Postwar Miami Modern (MiMo), or Mediterranean Revival styles.
“We are facing the biggest threat to Miami Beach’s historic identity in a generation,” said Fernandez, who has been lobbying lawmakers in Tallahassee. “The Senate Bill and the House Bill as they stand would allow developers to demolish our historic buildings without a public hearing, without a commission vote and without any community input.”
Developers would have the power to “tear down our two and three-story apartment buildings . . . the very buildings that give Miami Beach its sole, and them with 500-foot skyscrapers – nearly 50 stories tall.”
Fighting the bill is about preserving the character of neighborhoods, he said.
“If these bills pass without protections, our iconic Ocean Drive skyline, the Flamingo Park Art Deco neighborhood, the North Shore historic district could all be bulldozed into history.”
If passed, developers would be able to bypass local review in commercially zoned areas, enabling construction of new towers matching the height of the tallest building within a one-mile radius.
There are currently more than 2,600 historic buildings in the city that are protected by Miami Beach’s preservation regulations.
“Those regulations are at risk today,” Fernandez said. “The loss of these historic buildings wouldn’t just change our skyline, it would irreparably harm the cultural and architectural identity of Miami Beach.”
Calling the bills a “tax break for developers” that will put affordable and workforce housing at risk because small buildings would be replaced with “glass towers that will accelerate gentrification”.
As a former resident of Miami Beach and the man who was in charge of the renovation of Lincoln Road in the 90’s I love the art deco ambiance of Miami Beach. Since that time, I have been building Affordable housing projects throughout the state.
The one thing that has killed several affordable housing projects is the unwillingness of local politicians and property owners to work with affordable housing developers to facilitate the affordable housing outcome.
Given the new administration’s ideals, it may be next to impossible to build the necessary infrastructure and buildings without enthusiastic local support. This article sends me a message that instead of support, there will be opposition. That can be devastating to building family-friendly and workforce necessary buildings. There are ways around that.