{"id":125546,"date":"2026-01-20T23:05:19","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T23:05:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125546\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T23:05:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T23:05:19","slug":"st-johns-county-softens-growth-plan-to-satisfy-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125546\/","title":{"rendered":"St. Johns County softens growth plan to satisfy state"},"content":{"rendered":"

The St. Johns County Commission approved its comprehensive plan Tuesday for the second time in a calendar year \u2014 after the state rejected the last plan for being too \u201crestrictive\u201d of development<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Despite calls from some local residents and environmental groups, the County Commission passed a plan that stripped out language the state objected to. The commission promised to revisit the plan if and when things change in Tallahassee.<\/p>\n

The comprehensive plan, which is hundreds of pages long, functions as a set of guidelines for how land can be developed and how the county enforces its rules and regulations governing growth.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also, as Keto Burns, the head of the South Anastasia Communities Association, puts it, \u201ca key document that determines what our county looks like years from now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burns\u2019 nonprofit group, which fights to preserve natural lands on Anastasia Island, was among those opposing the county\u2019s move Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Burns says the county did a great job getting input from groups like his all around St. Johns County. That\u2019s important, he says, because of how instrumental the comprehensive plan is in county decision-making.<\/p>\n

But Burns had hoped the county would have waited until after the end of this year\u2019s legislative session to pass what he calls a \u201cwatered-down\u201d plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a 25-year planning document,\u201d Burns says. \u201cIt will outlive any commissioner or staffer at the county.\u201d<\/p>\n

Growth plan problems<\/p>\n

Over the course of the two years the latest plan was in the works, measures focusing on environmental protection and workforce housing arose as priorities among elected officials and members of the community.<\/p>\n

But the county hit a snag when it approved its new plan last summer. It ran afoul of a controversial set of guidelines that Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law last year.<\/p>\n

Those rules have become known as SB 180<\/a>, after the bill that introduced them.<\/p>\n

SB 180 was intended to help the state recover more quickly from hurricanes. But under the bill, the state informed local governments that their rules surrounding growth and development were too strict and had to be amended.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The state rejected St. Johns County\u2019s plan for a number of items, including language that strengthened the county\u2019s position on preserving environmentally sensitive lands and building bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure.<\/p>\n

Some municipalities chose to sue the state over the measure, but St. Johns County opted to see how things would play out<\/a> in the state capital when legislators met this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The more controversial elements of SB 180 may change \u2014 a bill amending that law<\/a> is moving through legislative committees, and the original bill\u2019s sponsor, Sen. Nick DiCeglie, R-Indian Rocks Beach, supports the changes. St. Augustine lawmaker Kim Kendall also has stated that she supports changing SB 180<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Local impact<\/p>\n

Changes in the comprehensive plan were largely necessary because of language the state deemed as too strong, said St. Johns County Growth Management Director Mike Roberson.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey identified certain policies \u2026 as more restrictive or burdensome,\u201d Roberson says. \u201cWe looked at each of those policies and either softened or removed them for now.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the plan approved Tuesday, county staff softened language surrounding workforce housing and land conservation \u2014 from \u201cinclude\u201d to \u201cmay include\u201d or from \u201cprohibit\u201d to \u201cdiscourage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burns, of the South Anastasia Communities Association, says language simply encouraging developers to consider things like development that is more considerate of environmental protection is pointless.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can consider it without even having the language,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Promises made\u2026<\/p>\n

The County Commission voted 3-2 on Tuesday to transmit the revised comprehensive plan to the state. Commissioners Krista Joseph and Ann Taylor pushed to wait on the measure.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The two argued that the revised plan was not what the board \u2014 or the community \u2014 really wanted. Joseph and Taylor were in favor of delaying a vote until the Legislature made its decision on altering SB 180, even if it left the county in a liminal state for some time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we can do it,\u201d Joseph said. \u201cWe have attorneys. I don\u2019t know why we can\u2019t hold the line.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But Commissioners Christian Whitehurst, Sarah Arnold and Clay Murphy pushed for passing the revised plan and revisiting it if the changes to SB 180 pass the Legislature during this session.<\/p>\n

If that happened, Murphy said he would be \u201cleading the charge\u201d to approve the plan the board agreed on \u2014 the one that the two years of community involvement helped build \u2014 as soon as they could.<\/p>\n

The comprehensive plan process is not over yet, though.\u00a0<\/p>\n

By agreeing to transmit the revised plan to Tallahassee, the county may still get more notes from state officials. Once the document comes back, notes or no notes, it will have to come back before the county\u2019s Planning and Zoning Agency and the Board of County Commissioners for another approval before it is completely adopted.<\/p>\n

Roberson estimates that won\u2019t happen until May.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The St. Johns County Commission approved its comprehensive plan Tuesday for the second time in a calendar year…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125547,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":["post-125546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125546\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}