{"id":368749,"date":"2026-08-11T21:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T21:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/368749\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T21:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T21:28:11","slug":"this-new-law-could-open-martin-co-farmland-to-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/368749\/","title":{"rendered":"This new law could open Martin Co. farmland to development"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MARTIN COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Martin County is reviewing its first agricultural enclave proposal under a new state law that could transform farmland across the region.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flsenate.gov\/Session\/Bill\/2026\/686\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Senate Bill 686<\/a>, which took effect July 1, allows landowners to build homes and businesses on land designated as agricultural enclaves.<\/p>\n<p>WATCH BELOW: Florida&#8217;s ag enclave law: Martin County reviews first application<\/p>\n<p>Florida&#8217;s ag enclave law: Martin County reviews first application<\/p>\n<p>To qualify, a property must be surrounded on at least 75% of its boundaries by existing development.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The property has to have been in continuous use for bona fide agriculture purposes for five years prior to the date of an application,&#8221; Martin County senior planner Jenna Knobbe said.<\/p>\n<p>On the same day the bill became law, the county received its first application for a 396-acre property known as Waterside. The site consists of three parcels located just west of Kanner Highway and south of Southwest 96th Street.<\/p>\n<p>            <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786483690_754_.jpeg\" alt=\"The Waterside site consists of three parcels located just west of Kanner Highway and south of Southwest 96th Street in Martin County.\"  width=\"1280\" height=\"720\"\/><\/p>\n<p>WPTV<\/p>\n<p>        The Waterside site consists of three parcels located just west of Kanner Highway and south of Southwest 96th Street in Martin County.<\/p>\n<p>Up to 1,200 homes were initially planned on the property.<\/p>\n<p>County staff recommended the enclave designation be denied.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We reviewed the property tax records for the three parcels in the application, and we found that not all of the property was classified for agricultural purposes from the property appraiser&#8217;s office,&#8221; Knobbe said.<\/p>\n<p>The Waterside proposal was expected to be discussed at a Martin County Commission meeting Tuesday, but the applicant asked for the item to be pulled from the agenda.<\/p>\n<p>The property owners declined to comment.<\/p>\n<p>How much pushback local governments can mount against the law remains unclear. <\/p>\n<p>In northeast Florida, St. Johns County commissioners agreed last week to have the county attorney examine whether there are legal grounds to challenge the new law, which expires Jan. 1, 2028.<\/p>\n<p>This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.<\/p>\n<p>            <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1777926727_903_.jpeg\" alt=\"REP_CARD_JON-SHAINMAN_JUPITER_FS.jpg\"  width=\"1280\" height=\"720\"\/><\/p>\n<p>WPTV<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MARTIN COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Martin County is reviewing its first agricultural enclave proposal under a new state law&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":368750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[28,149324,149325,1160,149326,149327,171,173,172,149328,149329,179,12758],"class_list":["post-368749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-florida","tag-florida-farmland-law","tag-florida-land-use-law","tag-martin-county","tag-martin-county-commission","tag-martin-county-development","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news","tag-sb-686-florida","tag-senate-bill-686","tag-treasure-coast","tag-wptv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368749","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=368749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/368750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=368749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=368749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=368749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}