{"id":68255,"date":"2025-12-02T17:54:06","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T17:54:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/68255\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T17:54:06","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T17:54:06","slug":"tangerine-plaza-developers-need-more-time-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/68255\/","title":{"rendered":"Tangerine Plaza developers need more time, money"},"content":{"rendered":"

Persistent issues continue plaguing years-long efforts<\/a> to redevelop Tangerine Plaza, a city-owned strip mall in South St. Petersburg that housed the area\u2019s only grocery store until 2017.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sugar Hill Group, which submitted its first proposal for the embattled site in 2020<\/a>, is now requesting $22.3 million in public funding and a one-year extension to meet city requirements. Mayor Ken Welch\u2019s administration is recommending that the City Council approve the additional time at a Dec. 11 meeting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In June 2024, council members narrowly approved<\/a> offering the group 18 additional months to secure funding and a grocer in a 5-3 vote. According to the Dec. 11 agenda, the developers have yet to fulfill either stipulation.<\/p>\n

The deal will terminate if the council rejects the extension and Sugar Hill fails to meet its obligations by the Jan. 2 deadline. Councilmember Corey Givens Jr, whose district includes the underserved area, said Tuesday that the city \u201ccan\u2019t afford to keep kicking the can down the road.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI was skeptical, but hopeful, that Sugar Hill would be able to secure financing and a reputable grocer for the Tangerine Plaza redevelopment,\u201d Givens said. \u201cHowever, it does not appear that either of the two are in place.\u201d<\/p>\n

Welch restarted a redevelopment process that began under former Mayor Rick Kriseman in July 2022<\/a>. The city selected Sugar Hill\u2019s previously estimated $37 million proposal to build affordable housing and provide a community grocer at 1794 22nd St. S.<\/p>\n

The team includes Rev. Louis Murphy, senior pastor at Mt. Zion Progressive Ministry; Roy Binger, CEO of Binger Financial Services; and Oliver Gross, president of Miami-based New Urban Development.\u00a0Murphy could not immediately be reached for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He spoke on behalf of the group to the council in June 2024. \u201cWe\u2019re going to make it happen,\u201d Murphy pledged.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThose of you who didn\u2019t vote for it, just know that we\u2019re going to show you that we are more than capable of turning our community around.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Evolving plans<\/p>\n

The development team expanded the project\u2019s residential scope by roughly 62% in early July, with less than six months to meet an increasingly impatient city\u2019s supposedly final deadline. \u201cIt\u2019s an important project,\u201d Welch said at the time. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd the January timeline for the next step is very important.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to documents obtained by the Catalyst, the group has sought state approval to build 72 new units through the Live Local Act. Sugar Hill had agreed to build 115 apartments and 10,000 square feet of total retail space, with at least 3,000 square feet dedicated to a neighborhood market<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Dec. 11 agenda states that Sugar Hill sent the city a letter of intent in mid-October to exercise its lease or purchase option. If the group can secure funding and a grocer, they would enter a $100,000 annual lease for 75 years, with 24 months of waived payments.<\/p>\n

Once redeveloped, Sugar Hill can buy the property, previously valued at $1.84 million, for $1.5 million. The group requested a one-year extension of the option period Oct. 30.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Letters sent in November assumed that the city would provide Sugar Hill $11.16 million in South St. Petersburg Community Redevelopment Area (CRA) funding. The group has also requested $11.16 million from Pinellas County.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A previous rendering of Sugar Hill Group\u2019s proposed development. Image provided.<\/p>\n

The developers offered to allocate 56 housing units for residents earning up to 60% of the area median income. They would cap 130 at 80%.<\/p>\n

However, five of 11 \u201crequired documents in the application are placeholder submittals,\u201d according to the agenda. In addition, city staff informed Sugar Hill that its funding request was \u201cnot possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Any city subsidies will require a review of Sugar Hill\u2019s other resources and the council\u2019s approval. The agenda states that Pinellas County is \u201cgenerally supportive\u201d of the group\u2019s $11.16 million request \u2013 if the city provides gap funding.<\/p>\n

Sugar Hill is now \u201caddressing the remaining comments to the site plan\u201d and \u201cintends to provide the city with a commitment letter from a grocer<\/a>.\u201d Staff wrote that the developers would also submit a building permit package and apply for low-income housing tax credits.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Givens noted the surrounding community has lacked access to a grocery store since a Walmart Neighborhood Market shuttered in 2017. He believes that reopening the proposal process<\/a> would \u201cmove this redevelopment forward and help to solve the food insecurity crisis in this vulnerable part of our city.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Councilmember Deborah Figgs-Sanders said Tuesday that she prefers to hear a project presentation Dec. 11 before forming an opinion on Sugar Hill\u2019s request. \u201cI love it when the council has those in-depth conversations \u2013 more comes out,\u201d she added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn today\u2019s economy \u2026 anything is possible.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Persistent issues continue plaguing years-long efforts to redevelop Tangerine Plaza, a city-owned strip mall in South St. Petersburg…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68256,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-68255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68255","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=68255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68255\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}