Shuttered Winter Springs Golf Course could be developed

A 133-acre conservation easement set aside 39 years ago for possible parkland may be sold off to make way for a 492-unit housing development in Winter Springs. Mayor Kevin McCann is saying that if it’s not done now, it could be turned into something the city doesn’t want. 

The controversial development centers on a ghost of Winter Springs’ past: the 177-acre leftovers of the Winter Springs Golf Club on West State Road 434. The club shuttered at the beginning of a national golf course contraction that’s claimed more than 11 percent of the nation’s golf courses since 2006, according to industry publication Golfweek Magazine. 

“This, of course, is a historic piece of property, and in my mind I kind of hoped that the links would be donated to the city and turned into park areas,” Winter Springs City Commissioner Ted Johnson. But so far that hasn’t been the case. 

The defunct golf course has been subject to development rumors in the past, including when it was purchased in 2006 by developer Arman Rahbarian, but never reopened and has since remained undeveloped.

That dead golf course resurfaced  in the news in 2021 when a large quantity of fish suddenly died in one of its ponds after a cold front sent temperatures into the 30s, coupled with a wastewater leak into the pond, leading to resident complaints about throat irritation, asthma, and the smell itself.

On Sept. 11 Pulte Homes Vice President for Land Acquisitions Max Perlman gave the preliminary pitch for an idea by the residential development company to turn the land occupied by the course into a mixed-use development of commercial and possible retail along the frontage at S.R. 434, and 78 acres devoted to a combination of townhomes and single-family homes at a density of about 2.77 homes per acre. 

That idea raised eyebrows because of the land in the middle of the development, the 133-acre conservation easement that had prohibited development upon it since 1984, according to City Attorney Anthony Garganese.

“All these development projects will require the city to release all or part of this public conservation easement,” Garganese said.  

“This isn’t the first project where we’ve come and had people staring daggers at us,” Perlman said. 

But Perlman said during that non-binding presentation that the development would “have a focus on maximizing the open space.”

“There would be, potentially, ponds, walking trails, benches,” Perlman said, in the area currently occupied by the easement. 

The easement would also not be affected by the commercial development near the state road, as that commercially zoned 10-acre parcel isn’t part of the easement.  

But, while acknowledging the importance of preserving the city’s vision for the area, Mayor Kevin McCann said the city may be running out of time to prevent the land from being developed in a way the city doesn’t want. He pointed to the recently passed Live Local Act that removes city control over some residential developments in the city on land that formerly wasn’t allowed to be developed upon. 

“Tallahassee is taking away our right to control many, many, many facets of the homes and properties within our city limits,” McCann said. “…they are allowed to put in apartments there, and they don’t have to meet our height requirements, they don’t have to meet our density requirements.” 

That big change has caused the City Commission to rethink its objections to other developments in the city, as the Commission tries to maintain control over projects before being forced into undesirable ones. He said that residents and the Commission should be open to working to cooperatively shape developments while they still have a voice in the process. 

“If somebody had asked me six months ago whether we were willing to give up that part of that conservation at all, I wouldn’t have given up one inch,” McCann said. “Not an inch. I would have fought for that, hard.” 

Whether Commissioners already knew about the project and were talking to the developer became a controversy on its own during the Sept. 11 Commission meeting, when McCann asked if any elected officials had already had prior communications with the developer. Commissioners Victoria Colangelo and Cade Resnick said they had. Deputy Mayor Rob Elliott said he’d been contacted by a representative of the developer but declined to speak with them. 

“I said, ‘At this point I have no reason to discuss this project’,” Elliott said. “That’s not how I operate. I have never had a backroom deal since I’ve been in this position and I never will.”

City Development Director Terrilyn Bostwick said that the development proposal would follow the usual path that large-scale developments take in the city, first being presented to city staff to make sure it meets code requirements, then being presented publicly during workshop-style sessions to solicit resident input to finalize the design, then being voted upon by the city’s Planning and Zoning Board and finally at the City Commission level. There is no time table yet established for that process.

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