To build taller, Bal Harbour Shops wants to overturn 2006 referendum. Voters to decide
The 11-acre Bal Harbour Shops mall may be in the middle of a $400 million expansion, but its owner wants to develop further — and taller — to revitalize the luxury shopping center.
To clear the way for further construction, the mall wants to overturn a 2006 voter referendum establishing a 56-foot height limit on the property and requiring that any development proposed to exceed the cap get voter approval prior to going before the five-member elected village council.
Whitman Family Development, which owns the mall at 9700 Collins Ave., in the village of Bal Harbour, formed a political committee called The Future of Bal Harbour and gathered signatures from 195 residents, enough to trigger a special election in the small municipality of about 3,100 people. The committee was required to collect signatures from at least 185 residents, representing 10% of the 1,855 registered voters in the village.
The Jan. 26 special referendum election, which will include in-person and mail-in voting, is going to cost the village about $16,266, according to a memo from Village Manager Jorge Gonzalez.
If approved by a majority of voters, the referendum will amend the village charter to grant council members unilateral authority to approve projects of any height at the mall, regardless of resident opinions.
“It kind of says, ‘Let the council decide,’ ” Gonzalez said.
The “open-ended” referendum doesn’t specify the purpose of the rule change, he said.
Matthew Whitman Lazenby, the president and chief executive officer of the company, said the Bal Harbour Shops has not submitted any plans to build taller than the current limit but “would like the opportunity to consider proposing a plan in the future.”
He said the 56-foot cap restricts the mall’s ability to adapt to the “severe impact” of COVID-19 on the economy and broader industry trends. In August, the mall sued to evict one of its longtime anchor tenants, Saks Fifth Avenue, over $1.9 million in unpaid rent and late fees. Its other anchor, Neiman Marcus, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May but announced in September it had completed the process.
“Bal Harbour Shops would like to give the Village residents an opportunity to vote on the future of the Shops,” Whitman Lazenby wrote in an email. “A vote in favor of the referendum will allow Bal Harbour Shops to present future plans to the Council and Village residents for their review and input, and will allow the Shops to adapt and continue to be a viable and long-standing local business that supports the Village of Bal Harbour.”
Mayor calls referendum ‘offensive’
Mayor Gabriel Groisman, a pro-business Republican, has long been a supporter of the Bal Harbour Shops. But he said the referendum is “offensive to the voters” and he will vote against it in January.
Groisman said the company met with him earlier this year to discuss possibly building a hotel on the property. While he spoke against that proposal, Groisman said the mall should bring forward its ideas to voters instead of asking them to “give up their right to vote on a height variance.”
“I am supportive of the Bal Harbour Shops, and I always have been,” he said. “It’s very important for our community for the Bal Harbour Shops to be a successful business because they play such a prominent role in our community. That being said, things have to be done the right way.”
In 2006, when concerned residents got the original referendum on the ballot with about 300 signatures, Shops founder Stanley Whitman proposed building an 18-story hotel. The Bal Harbour Civic Association, a homeowners group, referenced that history in warning residents to vote against the referendum. The letter claims that the company is planning to build a high-rise hotel or office building.
“The Shops has not even presented its proposed project for the public to examine and review for this special election,” the group wrote. “Don’t give the Shops a blank check to overdevelop at our expense.”
Whitman Lazenby said “there is no current plan for a hotel” on the site.
Groisman said residents have begun receiving “wildly misleading” text messages from the referendum campaign. One message, which purports to be funded by the mall’s political committee, promises residents that a Yes vote on the referendum will grant them a “voice” in deciding the future of the village when it will actually hand over approval powers to the council instead.
It wouldn’t be the first time the Whitman family dumped money into elections using political committees. In 2016, the family and its associates spent about $200,000 supporting the campaigns of council members Jeffrey Freimark and David Albaum.
In an interview Thursday, Freimark said he had not yet made up his mind on how he will vote in January. Even if he did, he said, he wouldn’t make it public.
“I want to respect what people want to do in terms of the voting,” he said.
When it opened in 1965, the mall was considered to be the first all-luxury retail center in the U.S. It is home to brands like Gucci, Missoni and Chanel.
In 2017, Groisman and three other council members voted to approve a 340,000-square-foot expansion of the mall. Whitman Lazenby said the approved plans do not include building taller than 56 feet.
He said there is a “misperception” that the charter provides voters a process to weigh in on specific development proposals, making the January referendum necessary. But Gonzalez said the company could have proposed a project as part of its referendum or submitted a proposal to the council, which could then put a referendum question on the ballot.
“There is never a prohibition from the voters voting,” Gonzalez said. “If they submitted a proposal to the council which exceeded the height and everybody seemed favorable for it, the council could put a referendum question.”
This story was updated after it was originally published online to clarify that Neiman Marcus has completed its bankruptcy process.
This story was originally published December 30, 2020 at 9:44 AM.
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