What happens when a $634M project wants to move next to City Hall? A debate begins

A plan to remake the government center in Dania Beach into a high-rise cluster of apartments, offices and a hotel took a step forward this week.

City commissioners voted to move forward with negotiations on a $634 million plan to build a mixed-use project on publicly owned land. It would be built on a parcel that now holds City Hall, a county library, a fire station, a parking garage and two historic buildings.

The developers want to build five apartment buildings, offices and a hotel at the site at 100 W. Dania Beach Blvd.

Tuesday’s vote is not a final approval for the project by Virginia-based developer Armada Hoffler Properties and Boca Raton-based Capital Group. They need to go back to the drawing board and rework their proposal.

In March, commissioners invited companies to bid on the public-private project to help revitalize a slice of Broward’s oldest city. In recent months, several new hotels have been built along the U.S. 1 corridor, just south of Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

A company hired by the city narrowed the list and selected Armada Hoffler Properties and Capital Group based on their experience of building similar projects elsewhere.

The project would be done in three phases, with the first producing four 14-story apartment buildings, including a four-story parking garage and retail at the bottom. Phase 2 would see a larger 14-story apartment building.

The final phase would bring two office buildings and a 150-room hotel.

In exchange, the city would get a new four-story building to house City Hall and a county library. The fire station would remain on site too, but developers suggested relocating the two historic buildings, one of which houses the chamber of commerce. The updated public buildings would be part of the project’s first phase in 2027.

Under the plan, Dania Beach would lease the 6.42 acres to the two developers for a maximum of 99 years. The city would lease back the building that houses City Hall and the library with a buyback option after 20 years.

Commissioners didn’t like everything about the proposed deal.

The hotel concerned Vice Mayor Lauren Odman, who questioned why developers included it when the idea wasn’t supported at a community meeting several months ago.

“How did hotels make it if at that time no one said that was part of their vision?” she said.

The buildings were too tall for Commissioner Chickie Brandimarte. She asked developers at Tuesday’s meeting to consider scaling back the 14-story buildings to three floors.

“I don’t think enough homework was done,” Brandimarte said.

She also expressed concern that the city’s cap on water allocation wouldn’t be enough for the development.

Despite their concerns, city commissioners voted to move forward with negotiations, but emphasized the need to better tailor plans to Dania Beach.

“It’s over the top,” Mayor Lori Lewellen said. “What has been proposed is not what is Dania Beach. It looks like something that belongs in Miami or Atlanta.”

This story was originally published August 29, 2019 at 11:43 AM.