Sweetwater CRA — Project Review
Confidential draft prepared for City review. Please enter the review passcode to continue.
Incorrect passcode — please try again.
Confidential draft prepared for City review. Please enter the review passcode to continue.
The implementation strategy — a walkable, connected, economically vibrant university city, built infrastructure-first. Draft · 06.30.26
The Sweetwater CRA will use Tax Increment Financing (TIF) to provide the infrastructure that closes the gap between what the private market produces on its own and what the community needs to be complete: a connected street network, a functioning main street, a residential neighborhood that works for the people who live in it, and public spaces that reflect the culture and energy of the community.
Infrastructure comes first. Streets, parking, pedestrian safety, and drainage are the foundation everything else is built on. TIF is deployed as leverage — not subsidy — where it produces binding public benefit, not where it rewards development that would occur anyway.
Public investment in streets, parking, safety, and drainage precedes and enables private investment.
Those who benefit from CRA investment or TIF provide public benefit proportional to the value created.
The residential community is an asset to support — not to displace or hold for future assembly.
Every expenditure documented, every agreement public, every budget and report submitted as required.
Invest in what the market will respond to — F&B, live entertainment, workforce housing, a mid-range hotel.
An authorization framework under Chapter 163, F.S. — establishing what must be done and what TIF may fund.
Complete and calm the street network
Build a functioning Main Street on 109th Avenue
Create anchor sites & a functional university partnership
Stabilize and invest in the residential community
Regulatory alignment & CRA overlay / form-based code
Tax Increment Financing is the CRA’s core funding mechanism. Model 40-year tax-increment revenue on the 2025 certified roll (base $879.6M, 1,177 parcels): set the CRA participation rate, value growth, and millage; toggle HJR 1 property-tax reform and present value; and add custom projects such as Flagler Center / Li’l Abner.
The plan is organized into program areas, each with a set of initiatives. Pick a program area, then open any initiative to see its objective, the specific activities that carry it out, and why it matters.
Loading program areas…
These visual anchors — the 109th Avenue Main Street, the gateway, and the SW 112th Avenue green connector — illustrate the intended character. They are conceptual and will be refined through design and community input as the plan advances.