WESLEY CHAPEL — A proposal to transform a prominent 32.5-acre parcel near Interstate 75 into a mixed-use “town center” narrowly cleared a key hurdle last week, exposing a divide among Pasco County commissioners between commercial space and how much multifamily housing the fast-growing Wesley Chapel area really needs.
The board voted 3-2 on Jan. 6 to amend the site’s future land use designation from commercial to planned mixed use, potentially paving the way for retail, office, hotel, townhomes and multifamily housing at the northeast corner of Old Pasco Road and Overpass Road.
The project was pitched as a walkable, amenity-rich town center designed to blend jobs, housing and retail around a central park, while Commissioner Jack Mariano argued it would sacrifice valuable commercial land near a major interchange at the expense of further worsening an already saturated apartment market.
Mariano and fellow commissioner Seth Weightman voted against the change.
Weightman said he was uneasy with the scale of the multifamily component and felt he lacked sufficient information to support the amendment. Mariano objected to a reduction in parking and the steady erosion of the site’s original purpose as an employment-generating commercial hub.
Originally, the plan prohibited any residential. And Mariano noted that an earlier version he saw last January included two hotels, while the current plan includes just one, and increases the number of multifamily buildings from five to six.
“I think it’s gotten worse,” he said. “I'm just confused why staff would approve commercial land that we had set aside at an interchange, to allow more residential — when we said we didn't want residential — and then to give the parking break and then even allow more buildings for multifamily and less hotel. It just doesn't seem to go along with what we've talked about in the past.”
Commissioner Kathryn Starkey, who voted yes, said she understood the need for the parking changes and residential component.
“You can't have that vertical mixed use without some density,” she said. “That's what feeds the machine.”
Mariano called the parcel a “prime intersection,” where county investment in interchange infrastructure was intended to attract office and commercial uses, not more apartments, which would produce more traffic.
The county’s planning staff, however, said the mixed-use designation was consistent with recent policy changes and would produce more revenue for the county than a commercial site would. Staff estimated the mixed-use buildout would generate roughly $1 million per year in ad valorem revenue to the county’s operating budget — approximately double the estimated $500,000 annual yield from the site under the older commercial-only entitlement.
Under the proposal, the site would allow up to 73,500 square feet of retail, 74,000 square feet of office, 275 hotel rooms, 125 townhome units and up to 325 multifamily units.
County planner William Vermillion highlighted pedestrian connectivity and urban design elements in the applicant’s concept, pointing to a central park amenity, sidewalks and pedestrian access to nearby Cypress Creek middle and high school and the Johns Hopkins Children’s Hospital campus across Interstate 75.
The plan also includes vertically integrated mixed-use buildings fronting the site’s internal streets, with office or retail on lower floors and residential above.
Clark Hobby, representing the applicant Ryan Companies, said the project would create a place that Pasco currently lacks — a walkable, amenity-rich town center where people could live, work and gather.
“We are trying to build a town center type development where people will pull in, park and walk over to this central park,” he said, citing similar Ryan projects that have successfully done the same.
Hobby also pushed back on criticism of the residential component.
“There's nothing wrong with rental properties when they're located in the right areas,” Hobby said. “This isn't the gated community that you see with every other apartment community. This is an actual community where people will live, work and play. This is what we should be doing.”
Mariano remained unconvinced, insisting the greater need in the area is for office space that can support higher-wage jobs, particularly medical and professional positions tied to the Johns Hopkins campus.
“There’s a market out there for office that’s unmet,” he said, adding he has heard directly from business owners forced to relocate due to a lack of suitable space.
Hobby responded that several nonresidential buildings in the plan are permitted to include office space and could even be built as multi-story structures if the demand materializes.
While Vermillion admitted the county currently has an apartment surplus, he said that may not hold true in this corridor as new employment centers, like the hospital and nearby Double Branch development, come online.
Hobby also told commissioners that the Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital, located about a mile east of the site, has exhausted most of its available land and is unlikely to deliver the 725 multifamily units approved there.
Weightman asked for confirmation of that claim, saying it would factor into his decision. When it couldn’t be promptly produced before the vote, he cast a no vote.