MAP: Wiregrass Ranch Present and Future

The Neighborhood News recently spoke with Wiregrass Ranch developer and owner JD Porter about his family’s philosophy in developing the land that has been owned by his family for more than seven decades, and some of the things that are coming to Wiregrass Ranch in the future. Here’s our story on Porter, and below is the map with descriptions of how Wiregrass Ranch might look in a few years.

1. TRANSPORTATION

Pasco County Public Transportation

JD Porter takes great pride in his family’s foresight. They paid $25 of $30-million to build out six lanes of S.R. 56 in front of the Shops at Wiregrass. “I give my uncles and dad a lot of credit,” Porter says. “Do it right the first time, it’s usually a lot cheaper and a lot more effective.”

And, while light rail may never become a reality, Wiregrass Ranch is ready for it. Porter says he doesn’t see it happening until the drive to Tampa takes people 2.5 hours. But, with so much traffic heading the opposite way, north from the University of South Florida area into Wiregrass Ranch, Porter has dedicated 3.5 miles of transportation right of way through the DRI, starting at FHWC, winding past the mall and Raymond James and up Wiregrass Ranch Blvd. towards the future town center.

“If not light rail, then rapid bus,’’ Porter says. Another touch: although they cost an extra $300-million or so, Porter says roundabouts are being built on Wiregrass Ranch Blvd.

2. ADULT LIVING

There are no over-55 active adult communities in sight — the nearest one to Wesley Chapel is still Tampa Bay Golf and Country Club on S.R. 52 in San Antonio — but Porter hopes to change that with Valencia, an 850-unit single-family residential development scheduled to begin construction later this year. In fact, he sounds downright excited to do so.

“We have a young demographic, and they are going to want their parents close to them,’’ Porter says. “We want Wiregrass Ranch to be family friendly.”

Porter also notes that having an A-rated adult community (and he says Wiregrass Ranch’s will be A+) has long been an integral part of his development plans.

3. OTHER RESIDENTIAL

Persimmon Park will be a 340-unit single-family development with villas and townhomes, and will be located within walking distance to the development’s town center. It will be located just south of Chancey Rd. and west of Wiregrass Ranch Blvd. and is currently in permitting, but Porter says he has a number of builders already lined up. And, while many developers use many builders, Porter said he likes to rely on a small group, which currently includes Lennar, CalAtlantic and GL Homes.

4. PHASE II OF THE SHOPS AT WIREGRASS MALL

Not much new to report here, as Shops at Wiregrass general manager Greg Lennars says the mall is still looking for those “perfect fits.” He said that a handful of green grocers have expressed interest in being one of the anchors of the new site, and better offers roll in every week, but no decision has been made.

Securing a movie theater for the project — which has yet to break ground and continues to wait on permitting — is ongoing. Altis is being built right behind it. The four-story apartment complex is a $60-million project, and is expected to open sometime in 2018, with 392 units. It is part of the Porters’ effort to begin to grow the residential area around Wiregrass Ranch as new businesses move in.

5. TOWN CENTER

Porter is not fond of the town center concept as it has been developed in most places — a Publix and a few other stores — but his team has huge plans for the center he envisions and for which he has set aside 146 acres right in the middle of Wiregrass Ranch.

“Bigger than downtown Winter Park, bigger than downtown Tampa, really,’’ says Scott Sheridan. “It will truly redefine what a downtown is.”

Porter doesn’t see the town center as Wesley Chapel’s downtown, or even Pasco County’s downtown. What he envisions is “Northern Tampa Bay’s downtown.” He says he is content to let the area around it develop as Raymond James, Persimmon Park, Estancia and The Arbors mature.

“If we did it now, it would be great, but it wouldn’t meet our standards,’’ he says. Porter adds that a performing arts center might be a good anchor, but also has seen 2-3 other proposals he likes even better. “I look at it as being what Buckhead is to Atlanta,’’ he says.

6. ATHLETIC COMPLEX

The Porters donated 138 acres to Pasco County for a park, and then watched as the county failed to close any deals to do something with the land. “It sat there for eight years,’’ Porter says, and he has expressed frustration with the progress of that land in the past, calling it a nightmare. But RADDsports out of Sarasota has won the bid to build an indoor athletic complex with some outdoor fields, and while not exactly what Porter had in mind, he seems more hopeful. “I think we all feel things are moving in the right direction,” he says.

7. MEDICAL

When Sheridan and Porter look down the road, they definitely see more medical industry coming to Wiregrass Ranch.

Florida Medical Clinic just north of S.R. 56 on Bruce B. Downs opened recently, and next to that construction is ongoing on the $3-million, three-story 16,000-sq.-ft. Lismark Medical Office (photo), which will be located between the Florida Medical Clinic and FHWC. And, NTBH is expanding, too.

Porter: The best of Wiregrass Ranch is yet to come

When you walk into the boardroom in JD Porter’s office in Wesley Chapel, one of the first things you see is a brick. It hangs in a shadow box on the wall, and is from the home that his grandfather, James “Wiregrass” Porter, once lived in on S.R. 54, currently the site of the Discount Auto Parts.

It’s a reminder. This isn’t just land Porter is developing in Wiregrass Ranch.

It’s home.

For years, it was that reminder that kept the Porter family from selling the land it has owned and lived on since 1946 to the highest bidder. They entertained offers, met with many deep pocketed investors from New York and Chicago and similar places, and wondered what it would take. Some was sold in 1972 — to be later developed as Saddlebrook Resort — and a bit more for the communities at Williamsburg and Meadow Pointe.

Over the years, the Porters have turned away millions of dollars in offers to sell it all. The current 5,100-acre Wiregrass Ranch DRI, which is being developed by the Porter family’s Locust Branch, LLC, extends from S.R. 56 north to S.R. 54, and west to east from Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. to Meadow Pointe Blvd.

“We had people asking to buy it for 20 years,’’ JD says. “There were a lot of bridesmaids out there, but we never found someone that we fell in love with.”

What they fell in love with was a vision to build the land out themselves. The offers, they still keep coming. But, with the family’s name so closely tied to Wiregrass Ranch, JD says it has become a project for the family to build a community and leave behind a legacy about which everyone can feel good.

“Everyone said, ‘Let’s make this something we can be proud of,’” JD says. “That’s what I grew up hearing. Let’s make it so we will be happy coming back here 20 years from now, 50 years from now and saying, ‘Man, we did a good job.’”

While the brick — as well as oil paintings of turkeys in a field and “Wiregrass” Porter, in denim overalls, standing on the family’s ranch — pay homage to the family’s roots in the community and guides their business principles, another wall shows the results of their resolve, among them framed color photos of Florida Hospital Wesley Chapel and the Estancia and The Ridge communities.

At Pebble Creek Golf & Country Club in New Tampa last week, Porter updated the Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce at its monthly Economic Development Council meeting. The meetings generally draw a few dozen local business leaders; a chance to hear Porter reveal what might be next in Wiregrass Ranch drew almost 100.

“He is a visionary, and he sticks to his guns,’’ Chamber vice-chair of Economic Development Mercedes Hale told the audience. “He is making sure his vision, and his family’s vision, is maintained throughout. They have really put us on the map.”

The cautious and patient development of Wiregrass Ranch began in earnest around 2002, Porter says, when the family took a long hard look at the kinds of things that would make a great community.

While many developers lead with homes, the Porters filled what they felt were more important needs first.

The open-air Shops at Wiregrass, which opened in 2008, is considered by many to be one of the critical anchors in Wiregrass Ranch, but Porter notes that before the mall was built, his family had already donated the land for John Long Middle School and Wiregrass Ranch

High, both of which opened before the mall opened its doors in 2008.

The Porters envisioned Mansfield Blvd. and the nearby area as an “educational corridor.” They left land for expansion, before they even knew that one day, Pasco-Hernando State College (PHSC) would take root in Wiregrass.

Also before the mall opened, says Scott Sheridan, the Locust Branch COO, the land for what would become Florida Hospital Wesley Chapel (FHWC) already had been sold as well.

Porter, who grew up on the land where the hospital now sits, remembers his own long trips to what was then called University Community Hospital (and is now Florida Hospital Tampa) on E. Fletcher Ave., “where we would have to go when I was an idiot as a kid and did something stupid,’’ he jokes.

That’s why FHWC is special to Porter.

“It filled an important need for everyone out here,’’ he says, and if you make him pick the crown jewel of his work developing Wiregrass Ranch, he does point to the hospital. He says it was given a sweetheart deal to pick up an additional 16 acres when it was trying to buy just 40, because Porter was convinced it would grow and create more jobs in the area. He was proven right, as FHWC has already expanded once and still has room to continue growing.

Porter also takes pride in being right about Raymond James Financial, which was announced in 2011 and has been a long and painstaking process. After years of doubts fueled partly by T. Rowe Price scrapping plans in 2014 to expand to Pasco County, land is finally being moved at the 65-acre Raymond James site at S.R. 56 and Mansfield Blvd.

Although a proponent of small busines, Porter,  says Raymond James, with the potential influx of 5,000 jobs into Wesley Chapel and a huge effect on surrounding businesses and developments, is a game-changer.

Some things, like the fact that Wiregrass Ranch has four power substations when Porter says most areas are lucky to have two, aren’t as heralded as a new business but are invaluable in attracting them, especially those in technology and medical.

While people eagerly await the next big thing and bask in the big splashes the developer family has made, Porter thinks sometimes, major things like the North Tampa Behavioral Health (NTBH) Hospital on S.R. 56 east of Mansfield Blvd. and the Beach House at Wiregrass Ranch assisted living & memory care facility get somewhat overlooked.

But, NTBH already is expanding too, as it is adding a veterans wing.

“Those are home runs anywhere else,’’ Porter says.

In a short time, the Porter family has delivered on its vision to provide things the community needs, even at the expense of their bank account. Schools, a mall and a hospital are things that some communities wait a lifetime for.

A sports complex on land the Porters donated (see page 4) is working its way through governmental approval, luxurious homes, apartments and condos will soon fill in the DRI along with an age-restricted community, and land is set aside for two additional new elementary schools and a state-of-the-art town center is on the horizon as well.

Porter and his family aren’t done yet. Not even close, really. Consider: despite all of the recent growth and expansion, Wiregrass Ranch is only 17 percent developed, a fact that drew a few gasps at the EDC meeting.

“Still in its infancy stages,’’ Porter says.

In the next 20 years, Porter says he’d like to make 20 more big announcements, and thinks he will. He hinted at the reveal of a big project by the end of the year, something bigger than Wiregrass Ranch  has seen before.

But, Porter says, we’ll just have to wait for that one.

“The best is yet to come,’’ he says.

Wiregrass Ranch Sports Complex Finally Moving Forward After BCC Vote

The Pasco County Board of County Commissioners (BCC) approved regular business item R5 that green-lit the RADDsports  Wiregrass Sports Complex, as well as agreeing to double the Tourist Development Tax (TDT), or bed tax, in order to help finance it.

The $44-million project, which will be built on part of a 224-acre parcel located northeast of the Shops of Wiregrass owned by the county (that was previously donated by the Porter family), has taken on many manifestations over the years but RADDsports’ proposal won over county commissioners at nearly every juncture.

“I had to sit here, look (former Major League Baseball star) Gary Sheffield in the face and tell him, no,” BCC chair and District 2 commissioner Mike Moore said, referring to a failed plan for a Wiregrass Ranch baseball complex at the same site in 2015.

“That was a bad project,” Moore said, “but this is a good project.”

The journey to build some sort of sports complex is eight years old, and a 5-0 vote by the commissioners indicated that they think they have finally found the right one.

“I 100-percent support the project and the steps that went into it,” said BCC vice-chair (and Dist. 4 commissioner) Mike Wells.

The project design calls for a multi-purpose sports complex that is anchored by a 98,000-sq.ft. multi-purpose building, which can host volleyball, basketball, cheerleading and other indoor events. The sports complex also will include eight outdoor sports fields, an outdoor amphitheatre and event lawn as well as pavilions, a playground and trails.

“This complex, along with (Florida Hospital) Center Ice, Florida Hospital of Wesley Chapel and Saddlebrook really put us on the map,” said Pasco strategy policy administrator Richard Gehring.

Funding sources for the planned complex include $11 million previously set aside by the BCC ($8.5-million in tourist tax funds and $2.5 million in excess bond proceeds from a prior half-cent sales tax bond), a county-backed loan of $14,253,700, plus $18,750,000 in private equity and debt from the Mainsail Development, which will be building a hotel on the complex site.

The two-percent increase in the TDT is expected to generate $1.2 million annually, which will help by paying down the loan, along with the revenue RADDsports says the complex will generate (the company says that by year six, the gross revenue will be approximately $4.6 million).

A super majority vote (four of the five BCC commissioners) is required to officially pass the TDT increase. A vote will be held at a future meeting, following a public hearing.

Despite doubling the TDT, it would still be lower than the TDTs in both Hillsborough and Pinellas Counties.

There also was some discussion about losing hotel revenue to Hillsborough County. Commissioners cited the December lacrosse tournament hosted by Dick’s Sporting Goods at Wesley Chapel District Park and how the county lost a lot of hotel revenue with people electing to stay at hotels in Hillsborough County, including several in New Tampa.

Gehring recommended creating a list of nearby, “preferred” hotels within the county and charging a fee for not using one of the preferred hotels.

The RADDsports proposal includes a Mainsail Development project for a $19-million, 120-room Marriot branded Residence Inn to be privately financed. The county says the sports complex will generate 27,000 room nights per year.

Saddlebrook Resort owner Tom Dempsey, as well as Saddlebrook general manager Patrick Ciaccio,  were two of a handful of speakers to voice their opinions before the commissioners debated the sports complex project.

Their  800-room resort has nearly a quarter of all the available hotel rooms in Pasco County, and as a result, collects most of the bed taxes.

“I’ve been in the sports business for 30 years and I think this project is questionable,’’ Dempsey said. “A tourist tax from Day 1 is a loser. I disagree with the two-percent tax increase.”

Other nearby hotels in Pasco include: a 92-room Fairfield Inn & Suites planned on nearby property in Wiregrass, an 80-room Holiday Inn Express that just opened east of I-75, and a 125-room Hilton Garden Inn that is currently under construction at S.R. 56 and Silver Maple Pkwy.

New Start & End Times Coming, But Not Until Next Fall

 Note: This story has been updated since it was printed in our April 21 issue hitting mailboxes today and tomorrow. Superintendent Jeff Eakins made an announcement after we went to press that he will propose to the School Board that changes in the bell schedule be postponed to the 2018-19 school year.

Superintendent Jeff Eakins emailed parents April 17 saying that he will now recommend the proposed bell schedule be implemented in 2018-19, not next fall.
Superintendent Jeff Eakins emailed parents April 17 saying that he will now recommend the proposed bell schedule be implemented in 2018-19, not next fall.

Hillsborough County Public Schools has released a proposal that changes the times school will start and end, which will affect start and end times for all elementary, middle and high school students in New Tampa. While originally the plan called for changes to be made this fall, for the 2017-18 school year, school superintendent Jeff Eakins sent an email to parents on April 17 saying that he will now recommend these changes be implemented for the following school year, 2018-19.

“Currently, many students are consistently late to school because there’s not enough time for our buses to pick up and drop off students,” explains Eakins in a video emailed to parents and staff in late March. “This means our children are losing valuable instructional time. When students are late to class, it affects the learning environment for all children.”

The bell schedule originally proposed for 2017-18 adds instructional time at the elementary level in most schools, with one exception in New Tampa. Turner Bartels K-8 students would lose 5 minutes of a day that already is longer than most elementary schools. For middle schools, students would lose 20 minutes, and high schools lose 32. Middle and high school students will keep their seven-period day, but may see the elimination of homeroom, a shorter time for lunch, and class periods that may be reduced by a minute or two.

Eakins says additional benefits of changing school bell times are that the new times may allow for more time for music, art and physical education at the elementary level, and that “… all students will benefit, due to an increase in quality planning time for teachers.”

Eakins wrote in his email to parents that he still feels the proposed plan is still the best option for meeting the school district’s goals. However, the proposal drew a large amount of public outcry, not only because of the time changes but also how the proposal was created. The plan, released on April 4 and available online at SDHC.k12.fl.us/doc/1855/administration/resources/belltimes/, proposes the following changes:

School Current Bell Schedule Proposed Bell Schedule for 2017-18
High (Freedom & Wharton) 7:33 a.m. – 3 p.m. 7:15 a.m. – 2:10 p.m.
Middle (Benito & Liberty) 9 a.m. – 4:15 p.m. 9:30 a.m. – 4:25 p.m.
Elementary (Chiles, Clark, Heritage, Hunter’s Green, Pride & Tampa Palms) 8 a.m. – 2:15 p.m. 8:35 a.m. – 3:05 p.m.
Turner Bartels K-8 8:45 a.m. – 3:35 p.m. 8:30 a.m. – 3:15 p.m.

The Board is still expected to consider the proposed recommendation — which may include revisions based on comments from the community — at a specially called meeting on Tuesday, April 25, 3:30 p.m.

To share your thoughts on the proposed changes, email bellschedule@sdhc.k12.fl.us.

New school zones irks some, pleases others

When Pankaj Jha moved to the Tampa Bay area, he was living in a condo in Tampa Palms while searching for the perfect school for his young children. He looked at homes in both K-Bar Ranch and Cory Lake Isles, and ultimately chose the neighborhood that would send his young children to Pride Elementary.

“We paid more to buy a house in Cory Lake Isles so my children would go to Pride,” Jha says. But, when it was time to move, his son — then in the 2nd grade — didn’t want to leave his current school. “It took me a year of driving him to school every day in Tampa Palms to convince him to go to Pride.” Last fall, his son — now in the third grade — and Jha’s daughter, who started kindergarten, both began the school year at Pride.

But now, if a proposal by Hillsborough County Schools is approved by the School Board and implemented, his children will be moved to Hunter’s Green Elementary for the 2018-19 school year.

“The biggest headache I have now is that it took time for them to adjust to going to Pride, and now I have to tell my kids they have to go to another school,” he says. “They don’t want to go to another school.”

He says not only do they have friends and feel comfortable at Pride, but they’ve built relationships with teachers. More than anything, he wants his children to go to Pride. He bought his house in Cory Lake Isles (CLI) specifically because he thought they would go there.

Jha was one of more than 300 people who packed the Benito Middle School cafeteria on March 30, when the school district staff presented its proposal for rezoning four New Tampa schools in the fall of 2018. While changes will happen at Clark, Heritage, Hunter’s Green and Pride, the loudest voices at the meeting came from residents of Cory Lake Isles and Arbor Greene (AG), where 563 stuSeedents are being reassigned from Pride to Hunter’s Green.

The proposal keeps a majority of students currently assigned to Pride together, with all residents of both CLI and AG now being assigned to Hunter’s Green. This makes room for residents of K-Bar Ranch — currently 154 elementary students — to be assigned to Pride. Right now, those students travel past Pride to get to their assigned school, Heritage. (Note-The actual number of students moving may be different because some students choose a school other than the one to which they are assigned).

It also opens up space at Pride for the residents of more than 1,500 new homes that are expected to be built in K-Bar Ranch in the coming years.

The proposed re-shuffling ends busing of students from the neighborhoods near the University of South Florida to both Hunter’s Green (HGE) and Clark and reassigns them to schools closer to their residences. From Hunter’s Green, 304 students will move to Shaw (just off of E. Fowler Ave. on N. 15th St.), and from Clark, 248 students will move to Witter (south of Fowler Ave. on N. 22nd St.). Additionally, 187 students who are residents of the Morgan Creek apartments, located just north of the Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. exit off I-75, will now be assigned to Clark.

Jennifer Ledford, parent of a second grader at Clark, attended the meeting to voice her support for the rezoning. She says this is the change she’s been looking for since before her son started kindergarten. “I moved to this area so my child could go to a neighborhood school with neighbors,” she says. “When you lose the geographic proximity to a school, you lose the investment in the community. I think the new plan is fabulous.”

But, not all parents agree.

“My grievance is that this reshuffling doesn’t address the elephant in the room, which is that Hunter’s Green is underperforming,” says Steven Hancz, a CLI resident whose seven-year-old twins are in first grade at Pride. “The school ranking has been dropping like a hot potato,” he says.

School grades for last year, which are based on test scores, rank Pride and Clark as “A” schools, Heritage as a “B,” and HGE as a “C.” While Hunter’s Green received an “A” grade for many years, it has been ranked a “C” the past two years. Pride has consistently been an “A” school.

School officials say the test scores of the students currently at HGE who live in New Tampa show that they are performing at an “A” level. They expect that the school grade will be an “A” once its attendance boundaries include students only from surrounding neighborhoods.

Elementary school grades for this school year (2016-17) will be released by the Florida Department of Education (FDoE) in July.

Lorraine Duffy Suarez, Hillsborough County Public Schools’ general manager for growth management, says the change is necessary. “We monitor growth, and we know how much growth is coming, and we have to accommodate it,” she says. “Pride was built on land that we bought from K-Bar Ranch. The school was sited there because we knew that development was coming. Now is the time.”

She says moving so many students should give the affected students a measure of reassurance. “The whole neighborhood is moving,” she explains. “You’re going to a different school, but you’re taking 562 of your friends with you.”

Not all Pride parents are angry. Some, such as Kellie Mulligan, an Arbor Greene resident whose three children have all attended Pride since kindergarten, are accepting it. Her youngest will be in fifth grade when the changes take effect. “I’m hoping she will be grandfathered in, but if her whole class and all her friends move, then I’m okay with that, too,” Mulligan says. “Honestly, I think the zoning makes sense.”

While many parents are at least accepting the change, they still have concerns they want addressed. Sigrun Ragnarsdottir is an Arbor Greene resident whose children attend Pride. As soon as she heard of the rezoning, she began researching all possible courses of action to stop it from happening, but hit dead ends. Now, she says she is embracing the change, but says she is still looking for answers.

“In the long run, I believe Hunter’s Green has a lot to offer the students,” she says, citing programs her kids don’t currently have, such as Hunter’s Green’s “Kindness Club” and garden plots with irrigation and soil available to teachers. “The question I’m still asking is, ‘What about busing?’”

With the school district ending so-called “courtesy busing” for middle and high school students this fall, elementary schools are expected to lose courtesy busing the following year, when this rezoning will take place (see story on next page). Anyone who lives less than two miles from the school will no longer be provided with a bus to school. Many Arbor Greene residents have a bus to Pride, but because Hunter’s Green is less than two miles for many of them, it is expected that there will be no bus to that school.

Ragnarsdottir also fears traffic will snarl coming out of Arbor Greene with residents waiting to turn left onto Cross Creek Blvd., then be backed up again as parents turn left onto Highland Oaks Blvd. to get to HGE. Other parents at the meeting expressed similar concerns, saying it will make traffic worse for everyone driving along the already busy Cross Creek Blvd. in the morning, and unsafe for those children who are walking or biking, as more are likely to do because of the end of courtesy busing.

“The school district says this will save money, but how much is a child’s life worth?,” Ragnarsdottir asks. “How much have they budgeted for lawsuits?”

All this adds up to a lot of changes for New Tampa parents, who are being hit with this school rezoning, the loss of middle and high school courtesy busing, plus the expected loss of elementary busing next year, and one more thing – new start and end times for all New Tampa schools (see story, next page).

Decision Day: May 16

Plans outlining the proposed new boundaries were released on the school district’s website on Mar. 21 and are available at http://www.sdhc.k12.fl.us/doc/251/growth-management/resources/boundary/.

Comments from parents and the community were accepted at the meeting on March 30. If you did not attend and would still like to comment, send an email to boundaries@sdhc.k12.fl.us.

Changes may be made based on the many comments received before a final recommendation is made by school superintendent Jeff Eakins to the seven-member School Board. The Board is expected to consider the proposed recommendation — including any revisions made as a result of comments from the community — at its meeting on Tuesday, May 16.

Duffy Suarez says she understands the plan means a lot of changes, and that parents leaving Pride are the ones expressing the most frustration with the proposal. “We’re changing a lot of students, and I understand that,” she says. “They have a lot of pride in their Pride, but Pride can’t hold all the students who are going to come there.”