Thomas Harmer is the Sarasota County Administrator

The Sarasota County Comprehensive Plan guides the county’s decision-making and the wise investments of resources in the unincorporated areas of the county. Sarasota County is beginning an effort to update this important, overarching Plan to reflect changes to our community characteristics and demographics , and, just as importantly, preparing for  how we want to develop and grow. 

The county’s Comprehensive Plan covers much more than just development and growth, however. Planning for a thriving community is just as much about the future of our libraries, educational systems and infrastructure. Each priority fuels the others, and no community can call itself a success unless it carefully considers how each theme can ultimately serve all of its citizens.

Over the coming years, southwest Florida anticipates a continuing influx of new residents and seasonal visitors who will bring with them the need for new services and demand for commercial and residential development. Planning for this growth is a vital part of ensuring a good quality of life for those living and working in Sarasota County.

Because one of Sarasota County’s primary goals is to plan for positive development and redevelopment, February will mark the start of a major update of the Sarasota County Comprehensive Plan. The updates will include:

• Incorporating current demographic data
• Clarifying the plan’s language and making it more understandable
• Illustrating connections between the various Plan priorities
• Increasing attention to the areas inside the “Urban Service Boundary” generally west of Interstate 75
• Encouraging  “infill” and “redevelopment” where appropriate
• Supporting and encouraging safe and healthy neighborhoods

Over the course of the next 18 months, Sarasota County Planning and Development Services staff will facilitate a series of  “cycles” that will address individual themes that focus on the many topics that make up the Sarasota County Comprehensive Plan. Each “cycle” will last approximately eight to nine weeks and your participation can be targeted to aspects of your community you care most about. The update effort kicks off on Feb. 11 with a workshop to introduce the plan and how you input will help shape our future.

After each “cycle” closes, staff from Sarasota County will evaluate the plan’s goals, policies and objectives for that cycle, combine all the public feedback and present it to the Sarasota County Commission and Planning Commission. 

At the end of the process in 2016, staff will use all the feedback gathered to draft a restructured Comprehensive Plan that will convey the community’s desires for our future and how those goals will be accomplished in an easier to understand format.

We need your voices and want to hear your vision for Sarasota County, so we’re asking you to join the effort, starting with the initial kick-off event in February. If you can’t attend a workshop or the kick-off event, there will be many different ways and opportunities to participate. The county will be providing virtual and distance participation via a website that will illustrate each cycle of the update and include a survey section, public meeting announcements, an events calendar and documents pertaining to the update process. 

Thomas Harmer is the Sarasota County Administrator