A year of debate among Florida Keys residents and government officials over the future of development in the islands will spill over to the state level, according to two new bills filed in the Florida House and Senate by state Rep. Jim Mooney and Sen. Ana Maria Rodriguez, respectively.
The two bills are the first official glimpse at legislation that could add building allocations to the islands’ dwindling stock. But while both propose additional units, the number and distribution timeline described in each bill vastly differ.
Mooney’s House Bill 995 and Rodriguez’s Senate Bill 1326 tackle amendments to the laws governing the Keys as an Area of Critical State Concern, a designation responsible for several stricter building regulations throughout the island chain.
Among other provisions, they would extend the Keys’ legally-mandated hurricane evacuation clearance time for permanent residents. Mooney’s bill moves the clearance time from 24 to 24.5 hours and details the award of 500 permit allocations over a period of 10 years. Rodriguez’s bill ups the clearance time to 26 hours, providing for up to 3,550 permit allocations over a minimum of 40 years.
Of the 500 units in HB 995, 220 were already accounted for, but not yet awarded to the Keys, within the previous 24-hour evacuation clearance time, while 280 would come to the islands as additional units directly due to the evacuation time change. Unincorporated Monroe County would receive 283 units, 103 would go to Marathon, 64 to Islamorada and 50 to Key West, the bill states. In SB 1326, Monroe County would receive 2,320 allocations, followed by 803 for Marathon, 307 for Islamorada and 120 for Key West.
In Mooney’s bill, 70% of the units would be reserved for workforce housing, restricted to households deriving 70% of their income “from gainful employment in Monroe County supplying goods or services to Monroe County residents or visitors.” The building allocations could only be used on vacant, buildable properties, with a maximum award of one allocation per property.
Rodriguez’s bill has similar provisions for vacant buildable parcels and reserves the remaining portion of each government’s allocations for permanent residential uses, prioritizing affordable and workforce housing.
In October 2024, the Monroe County Commission sent a request to FloridaCommerce for the 220 building rights already allowed under a 24-hour hurricane evacuation time, but not yet bestowed to the Keys. Two months later, state officials reportedly informed the county that FloridaCommerce was unlikely to award even these first 220 units until Keys municipalities exhausted their remaining supplies of building rights.
In a special session in December, the county commission voted 4-1 to petition state lawmakers to change the hurricane evacuation time from 24 to as many as 26 hours, potentially paving the way for up to 3,550 new units throughout the Keys.
The decision came as each local jurisdiction approached the 2025 state legislative session with varying degrees of urgency to acquire new units and stave off potentially costly takings cases if owners of otherwise-buildable lots were denied the ability to do so.
A complete denial of building rights could leave some municipalities more immediately vulnerable than others. Marathon, which has effectively exhausted its supply of building rights, received a grim reminder of the reality of takings claims earlier this month when a decision from Florida’s Third District Court of Appeals struck a blow to the city in a decades-long legal battle over development on Shands Key.
Two days before the county’s special session in December, Mooney told Keys leaders that he would be in favor of the “ask” later reflected in the new bill – up to 500 new units. He told the Weekly a push to increase development throughout the Keys while asking for appropriations to protect the islands’ fragile ecosystem could be seen as contradictory, jeopardizing funding for other critical initiatives.
In January, Rodriguez told the Weekly she planned to support the 26-hour evacuation extension after consultation with municipal leaders and the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office.
“While it may sound like a large increase when translated into the number of permits, as a Legislature we can set parameters on when these can be issued over the next 40 years,” she said.
Florida’s 2025 regular legislative session begins on March 4.
