Searstown Plaza is becoming the Conch RePublix Shoppes.
A five-year construction project to replace one of Key West’s three original strip malls began in a visible way this week with the demolition of the long-vacant Sears. The department store for decades anchored the Searstown plaza, which was built in 1965 on North Roosevelt Boulevard.
A construction fence now surrounds the Sears end of the plaza, which includes the former department store and a separate, stand-alone building that was Sears Auto Center.
Demolition crews by June 30 had cratered a giant hole in the front of the Sears building.
In January 2022, Publix, which has anchored the other end for more than 40 years, bought the whole plaza that also includes Royal Furniture, TJ Maxx, Outback Steakhouse, Imagination Station toy store, medical offices and the local driver license office, operated by the Monroe County Tax Collector.
The Key West City Commission in April 2025 approved a major development plan to rebuild the shopping center in a multiyear, phased approach, but did not require the developer to include any workforce housing above the plaza, which city officials have discussed for more than 20 years.
According to the development plan, the project will start with the demolition and replacement of the old Sears space. Publix will move into that new space in a temporary facility while a new supermarket is built at the opposite end to replace the existing one. Publix will then move back into its original location. Work to replace the other spaces will begin in sections.
The project will be completed in four phases to minimize interruptions for tenant businesses as much as possible, Key West attorney Bart Smith, who represents the developers, told the commission in April 2025.
The first of the four phases is expected to be completed and open by fall 2028, with the final phase expected to be finished by 2031, Smith said.
The commission approved the project n a 6-1 vote with commissioner Sam Kaufman casting the long dissenting vote due to the omission of any workforce housing from the development plans.
Kaufman at that meeting reminded his fellow commissioners that officials have for decades discussed the possibility of building workforce housing apartments above Searstown Plaza, Overseas Market and Key Plaza.
“The city even approved a density increase of 40 units per acre to incentivize shopping centers to add housing,” Kaufman said last year, calling the plan a “missed opportunity.” “How many times are we going to drop the ball and not require developers to provide affordable housing?”
Then-commissioner Mary Lou Hoover agreed, saying, “We have indeed dropped the ball,” before voting in favor of the new Conch RePublix Shoppes. Hoover died in November 2025.
