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Process at a standstill for proposed Largo apartment complex

 
Published May 31, 2017

LARGO — The land sits at the intersection of Clearwater-Largo and Rosery roads mostly empty, save for about a dozen mobile homes and even more concrete slabs of foundations past.

After years of hearing rumors of a sale, residents said they received notices to move out by Oct. 31 to make way for a land use change. And in April, a developer submitted plans to build a 208-unit apartment complex to be named Rosery Court on the two parcels bordered by the Pinellas Trail to the west, Rosery Road to the north, Clearwater-Largo Road N to the east and the Belleair Village Motel to the south.

The land was poised for a change, but the process has come to a halt.

When contacted by the Tampa Bay Times, developer Steve McConihay, owner of Dockside Investors, said he was no longer interested in continuing the project if it was going to be in the newspaper, saying he didn't want to go through the "court of public opinion."

"I have decided that it's not in my interest to pursue the project," he said. But as of this week he had not formally notified the city of plans to kill the project.

McConihay has developed two other apartment complexes in the city: the Boulevard, which recently opened at 2098 Seminole Blvd. near Largo Mall; and the Broadway, which is nearing completion at 12700 66th St. N on the site of a former driving range.

The Boulevard was built on a former mobile home park called Briarwood Travel Villa and RV Park, which made for a tumultuous journey through the regulatory process — a process McConihay said he doesn't want to go through again.

Residents and neighbors showed up in droves to protest the development. A lawyer from Gulfcoast Legal Services, a nonprofit legal aid organization serving mainly low-income clients, took up the residents' case.

"Our fear is that if the project moves forward as it is planned, we will have low-income, disabled people who will become homeless,'' the attorney, Christine Allamanno, told the Times in 2013.

Teresa Brydon, Largo's economic development manager, said she was impressed with the quality of Dockside's other projects and was looking forward to development of the roughly 8-acre Clearwater-Largo Road site.

"Dockside's stuff is high-quality. It helps the community," she said. "This is a great opportunity for this corridor."

The redevelopment district allows for more units per acre, known as density bonuses, for projects that are a mix of market-rate and affordable housing. That was the plan for Rosery Court, Brydon said.

The site plan submitted to the city shows four buildings with a pool, cabana and pond. The city was going to work with the developer to fit the complex into a larger plan to make the district pedestrian-friendly and connect the corridor to the Pinellas Trail.

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But the process is at a standstill. The next step following review of the site plan is to schedule a neighborhood meeting, but that hasn't happened, Brydon said. McConihay has verbalized to the city that he's planning to back out, but hadn't submitted a formal letter as of Wednesday.

"It's disappointing," Brydon said, "but I do understand."

Property records show the east parcel is owned by Largo Belleair LLC and the west parcel to Biltmore Trails LLC, both of which are connected to Gordon McBride, according to state business records.

McBride did not return multiple calls for comment.

At the mobile home park on a recent afternoon, residents said they'd received letters to either move their homes or abandon them by Oct. 31. A copy of one of the letters said the owner "intends to change the use of the land" and that residents "may be entitled to compensation from the Florida Mobile Home Relocation Trust Fund."

Johanne Frenette, 61, lives in a mobile home with her son paying a base rate of $269 to her brother, who owns the home. Together, they make $1,600 a month from disability payments, mother for diabetes and bipolar disorder and son for Asperger syndrome.

She said she enjoyed living there with friendly neighbors and a patio big enough for all her plants, she said. She'd prefer to stay, but a potential land sale was never far from the rumor mill.

"They've been saying they're going to sell, sell, sell forever," she said, "and nothing happened."

Down the dirt road, Guillermo Tolentino was home with his wife and five children, ages 3 to 19. Tolentino, 42, said the living situation isn't ideal but for the concrete worker and his wife, who doesn't work, it's affordable and has space for the kids to run around. They're hoping to find an apartment.

His neighbor across the street, Jeff Hurlow, had already started packing up the home he stayed in with his wife from October to mid-May. Like Frenette, he saw the move coming for years, he said.

"This served our purpose very well for 12 years," Hurlow, 63, said. "It's just progress."

Contact Kathryn Varn at (727) 893-8913 or kvarn@tampabay.com. Follow @kathrynvarn.