By Taylor M. Coffman
Herald Correspondent
Spending is something on the forefront of a lot of people’s minds, and for Sanford residents specifically, nothing has sparked more concern than some of the city’s spending habits in recent years. The multi-million dollar price tags on some of the city’s development plans has raised a lot of eyebrows lately, and nothing showcases resident’s concerns better than Heritage Park.
Proposed way back in 2017, Heritage Park was meant to bring 234,000 square feet of residential units, 28,000 square feet of commercial space, and 9,000 square feet of office space to downtown Sanford. The proposed project would have massively boosted the area’s residential and commercial draw - if it had actually happened, that is. Rather than bringing any of its proposed benefits, the land set aside for the Heritage Park development lay stagnant for eight years until Sanford’s government finally called it quits.
Last August, city leadership finally called off the Heritage Park development. The news of the decision came with an unfortunate condition, however, as the city announced it would have to pay the project’s developers, Sanford Waterfront Partners, $3.75 million. Many residents hotly objected to the decision, concerned about where the money was coming from and why they were being made to pay such a large sum for seemingly nothing.
In an interview, Sanford Mayor Art Woodruff said that the downfall of the Heritage Park project was caused by a “downgrade in the project” and an ever-growing gap between what the city had asked for and what the developer was going to deliver on.
While very little actual construction happened between 2017 and 2024, Mayor Woodruff said that the developer had changed many of the terms of the agreement, with the largest being changes to the “live-work” apartments the city had initially requested. Instead of buildings with office or retail spaces on the first floor and apartments above - similar to Colonial Town Park in Lake Mary - the developer instead had plans with only residential spaces and low-income housing, which “was never addressed” in the initial deal, according to Woodruff.
“We were not getting what we wanted,” the mayor said. “The project was not looking the same. The materials were being downgraded. We had $12 million wrapped into the project, plus the value of the land. The land is worth more than the $3.75 million, so we had to pay off [Sanford Waterfront Partners] to get them out of the deal.”
Mayor Woodruff also confirmed that the $12 million had been initially set aside for Heritage Park before they had entered the deal. Additionally, he revealed that the city’s contract with the developer ended at the end of this year; if they had waited for the contract to run out, they would have been on the hook for a lot more than the $3.75 million. While the $3.75 million payment stings, it’s not as bad as the full sum, and the city retains the value of the property.
With the payment made and the Heritage Park project officially nixed, there’s still the question of what happens to the land the project was supposed to occupy. Not long after the project was canceled, the city of Sanford held a survey asking residents what they wanted to do with the land. The results of that survey lined up nicely with Mayor Woodruff’s personal vision for the land: apartment units, with retail on the first floor and residential space above, very similar to what Heritage Park was supposed to be in the first place.
No official plans to revive the project have been made and given that some residents are still upset by the project’s stagnation the first time around, maybe that’s for the best.
