Interim City Manager Bullock explains how city would be able to pay for project, though state property tax issue could disrupt process
With interim Sarasota City Manager Dave Bullock expressing confidence in the financial aspects of the plans, the City Commission this week voted unanimously to accept a revised proposal for a new Sarasota Performing Arts Center (SPAC) within The Bay Park in downtown Sarasota.
An “Implementation Agreement” for the construction of the facility is expected to be presented to the board members later this year.
The estimated total for the project, as presented during the commission’s regular meeting on March 2, is between $260 million and $295 million. In March 2025 — the last time the board members discussed the project — Jennifer Jorgensen, director of governmental affairs for the city, put the estimate at $407 million.
Yet, this week, both Bullock and board members acknowledged the major unknown in the planning: the outcome of voters’ responses to one or more expected Florida Legislature referenda on property tax reductions on the November General Election ballot.
Moreover — though none of the commissioners addressed this during the March 2 discussion — the Sarasota Performing Arts Foundation (PAF) has committed itself to raising up to $207 million in philanthropic contributions to supplement the $150 million that the city would provide through bonds. Those bonds would be paid off by revenue from a special tax-increment financing (TIF) district that encompasses The Bay Park, plus other revenue that does not derive from property tax payments. Among the latter sources, interim City Manager Bullock explained, would be sales taxes and franchise fees.
Tania Castroverde Moskalenko, CEO of the Foundation, did not tell the commissioners how much money the organization has raised for the Performing Arts Center (PAC), and no amount was included in the slides presented to the board on March 2.
Approximately $6 million in city funding from the Sarasota County Surtax Program, which brings in revenue from an extra penny of sales tax, also will be used for the PAF initiative, Bullock said.
The $150 million to be provided through the bonds, Bullock pointed out, is the amount calculated to cover the expense of the remaining phases of The Bay Park, plus the PAC.
Bullock explained that staff had consulted with the city’s financial adviser and bond counsel in regard to “how much debt we could carry with this project,” as well as the amount the TIF district is expected to produce over its 30-year life.
The answer to the second question, he noted, is about $273,879,324. They recommended holding the total debt service expense to $10 million less than that at this point, Bullock continued. “You need a buffer; it needs to be a conservative estimate.”
Then, he said, the cost of issuing the bonds will be “roughly a million dollars”, and the expectation is that that would take place in 2028, though “that [date] may change.”
The plan also calls for the bonds to have a life of 22 years, Bullock noted.
“The TIF is highly likely to pay all of your debt,” he summed up those details for the commissioners.
Jorgensen, the governmental affairs director, told the commissioners that city staff anticipates that the County Commission will pay for its share of Phases 3 and 4 of The Bay Park, as well as related expenses, such as the parking areas for the park and the PAC. However, the county commissioners have made it clear that they do not intend to allow county TIF money to go toward the PAC.
All of the remaining funding expected to be needed for the park adds up to $68 million, Jorgensen noted. That leaves $88 million for the SPAC.
“I think we have a doable project,” Bullock said, providing no “significant barriers present themselves as we move forward.”
Although it had been nearly a year since project team members had appeared before the board, Vice Mayor Kathy Kelley Ohlrich pointed out, “I think this delay has resulted … in a better location [along with a] better design [and] a total cost that the city can afford.”
Moreover, Ohlrich said, “It seems now that we have a team instead of people fighting against each other.”
In response to a question that Ohlrich posed, PAF CEO Castroverde Moskalenko predicted that the Foundation team could be back before the commissioners in about six weeks with the formal Implementation Agreement for the revised plans discussed this week.
However, Bullock suggested that it would be better for that document to be considered “sometime in the summer,” with hope that Gov. Ron DeSantis’ and the Legislature’s property tax referenda plans will be clear by that time.
Even then, the March 2 discussion made it clear that no one can predict the outcome of the votes on those referenda.
Nonetheless, all of the city commissioners indicated their appreciation of the work on which the Foundation team and city staff had collaborated to arrive at the proposed PAC budget.
‘Concept 2.0’
During their presentation to the commissioners, the Foundation representatives referred to the revised plans for the PAC as “Concept 2.0.”
Among the changes since Foundation team members last appeared before the board — on March 17, 2025 — are the relocation of the complex to south of the 10th Street Boat Canal.
AG Lafley, founding CEO of The Bay Park, told the commissioners — via Zoom — that the Bay Park Conservancy, which plans the amenities for the park and raises private funding for them, has “a site for the design concept that could and should work” in the master plan for the park that the City Commission approved in 2018. “We’re trying to put together a lot of different pieces of a Rubik’s Cube here,” he added.
“To say that’s a Rubik’s Cube, I think, would be an understatement,” Jerry Sparkman, one of the principals of the Sweet Sparkman architectural firm in Sarasota, added with a laugh.
Sweet Sparkman is the local partner of Renzo Piano Building Workshop, the Genoa, Italy-based architectural firm that the Foundation hired to design the PAC.
Moreover, the number of seats in the main theatre has been reduced to 2,200. The original figure was 2,700.
An indoor-outdoor lobby will contain 16,000 square feet, with another 1,400 square feet devoted to patron services and 4,000 square feet set aside for a donor and community lounge. A multi-purpose structure will have between 250 and 300 seats in a flexible theater, plus a 2,600-square-foot “learning lab” and studio space.
“This combination,” Castroverde Moskalenko told the commissioners, “creates a facility that can deliver world-class experiences and performances and also support education and local arts organizations and community use.”
Architect Sparkman noted, “Concept 2.0, from an architectural point of view, has a certain lightness and openness that, I believe, is reflective of our local culture. … It’s not trying to be imposing on the park.”
He added, “I believe this design is right-sized” for the city of Sarasota.
Adam Gelter, principal of the iterum Consulting Group and a member of the Foundation team, also pointed out that the PAC “stays under the view corridor easement,” referring to the line of sight toward Sarasota Bay for Sarasota Renaissance condominium owners on U.S. 41.
Gelter was the one who discussed the parking aspect of the plans, noting that those were “not fully figured out in the original master plan” for the park. He did acknowledge that they are “still a work in progress,” but the team is aware that the city is trying to replace the 750 surface spaces on the 53 acres of the bayfront park with “a greater and much more efficient parking solution,” as depicted on slides he showed the board members.
“We’re looking at a series of alternative designs,” he added.
A graphic presented on March 2 showed the parking garages underground. Architect Sparkman noted that patrons would be able to take stairs or elevators from the garages to the ground level and then walk to the front door of the PAC building with the main theater.
Jorgensen, the governmental affairs director, said that the parking garages — if ultimately constructed — would be paid for out of the $150 million generated by the bonds, as would a pedestrian bridge over U.S. 41, on the east side of the park, to provide safer public access to all of the park’s amenities.
One rendering that Castroverde Moskalenko showed the board members depicted people headed west from U.S. 41 toward the PAC. She noted the “very gentle slope” of about 5%.
Referring to the elevation as well, Gelter explained that patrons will be able to enter the new venue at what they will perceive as ground level. People coming into the park from other areas of the city, or from other areas of the park, will be on “a continuous grade,” as another slide noted.
He also pointed out, “The main goal of the park was to raise elevation, for resiliency … and provide for stormwater treatment.”
Sparkman explained that dirt will be used to “mound up” the area where the PAC will be built. “Phase 1 [of the park] did the same thing,” he continued.
With a chart on the overhead projector in the Commission Chambers, he showed the commissioners and the public that Sarasota Bay is at elevation zero, and the concession stand in Phase 1 of the park is 12 feet above sea level, the same height as that of the Municipal Auditorium on U.S. 41.
The theatre is capped at 99 feet above sea level because of the view corridor issue, Sparkman noted.
The lobby level, he added, will be 22 feet above sea level.
The color scheme
One new feature of the PAC, as shown on several slides, prompted several commissioners’ remarks during the discussion.
Commissioner Liz Alpert pointed out, “I like the idea of different colors for these buildings.”
Mayor Debbie Trice noted the potential that private donors might be more willing to give significant gifts to the Foundation if those donors were able to choose the shades.
Trice told Foundation CEO Castroverde Mosklanko, “I sort of was watching the wheels turn in your brain,” when Vice Mayor Ohlrich and Alpert mentioned that aspect of the March 2 renderings.
Perhaps $25 million would net a donor the shade that donor prefers on a building, Trice suggested laughingly.
“Maybe a little more than that!” Castroverde Moskalenko replied.
Trice recommended that the Foundation team keep its final ideas about the colors a secret “and reach out to donors …”
“I’m really confident that the excitement throughout the community will build,” Trice added of the revised concepts the board members had reviewed that day.
Commissioner Kyle Battie ended up making the motion to formally accept the March 2 presentation, and Commissioner Jen Ahearn-Koch seconded it.