LEON COUNTY – Manatee County is among several municipal plaintiffs filing suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief from a controversial hurricane recovery-related state law enacted earlier this year.
Signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis on June 26, the new law created by the Florida Legislature’s adoption of Senate Bill 180 and its matching bill in the House of Representatives prohibits city and county governments from adopting land development regulations that are more cumbersome or restrictive than the regulations in place as of Aug. 1, 2024.
Fort Lauderdale-based Weiss, Serota, Helfman, Cole and Bierman attorney Jamie Cole filed the lawsuit on Sept. 29 in the Second Judicial Circuit Court in Leon County.
The lawsuit seeks a court order declaring that the enactment of SB 180 violates the Florida Constitution and the Florida Statutes that codify local home rule powers, deems the preemptions in the new state law to be impermissibly vague and invalid and prohibits the state from enforcing the new law.
On Sept. 2, Manatee County commissioners voted 6-1 in favor of the county joining the lawsuit.
In addition to Manatee County, the named plaintiffs include city of Destin, the city of Lake Alfred, the town of Windermere, the city of Delray Beach, the city of Deltona, the city of Weston, the city of Alachua, the city of Stuart, Orange County, the town of Mulberry, the city of Naples, Miami Shores Village, the town of Lake Park, the city of Fort Lauderdale, the town of Jupiter, the city of Edgewater, the city of Pompano Beach, the town of Dundee, the town of Cutler Bay, the village of North Palm Beach, the village of Pinecrest, the city of Margate, the town of Palm Beach and the city of Homestead.
The lawsuit names as defendants Florida Secretary of Commerce Alex Kelly, Executive Director for the Florida Division of Emergency Management Kevin Guthrie, Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Wilton Simpson, Florida Department of Revenue Executive Director Jim Zingale and Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia.
The complaint cites Section 28 of the new Florida Statute that states, “Each county listed in the federal disaster declaration for Hurricane Debby, Hurricane Helene or Hurricane Milton, and each municipality within one of those counties, may not propose or adopt any moratorium on construction, reconstruction or redevelopment of any property damaged by such hurricanes; propose or adopt more restrictive or burdensome amendments to its comprehensive plan or land development regulations; or propose or adopt more restrictive or burdensome procedures concerning review, approval or issuance of a site plan, development permit or development order before October 1, 2027, and any such moratorium or restrictive or burdensome comprehensive plan amendment, land development regulation, or procedure shall be null and void ab initio. This subsection applies retroactively to August 1, 2024.”
A case overview provided on page two of the 46-page complaint says, “This is an action by a large number of
Florida municipalities and counties challenging Senate Bill 180, a law that was enacted in the 2025 legislative session that represents the largest incursion into local home rule authority in the history of Florida since the adoption of the Florida Constitution in 1968. SB 180 purports to be ‘an act relating to emergencies’ supposedly designed to assist people rebuild properties that were damaged in hurricanes. But, as the result of a last minute amendment, and in a classic example of log rolling and stealth legislating, SB 180 goes much further, freezing all local land development regulations and comprehensive plans in place on August 1, 2024, declaring that any ‘more restrictive or burdensome’ amendments to such regulations that were enacted by any of the 67 counties or 411 municipalities in Florida between August 1, 2024, and October 1, 2027, are ‘void ab initio.’”
The complaint says, “SB 180 should be declared invalid and the defendants should be enjoined from enforcing it.”
Manatee County referenced
Earlier this year, due to concerns about potentially violating the new state law, Manatee County commissioners delayed voting on reverting back to the county’s previous and more restrictive wetland buffering regulations.
The complaint notes some local governments received letters from Florida Department of Commerce advising them that certain planning and zoning regulations are in direct conflict with Section 28 of the new state law.
The complaint says, “Manatee County received such a letter on April 15 regarding two proposed comprehensive plan amendments, in which Florida Commerce states it previously declared the proposed comprehensive plan amendments ‘null and void’ and that Manatee County, nonetheless, thereafter continued to move toward final adoption. The letter states the proposed ordinances may be violative of Section 28 for being a ‘restrictive or burdensome’ procedure for obtaining a development permit after a disaster – without purporting to identify what it was more restrictive or burdensome than, or to whom it was more restrictive or burdensome. The letter also states the proposed amendments may violate Section 3 of SB 180 regarding impact fees.”
Although the Island cities of Anna Maria, Bradenton Beach and Holmes Beach are not plaintiffs in the lawsuit, Holmes Beach city attorney Erica Augello recently said the outcome of the SB 180 lawsuit will impact every Florida city and county one way or another.
