Senate Bill 180 passed the 2025 legislative session and included an increase in the required hurricane evacuation clearance time for Monroe County from 24 hours to 24.5 hours and allows up to 900 additional ROGO/BPAS allocations Keys-wide.  

The allocations are to be distributed based on the proportion of vacant buildable lots in each jurisdiction.  The 900 must be spread over at least 10 years.

All new permits must be issued for vacant, buildable parcels, only one per individual lot, and allocations for owner-occupied residences, affordable housing, and workforce housing must be prioritized.

While it has not been confirmed, it is believed the table below reflects the distribution.

A Comp Plan amendment will be needed to distribute the Village allocations according to the restrictions approved by the state.

BUT there’s a catch: The same legislation, SB 180, created a complication. It does not allow local governments to adopt amendments to their land development code or comp plan that are more restrictive than current code. And the same SB 180 requires more restrictive ROGO/BPAS distribution requirements.

The portion of SB 180 that doesn’t allow more restrictive changes to regulations until July 2027 is already being challenged by numerous local governments throughout the state. The 2025 Legislative Session will address this issue.  

Critical to Islamorada: The fact SB 180 prohibits any changes to local land use law that would be considered “more restrictive,” the $125,000 contract with Able City East comes into question. Considering the traffic congestion, environmental damage, limited infrastructure, it would seem likely that amendments to the Village Comp Plan being developed currently by Able City may be in jeopardy as “more restrictive.”  

Note: Islamorada still has 292 affordable BPAS allocations the state gave the Village following Hurricane Irma.  They are also restricted - multi-family with onsite management. Referred to as “early out” allocations, occupants of these units must evacuate before other local residents.  Why aren’t they being used?