Cocoa community redevelopment agencies

The City of Cocoa runs two community redevelopment agencies, the Cocoa CRA around Cocoa Village and the waterfront and the Diamond Square CRA on the south side, each with its own seven-member board and redevelopment plan (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

Both were set up under Florida's Community Redevelopment Act, Chapter 163, Part III of the Florida Statutes, and the City of Cocoa reports on them together because it is financially accountable for both (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). Each agency writes and carries out its own Community Redevelopment Plan for its area, and the stated overall goal of each is to reduce and eliminate slum and blight conditions, promote private investment and economic development, and enhance property values inside the district (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

The annual report lists the general activities and programs the agencies offer or have taken part in: infrastructure engineering, design and construction; stormwater improvements; streetscapes; affordable and workforce housing; land acquisition and redevelopment through public and private partnerships; community policing programs; and commercial facade grants (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). The Cocoa CRA has no staff or offices of its own: the City of Cocoa provides accounting and administrative support to it without charge (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

Questions about either agency go to the city's Community Services office at 65 Stone Street in Cocoa, which lists (321) 433-8577 on the annual report cover (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report) and 321-433-8501 as the general Community Services line on the Diamond Square grant page (Diamond Square Grant Programs page).

The Cocoa CRA covers the riverfront side of the city east of the Florida East Coast Railroad, and Diamond Square sits west of the railroad on the south side (Cocoa CRA page; Diamond Square CRA page).

The annual report describes the Cocoa CRA as taking in the Indian River Lagoon waterfront, Historic Cocoa Village, the Heart of Cocoa neighborhood, S.R. 50, the southern part of the U.S. 1 corridor and an uptown area north of Cocoa Village and S.R. 520 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). The 2018 plan put that area at 248 acres, about .45 square miles, or about 2 percent of the land inside the city limits by the plan's own figure (2018 Cocoa CRA Plan Update).

Diamond Square lies on the southern border of the City of Cocoa, and its earlier name, Census Tract 626, still shows up in older records (Diamond Square CRA page). The Florida East Coast Railroad is the western edge of the Cocoa CRA and the eastern edge of Diamond Square (Cocoa CRA page; Diamond Square CRA page).

Cocoa's CRAs are funded primarily by tax increment financing (TIF), leveraged with public funds to promote private sector activity in each area (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

The audited statements in the City of Cocoa annual report put it plainly: the Cocoa CRA is funded primarily by incremental ad valorem tax revenues, levied and remitted in amounts proportionate to property tax values for each participating entity, and it is economically dependent on that revenue (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). Florida Statutes section 163.387 sets the increment at 95 percent of the difference between the taxes levied each year on real property in the district and the taxes the same millage would have produced on the base-year values, unless the creating ordinance sets a lower share of no less than 50 percent (Florida Statutes 163.387).

For the year ended September 30, 2025, the Cocoa CRA reported total general revenues of $2,186,050, up from $2,061,404 the year before, of which intergovernmental revenue was $1,959,551 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). Its net position, assets minus liabilities and deferred inflows, stood at $7,361,083 at the close of that year (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). The same report says the Diamond Square CRA currently has no outstanding indebtedness (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). Cocoa's fiscal year runs October 1 through September 30, and the 2025 report covers October 1, 2024 through September 30, 2025 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

The 2018 Cocoa plan describes the trust fund as the repository for all tax increment revenue generated in the Cocoa redevelopment area and notes that a CRA may also issue redevelopment revenue bonds backed by that increment (2018 Cocoa CRA Plan Update).

The Cocoa CRA's largest recent project was a $1.2 million rebuild of the Lee Wenner Park parking lot, approved in April 2024 to add 74 parking spaces (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

That reconstruction closed Lee Wenner Park from Labor Day 2024 to Labor Day 2025, and the annual report records the project as complete by the end of fiscal year 2025 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report), while the Cocoa CRA page still lists Lee Wenner Park Parking Improvements as construction in progress (Cocoa CRA page). On the water, a March 2023 Cocoa CRA application to the Florida Inland Navigation District paired an $84,000 FIND grant with an $84,000 CRA match for Phase I engineering design and permitting of the Lee Wenner Park New Docking System and Breakwater project after Hurricanes Ian and Nicole damaged the waterfront (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). The Cocoa CRA page reports that design of the day slips and revetment (breakwater) was completed, with construction to be funded in 2025-2026, and that a repair or replacement design for the damaged T-Dock is under way (Cocoa CRA page).

Other Cocoa CRA work listed for 2024-2025 includes design of the Oleander West parking area for Cocoa Village visitors, curb and sidewalk repairs, flashing stop sign indicators in Cocoa Village and two commercial facade grants for historic and commercial buildings (Cocoa CRA page). In the Heart of Cocoa neighborhood, the CRA secured the purchase of 203 Orange Street to redevelop it as affordable housing (Cocoa CRA page). The annual report also counts 45 new businesses opening in the Cocoa CRA during fiscal year 2025 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

The Cocoa CRA's goals for fiscal year 2026 include crosswalk art and murals, uniform Cocoa wayfinding and gateway signs, pocket parks in the Heart of Cocoa and South of the Village neighborhoods, better event parking and identifying a future Brightline connection stop (Cocoa CRA page). The annual report identifies 603 Brevard Avenue as the site of the old City Hall, where the Cocoa CRA approved the selection of a developer in May 2024 for a mixed-use hotel project (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report), and the Cocoa CRA page lists it as a new mixed-use hotel with negotiations in progress (Cocoa CRA page). The Riverfront Park and Lee Wenner Park guide covers the parks themselves.

Diamond Square CRA money has gone into housing, parks, drainage, street projects and youth programs, including the Dr. Joe Lee Smith Community Center, which opened in August 2020 (Diamond Square CRA page).

The Diamond Square CRA page lists completed projects since 2014: facade and signage grants; demolition and acquisition of the Ritz Condominium property on Rosa L. Jones Drive; down payment help for first-time homebuyers; park improvements; land and site work for Habitat for Humanity homes; bus stop benches and trash cans; street trees and lighting; drainage on Catherine Court, Donley Street and Bernard Street to Railroad Avenue; and the Peachtree Street Complete Street and Stone Street reconstruction projects with the Diamond in the Square gateway design (Diamond Square CRA page). The old Skyview Trailer Park site became a stormwater pond and homes for female veterans, and the Habitat for Humanity Female Veteran's Village was completed in 2022 (Diamond Square CRA page). The city notes those projects were funded in part with City, Local, State and Federal funds (Diamond Square CRA page).

For 2024-2025, the Diamond Square CRA reports five down payment assistance awards to families, three residential paint or beautification grants and one commercial facade grant (Diamond Square CRA page). Its youth spending in the 2025 annual report includes $6,000 in summer camp scholarships for a dozen youth at the Dr. Joe Lee Smith Center and $4,500 for the Cocoa Police Athletic League, alongside a partnership with the Alliance for Neighborhood Restoration that runs youth programs at the Harry T. Moore Center (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

Diamond Square also runs UpStart Diamond Square, created at the February 8, 2021 board meeting: a three-year forgivable loan for new business owners in the district, with a community enrichment component in which 25 percent of the grant is paid back to the community within three years (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

Either Cocoa CRA offers matching facade grants up to $20,000, and Diamond Square homeowners can get a paint grant up to $1,000 (Cocoa CRA page; Diamond Square Grant Programs page).

The Diamond Square paint and beautification programs began in June 2021, and the annual report says Florida-friendly landscaping is what the beautification grant supplies (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report). For the residential grants, Cocoa City Hall hands out paper applications on the 2nd floor in Community Services, and the Redevelopment Coordinator answers at 321-433-8577 (Diamond Square Grant Programs page). The Diamond Square CRA page gives the same number for facade grant applications (Diamond Square CRA page).

Cocoa CRA goals for 2026 also mention starting residential paint and beautification grants inside the Cocoa CRA itself, but the Cocoa CRA page lists that as an objective, not an open program (Cocoa CRA page).

The Cocoa CRA board is the Cocoa City Council plus two council picks, while one of seven Diamond Square seats belongs to a Brevard County commissioner (Cocoa CRA page; Diamond Square CRA page).

On the Cocoa CRA, the two added members must reside or be engaged in business inside the City of Cocoa, are chosen through an application and verification process, and serve four-year terms (Cocoa CRA page). The Diamond Square board was reformed under an interlocal agreement with Brevard County effective October 1, 2019: terms are four years and no Diamond Square member may serve more than two consecutive terms before at least one year off (Diamond Square CRA page). Members of both Cocoa boards follow the Florida Code of Ethics for Public Officers and Employees (Cocoa CRA page). Current members and agendas are posted on each Cocoa CRA page.

Official Cocoa records give different creation details for the Cocoa CRA. The CRA page names Ordinance No. 10-81 (Cocoa CRA page), and the 2018 plan says the City of Cocoa Council established the agency on April 14, 1981 with the adoption of Ordinance No. 10-81 (2018 Cocoa CRA Plan Update); the 2018 plan's introduction also says the agency was created in 1980, after the city's July 8, 1980 resolution finding a necessity for redevelopment (2018 Cocoa CRA Plan Update); and the audited notes in the 2025 report cite City Resolution 10-81, dated April 14, 1981 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

The Diamond Square plan dates also differ. The Diamond Square CRA page measures its goals against the 2014 Plan Update and says Brevard County approved a Diamond Square Redevelopment Plan Update on September 5, 2019 (Diamond Square CRA page), while the 2025 annual report says the Diamond Square plan was updated and approved in 2022 (City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report).

Last verified: October 21, 2026, by re-reading both Cocoa CRA web pages, the Diamond Square grant page, the City of Cocoa CRA 2025 Annual Report with its audit, the 2018 Cocoa CRA Plan Update and Florida Statutes 163.387.