Tampa Land Development Code Update — Tampa, Florida

The City of Tampa is rewriting its Land Development Code, the body of law that decides what can be built on a parcel and how. The Development Coordination division calls the effort Tampa Forward: Building Tomorrow Together, a two-year project to update the LDC. In the City's own words, the LDC is the set of regulations that govern how land can be used and developed in the City, and most of it lives in Chapter 27 of the City Code of Ordinances.

Tampa Forward launched in April 2024. As of the project page updated October 6, 2026, the rewrite is anticipated to be completed in the second half of 2026, and the City is releasing the new code in installments rather than as a single document. Installment 1, dated March 2, 2026, covers zoning districts, definitions and uses. Installment 2, released in October 2026, covers how development projects are reviewed and approved and adjusts how decisions can be appealed.

The rewrite is a restructuring of Chapter 27, not a citywide rezoning announced on the project page. The City lists four aims: a code significantly restructured so it is more logical and easier to understand; more photos, diagrams and other illustrations; more precise language to reduce ambiguity and provide increased predictability; and enhanced development standards, with tree planting and landscaping requirements given as the example. Until the new chapters are adopted, Tampa projects continue to be reviewed under the existing Chapter 27.

The public record on the Tampa Forward page begins with a kickoff public forum on September 16, 2024, followed by Land Development Code Advisory Team meetings on December 13, 2024, January 10, 2025 and January 24, 2025. An assessment of the existing Tampa code was presented at a public forum on March 3, 2025. The Advisory Team is a twelve-member panel listed by name on the City page; it reviewed drafts with City staff before Installment 1 went public.

Installment 1 was posted on March 2, 2026 for public review and comment, with an LDC How-To Guide and a Zoning 101 overview deck. In June 2026 the City held Tampa Forward community meetings around the city, including an East Tampa LDC update meeting on June 2, and asked attendees to complete a feedback survey. In July 2026 Development Coordination added a Zoning 101 Information Sheet that frames zoning as the city's rulebook for development and explains how development rules build on one another.

The second installment followed in autumn 2026. It was shared with the public on October 1, and the Code Update Advisory Meeting met on October 2, 2026 at Hanna City Center, 2555 E. Hanna Avenue. A further Tampa Forward public meeting is scheduled for Thursday, October 29, 2026, from 6:30 to 8:00 P.M. at the same Hanna Avenue building, with a virtual option. Written comments on the drafts go to the project mailbox, [email protected].

The rewrite sits on top of a code that keeps changing in the meantime. The Development Code Composition page records a July 2025 cycle of Land Development Code amendments to the current Chapter 27, with a City Council virtual public engagement session and its recording, so Tampa residents have seen both incremental amendments and the larger rewrite move in the same two years.

Every parcel inside Tampa city limits carries a zoning district designation, and the district decides which uses are permitted and what dimensional rules apply. The City of Tampa Zoning Maps page offers an interactive map that looks up zoning by address or by property tax folio number. A search by parcel returns the site address, folio number and owner information, any historic district or overlay district, and the zoning district itself. The map also shows the City limits, which matters in a county where unincorporated Hillsborough land sits next to Tampa neighborhoods and follows county rules instead of Chapter 27.

The City notes that the static zoning maps are updated and re-published monthly as zoning requests are decided, while the interactive map data is refreshed every 24 hours. The page also states that the maps are provided as-is and directs anyone needing the latest information on a specific property to a Development Coordination planner at 813-274-8403. Historic districts and overlay districts sit on top of the base district, so a lot in a Tampa historic district can face design review that a lot with the same base zoning elsewhere in the city does not.

For background, the division keeps an ABCs of Zoning presentation from January 11, 2023, described as a broad view of zoning and land use regulations and the processes the City uses to regulate development. The Development Coordination division itself processes entitlements, reviews projects for compliance with urban design standards and runs the Streets and Addressing section. Its office at 2555 E. Hanna Avenue is open from 8:00 AM until 4:30 PM, by appointment requested through email, and Eric Cotton is listed as the division manager.

When a property cannot meet a Chapter 27 standard, the owner can ask the Variance Review Board. The VRB receives its direction from Article 2, Division 3 of Chapter 27 and usually meets on the second Tuesday of the month at 5:30 PM in City Council Chambers, 315 E. Kennedy Boulevard, 3rd Floor. Members of the public who do not attend can mail or email written comments to Development Coordination, and those comments must arrive no later than 24 hours before the meeting to enter the official record. Quorum is a practical constraint: the June 9, 2026 hearing was moved to June 16, 2026 for lack of quorum.

The Tampa VRB may grant a variance only when the applicant has demonstrated practical difficulties or unnecessary hardships. Its decision rests on substantial competent evidence in the record, and the listed criteria include that the hardship is unique to the property, that a self-created hardship does not justify a variance, and that the variance is in harmony with Chapter 27 and the adopted Tampa Comprehensive Plan. The board may also attach reasonable conditions, and breaking a condition is itself a code violation.

Neighbors hear about these requests through the Good Neighbor Notification program, set out in City of Tampa Ordinance Sec. 27-149. Applicants must notify property owners within 300 feet of the proposed change, the leaders of neighborhood associations within 300 feet, and participating organizations that have registered for the neighborhood. A participating organization must be an officially registered Tampa association, an incorporated not-for-profit entity or a condominium association. Notice is required for rezonings, special uses, variances, Historic Preservation Commission consideration of local designation, amendments to the Future Land Use Map of the Tampa Comprehensive Plan, Barrio Latino and Architectural Review Commission decisions, and vacating of public right-of-way.

Separate from the formal notice, the monthly Tampa CARES newsletter lists petitions for rezoning, special use applications, variance requests and right-of-way vacatings for all Tampa neighborhoods, with the petition number, location, affected neighborhood association and tentative hearing date. It also carries hearing and workshop dates for City Council and the Hillsborough County City-County Planning Commission, the two bodies that handle land use questions beyond the VRB.

Some Tampa projects are governed partly by state law rather than by Chapter 27 alone. The City's Live Local Act page explains that Senate Bill 102, known as the Live Local Act, was approved by Governor DeSantis on March 29, 2023 and became law on July 1, 2023. According to the City, the act preempts a local government's regulation on zoning, density, and height for certain multi-family and mixed-use affordable housing developments.

In practice the Development Coordination division runs a separate Live Local application form and memo, and as of October 2026 it publishes a Live Local application map of projects filed in Tampa under the statute. A qualifying housing proposal can therefore rise taller or denser than the base Tampa zoning district would otherwise allow, which is one reason the zoning map alone does not settle what can be built on every parcel. Whatever form the rewritten Land Development Code takes after Tampa Forward, these state preemptions continue to apply alongside it.

The Tampa Forward project page is the City's single record of the rewrite. It posts each installment, the presentations from the September 2024 kickoff and the March 2025 assessment forum, recordings of past public forums and Advisory Team meetings, and an email sign-up for project updates. Feedback on Installment 1 and Installment 2 goes to [email protected], and the October 29, 2026 meeting at the Hanna Avenue building offers both in-person and virtual attendance.

Final adoption belongs to the Tampa City Council, which already holds the hearings on rezonings listed in the Tampa CARES newsletter. Last verified: October 8, 2026, on the City of Tampa website.