Plant City Church of God was filled to capacity Thursday night as residents of Walden Lake flocked to hear the proposal from 2XS Development L.L.C. The company has expressed an interest in purchasing the golf course, but needs the community’s blessing before they pursue the massive undertaking.
Stephen Katz and Sam Bauer, owners and managers of 2XS, along with Elliot Cohen with neighborhood relations, talked to the residents about what they have planned for the property.
“We’re proposing a reduction in the previously proposed building area,” Bauer said. “We hope to have walking and biking trails and a boutique hotel amenity.”
He said their goal is to “not pack as much as we can into the area,” but rather to offer an ideal environment to live in
and transform the property into a state of the art facility. The goal is to create an 18-hole par 73 PGA certified golf course as well as a boutique hotel with between 150 and 200 rooms.
Cohen said they are already in talks with some “globally recognized hotel operators” and if they close on the property they will enlist the partnership of a reputable golf club team to manage the course in conjunction with the hotel. Currently, the proposed hotel will also have large banquet facilities, meeting rooms, a spa, pool and restaurant.
A new clubhouse is also planned to replace the dilapidated shell residing near the driving range. In preparation for all of this construction, Bauer assured residents they were planning to build a new service road so the massive vehicles would not need to go through the middle of the already established community.
All of this is merely proposed. Until they close on the deal, nothing is set in stone. After giving a brief presentation of the new amenities 2XS is hoping to bring to Plant City, one community member asked Bauer what assurances he could give to prove this wasn’t “simply another hoax.”
“Steve and I will personally sign for $125 million to achieve this,” Bauer said. “But we aren’t coming into a community that doesn’t want us. That’s why we’re making these efforts to create a conversation between our company and the Walden Lake residents.”
Both Bauer and Katz have spent years working in the development industry and they came together to form 2XS on Feb. 21, 2018. Their combined list of accomplishments includes items like the Banyan Cay golf courses and country clubs, Orchid Estates and various retail and housing community construction.
But before they can even begin considering meeting their closing date at the end of December there is one obstacle they have to overcome. The Walden Lake HOA.
The HOA has been in an ongoing lawsuit regarding the rezoning of the shuttered Walden Lake course. The homeowners that live near the course were opposed to Visions Golf LLC’s plan for the city to rezone the land for the construction of hundreds of homes.
As time has passed, the lawsuit continued and 2XS gave them an ultimatum: drop the lawsuit or we will be forced to walk away.
“To date, we have spent a considerable amount of time and money in pursuit of this and cannot continue to do so without a clear path,” Bauer wrote in an email to Walden Board members. “Due to the time allowed for us to correctly complete our due diligence, and have the appropriate information in place to close, we must know where the board stands with the outstanding litigation and our proposed development.”
Bauer assured that if the matter was resolved they would continue to move forward.
Originally 2XS asked the board to reach a decision by Oct. 31, however, after learning the president of the HOA was not in town Cohen said they are shifting their timeline “as much as possible to accomodate them.”
If the board says they will begin the steps to drop the suit the company will move ahead and wrap up the process with the property owner. If not, the plan could soon be dead in the water.
“We don’t go into a community that doesn’t want us,” Cohen said. “As much effort as we put into a building project we have to make sure the people that are next to it want us. The golf course right now is, well let’s say decaying. I’ve read about the rat infestation. It’s overgrown. There’s no good answers. Golf clubs and courses in this day and age are tough to maintain financially so the question is what do you do with it? We have a good plan. We can make this work.”