Subject:
Title
Approval of Legislative Intent to advertise an ordinance change to rename the County-owned Spaceport Commerce Park in Titusville to Exploration Park West.
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Fiscal Impact:
The cost of installing new monument signs, bearing the name “Exploration Park West,” has been included in the NBEDZ’s approved budget for Fiscal Year 21/22.
Dept/Office:
North Brevard Economic Development
Requested Action:
Recommendation
The North Brevard Economic Development Zone (NBEDZ) formally requests that the Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) approve legislative intent to advertise an ordinance change to Brevard County Code section 98-247, 98-247a, to remove the name “Spaceport Commerce Park” from the county-owned business park in Titusville, and replace it with “Exploration Park West,” as part of a rebranding and marketing campaign that the NBEDZ and its economic development partners, including Space Florida, would like to initiate.
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Summary Explanation and Background:
In the early 1980s, the county created a light industrial park in Titusville to serve the facility needs of the private-sector aerospace industry. Marketed as “Spaceport Commerce Park,” the business park contained approximately 300 acres, but experienced minimal site activity until the last decade, when a greater emphasis was placed upon lot development within the park, to alleviate the economic downturn following the end of the Space Shuttle program. Those efforts, along with growth in the local economy from key aerospace players such as Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, SpaceX and Blue Origin, helped attract more manufacturing operations to the area. Now, the Spaceport Commerce Park is home to a diverse mix of manufacturing tenants, including Pharmco Labs, Paragon Plastics, Raider Outboards, and most recently, Dark Storm Industries. [In 2011, the park was home to an estimated 200 workers; today, tenants in the park employ close to 1,000 people aggregately.] With each new development, the county has been able to induce more job creation and capital investment, thus providing employment opportunities for citizens while expanding the tax base.
In order to maximize the economic development potential of the remaining lots within the park, the NBEDZ would like to join efforts by Space Florida, the Titusville-Cocoa Airport Authority, and the Economic Development Commission of Florida’s Space Coast to rebrand the park and its surrounding area by changing the name of the park to “Exploration Park West,” a nod to an existing 200-acre business park on federal land on Merritt Island called “Exploration Park”. The name change would be part of a targeted marketing campaign to generate high-quality development leads for the park. As available lots in Exploration Park dwindle, it is believed that capitalizing on its good name among site consultants and real estate brokers will induce more manufacturing clients to the area, and raise the profile of the county as the nation’s premier aerospace community. The NBEDZ board, acting as the county’s authorized agent for developing and/or inducing the development of lots within the Spaceport Commerce Park, formally approved recommending this change at its May 14, 2021 meeting. It now requests that the BOCC approve legislative intent to advertise an ordinance change as the first step toward changing the park’s name; upon completion of the ordinance amendment, the BOCC would need to modify the restrictions and deed covenants to reflect the name change, and re-record those restrictive development covenants.
Clerk to the Board Instructions:
Please send executed copy of memo to NBEDZ