Raleigh Hotel's bid for 66,000 more square feet faces final Miami Beach vote Nov. 18

The Miami Beach City Commission is scheduled to take a final vote Nov. 18 on a zoning change that would let the owner of the Raleigh Hotel site at 1751-1775 Collins Ave. build about 66,418 more square feet, and one commissioner who helped send it there says her vote is still in play.

Commissioner Monica Matteo-Salinas wrote in her November newsletter, sent Monday, that she first voted against the proposal at the Oct. 14 meeting, then reconsidered and switched to yes so it could reach a second reading. The Real Deal reported Oct. 14 that the commission had moved the upzoning forward on second thought. Matteo-Salinas said the switch was “not an endorsement” of the project as proposed, and she named her concerns: the effect on neighboring hotels and what she called meager public benefits offered by the developer. “If nothing changes with this project, then I will remain a no,” she wrote.

What the change does

The owner, Nahla Raleigh LLC, applied in April to raise the floor area ratio (FAR), the limit on a building’s total floor space relative to its lot, from 2.0 to 2.5 for oceanfront lots in the Miami Beach Architectural District larger than 100,000 square feet with an existing historic “contributing” building. The city’s memo says no other property would qualify.

The site holds three historic hotels: the Raleigh at 1775 Collins, the Richmond at 1757 and the South Seas at 1751. The Historic Preservation Board approved a restoration and a 175-foot residential tower there in 2020, and the city says construction is underway. The change would not raise the height or density limits, according to the memo, and the revised plan has fewer homes than the 2020 approval. Any redesign still needs the preservation board’s approval.

The Planning Board recommended the change 5-1 in July. City staff recommended approval.

Why Nov. 18

Under the city’s zoning calendar, a second reading for an FAR increase would normally wait until April 2027. In a Sept. 17 letter, the owner’s attorney at Greenberg Traurig asked the commission to waive that schedule so work on the hotels, a construction site for more than nine years, isn’t delayed another six months. City staff backed the waiver.

The Nov. 18 meeting is at City Hall, 1700 Convention Center Drive, and the public can speak at the hearing. Matteo-Salinas holds a virtual “Mondays with Monica” session on the agenda Nov. 16 from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., according to her newsletter.