A developer has filed under Florida's Live Local Act to replace a two-story 1939 building at 1920 Alton Road, at the edge of Sunset Harbour, with a 20-story, 297-foot tower in a district zoned for 50 to 65 feet. The law was written to speed up workforce housing.
The Journal obtained the complete planning file for the project through a public records request. The plans show 14 small workforce units, eight studios and six one-bedrooms, on the building's second and third floors, and 21 condominiums above them averaging 4,288 square feet, topped by an 11,125-square-foot penthouse.
City staff recommended a shorter building. The plans did not change. By the city's Sept. 18, 2026 review report, the application had passed every review.
Who is behind it
The application, filed in June 2026, lists Alton Office Holdings II LLC, with an address of 4700 North Bay Road in Miami Beach, as the property owner. Its corporate documents show the sole member is WMB Resources, LLC, which is managed and solely owned by Wayne Boich. The entity's chief financial officer, Brian Murphy, signed the affidavits, which were notarized in Franklin County, Ohio.
The plan set names New York-based Turnbridge Equities in its owner block. The project, branded "Reserve at One Sunset," was first reported by Floridian Development.
The architect of record is O'Donnell Dannwolf & Partners (ODP) of Hollywood, Fla., with Brandon Haw Architecture of Brooklyn as design consultant. The applicant is represented by attorneys Graham C. Penn and Carlos Markovich of Bercow Radell Fernandez Larkin & Tapanes, who are registered as compensated lobbyists on the application along with Hernando Marin, listed at ODP's Hollywood address.
What the plans show
The Live Local Act lets a developer build housing on commercially zoned land, at the tallest height allowed within a mile and without a public hearing, as long as at least 40 percent of the units are rented for 30 years to households earning up to 120 percent of the area median income.
At 1920 Alton Road, the math works exactly. Fourteen of the 35 units are workforce housing: eight studios of about 410 square feet and six one-bedrooms of 508 to 751 square feet, averaging 512 square feet. The other 21 are condominiums: sixteen three-bedrooms of 3,305 square feet, four five-bedrooms of 6,510 square feet and the penthouse, averaging 4,288 square feet.
The building meets the 40 percent test by unit count. Measured by floor area, the 14 workforce units total 7,168 square feet, about 7 percent of the building's 97,213 square feet of homes.
What the city had already approved here
This is not the first plan for the site. In April 2023, after three public hearings, the Design Review Board approved a five-story building at 1920 Alton Road, designed by Gensler, with offices, two restaurants and three condominiums. It needed a three-foot height variance, to 58 feet. It was never built.
In June 2026, the same owner filed under the Live Local Act instead.
Staff asked for 150 feet
During review, city staff recommended reducing the building's height to 150 feet, about half of what was filed, and setting the tower back an extra 10 feet along 20th Street. The applicant left the plans unchanged, and staff marked both comments "OK." The plans claim a 300-foot limit under the Act, based on what was allowed at the Convention Center site, within a mile.
Under the Act, that is as far as the city's leverage goes. The planning director reviews the plans and signs an order. There is no Planning Board hearing, no Design Review Board review and no Commission vote. The application marks the existing building as not architecturally significant under the city code, which clears the way for its demolition.
A different use of the same law
The contrast with the city's first approved Live Local tower is sharp. At 663 Alton Road, the entire building is workforce housing. At 1920 Alton Road, the workforce units are the minimum the law requires to unlock the height.
Statewide, the Florida Housing Coalition tracked roughly 55,000 units proposed across 182 Live Local projects as of March 2026, with only about 3,000 delivered. Miami Beach officials have argued the law is being used mainly to bypass height and density limits, and the city has explored a homegrown alternative to the state framework.
What's next
With every review passed, the remaining step is a signed approval order from the planning director. No signed order for 1920 Alton Road was included in the records the Journal received.
Planning Director Deborah Tackett told the Land Use and Sustainability Committee on Sept. 24 that 19 Live Local applications have been filed in the city since early 2024: four approved, seven under review and the rest dormant. The item now returns to the committee monthly.
Once an order is issued, it must be recorded with the Miami-Dade Clerk of Courts before a building permit can be issued, and the permit would include demolition of the existing building on the three-lot assemblage (Lots 3, 4 and 5 of Block 12-A, Island View Addition).
