Overview
Jake is obviously a market expert. Very professional, articulate and certainly delivers.
- Chambers USA 2023
Jake counsels clients in their interactions with local, state, and federal governments on environmental, land use, and land development issues. He has been lead counsel on a variety of complex permitting and economic development matters. He excels in complicated matters requiring both environmental and land use permitting, including brownfield designations, urban redevelopment, and master-planned communities. He has extensive experience protecting environmental and land use permits against challenges, defending against government compliance and enforcement issues, and litigating property rights issues, including before the United States Supreme Court.
A sixth-generation Floridian, Jake grew up in Palatka working in his family’s timber operations and has significant experience working with agriculture, silviculture, agribusiness, and heavy industry interests. Because of this personal experience, Jake routinely assists large agricultural landowners in defense of their greenbelt classifications and in asserting Right-to-Farm Act challenges to government overreach. He also assists them with long-term strategic planning for development entitlements and unlocking alternative income streams, including the use of wetland mitigation banks and conservation easements.
Jake began his law practice in Tallahassee, where he gained experience dealing with the legislative and regulatory process of state government. As a Gubernatorial Fellow at the Department of Community Affairs, he participated in executive-branch policymaking and developed relationships with state environmental and growth management regulators. This experience allows Jake to advise clients whether permitting, litigation, or lobbying is the best approach for their needs.
Representative Experience
Permitting, Entitlements, and Regulatory Matters
- Lead counsel representing clients including national homebuilders, real estate investment trusts, investors, and other landowners in obtaining development rights and entitlements from local governments, including comprehensive plan amendments, rezonings, variances, special uses, legal nonconforming designation, and other permits.
- Represents master developer in land use and permitting issues related to the Westshore Marina District, the second largest new development project in Tampa Bay today. This $600 million large-scale project consists of 55 acres of the Tampa Bay waterfront and will include 200+ marina slips, a hotel, retail shops, boat-up restaurants, a public esplanade connected to a 1.4-mile public park, and 1,250+ apartments and condos.
- Lead counsel representing clients in pursuing development incentives, including ad valorem tax abatement and brownfields tax credits and jobs tax refunds, including representing the developer of a dual-flag hotel adjacent to City Hall in downtown Tampa in the purchase of the site from the City of Tampa, and partnering with the City to rehabilitate the site prior to redevelopment and obtain a cleanup grant from FDEP for $1 million.
- Represented an affordable housing developer in obtaining a brownfield area designation for an affordable housing project in the City of Tallahassee during the COVID-19 pandemic. The team coordinated an in-person and virtual community meeting that included a team of consultants and members of the public as well as two virtual public hearings to obtain the brownfield area designation. The designation allowed the developer to take advantage of both state environmental clean-up programs and financial incentives.
- Obtained a zoning modification on behalf of Piedmont Companies, a developer of Goodwill Industries projects across the country. The 212,000 square foot facility in Hillsborough County will serve a 10-county area, employing over 100 individuals with disabilities and special needs. It is Goodwill Industries-Suncoast, Inc.’s first "build to suit" distribution center in its central Florida territory and will be used as a model for future facilities.
- Lead counsel assisting a large silvicultural landowner in investigation of alternative environmental income streams, including wetlands and species mitigation banks and carbon offset credits, and land use entitlements strategies, including the Sector Plan.
- Lead counsel representing sporting lodge and hospitality operation in obtaining and modifying alcohol, tobacco, and firearms licenses from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and Florida Department of Business & Professional Regulation, Division of Alcoholic Beverages & Tobacco.
- Lead counsel representing landowner in a Right-to-Farm Act matter, obtaining the first approval in decades from a local government environmental agency for the commercial harvesting of cypress timber.
- Lead counsel representing clients in professional licensure and permitting disputes and disciplinary procedures, including the successful resolution, with no fine, penalty, or disciplinary action of Florida Board of Professional Engineers allegations of practicing without a license; and development and presentation of licensure strategies to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services for private investigation, private security services, and concealed firearms carry.
- Secured numerous environmental and land use permits and entitlements before local, state, and federal governmental entities.
- Counseled industrial clients in compliance and reporting obligations under complex federal environmental regulations, including CERCLA, RCRA, EPCRA, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, and the Endangered Species Act.
- Participated in policymaking, including drafting changes to Florida’s impact fee statutes and an expedited port permitting bill passed by the Florida Legislature and drafting comments on proposed environmental regulations at the federal, state, and local levels.
- As a Gubernatorial Fellow at the Department of Community Affairs, developed a model for presentation to the Legislature for converting the agency’s operations to a fee-based services model after studying operations.
Land Use, Environmental, and Property Rights Litigation Matters
- Successfully overturned a local government decision denying the grandfathering of an intensive commercial use, paving the way to achieve a favorable rezoning of the property.
- Lead counsel in successfully protecting agricultural client’s right to continue operations using the Right to Farm Act and the Florida Agricultural Lands and Practices Act following attempts of both local government and neighbors to force closure.
- Successfully used the Florida Land Use and Dispute Resolution Act to resolve contentious property rights case, including a resolution following a rezoning denial that would have resulted in the closing of one of the country’s largest trapshooting ranges and gun clubs.
- Lead counsel in resolving an annexation challenge and an administrative challenge to a comprehensive plan amendment for a coalition of developer clients with projects at risk due to a long-running dispute between Alachua County and the City of Gainesville. Successfully negotiated with the County and the City for a global settlement allowing clients to move forward with projects that had been stalled for over six months and which were at risk of being delayed for another year or more.
- Testified before a Florida Senate Committee on the effects proposed legislation would have on a client’s subsurface property rights.
- Assisted counsel of record defending oceanfront property rights before the U.S. Supreme Court in Stop the Beach Renourishment, Inc. v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection, 130 S.Ct. 2592 (2010), a case of first impression considering the doctrine of judicial takings.
- Authored amicus brief supporting the successful landowner before the U.S. Supreme Court in Koontz v. St Johns River Water Management District, 133 S.Ct. 420 (2013), a case that limited the government’s ability to exact concessions during the land development process.
- Represented clients in obtaining nearly $10 million in settlements of private property rights claims against governmental entities, including takings and inverse condemnation claims, constitutional claims, Bert J. Harris, Jr. Private Property Protection Act claims, and Florida Land Use and Environmental Dispute Resolution Act proceedings.
- Represented national gas and convenience chain in obtaining dismissal of a comprehensive plan consistency challenge.
- Lead counsel representing commercial agricultural operations in defense of agricultural tax classification (greenbelt), including an appellate case that confirmed in a case of first impression that even unusual agricultural uses must be allowed greenbelt classification.
- Represented commercial timber harvester in successful negotiated reduction of penalties incurred in a code enforcement action.
- Lead drafter of two successful appellate briefs defending against a challenge to an electrical utility’s rezoning of 2,000+ acres.
- Represented mining company in defense of local government mining and land use permits.
- Represented electrical utility in a citizen’s administrative suit seeking to invalidate water quality permits.
- Successfully appealed a local government's refusal to process a planned development rezoning application because of unreasonable interpretation of its land development code.
Professional & Community Involvement
- City of Tampa, Tampa Forward: Building Tomorrow Together, Land Development Code Advisory Team, Chair, 2024-Present
- Florida Brownfields Association (FBA), Advisory Board Member, Present
- The Junior League of Tampa, Community Advisory Board, 2019-Present
- Association of Florida Community Developers (AFCD), 2015-Present
- Tampa Bay Builders Association, 2015-Present
- Board of Directors, 2022-Present
- Florida Eminent Domain Conference, Co-Chair, 2021
- Florida State University College of Law, “Legislation and Regulation,” Adjunct Professor
- Appointed by Commissioner of Agriculture Adam Putnam to the Florida Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services’ Silviculture Best Management Practices Technical Advisory Committee
- Hillsborough County Farm Bureau, Board of Directors, 2015
- Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council, Gubernatorial Appointee
- Tampa Bay Agency on Bay Management, Appointee
- Leadership Tampa Bay, 2016
- Tampa Connection, Class of 2015
- Leadership Florida Connect, Class II, 2012
- Board of Governors, 2013-2015
- The Florida Bar Environmental & Land Use Section (ELULS), Executive Council and Co-Editor of the Reporter
- Rhodes College Alumni Association Executive Board, 2011-2014
- J. Clifford Cheatwood American Inn of Court
- Florida Forestry Association, Government Affairs Committee
- Forest Landowners Association
- Palma Ceia Golf & Country Club
- Ybor City Museum Society
Recognition
- Chambers USA
- Real Estate: Zoning/Land Use (North & Central Florida), Band 2, 2018-Present
- Environment (Florida), 2021-Present
- The Best Lawyers in America®, 2023-Present
- Lawyer of the Year, Litigation - Land Use and Zoning (Tampa), 2025
- Florida Super Lawyers, 2024-Present
- Rising Star, 2013-2023
- Florida Trend’s Legal Elite, “Up and Comer,” 2012-2017
- Florida State University Alumni Association, 30 Under 30, 2014
- Tampa Bay Business Journal, “Up and Comer,” 2013
- Florida Forestry Association, 40 Under 40 Young Leader, 2011
- American Planning Association, Florida Chapter, Outstanding Student Urban Planner, 2009
- Jeb Bush Outstanding Achievement Award, 2009
- National Merit Scholar
Publications & Presentations
Publications:
How to Streamline Housing Permitting in Florida
Policy Briefs, Mercatus Center, George Mason University|December 2024
Publications:
How to Streamline Housing Permitting in Florida
Housing | Policy Briefs, Mercatus Center, George Mason University|December 2024
Events:
Live Local Redux: What Eminent Domain Professionals Need to Know This Time Around
Florida Eminent Domain Conference|November 2024
Land Development News Update, Publications:
What's Developing | Fall 2024
Stearns Weaver Miller News Update|November 2024
Events:
Investing and Developing Over the Next Cycle
FSU Real Estate Center, TRENDS Conference|November 2024
Land Development News Update, Publications:
Hurricanes, Flash Floods, and Tornadoes – Development Permit Extension Opportunities Are Now Available
Stearns Weaver Miller News Update|September 2024
Land Development News Update, Publications:
What's Developing | Summer 2024
Stearns Weaver Miller News Update|August 2024
Publications:
Florida Attorney General’s Office Issues Informal Opinion Clarifying Zoning Districts that Qualify for Development under the Live Local Act
Stearns Weaver Miller News Update|August 2024
Newsroom
In the Media:
Florida's affordable housing crisis: The missing middle part 4 of 4
Fox13 Tampa Bay|November 2024
In the Media:
Inside the $700 million-plus reimagining of Robles Park Village in Tampa
Tampa Bay Business Journal|August 2024
In the Media:
Report: Revision to ‘Live Local Act’ reduces stock of affordable/workforce housing in FL
Florida Phoenix|June 2024
Firm Announcements:
35 Stearns Weaver Miller Lawyers and 11 Practice Areas Ranked In Chambers USA 2024
June 2024
In the Media:
Live Local Act changes Could Affect Affordable Housing in Tampa Bay
Tampa Bay Business Journal|January 2024
In the Media:
Advocates hailed a new law to help stabilize FL’s housing crisis, but implementation has been rocky
Florida Phoenix|October 2023
In the Media:
600 apartments in suburban Tampa become first Hillsborough project to move forward under Live Local Act
Tampa Bay Business Journal|October 2023
Firm Announcements:
29 Stearns Weaver Miller Lawyers in 11 Practice Areas Ranked In Chambers USA 2023
June 2023