On March 9, 2026, the Flagler County Commission met to decide whether to sue the city of Flagler Beach over the annexation of Veranda Bay, a gated master-planned community on John Anderson Highway. Two commissioners argued the annexation might be illegal. The developer's attorney disagreed. The county's own attorney admitted no Florida court had ever ruled on the question. It was, by any measure, a real legal fight over a real neighborhood.
Not one of the roughly 121 homeowners who already lived inside Veranda Bay showed up to weigh in. Property Appraiser Jay Gardner, a Flagler Beach resident himself, said as much from the podium, asking commissioners to notice that nobody from those 121 lots had come to complain. The commission voted 4-1 to drop the matter. The annexation stood.
That silence is the story. It is not evidence that residents didn't care which city governed their neighborhood. It is evidence of something buyers in any new gated community should sit with: the decision had already been made, years earlier, in language most people don't read closely at closing.
The Clause Buyers Signed Without a Second Vote
When homeowners bought into Veranda Bay, their deeds included a covenant agreement, and buried in that covenant was language giving the developer the right to annex the property into a Flagler County municipality down the road. Florida law normally requires signatures from existing property owners before a piece of land can be annexed into a city. Flagler Beach and the developer's position was that the covenant already signed at closing satisfied that requirement. There was no need to go back to homeowners years later and ask again.
County Attorney Michael Rodriguez laid out the mechanics for commissioners: the declaration in the deeds gave the developer the right to annex into any Flagler County municipality, and no Florida court had ruled on whether that kind of covenant is legally equivalent to the individual petition signatures the statute describes. Commissioner Kim Carney didn't buy the substitution. She called the project "over development" and argued the covenant wasn't enough to satisfy state law. Commission Chair Leann Pennington cast the lone dissenting vote against dropping the county's challenge, saying she wasn't convinced the process served "the people that currently reside in there."
They lost that vote. The annexation had already been finalized by Flagler Beach's city commission on February 26, folding roughly 211 acres of Veranda Bay into the city on a 4-1 vote, part of a combined expansion with the neighboring Summertown project that grew the city's total land area from 2,624 to 3,380 acres, an increase of almost a third.
Why the City Wanted the Deal
Annexation fights are rarely one-sided, and this one wasn't. Flagler Beach had reasons to want Veranda Bay inside its limits. The development is expected to generate approximately $2.8 million in impact fees for the city and will dedicate a two-acre park. Short-term rentals will be permitted in parts of the community, particularly around a planned commercial hub called Marina Village, which gives the city a new tax base without adding to its existing single-family rental stock.
The developer, Ken Belshe, also had a separate conservation agreement riding on the relationship staying intact: a three-year window for Flagler County to arrange funding to purchase 153 acres of environmentally sensitive land along Bulow Creek from the sister Summertown project. Belshe told commissioners directly he would not back out of that agreement regardless of how the annexation dispute played out, but several commissioners weighed the annexation vote against the risk of losing that conservation deal anyway. The two issues were legally separate. Politically, they were not.
What's Actually Built, and What's Still a Rendering
Buyers evaluating Veranda Bay today are shopping four different builders at four different price points inside the same gate: Dream Finders Homes starting around $403,000, Toll Brothers in the mid-$500s, ICI Homes starting near $600,000 with finished homes well past $1 million, and AR Homes, operating as Marcus Allen Homes, building custom product from roughly $800,000 to $2 million and up.
The amenity package used to market all four price points, resort-style pool, clubhouse, fitness center, tennis, pickleball, a dog park, and the 150-slip marina known as Marina Village with fuel and transient dockage, is approved as part of the annexation but not yet built, and none of it carries a firm delivery date. That gap between what's approved on paper and what's poured in concrete matters more here than in most communities, because the annexation itself shows how much of Veranda Bay's identity is still being negotiated in real time rather than settled at the ribbon-cutting.
"I'm not comfortable that we're doing the best thing in the interest of the people that currently reside in there." — Flagler County Commission Chair Leann Pennington, March 9, 2026
What This Means If You're Comparing Master-Planned Communities
The lesson from Veranda Bay isn't that annexation is bad or that the neighborhood made a mistake. Cities and developers negotiate these agreements constantly, and a lot of infrastructure gets built because of them. The lesson is narrower and more useful: which city governs a master-planned community, taxes it, and services it is not always a fixed fact you can take from the listing sheet. In a community still selling new phases, that fact can be pre-negotiated by the developer years before most buyers ever look at a lot, and it can move without a fresh vote from the people already living there.
Before writing an offer in any newer gated or master-planned community in unincorporated Flagler County, it's worth asking a few questions that a listing agent, builder rep, or title company can help answer directly:
- Is this parcel currently incorporated into a city, or still in unincorporated county land, and does the declaration of covenants say anything about future annexation?
- Who owns and maintains the roads leading into the community, the county or a municipality, and does that change under any pending agreement?
- Are the marketed amenities built and operating, or approved and pending, and is there a written delivery date anywhere in the purchase contract?
- If short-term rentals are part of the pitch, where specifically are they permitted under the current zoning, and has that zoning been finalized or is it still moving through approval?
None of these questions require a lawyer to ask. They just require asking before the closing table instead of after.
A Few Questions This Raises
Does this affect homes that are already built and resold, or only new construction? It affects both, because the annexation covenant was written into every closing in the community, including the earliest resale-eligible homes. A buyer purchasing a resale Veranda Bay home today is buying a property that is now inside Flagler Beach city limits as a result of that 2026 annexation, not the county jurisdiction the original owner may have purchased into.
Will my property taxes or services change because of the annexation? That depends on Flagler Beach's own tax rate and service structure relative to what the county previously provided, which is a separate question from the annexation dispute itself and worth confirming directly with the city and county tax offices for the specific parcel.
Is this kind of covenant unique to Veranda Bay? No. Annexation consent language inside a declaration of covenants is a standard tool developers use in unincorporated master-planned communities. Veranda Bay is simply the community where it became public and contested. Any buyer looking at a newer gated development outside existing city limits should ask whether similar language exists in that community's governing documents.
If you're weighing Veranda Bay against other coastal and golf communities in Palm Coast, Flagler Beach, or Ormond Beach, and you want someone who reads the covenant before you sign it, not after, Andy Kalcounos has spent 25 years working these exact questions through to closing. Let's Connect.
