Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Built-up Broward has few tracts of open land remaining
Largest is Hendrix family’s farmland
The open swaths of land that made Broward County a magnet for builders have all but disappeared in recent decades, with just a few large properties escaping South Florida’s building booms.
Farmland in Broward is fewer than 4,500 acres. In 1980, it was 47,000 acres. In 1950, that was 130,000 acres.
There’s no telling how much time is left before the largest remaining vacant tracts succumb to development — with offers that can exceed $1 million an acre. Many have had proposals that have fallen through for one reason or another.
“I’m well aware that there are dozens, perhaps hundreds of buyers interested in the larger properties,” said George Platt, a member of the business-oriented Broward Workshop who has represented owners of some of the large properties.
Hendrix Farms, Parkland
There’s nothing left in Broward that compares to the 739-acre tract of farmland in and near Parkland that has been in the Hendrix family’s hands for 70 years.
While most farmland in the county went from feeding people to feeding Broward’s building boom from the 1960s through the 1980s, Woody Hendrix had no desire to give up on agriculture.
C.W. Hendrix Farms still operates on the south side of Loxahatchee Road, with crops that include eggplants, cucumbers and bell peppers, according to Produce Market Guide.
The land’s future development potential has already been set: Up to 1,500 homes and 40 acres of commercial use. But the land has not been rezoned yet and is still listed as agricultural, said Richard Coker, an attorney for the company.
The property has had brushes with encroaching development over the years. Back in 1986, when a residential development opened in Palm Beach County to its north, rumors spread about a pig farm coming to the site, a stench the
new neighbors weren’t going to put up with.
At the time, Hendrix would not confirm or deny pigs were coming. He had signs put up to let the neighbors know the land was agricultural and that he was there first.
“I want them to realize they are moving next to farmland zoned a long time ago,” Hendrix told the Sun Sentinel back then. “I don’t want them complaining when we begin doing something they don’t like.”