Business View Civil and Municipal l January 2023

130 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 9, ISSUE 12 these industry clusters that we have.” With this diversification comes a need for more permanent housing, and Cocoa Beach is making it happen. The Drift will bring 220 units to the city. Robin R. Hayes, City Manager, describes, “We have four new building potential opportunities for us here in Cocoa Beach, and that’s one of them. It will be two facilities, approximately six to eight stories in structure and height.” A 412-unit condominium development by BVH Investments will also bring more housing options to the city, which Hayes notes is a much-needed opportunity. “That will change the number of residents that we’ve been able to open the doors to, so to speak. We’ve been pretty much landlocked, so any opportunity we have in which we can look at permanent residents with a permanent tax base associated with their homes, that’s important.” In other development, Driftwood Capital is finalizing plans for a $380 million Westin Resort and Convention Center, which will have 502 rooms. “There is some funding from the county tied to that convention center through the use of our tourism dollars. So that’s a great opportunity for us,” relays Hayes. A new build of the Westgate Cocoa Beach Resort, is also in the plans, at an investment of approximately $80 million. “It will be 116 rooms, and it’s attached to our pier. Our pier is one of our signature areas to visit. It is a privately owned pier, but we have a great working relationship with Westgate,” she adds. For Mayor Malik all of the development happening in Cocoa Beach is a welcome sign, and something he believes was long overdue. He elaborates, “The only reason I got involved in government 10 years ago was because Cocoa Beach had just kind of languished for the past 20 years. We had very archaic and restrictive land development codes, that frankly drove away any outside investment in our community, to the point where we had not one new major building built in 20-something years.”