- January 14, 2026
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Although all has been quiet in the nine months since the matter of a new Sarasota Performing Arts Center last appeared before the City Commission, behind the scenes a harmonious sound has been building to a crescendo.
On Jan. 8 the Sarasota Performing Arts Foundation announced, following months of discussion with heirs of the namesakes of the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, that the family has joined with the foundation in support of the proposed new venue.
In addition, during the foundation’s monthly Center Stage Conversation event that evening, SPAF CEO Tania Castroverde Moskalenko announced a forthcoming new design — dubbed Concept 2.0 — that moves the new PAC to the south of the 10th Street boat basin, a reduction of seating in the main hall to 2,200 plus a 300-seat multipurpose room, plans for two on-site parking decks and a new price tag of less than $300 million.
How much less has yet to be announced, but more clarity is promised when a new design concept by architect Renzo Piano Building Workshop is revealed, perhaps as early as February.
“We have spent the last year refining the center, the design, and taking the feedback from the community and taking the feedback from our elected officials,” Castroverde Moskalenko said during the Center Stage Conversation. “And so we have a few updates.”
Those updates are intended to garner full support of the heretofore reticent City Commission, which tabled an implementation agreement with the SPAF in March 2025, citing concerns over the cost and scope of the project. At that time, the proposed design showed two buildings, pared from the originally proposed four, with a main theater seating capacity of 2,500 to 2,700. The projected cost was $407 million, factoring inflation.
At that meeting, commissioners requested more thought be put into the project and brought back to the board at a special meeting prior to May 5, a meeting that never occurred.
The Sarasota PAC is a public-private partnership plan between the SPAF and the city and county with the foundation pledging 50% of the capital cost and the local governments 25% each via tax increment financing revenues collected on the improved value of properties within close proximity to The Bay park. That’s the same arrangement the Bay Park Conservancy has with the city and county, which includes all development within the 53-acre property, such as a new Performing Arts Center.
The refined scope of the new design that will be soon be presented is reflective of the original architecture firm request for proposal issued in 2023. Criticisms of the initial design concept presented include the seating capacity, the location that impeded into the boat launch area of Centennial (soon to be The Bay) Park and the cost.
The newly proposed location places the building approximately where the master plan has shown it for nearly a decade.
“One of the things that we heard last year was the location, and so we've gone to work with our partners at the city of Sarasota, at The Bay park, the architects and our consultant, and we have moved the location of the Performing Arts Center,” Castroverde Moskalenko said. “That has now changed, and we have moved the location of the building to the south side of the 10th Street canal.”
A new site map displays the building just south of Van Wezel Way, the main entrance into the current parking lot, flanked by two parking structures to its south.
“I'm happy to report all of you who always ask me about parking that those are two parking garages,” Castroverde Moskalenko said. “One of the visions of the city and The Bay park is to provide more park for all, and so by removing the parking (lot) from the Van Wezel, that will be replaced by two parking garages.”
