American flag will fly high again over Sarasota Ford

It isn’t often a city Board of Adjustment meeting draws a crowd. Even more rare is a standing ovation after it renders a decision.

But it’s also not every day the board has before it a request to relocate an iconic, 150-foot flag pole that supports an 1,800-square-foot American flag only weeks before the nation celebrates its landmark 250th birthday.

With no discussion among board members on Thursday, the adjustments were quickly and unanimously approved.

Since the 1970s, the flag has flown above Sarasota Ford at the intersection of U.S. highways 301 and 41. Dealership owner Matt Buchanan told the board the massive pole that protrudes through the roof of the building was failing and the flag has been removed, but wants to relocate the pole to the northwest corner of the property.

That move, though, runs afoul of the zoning code, which restricts the height of accessory structures in the Commercial Intensive district to 45 feet. That leaves the total variance request at 105 feet, not including the 15 feet required to bury the pole in order to support its height and weight. A second variance was requested to allow the pole to exceed the height of the principal building by 128 feet, 8 inches.

“Growing up here in town, it's something I've always known. It's a local landmark, but it served its time structurally,” said attorney Steve Rees, who represented the petitioner. “It's not able to support the flag there anymore, and to move it, we realized the variances were required.”

Courtesy image

The Buchanan family acquired the dealership in 1995 when Matt Buchanan was a middle school student. To bolster his case for an adjustment, he appealed to the panel’s sense of patriotism.

“Our goal and wish is to restore it to safe standards for the new placement of (a flagpole) and bring back that American flag to downtown,” Buchanan said. “I know the flagpole and the flag sits on our property. In my opinion, it's not ours. It's the community of downtown Sarasota's. It belongs to our veterans and the men and women who've fought for our country, and so today we fight for them.”

No residents or business, affected or otherwise, spoke against the variance with two residents speaking in favor, including Melissa Morsli.

“I moved here 17 years ago, and Sarasota is my home now and the flag has always been a great source of pride,” she told the board. “I think it's a beautiful symbol of unity, no matter what is going on in our city, our country or the world, to look at that big, huge flag every time you drive by just creates such a sense of pride, and I love it.”

After the applause stopped supporters were buzzing as they left the City Hall meeting chamber. As the board paused to allow the din to fade, one member said over a hot mic “How dare we vote against it.” Said others, “Very emotional. It was very nice." And, "What a great city.”