Historical Society has new plan to preserve homes in Old Naples

Elaine Reed, president and CEO of the Naples Historical Society, is drafting a proposal to the city to preserve historic properties in downtown Naples. The Historic Palm Cottage is the educational headquarters for the Naples Historical Society.

The business of preserving historic buildings among the ultrawealthy pockets of downtown Naples — where millions in real estate is bought, redeveloped and sold on the regular — is an inherently tricky, almost oxymoronic thing.

Elaine Reed knows this. She sees the changes every day.

She works out of an upstairs office in the Naples Historical Society’s single-family cottage near the intersection of Gulfshore Boulevard and Broad Avenue South. The building is more than 100 years old with original wood floors made from Dade County Pine.

Just down the street is a single-family home built in 2014. This one is worth about $7.9 million, complete with a two-story guest house, courtyard and a private pathway to the beach.

If something doesn’t change, Reed said, there’s nothing that could stop all of Old Naples from being torn down for something bigger and more valuable.

“When someone says, ‘I want to raze a house,’ we want to be able to offer options first,” said Reed, the historical society president. “The true problem is a lack of education.”

Reed is drafting a proposal requesting the state to sign off on a new Naples historic preservation program.

The program, in partnership with City Hall, would certify an updated map of the area’s more than 60 historic structures, include additional outreach to homeowners in the historic district and give the city new authority to review projects that alter or restore historic properties.

It’s the most comprehensive effort yet to preserve the city’s historic structures, mostly old cottages bunched west of Third Street South between Ninth and 14th avenues.

There’s a reason that such a project has felt impossible in Naples for decades — intense market pressures. After all, the historic district is bordered by Third Street’s boutique retail and not far from the million-dollar condos of Fifth Avenue South.

For as long as downtown land values are in the tens of millions, incentives for owners will go in the opposite way of preservation.

But Reed is emphasizing that her group is not opposed to redevelopment at historic properties. In fact, she encourages it, so long as the project maintains the character of a historic structure.

Preservation could include careful maintenance of a historic property or substantial improvements that don’t affect its historic nature, Reed said. It could also include tearing down an old property and rebuilding it to match its original vernacular, like the recent restoration of the Naples Pier.

Other communities — like Alexandria, Virginia, or Savannah, Georgia — have strict rules against physical alterations of historic buildings. The Naples program is voluntary, Reed said.

“With respect to private property rights, we will not have a program that has a mandate,” Reed said. “The entire historical preservation program is going to be based on marketing.”

As part of the program, the historical society, a private nonprofit, is hiring an outreach coordinator, a 20 hour per week paid position, who will go door to door in the historic district to inform homeowners of the society’s mission.

The group is working with the Naples Area Board of Realtors to include the historic district in the local housing MLS database, letting potential buyers know if the property is deemed historic, Reed said.

If a homeowner or buyer wants to tear down a historic structure and build a megahome, that’s their call, Reed said. She just wants to let them know there’s another way.

“Wrapping your brain over what is allowed is a big deal,” she said.

The program is also requesting approval from Florida’s State Historic Preservation Office to allow a Naples panel to review preservation projects at the city’s historic properties.

Historic structures, if undergoing improvements, could be exempt from federal floodplain regulations, but only if the state certifies that the improvements won’t alter the structure’s historic character.

This requires homeowners planning the improvements to undergo a lengthy approval process with the state. 

The historical society’s program is requesting the state transfer that authority to the city’s design review board, as it has done elsewhere in Florida, to keep the process local. 

Currently, the design panel reviews the architectural plans and project renderings for developments throughout the city.

Shifting that responsibility to the design panel may result in  the city hiring or contracting with a historic preservation specialist, Planning Director Robin Singer said. 

If the state approves the program, Reed envisions a future where homebuyers in the historic district are connected with preservation-minded real estate professionals, including brokers and architects, who can help provide options.

“There’s a lot of people that I’ve heard from about this,” Reed said. “There just hasn’t been a program to support it.”