Delray Beach’s planning and zoning board has voted against a proposal to permit an indoor gun range in the Wallace Drive Overlay District, but the matter will still be considered by the city commission.
The application was made by Wallace Drive LLC, which owns an 18,400-square-foot flex office warehouse at 1215 Wallace Drive. The company is seeking approval for an ordinance that would allow indoor gun ranges within this industrial area. The site is located next to a senior housing community and a church, and is about 1,000 feet from Pine Grove Elementary School.
At Monday’s meeting, four out of seven planning and zoning board members opposed the proposal. Neil Schiller, attorney for Wallace Drive LLC, explained that the planned facility would serve both private members and Delray Beach police officers for firearms training.
If approved, the legislation would enable owners of 12 other parcels in the overlay district—bounded by Southwest Tenth Street, Georgia Street, Southwest Ninth Avenue and Wallace Drive—to submit their own plans for similar facilities to the city commission. The area currently contains a self-storage business, two warehouses, two single-family homes, and five vacant lots; three of these are owned by the city.
Schiller stated that under proposed rules, any gun range would require 24-hour security, compliance with National Rifle Association safety standards and local noise regulations, as well as a ban on alcohol sales on site.
Despite these measures, some board members expressed concern over proximity to residential communities and schools. Mitch Katz noted that while there had been discussions about distance requirements for vape shops near sensitive sites like schools in recent meetings, such requirements were not included in this proposal for gun ranges. “But gun ranges? Well, we can just put them across the street from a school,” he said. Schiller responded that his client’s property is at least 1,000 feet away from Pine Grove Elementary School.
Board member Dedrick Straghn raised concerns about placing a private gun range near both a church and senior residences. He also pointed out that another gun range already operates within the city’s mixed industrial-commercial district less than half a mile away: “This doesn’t smell right to me,” Straghn said.
Mark Grafton, another attorney representing Wallace Drive LLC’s interests, said that if built the facility would be state-of-the-art and meet law enforcement needs such as low-light training scenarios.
Chairman Gregory Snyder suggested adding regulations requiring future ranges to be at least 500 feet from schools or churches and limiting noise levels beyond property lines to no more than 60 decibels. However only Snyder himself along with Katz and Roger Cope supported moving forward with these amendments; Straghn joined Price Patton James Chard and Judy Mollica in voting against them.
Wallace Drive LLC is managed by Delia Lalchan who purchased 1215 Wallace Drive for $5.8 million earlier this year from Aram LLC.
The property lies roughly one-and-a-half miles from Kolter Group’s planned Alton Delray development—a project set to include workforce apartments under Florida’s Live Local Act—and less than two miles from Aura Delray Beach which was recently acquired by an affiliate of Related Companies for nearly $117 million.
