By 1990 Sarasota, like the rest of the Tampa Bay region in Florida, was under serious water restrictions. Despite a barrage of public media exhortations to conserve water, water consumption continued to rise. Finally, a building moratorium referendum was placed on the November ballot. The local political climate was highly charged and focused on “growth” versus “no-growth.”

A few interested citizens, led by the University of Florida/IFAS Sarasota County Extension, a local non-profit Earth Metabolics Design Lab (Earth MD Lab) and a number of development and environmental interests, and stimulated by a desire to develop a community-based solution to the water conservation challenge, organized diverse community interests into a coalition to explore common ground. Their goal was to increase public participation in the planning process and the conservation campaign through demonstrating positive economic solutions for environmental problems. Discussions centered around the construction of a model home and landscape that would be a new and innovative learning center to demonstrate real life solutions to water, energy and environmental dilemmas. In that center Extension educators and trained volunteers would provide teaching and guidance for visitors to the center.

Earth MD Lab changed its name to the Florida House Institute and partnered with UF/IFAS Extension to create a public/private partnership to lead the effort through visioning, planning, fund-raising and construction. Professionals volunteered their time to develop plans for the house and landscape using most current resource conservation products and materials. It quickly became obvious that the project afforded a not-to-be-missed opportunity to demonstrate not only water conservation, but building techniques and a design and development philosophy that would lead toward a sustainable lifestyle in which resources are used with maximum efficiency. Today we call this green building and sustainable living. Committees were formed to take on leadership in landscaping, house design, fundraising and education, and a final planning decision was made to use the traditional Florida “cracker style” model for the house.

The Sarasota County School Board became a partner in the effort and donated a site for the house and landscape on the campus of the Sarasota County Technical Institute. The School Board rented the site to the County for $1 a year for a period of five years, which has now stretched to 15 years. The Southwest Florida Water Management District provided the first grant, for $80,000. This grant required matching funds, so in-kind services and donations were solicited from businesses and individuals. Florida Power and Light Company donated $20,000; the Selby Foundation donated $40,500; and the National Estuary Program and Home Depot Corporation donated $10,000 each. All told, there were more than 200 contributors for the project. In the years since the project was built, more than 100 more contributors have donated products or services to the project.

In September of 1992 a Groundbreaking Ceremony was held, and the Florida House Learning Center, as it came to be called, became more than just a vision. Throughout 1993 scores of community volunteers built the Florida House with guidance from professionals. Students from the Technical Institute on campus helped with the construction of the house as a part of their building trades curriculum. Even before the house was completed, it was entered into and became part of the 1993 Sarasota Parade of Homes.

The construction took nearly two years to complete. In early 1994 the finishing touches were put on the house and landscape, and it opened to the public on Earth Day in April of 1994. The thousands of man-hours that were donated by hundreds of volunteers had created a unique community demonstration center unlike any other, and a huge plaque in the covered porch commemorates each donor and testifies to the fact that this special project was truly a community endeavor. It was not surprising that the center quickly became a Sarasota treasure; what was surprising was the speed with which it became a regional, statewide, national, and even international attraction. It was a new, effective public education delivery system that showed citizens the best off-the-shelf technologies to promote resource conservation, recycling and building techniques and materials that enhance our quality of life while protecting our environment and meeting our economic sustainability needs.

In addition to its educational mission, the project seeks to stimulate consumer demand for “green” products and methods, and everything featured at the Florida House is readily available off the shelf. By demonstrating positive, real life, economic solutions to environmental dilemmas, the Learning Center has stimulated the marketplace in a number of tangible ways, for example, the creation of an Environmental Award category in the annual Homebuilder’s Parade of Homes. Where once there were none, Sarasota now boasts many builders and developers committed to achieving certification by the Florida Green Building Coalition. Scores of new homes embodying Florida House concepts have been built.