Summary

 
By April 2026, the Sarasota Manatee Airport Authority (SMAA) had prepared a draft License  Agreement authorizing New College of Florida to use a narrow strip of airport-owned land  formerly occupied by the DeSoto Road right-of-way. The agreement authorizes New College to  construct and maintain monument signs identifying its new baseball facility as the "Beruff  Family Field of Dreams." New College is to pay an annual fee for use of the property until  November 30, 2056, the same date the existing leases of 34 acres of airport property to New  College also expire. The License Agreement does not amend or reference the existing leases,  even though the monument sign serves the baseball facility being constructed on both leased  airport land and adjacent state-owned land. As this manuscript is being completed in mid-July  2026, the License Agreement has not yet been fully executed, although construction of the  monument sign structure is already underway. 

The baseball facility will occupy three separate parcels of land. The stadium and much of the  infield will be located on state-owned property used by New College. Most of the outfield will  be located on airport property leased by SMAA to New College/the state. The monument sign  will be located on a separate strip of airport-owned land made available through the proposed  License Agreement.
The use of a License Agreement is significant because the monument sign is clearly intended to  be a permanent feature of the baseball facility rather than a temporary improvement. Constructed  of masonry and serving as the principal identification for the facility, the monument sign is  intended to remain for as long as the baseball facility remains in operation. Nothing about the  project suggests the sign is intended to exist only temporarily. 

Internal SMAA communications indicate that airport staff considered various methods of  authorizing New College's use of this parcel, such as a quit-claim deed, an easement and a lease. They ultimately selected a License Agreement. Those communications also discuss avoiding the need to obtain FAA approval to release the property from federal airport obligations. Under  normal circumstances that may have worked. 

The FAA's February 12, 2025 "14 CFR Part 13 Review Report," however, established an  additional requirement. Although the FAA concluded that the existing New College lease was  essentially "grandfathered," it also directed SMAA to submit certain future agreements involving  New College to the Orlando Airports District Office for review. Among the situations requiring  FAA review were proposals to: 

• enter into a new agreement with the same lessee for the same or similar purposes;

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• enter into a new agreement with a different lessee for the same or similar purposes; 

• enter into a new agreement with the same or different lessee for any nonaeronautical  purpose; 

If the proposed License Agreement falls within one or more of these categories, the FAA's own  guidance suggests that the agreement should be submitted for FAA review regardless of whether  it is called a license, a lease, an easement, or another form of agreement. 

Significance 

Property law has long distinguished between temporary permission to use land and long-term  property interests. Licenses, leases, easements, and deeds each exist because they serve  different legal purposes and reflect different expectations regarding permanence. 

A license traditionally grants a personal privilege to use another person's land for a limited  purpose. It generally contemplates that the permitted use is temporary. Common examples  include parking permits, campground permits, hunting licenses, and admission tickets.

 
Permanent improvements intended to remain in place for decades have traditionally been  addressed through different legal instruments. When both parties expect a land use to continue  throughout the useful life of a facility, they commonly use a deed, a long-term ground lease, or a recorded easement because those instruments more accurately reflect the enduring nature of the  arrangement. 

That distinction is important here. 

The monument sign is not a temporary improvement. It is a permanent feature identifying a long term collegiate baseball facility. There is no indication that either SMAA or New College expects  the monument sign to be removed before the baseball facility ceases operation. To the contrary,  the obvious expectation is that the sign will remain for the life of the facility—likely thirty years  or longer. 

If that is the parties' expectation, several alternatives would appear to more accurately reflect the  long-term nature of the arrangement: 
• obtaining FAA approval to release the narrow parcel from federal airport obligations and  selling it to New College; 
• incorporating the narrow parcel into the existing long-term ground lease of 34 acres  through a lease amendment; or 
• granting a recorded long-term easement for the monument sign and related access. 

Each of those approaches would openly recognize the permanent nature of the improvement. A  License Agreement, by contrast, characterizes the arrangement as temporary even though the  improvement itself is plainly intended to remain for decades. 

The FAA's February 12, 2025 Review Report also raises a second question. If the proposed  License Agreement falls within one or more of the categories identified by the FAA for  mandatory review, then changing the legal instrument from a lease or lease amendment to a  license would not eliminate the requirement to submit the agreement to the FAA. In that event,  the practical benefit of using a License Agreement instead of a more traditional property  instrument becomes difficult to identify. 

This may also explain why the License Agreement was drafted by April 2026 but had not been  executed as of mid-July 2026. I do not know why the agreement remained unsigned, and there  may have been reasons unrelated to FAA review. However, if airport officials concluded that the  FAA expected to review the proposed agreement regardless of its title, additional review or  reconsideration would not have been surprising. Apparently, the monument sign is being  constructed without the benefit of any agreement to use the airport land. 

As of mid-July 2026, I have also requested construction drawings showing whether additional  portions of the baseball facility—including stormwater facilities or utilities—are planned within this same licensed area. If permanent infrastructure serving the baseball facility is also  constructed within the licensed area, the long-term commitment of airport property would  become even more substantial than the monument sign alone suggests. 

This development continues a pattern documented throughout this book. Rather than addressing  long-term land use through legal instruments traditionally associated with permanent property  interests, SMAA again adopted an unconventional approach that appears designed to characterize  a permanent use of airport property as temporary. Whether that characterization ultimately has  any significance under the FAA's February 12, 2025 Review Report depends upon whether the  proposed License Agreement falls within the categories of agreements that the FAA directed  SMAA to submit for review before execution. I believe it does. 

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