Stetson University Plans to Redevelop Its Tampa Law Campus

• Stetson University is redeveloping its 6.5-acre Tampa Law Center at 1700 N. Tampa St. with Bromley Companies.
• The plan: 670 apartments, a 300-key hotel, 440,000 SF of office and 37,500 SF of retail, plus a new law school building.
• A rezoning request is before Tampa City Council now; groundbreaking is targeted for late 2027.
• Bromley built the $1.8 billion Midtown Tampa; Stetson keeps the law center and permanent access to the hotel and garage.

The Plan

Stetson is turning its own campus into a development site. The university is partnering with New York-based Bromley Companies to remake the 6.5-acre Tampa Law Center property at 1700 N. Tampa St. into a mixed-use district: 670 apartments, a 300-key hotel, 440,000 square feet of office and 37,500 square feet of retail, wrapped around a new home for the law school itself.

The project needs a rezoning approval from Tampa City Council before it can move. If that clears, construction comes in three phases, starting with the new law center so classes keep running uninterrupted at the existing facility. Only once the new building opens does the university tear down the old one. Groundbreaking is targeted for late 2027, with the multiphase build-out timeline still being finalized.

Stetson isn't cashing out. The university keeps ownership of the new law center and gets permanent access to the project's hotel and parking garage, a structure that lets Bromley build the revenue-generating pieces around an anchor tenant that isn't going anywhere.

Why Now

The opening came from an unplanned vacancy. The Florida Second District Court of Appeals, a longtime tenant at the Tampa Law Center, relocated to the Bernie McCabe Courthouse in downtown St. Petersburg in February. That freed up space Stetson had held onto for two decades and gave the university a reason to rethink the site's future.

Stetson bought the land from the City of Tampa in 2002, on what was previously the Tampa Heights police station. The current law center opened in 2004, built after a 1997 survey showed demand for part-time legal education in the Tampa Bay market. Roughly 1,000 students are enrolled across Stetson's law campuses, with the Tampa site supporting the school's Flex JD program for working professionals alongside the main Gulfport campus.

CEO Nicholas Haines frames Bromley's role as connective tissue for a site that sits between three of Tampa's growth corridors:

"A true gateway, linking downtown, the Heights and the Riverwalk."

Bromley's Track Record

Bromley isn't new to Tampa scale. Haines-led Bromley is the developer behind Midtown Tampa, a 22-acre, $1.8 billion mixed-use project between the Westshore and Downtown districts that opened in March 2021 with 1.8 million square feet across office, residential, a hotel and public space. The Stetson site gives the firm a second large Tampa mixed-use bet, this time built around an institutional anchor instead of ground-up retail.

A Crowded Tampa Pipeline

Stetson's move fits two trends at once. Nationally, universities are increasingly developing their own real estate to add revenue streams and build student villages rather than leasing it out. The University of South Florida is doing the same nearby with its $268 million, 27-acre Fletcher District, now under construction on its Tampa campus.

Locally, the Stetson deal lands amid a wave of Tampa mixed-use announcements. The Pérez family's Related Group broke ground last week on Manor Riverwalk, an $800 million, 1,200-unit project with 37,000 square feet of retail in downtown Tampa. Third Lake Partners closed last week on the 54-acre WestShore Plaza for $135 million, clearing the way to redevelop the mall into housing, shops, offices and restaurants. Kettler and Darryl Shaw are advancing a 50-acre redevelopment at the edge of Ybor City known as Gasworx, and Kolter Urban is building ONE Tampa, a 42-story luxury condo tower.

What's Next

The rezoning application is the gating item. If Tampa City Council approves it, Bromley starts with the new law center, keeping Stetson's Flex JD program running without a gap, before the hotel, apartments, office, and retail phases follow and the current building comes down.