The Pewtermark Report
For one site and one request: the chance of final approval, the conditions the board usually attaches, the likely delay, and the reasons behind each, tied to past cases in the public record.
A forecast for a city’s decision.
Before you buy land that needs a zoning approval, know the chance the city will say yes, what it will ask for in return, and how long it will take. Pewtermark builds that forecast from the public record.
What we’re building
Pewtermark Hearing Prep
A prep file for one upcoming hearing: how the board has voted on similar requests, the conditions it tends to impose, the city staff’s recommendation, and the voting rules that apply.
Who it’s for
Land-use attorneys
Before a hearing, see how the board has handled requests like your client’s: the votes, the conditions it attached, how often it put items off, and the voting rule that applies.
Hearing PrepDevelopers
Before you commit to a site, know whether the approval it needs is likely, which conditions to budget for, and how many hearings to plan around.
Report and Hearing PrepLand buyers
When a site’s value depends on an approval it doesn’t have yet, price that uncertainty from the record of past decisions.
ReportLenders
When a loan’s collateral depends on an approval, see the chance it comes through and the likely delay before you set terms.
ReportA sample Hearing Prep
What Hearing Prep would have said the day before a real City of Miami hearing, built from cases decided before that day. It reports the record. It doesn’t forecast the vote.
Pewtermark Hearing Prep · Sample
A preschool for 68 children
As ofSep 3, 2024
The request
An exception to run a preschool for 68 children, plus a waiver for demolition. An exception is a use the zoning code allows at a location only if the board approves it after a hearing.
Who decides, and the vote it needs
PZAB decides this request itself. Its decision stands unless it’s appealed to the City Commission.
An exception needs a supermajority: one more member than a simple majority of the members present. So the yes votes needed depend on who attends.
| Members present | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes votes needed | 5 | 6 | 6 | 7 | 7 |
With 7 members present, 4 yes votes is a majority, and the request still fails.
City staff’s recommendation
Approve, with 17 conditions.
How the board has handled similar requests
Every preschool exception PZAB voted on from January 2022 to the day before this hearing:
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May 17, 2023File 13906PreschoolStaff: approve, 17 conditionsApproved 6–1 at its first hearing, with all 17 conditions.
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Nov 1, 2023File 14397Preschool and charter schoolRecommendation to the City Commission. Staff: approve, 21 conditionsFailed 4–3. With 7 present, it needed 5. It took four hearing dates: two had no quorum and one was continued.
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Dec 6, 2023File 14992Preschool, with a parking reductionRecommendation to the City Commission. Staff: approve, 20 conditionsRecommended for approval 8–0 after one deferral, with 18 conditions: the board rewrote one and dropped two. The City Commission approved it on December 14, 2023.
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Jun 18, 2024File 13949Preschool, county applicantStaff: approve, 29 conditionsApproved 7–0 on its third hearing date, after two without a quorum, with 22 conditions: the board dropped 4 duplicates and 3 others.
The wider pattern: exceptions by private applicants that PZAB decided itself, with staff recommending approval, from January 2022 to the day before this hearing. All 12 were approved, 9 of them at their first hearing.
What to plan for
- Attendance. With 7 members present, approval takes 5 yes votes. The one preschool request that failed had 4.
- A quorum. Two of the four earlier preschool cases lost hearing dates because too few members attended.
- Staff’s conditions. In the three earlier preschool cases that passed, the board adopted staff’s list or a shorter one: 17 of 17, 18 of 20 and 22 of 29.
What happened
On September 4, 2024, PZAB approved the request 7–0 at its first hearing, with all 17 of staff’s conditions. No appeal was found.
Hearing Prep doesn’t forecast the vote, so this sample says nothing about how accurate Pewtermark’s forecasts are. The applicant isn’t named here; the file numbers link to the city’s public record.
How we test
A forecast is worth paying for only if it beats simple rules of thumb, on cases where the answer couldn’t have slipped in. So every forecast is tested on past decisions first.
- Only what was public before the hearing. Each forecast has an “as of” date, the day before the hearing. Documents posted later are left out, and every document’s date is checked.
- Scored against what happened. Three questions for each case: did the board go the applicant’s way, was the request finally approved after any City Commission vote or appeal, and how many hearings did it take. The score is a standard one for percentage forecasts, and it punishes confident misses.
- Compared with simple rules. Always predicting approval; following city staff’s recommendation; and a checklist score from basic facts like the type of request and the staff position. A forecast that can’t beat these isn’t worth selling.
- The pass bar is set before scoring. It includes a minimum number of cases that went against the applicant, so no verdict rests on a handful.
Three stages, in order
- Build, on 2022–2024 cases.Used to design the method. These scores are never quoted as results.
- Check, on 2025 and early 2026 cases.Scored once, after the method is frozen. It isn’t blind, because those outcomes were already public while the method was built.
- Judge, on cases decided after June 2026.Plus forecasts made before upcoming hearings. Only this stage counts toward the public track record.
Track record
Nothing is published yet. Results will be, once the final stage has enough cases to judge.
- Proof of timing. Before each upcoming hearing, the forecast’s digital fingerprint will be timestamped by two independent public services. Only the fingerprint leaves Pewtermark, so the forecast stays private until the vote.
- Published after the vote, with the proofs, so anyone can check that each forecast was made before the hearing and not changed since.
- Misses included. The scorecard shows the forecasts that went wrong next to the ones that went right.
About
Independent
Pewtermark builds forecasts for city land-use decisions from public records. It isn’t affiliated with the City of Miami, doesn’t represent applicants or neighbors, and doesn’t appear before the board. Forecasts on pending applications are never published before their hearings.
The name
A pewter mark, or touch mark, was the mark a pewterer struck on finished work, often carrying the maker’s name or initials. Pewtermark aims to do the same for each forecast: date it, record it, and check it against what happened.
Questions
- Is this legal advice?
- No. Pewtermark reports what the public record shows. For advice on a specific application, talk to a land-use attorney.
- Where does the information come from?
- The City of Miami’s public records: agendas, staff reports, resolutions and recorded votes, for every site-specific case the board has heard since January 2022.
- Which boards does it cover?
- The City of Miami’s Planning, Zoning and Appeals Board, and the City Commission votes that follow its recommendations. Other boards come later.
- How accurate are the forecasts?
- Not published yet. See Track record for how results will be shown.
- Will you publish a forecast on my pending application?
- No. Forecasts on pending applications aren’t published before their hearings.
- Can I use it now?
- Both products are in development. Write to ask about early access.
Terms used here
- PZAB
- The City of Miami’s Planning, Zoning and Appeals Board. It decides exceptions, variances and some appeals, and advises the City Commission on rezonings and land-use changes.
- Exception
- A use the zoning code allows at a location only if the board approves it after a hearing.
- Variance
- Permission to depart from one of the zoning rules by a small amount, usually because something unusual about the property makes the rule hard to meet.
- Rezoning
- Asking the city to change the rules for a piece of land itself.
- Staff report
- The city planners’ written analysis of a request, usually ending in a recommendation: approve, approve with conditions, or deny.
- Conditions
- Changes or promises the board requires as part of a yes.
- Supermajority
- A rule that needs more than a simple majority. At PZAB it’s one more member than a simple majority of those present.
- Quorum
- The minimum number of members who must attend for the board to vote at all.
- Deferral
- Putting an item off to a later meeting without deciding it. A continuance is much the same.
Get in touch
Questions, or interested in early access? Write to zach@pewtermark.com.