You may remember back in May when we shared the Herald Tribune’s story about a long running breach-of-contract dispute that the City of Sarasota had with Buck-Leiter Development over the Palm Avenue Parking Garage that, at the time, resulted in a nearly $50 million bill for the City of Sarasota. Here’s some good news for the city: on Thursday, August 16, County Court Judge Erika Quartermaine ordered the judgment be reduced from $49.8 million to $1.4 million plus interest. The reasoning behind this decision is that Buck-Leiter’s evidence for its lost profits caused by the city were speculative, and did not take into consideration how the economy declined during the great recession. The reduced sentence will be a huge relief for the city and allow it to focus on things like a variety of proposed city improvements.

To learn more about the original dispute and its reduction, read Nicole Rodriguez’s story on the Herald Tribune.