OBT Development Board

OBT Development Board The Orange Blossom Trail Development Board, Inc. was created in 1984 to focus solely on the specific needs of the community along the South OBT corridor.

The mission of the OBT Development Board is to revitalize the OBT corridor from W Colonial to the Beachline (N to S) and from Rio Grande to Westmoreland (W to E).

06/01/2026

Some businesses move into a corridor. Ivanhoe Park Brewing Company moved in to be part of one.

"Ivanhoe Park is all about commitment to community. That's been our vision from the beginning."

The proof is in the calendar. Every Wednesday, the Lager House taproom on OBT fills up for Board and Brews, a board game night that started with a handful of regulars and now packs the room. The recent Bad Bunny market drew a crowd that didn't even know the brewery was there. Then the people in that crowd became regulars.

This is the kind of momentum the Orange Blossom Trail Development Board, Commissioner Rose, and the West Lakes District have been quietly stitching together. Not big-budget marketing campaigns. Real local partnerships that put a brand in front of the people who actually live around it.

That's the part of community redevelopment that doesn't show up in a press release. The CRA helps bring a business to a corridor. The community-building is what gets it to stay, grow, and become a third place for the neighborhood.

To the community: the door is open every Wednesday. So is the rest of the week. To investors and stakeholders: this is what a CRA-backed business with cultural traction actually looks like. To anyone watching how OBT changes from here: the change is being built by the people who already live, work, and drink here.

05/29/2026

You don't need a four-year degree to run a CNC machine on the Orange Blossom Trail.

That's by design. The owner of this Orlando manufacturing shop isn't recruiting from engineering schools. He's recruiting from the neighborhood, and he's training operators in-house.

"We tend to be more of an entry level CNC operator position, so we look for people that are maybe not traditionally or technically trained, and we train in house."

This is the part of the CRA story that doesn't get enough airtime. The buildings get the photo ops. The careers that fill those buildings are the actual return. When a CRA-backed business plants on this corridor, the jobs created stay close to home, and the skills get taught to people who would have been overlooked everywhere else.

To the community: that career is hiring near you. To investors and stakeholders: workforce development without a workforce-development line item is a real ROI most spreadsheets miss. To anyone debating whether the OBT CRA delivers value beyond brick and mortar: the value walks in the front door every morning.

05/27/2026

A Facebook ad. A grant application. A new office on the Orange Blossom Trail.

That's the short version of how Marquise McKenzie moved DirtMaster from a home-based hustle into a brick-and-mortar headquarters in the 32805, the same zip code that houses the most justice-impacted residents in Central Florida. The catalyst? OBT Next, the grant program is backed by the Orange Blossom Trail Development Board and the OBT CRA.

This is exactly what a Community Redevelopment Area is built to do.
CRAs aren't bureaucratic line items. They're the engine that takes corridors long written off as blight and rebuilds them block by block, business by business. When a CRA is implemented the right way, you get owners signing leases instead of giving up on them, second-chance employees back on payroll, and tax dollars staying in the neighborhood that generated them.

To the community living and working along OBT: this is your investment coming back to you.

To the investors and stakeholders watching this corridor: this is what activated capital looks like at street level.

To anyone still questioning whether CRAs belong here: Marquise has the answer. He's open for business.

#32805
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05/20/2026

"A company of transformation, not transaction."

That's how Marquise McKenzie describes DirtMaster. And it's not a slogan painted on a wall. It's a hiring policy.

Every employee who walks through the door at DirtMaster carries a story. Some of those stories include time inside the criminal justice system.
Marquise doesn't see that as a disqualifier. He sees it as the starting line.

"We make them realize that their past does not determine their future. We build trust and leadership skills in them from the first day they start."
The numbers behind this aren't soft. Working with the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, Marquise learned that individuals who receive second chance employment are 35% less likely to reoffend. That's not a feel-good metric. That's a public safety statistic.

Now layer that onto the CRA story.

The Orange Blossom Trail CRA didn't just fund a cleaning company moving into 32805. It funded an employment engine for a population most of the market won't touch. That's the compound interest of community redevelopment done right. Every dollar of CRA grant money in DirtMaster's hands buys economic activity, lower recidivism, and a corridor that's safer for everyone who lives on it.

To the community: this is what happens when investment lands in the right hands.

To investors and stakeholders: social ROI and financial ROI live on the same spreadsheet here.

To anyone debating whether the OBT CRA is worth the line item: count the people who didn't go back. That's the answer.
#32805

05/18/2026

When the owner of Plywood Express was asked what to tell lawmakers about the CRA program, his answer was direct: "I strongly suggest to keep it."

Here's why.

Before he could grow the business, he had to make it safe. Fences up. Cameras up, 24 hours a day, two weeks of recorded footage on rolling backup. Because employees don't do their best work in a place that doesn't feel secure, and customers don't keep coming back to one either.

That kind of investment isn't glamorous. It's foundational. And it's the kind of expense most small businesses can't front on their own. The CRA closed the gap.

His words again: "It's something you can clearly measure."

Employees protected. Customers retained. Property values trending up on a corridor that used to drift the other way. That's the math.

To the community: a safer OBT isn't a slogan. It's the lights, cameras, and locked fences paid for by a program built to do exactly this kind of work. To investors and stakeholders: this is what de-risks the next deal on this stretch. To lawmakers: the people running businesses on OBT are telling you what they need. Keep the CRA.

05/15/2026

Two new 30-barrel tanks. One fermenter, one bright. That's how Ivanhoe Park Brewing Company kept up with Trader Joe's going statewide.

Without the CRA grant, those tanks don't exist. Without those tanks, the contract collapses.

That's the kind of moment most small businesses don't survive. A career-defining contract lands, and you don't have the equipment to deliver. The CRA grant solved the problem in steel and copper, then went further. The grant also helped bring the beer back in-house from a contract brewer in Lakeland, which means better margins, tighter quality control, and product that's actually made on the corridor it's sold from.

Beer education got funded. New staff got trained for tours, tastings, and the walk-through that turns a tourist into a regular. A portion went toward starting the distilling process, opening a whole new product category in the next year.

This is what redevelopment looks like when it actually reaches operations. Not a sign on the building. New equipment, new product lines, new revenue, new jobs, all funded so a small Orlando brewery could meet a national-scale opportunity head-on.

To the community: every pint poured in-house feeds back into the corridor that made it possible. To investors and stakeholders: the CRA is closing the gap between contract and capacity, the exact gap most small businesses can't bridge alone. To anyone still asking what the OBT CRA is for: it's for the day a Trader Joe's contract lands and an Orlando brewery has the tanks to fulfill it.

05/13/2026

Before he was a CEO, he was a kid who hated cleaning.

Marquise McKenzie's mom ran a tight house. The kind of strict where the rags get folded a certain way and the floors get done twice. He didn't appreciate it growing up. Years later, sitting inside a cell, he realized those lessons had quietly become his trade.

That's how DirtMaster was born. A janitorial, construction, and residential cleaning company built on one promise: if we didn't clean it, it's not clean.

This is exactly the story the OBT CRA was designed to back.

Community Redevelopment Areas exist because talent doesn't only come from boardrooms and business schools. It comes from kitchens. From corridors. From cells. The job of the CRA, when it's implemented right, is to recognize that talent early and put real capital behind it. That's how blighted blocks turn into operating businesses. That's how a zip code most people drove past becomes a zip code people drive to.

To the community: your story is the next investment.

To investors and stakeholders: this is the kind of return that builds a corridor, not just a balance sheet.

To anyone still debating whether the Orange Blossom Trail CRA earns its keep: the proof clocks in every morning in 32805.

#32805

05/06/2026

The system calls them "collateral consequences."

That's the legal term for what happens after the sentence is over. The locked doors. The closed applications. The "we regret to inform you" letters that pile up when a felony conviction follows you home.

Marquise McKenzie didn't fully understand any of that until he lived it.
"It was hard for me to further my education. It was hard for me to get a certain job."
So he went back to a plan he'd had before prison: start a business. He named it DirtMaster, and it grew out of the same skill that helped him survive the inside, where rights were earned back through cleaning, one task at a time.

This is the story most second-chance hiring programs are designed to address from the wrong end. They wait for someone to find a job that won't have them. The OBT CRA, by funding businesses like DirtMaster, attacks the problem at the source. It puts capital in the hands of operators who will hire the population that the rest of the market won't.

This is the story most second-chance hiring programs are designed to address from the wrong end. They wait for someone to find a job that won't have them. The OBT CRA, by funding businesses like DirtMaster, attacks the problem at the source. It puts capital in the hands of operators who will hire the population the rest of the market won't.

To the community: this is what entrepreneurship looks like when the door slams the loudest.

To investors and stakeholders: founder grit isn't a metric you can buy. The CRA finds it and funds it.

To anyone debating whether the OBT CRA is worth the line item: there are people on this corridor running businesses precisely because somebody bet on them when nobody else would.

We want to thank Orlando Health and amazing volunteers for a successful Rollin & Strollin event this past weekend. ✨️...
04/01/2026

We want to thank Orlando Health and amazing volunteers for a successful Rollin & Strollin event this past weekend. ✨️

Our vendors and volunteers came out to connect with our community. We had so much fun and excitement learning how to be safe on our roads.

Also, thanks to Kyle's Bike Shop for checking the bikes and helping us prepare them for our riders.💫

A lot of work goes into this event, and we appreciate the Holden Heights Community Center for accommodating Rollin' and Strollin' this year. 👌🏽

03/28/2026

We are Rollin' and Strollin at Holden Heights Community Center!

Address

2800 S. Orange Blossom Trail
Orlando, FL
32805

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm

Telephone

+14078551705

Website

https://bit.ly/3NceL4s

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