Public vs Private Beach [threads merged]

[Danny Glidewell]

John G, without adequate public beach the demand for properties that do not have beachfront will decrease and thus will need to cut prices which will change the clientele in a negative fashion. And that lower demand will increase pressure for TDC to increase advertising to prop up demand and will reduce the amount of funds available to purchase additional beachfront for public use. The Sheriff cannot hire enough deputies to enforce the trespass violations and pandemonium will be the order of the day.
The only solution that will work for both sides is to increase the amount of public owned beachfront. Rather than pay attorneys millions with no certainty as to outcome maybe it would be it might be better to start eminent domain proceedings on the white sand areas near the existing public beaches. The process could continue as money is available and we see what the exact value of the white sand area is. Since you cannot build on it, grow anything on it or do much of anything except sunbath on it, the value might not be very much after all. Then the owners are compensated and the public can utilize the beaches free and clear.
But BMBvagrant has a valid point. The politics of it are simple. There are at most a couple of thousand beachfront voters against the vast majority of Sowal voters north of 30-A/98 and the vast majority of Nowal voters who want to continue to have a job and enjoy the beach too. So either the BCC will move to secure the beaches for the public or there will be new commissioners elected who will.
I think a compromise of taking down the signs and fences while the county vigorously purchases beachfront with TDC funds formerly used for advertising while increasing enforcement against the common nuisances and restricting vending might be in everyone's best interests. Because fighting in court for years helps no one.

 

[Dawn]

Exactly, 100% correct.

We can thank Dawn and the TDC for all the increase.

It's supply and demand. Demand is up, supply is down. In economics, that's about the time for a price increase.

You solve this issue by;

Owners to increase rental rates, year round. Price out the riff raff.

County to crack down, if not completely remove, vendors from County beaches.

Hold Sheriff Mike accountable for not enforcing trespass and for requiring people to have signs, ropes, etc. It's his SOP...

Have to TDC immediately cease funding marketing and look for ways to solve problems, not create them.

Enforcement the current rules and regulations we have for dogs on beach, glass on beach, parking, etc.

Not that hard.

Myopic. Bed tax collectors want their beds filled every night of the year. The job of TDC is to do it and spend as much as they can to acheive that. You might as well blame BP for the $11 million the TDC was given after the spill. Or blame builders for continuing to build bedrooms. Or blame people who buy the rental homes.

 

[John G]

Myopic. Bed tax collectors want their beds filled every night of the year. The job of TDC is to do it and spend as much as they can to acheive that. You might as well blame BP for the $11 million the TDC was given after the spill. Or blame builders for continuing to build bedrooms. Or blame people who buy the rental homes.

I do blame builders for building homes on postage stamp sized lots without adequate parking.

I do blame people who buy rental homes and then turn their closets into bunk bed rooms.

Our area is running out of room.

We either get more "room" or cut back on the volume.

I personally like the idea of cutting back on volume.

 

[jkmason]

Regency Towers is now blocking off their beach to the waterline.

 

[BlueMtnBeachVagrant]

Dawn and John G, here's who you can blame (although I'm preaching to the choir here - I hope). It's extremely clear to me...

Walton County and the TDC (one and the same) are to blame.​

They make little to no effort whatsoever to inform the public that "most" of the Beaches of South Walton are not public. Why?...pressure from businesses and others who financially thrive on the masses - and that's practically every business in South Walton with the obvious exception of beach front private property owners.

It truly is a very simple case of follow the money.​

Several years ago, I remember posting in this forum something along the lines that encouraging all the growth could actually backfire and actually hurt those locals who were accustomed to using public accesses without incident. I'm not sure if anybody really understood what I was trying to say. Subsequent beach nourishment efforts almost made that a moot point - but not now.

So now we have overcrowding on our public accesses putting greater and greater pressure on old time adjacent private beach, beach vendors running off the public from OUR public beaches, severe parking issues, etc.

It is out of control and the county is in a state of panic as much for political reasons as anything else.

Just in case some people don't know it, money and politics go hand in hand. But in this situation, it's not the "rich and greedy" beach front owners greasing the system.

The county's efforts to "fix" things such as with exploring customary use on any wide scale and public beach vending remind me of trying to put out an electrical fire with water.

 

[sunspotbaby]

Regency Towers is now blocking off their beach to the waterline.

They've been doing that for years.

 

[BlueMtnBeachVagrant]

From FLEECING FLORIDA'S LANDOWNERS.....

"Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Adams, Mason, Witherspoon, Madison and all of the other Founding Fathers knew that without a Constitution that zealously protected the property rights of its citizens, a king, a pope, a landlord, a tyrant, a battalion of soldiers, or in modern times, your trespassing neighbor or an oligarchy of five justices on the Supreme Court, could take away your property rights – natural rights founded on natural law precepts that were literally written by the blood of our forefathers."


"....Good simply means getting whatever you want, and evil is anything that might stand in your way of getting it. My desires equal my rights.

Show me a monopoly (radical eminent domain, trespassers’ rights) and I’ll show you a tyranny (Florida’s beachfront property belongs to everybody)."

 

[Misty]

They've been doing that for years.

This just popped up on facebook. I believe the original poster is Doug Freret from Destin Fl.

Dear Regency Towers and all other condo operators in Okaloosa and Walton Counties :

You do not own the entire beach in front of your property. The base rule is that you own to the mean high water line (MHWL). That line is measured over an 18.6 year cycle and is fairly hard to determine on any given day. Both Okaloosa and Walton County Sheriffs Offices have interpreted this line for claims of trespassing as either 20 or 25 feet from the water debris line.

However, on any beach that has been renourished using public funds, such as the one in front of Regency Towers and most of Okaloosa beaches east of the pass, private property only extends to the previous MHWL, a line known as the Erosion Control Line (ECL). This line lies somewhere between the dune line and the water. Pictures of the beach before renourishment show many area beaches only 30 to 50 feet wide. If you care to know the exact location of the ECL for your property, you can commission a survey. See the U.S. Supreme Court decision in
Stop the Beach Renourishment v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection which directly addressed Destin property owners claims up to the new MHWL. They lost.

I understand the value of waterfront property and your desire to protect that value as much as possible for your condo owners. But chaining off the beach all the way to the surf line is beyond obnoxious. It is also a violation of city ordinance to set up commercial chairs within 20 feet of the water. Your baseless threats of prosecution for trespass is also likely illegal, especially for people sitting close to the water line.

Please be a good citizen and share public beaches while protecting your property rights and reporting nuisance behavior. But stop being hostile to public use of the beaches.

It's wrong and you know it. So knock it off.

 

[John G]

Dawn and John G, here's who you can blame (although I'm preaching to the choir here - I hope). It's extremely clear to me...

Walton County and the TDC (one and the same) are to blame.​

They make little to no effort whatsoever to inform the public that "most" of the Beaches of South Walton are not public. Why?...pressure from businesses and others who financially thrive on the masses - and that's practically every business in South Walton with the obvious exception of beach front private property owners.

It truly is a very simple case of follow the money.​

Several years ago, I remember posting in this forum something along the lines that encouraging all the growth could actually backfire and actually hurt those locals who were accustomed to using public accesses without incident. I'm not sure if anybody really understood what I was trying to say. Subsequent beach nourishment efforts almost made that a moot point - but not now.

So now we have overcrowding on our public accesses putting greater and greater pressure on old time adjacent private beach, beach vendors running off the public from OUR public beaches, severe parking issues, etc.

It is out of control and the county is in a state of panic as much for political reasons as anything else.

Just in case some people don't know it, money and politics go hand in hand. But in this situation, it's not the "rich and greedy" beach front owners greasing the system.

The county's efforts to "fix" things such as with exploring customary use on any wide scale and public beach vending remind me of trying to put out an electrical fire with water.

I couldn't agree more.

I think it would be worth finding those historical posts.

I agree that the County is in a state of panic, BIG TIME. Their efforts at taking the beach via re-nourishment failed badly. That was plan A.

This new nonsense is plan B.

Like most things in this County, they were not very well thought out and thus, chaos and lawsuits to follow.

 

[Teresa]

I just can't believe we now have signs, ropes, chain in addition to lines of chairs and umbrellas - now featured up and down our beaches. This is NOT acceptable regardless of private, public or otherwise owned. One or two small plain signs at a state park preserved beach that says "stay off dunes" is as far as it should ever go.