Cruisers are no longer welcome in Florida!

[SV Lady Lena]

Good afternoon cruisers, I have embarked on a post covid trek to Florida to get a jump on the winter cruising season to the Keys and Bahamas; like i've done many times in the past. Except it would appear during the covid epidemic local and state politicians have been raging war against the poor and lower working class! Hear me out! There is no doubt we've all seen the problem here with derelicts and that problem lies solely with the greedy politicians that created heaping mounds of red tape to clear the water ways of these wasted vessels. But what's new is with Florida's economy in the dumps people can no longer afford to live in their traditional land based homes and there has been a huge trend of people moving to the cheaper alternative of water life. I'm certain many of you guys and gals have seen a huge uptick in live aboard boats every where and many times creating serious navigation and anchoring problems! So it would seem that Florida and every local government agency rather than working with those local communities and new live aboard folks they would rather starve them from every access point to land. It doesn't take a genius to see where this is leading! Yes ever since I started my path down into Florida ICW waters every place that was convenient to stop anchor and access land for water, groceries, food or just a fun night in town has been completely cut off by threatening laws and ordinances! I am currently in Tarpon Bay and can tell you it has been a complete hell trying to enjoy myself! Its hard enough sometimes trying to chart, plan and navigate that far without all this petty BS! I wonder how many millions of dollars was spent trying to implement all this to harass these poor people but I can tell you when I get back I'm selling my boat and ill start flying to the Bahamas or wherever I go without ever stepping foot in Florida again! They have taken the fun and challenge out of cruising! My advise is unless you have lots of money to afford those expensive marinas; (I do not), get them early because they cant accommodate everyone (I'm sure you seen FL marinas only cater to the wealthy yachtsman!) and they'll likely jack their rates up even more. If your like me on a budget you'll want to plan on not stopping even for anchoring; yes new laws are coming into affect on that as well-police harassment included! It was customary for me to spend a week in Largo before heading on but if I can't access land for basic necessities for the trip then that changes everything! I'm guessing these politicians didn't factor in the hundreds if not thousands of cruisers who travel through Florida to reach the Keys, Bahamas or anywhere in the Caribbean for that matter. It's clear they don't want you, your family, your boat or your money! It's their loss I'll take my money elsewhere!

[GreenWave]

There are plenty of places to anchor, dock, no land your dinghy. You just have to pay.

[5BTM]

Really?
Hundreds of stories like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GlKQDKFDuI

Ever try to negotiate with the irresponsible hippy-dippy crowd
that believes everything should be free?

[Simi 60]

Originally Posted by GreenWave

There are plenty of places to anchor, dock, no land your dinghy. You just have to pay.

Pay to anchor?

[Tetepare]

Paragraph breaks are your friend.

[catalystcat]

Sorry to hear about your negative experiences. That's not what I've seen, but, I'm mostly on the East Coast and not very close to the Tarpon Springs.

I can tell you that Florida's economy is certainly not in the dumps. From the SpaceCoast boom to the emerging Wall Street of the South near Miami to the resurgence of tourism in Central Florida, the economy has rebounded quite strongly. I kinda miss the light traffic from 2021. It may be that some of the places on the Gulf Coast have not yet rebounded.

On the East Coast, the ICW from Daytona to Lake Worth (and maybe elsewhere), has a lot of anchorages that are available and provide ready shore access. Some examples are Titusville (near the barge canal), Cape Canaveral (near the locks), Merritt Island (South end and near 520), Melbourne (near 192), Sebastian (near the spoil islands), Vero Beach/Wabasso (near the causeways), Fort Pierce (just N of the bridge and near the S beach), Stuart (Hooker Point, Manatee Pocket, mooring fields near old town), Jupiter (just N), Lake Worth (though it's not as nice, friendly, or convenient as it used to be); etc. Some of them may require a bike or Uber ride to get to things.

[SeanPatrick]

Originally Posted by Tetepare

Paragraph breaks are your friend.

^ This.

I didn't even read the OP once I saw it was a wall of text. If you can't be bothered to write in a proper manner, then I can't be bothered to care about whatever it is you are upset about.

[Sun and Moon]

ummm... I'm in Florida. There are countless places to dinghy to shore. Lots of lottery money has gone into day-use areas with boat ramps and day docks. And they're all free. There are three within two miles of me and several more a little farther away.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Simi 60

Pay to anchor?

Not pay to anchor, but in some places you may have to pay for a spot to put the dinghy to get ashore. Not everywhere has somewhere public / free that you can just leave the dinghy.

[smj]

Were you referencing Tarpon Basin in Key Largo and not Tarpon Bay? If so, there’s good reasons the free dinghy dock is no longer available. Please thank those that abused the privilege and ruined it for all that appreciated it.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by smj

Were you referencing Tarpon Basin in Key Largo and not Tarpon Bay? If so, there’s good reasons the free dinghy dock is no longer available. Please thank those that abused the privilege and ruined it for all that appreciated it.

Exactly. I’m aware of someone left my Marina recently and they are abusing a free slip at one of the small towns that provides them. I feel like going over and towing them out to sea. I’m kidding of course, but I’m very upset that they would do something like this. They’re going to ruin it for everyone else.

I really haven’t seen much of what the OP is describing. The facilities are still here.

To the OP: Take a look at waterway guide or get a guidebook. There are probably dozens and dozens of places that you don’t know about that you can use.

[Captain Bill]

While the poor may be part of the problem, they probably don't want their home to sink. The largest problem is that the most common way people permanently leave Florida is in a coffin. Many of these people were boat owners and also have no heirs. in their last few years of life the boats get very neglected. Once they pass a marina is often left with a poorly maintained boat in a slip that no one is paying for. If it sinks at the dock it's the marina's problem. Furthermore it cost a great deal to properly scrap it. The easiest solution is to tow it somewhere under cover of darkness and drop its anchor. Now it's the state's problem. I know of two boats that disappeared out of marinas that were formerly owned by single dead guys. This was after many efforts by the marinas to get title and failing. No one ever said where the boats went. Maybe people should stop jumping to the conclusion that poor working people are responsible for the state's failure to come up with a workable solution to the problem of old boat owners dying before the boat has to be salvaged from the bottom.



The second thing is that part of Florida boat registration fees are sent to the counties for the purpose of dealing with derelict boats among other things. Each county is supposed to send a yearly report on how they spent the money. These reports are public records, yet when I called the FWC to see if I could get a copy of the report for my county they told me I would have to sue them. In my county the money seemed to disappear into the parks and recreation dept. budget but I could never find out how the money was spent. The amount for the county in question was almost 300k per year yet, the county always complained that it didn't have any money for removing derelict boats.



I figured that an organization might have better luck getting a report out of the FWC than I did so I talked to the legal guy for the SSCA. He got the same answer I did.

[Knotical]

Huge rant with a lot of generalization and not enough specifics - how exactly were you treated badly? Where? By who? Those will help find solutions. AFAIK, most people have positive experience in FL.

[CarlF]

The question is why should someone who spends money maintaining a dock and paying taxes on it should let you use it for free?

While free anchoring is a tradition. Free dinghy parking has never been easy in built up areas. It's a bit like free car parking. You can't park your car on someone's front lawn and walk across their property to the store.

But if you are planning to spend money at a business with docks they will almost almost always let you park your dinghy - this includes paying a marina a small charge for a day of dinghy dockage or paying for a mooring.

Some municipalities still provide public docks but I can understand why local tax payers would prefer their tax dollars to go to schools for their kids rather than free dinghy docks for a bunch of cruisers who don't pay their share.

[Sailor Sailor]

Originally Posted by Captain Bill

... These reports are public records, yet when I called the FWC to see if I could get a copy of the report for my county they told me I would have to sue them. In my county the money seemed to disappear into the parks and recreation dept. budget but I could never find out how the money was spent. The amount for the county in question was almost 300k per year yet, the county always complained that it didn't have any money for removing derelict boats.



I figured that an organization might have better luck getting a report out of the FWC than I did so I talked to the legal guy for the SSCA. He got the same answer I did.

Send a FOIA request. There are forms online.