- May 17, 2024
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Hoping to avoid becoming home to the kind of on-the-water concession stand that's been causing controversy in St. Johns County, Flagler County has banned unpowered "floating structures" from its waters.
The County Commission voted unanimously Sept. 6 to pass an ordinance barring the structures, except in marinas.
County Commissioner Donald O'Brien said he'd noticed such a structure this past weekend, just north of the Flagler-St. Johns County line
"Boats all congregate there on weekends or whenever, and there's this structure there that clearly is a concession stand," O'Brien said. "And it is huge. And it's just sitting there ... The only intent and the only use of that structure is to sell food and snacks or whatever, and it does not belong there."
Commissioners in St. Johns County passed a similar ordinance on Aug. 1 after residents created a Change.org petition to oppose a floating business, Hurricane Watersports, that sells snacks, plays music and rents out paddle boards and kayaks in the Matanzas Inlet area.
County Commissioner Andy Dance passed the Hurricane Watersports structure on Saturday in the Matanzas River just west of Las Brisas Condominium. It looked closed, and he took a photo of it and sent it to County Attorney Al Hadeed and the county administrator, he said in a text sent to local reporters.
Jeff Thomas, the owner of Hurricane Watersports, told the Observer that he's ready to move on: He wants to travel the country, see the west coast and Alaska and then build a bigger floating music venue out west, likely in Lake Tahoe.
"This time I’m going into the politics side of it first," he said. "I’m going to get somebody to invest in it, so they have a vested interest to make sure it doesn’t get shut down."
Of the bans in St. Johns and Flagler, he said: "I’m just honestly shocked that they passed a law that it’s OK just to go in and shut down an operating business, that wasn’t breaking any laws. ... As soon as you let the government take over, they’re going to take over and ban everything. The fact that you can’t have an unattended float? That's crazy."
He said he'd started the company in June 2021, and denied accusations that he'd played loud music or sold alcohol or sold alcohol to minors, noting that he has a teenage daughter himself.
"You could barely hear our music from the shore," he said. "The company was based off of renting to children and their parents."
Thomas said he'd built the float himself and expected to pull it from the water by Wednesday, Sept. 13, before he takes to the road.
Hadeed told commissioners at the meeting that Flagler County's ordinance is preventative. It does not apply to barges or boats that meet state registration guidelines.
The kinds of floating structures the ordinance targets, Hadeed said, don't meet the safety requirements boats must meet and can cause environmental damage when anchored and a safety hazard when storms approach and the structure can't move out of the way.
The county's staff overview of the new ordinance refers to the structures as, "in essence, a neighborhood convenience store on the water," and adds that those may work in some parts of the state, but that Flagler County's waterways are too narrow.
The ordinance would prohibit such structures from mooring, anchoring, or tying to shoreline vegetation.
Hadeed noted that the northeastern part of the county is part of the Guana Tolomato Matanzas National Estuarine Research Reserve.
"Those are very high-quality estuaries that would be damaged if a floating structure shaded out a particular part of that area, which is a very sensitive area where we have mangroves growing, etc.," Hadeed said.
