Miami Beach is done with Spring Breakers: ‘It’s not us. It’s you.’

More than twenty years ago, Wayne Jones traveled to Daytona Beach, then the spring break mecca in Florida, not to party but to study.

His bosses at the Miami Beach Police Department, where he was a young officer, wanted to know how Daytona handled the famously rowdy crowd. Perhaps Miami Beach, which has had its own unruly scene every year over Memorial Day weekend, can learn a thing or two.

Officer Jones is now Chief Jones of the Miami Beach Police Department. And Memorial Day is no longer the city’s top concern: Its most urgent task is to bring order to the weeks of March, when Miami Beach is overrun with spring breakers, a month-long slog that is a thorn in the side of the city become. Last year, police made more than 500 arrests and seized more than 100 weapons during spring break.

But Chief Jones has high expectations.

“This will be the best spring break ever,” he said recently in an interview at his South Beach office. “I feel it in my bones.”

It was a bold statement in a city where worrying about spring break has become a year-round affair, with each new wave of politicians and administrators promising to be the ones to finally get the season under control.

That would mean that shootings like the one that killed two people in one weekend last year should be avoided. But how far to go to keep the city safe when large numbers of visitors arrive in March has long been a subject of debate, with some tactics prompting accusations of racism and lawsuits over civil rights and over-policing.

About 25 years ago, Miami Beach became a destination for young black visitors during Memorial Day weekend, when clubs hosted hip-hop events that became known collectively as Urban Beach Week. After several violent incidents over the years, including some involving excessive force by police, the city hosted a more family-friendly annual March event in 2017, the Hyundai Air & Sea Show. That shifted some of the black tourism to spring break.

Since the coronavirus pandemic began, unruly crowds have flocked to the city for spring break. Miami Beach imposed a midnight emergency curfew in 2023 and 2022, and a particularly controversial 8 p.m. curfew in 2021.

A new mayor and commission elected to nonpartisan seats in November after a campaign cycle dominated by public safety issues took a more aggressive approach. Miami Beach is ending spring break, the city announced this week in an ad on social media: “This doesn’t work anymore,” it begins. “And it’s not us. It’s you.”

“Our idea of ​​a good time is relaxing on the beach, going to the spa or visiting a new restaurant,” people in the ad say from various spots in Miami Beach. “You just want to get drunk in public and ignore the laws.”

This weekend and next — typically peak times for crowds — Miami Beach visitors should prepare for extraordinary measures, including DUI checkpoints, bag checks at beach entrances and possible curfews. Access to the beach is restricted after 6:00 PM and no one is allowed after 10:00 PM. Sidewalk tables and chairs are prohibited in the many cafes along Ocean Drive.

Public parking garages on South Beach are closed except to residents and permit holders. A garage on 42nd Street, north of the spring break crowds, charges a flat rate of $100. (Not a typo.)

“We have had enough,” Mayor Steven Meiner said at a news conference unveiling of the city campaign.

In a change for liberal Miami Beach, whose mayors have been outspoken critics of state leaders in the past, Mr. Meiner, who leans more conservative than his predecessors, has sought support from Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican. Mr. DeSantis traveled to Miami Beach on Tuesday and, flanked by law enforcement, vowed to send state troopers to help in the crackdown.

“We welcome people to come and have a good time,” Mr. DeSantis said. “What we do not welcome is criminal activity. What we don’t welcome is chaos.”

Mr. DeSantis said 140 troops will be deployed across the state to keep spring break peaceful, including in Fort Lauderdale, Daytona Beach and Panama City Beach. Forty-five of them will help direct traffic, fly drones and use license plate readers on Miami Beach’s causeways.

Many of the troublemakers in recent years have been residents of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, who tend to drive onto the barrier island at night, Chief Jones said.

Miami-Dade County Commissioner Keon Hardemon said Miami Beach is “doing it wrong” by imposing heavy-handed rules on events such as a ticketed music festival.

“What you’re telling people is, ‘You’re not welcome here,’ and that’s the antithesis of a community built on tourism,” he said.

“The people who come during this period happen to be people who look like me,” added Mr. Hardemon, who is black. He said he would be equally upset if he felt other subsets of visitors were being targeted.

“To single out these types of people in these times and say you welcome them, but take these types of heavy-handed measures,” he said, “I think is unfair.”

Joshua Wallack, the chief operating officer of Mango’s Tropical Cafe on Ocean Drive, said he was happy to see the city trying something new, although he expects businesses will suffer. He was grateful that cars would still be allowed on Ocean Drive as previous closures had led to chaotic street parties.

“Stop turning the whole place into a schoolyard full of kids getting into fights at three in the morning because they’re drunk and high,” he said.

Marilyn Freundlich, who lives in South Beach’s Sunset Harbor neighborhood, somewhat removed from the partying, called closing the garages “a great idea.”

“In recent years it has become chaos, a freedom for all,” she said.

In a split vote last month, Miami Beach commissioners repealed a 2015 ordinance that gave police officers the discretion to issue civil citations for possession of up to 20 grams of marijuana instead of arresting people for it; Chief Jones said officers had rarely used the citation option. Commissioner Tanya K. Bhatt was one of several voices against the repeal, citing concerns about racial disparities.

“Statistically, black and brown people get arrested and go to jail for pot, and white people with more money and more access to lawyers” don’t, she said. None of the city’s commissioners are black.

Chief Jones, of the city first black police chief, who started his career as a bike cop, said his officers “police behavior – bad behavior – no race or color.” He said he might even get on his bike and do a little patrol himself.

“As a black man, I am hypersensitive to race and policing,” he said. “Arrest is not the first option for us.”

How does he think this year’s big law enforcement display will go?

“It’s not a problem as long as people are safe,” Chief Jones said. “As long as there are no shootings, as long as there are no murders, I think we’ll be fine. I’m okay with being told, “You’re overdoing it.”

“If no one gets hurt and no one dies,” he added, “that’s a victory.”

Kitty Bennett research contributed.