Title: Carter v. Town of Palm Beach

State: florida

Issuer: Florida Supreme Court

Document:

237 So. 2d 130 (1970)
Bruce Arthur CARTER, Petitioner,
v.
TOWN OF PALM BEACH, Florida, Respondent.
No. 39297.

Supreme Court of Florida.
July 1, 1970.
Rehearing Denied July 27, 1970.
Paty, Downey, Lewis & Daves, Palm Beach, for petitioner.
Robert C. Ross, of Burns, Middleton, Farrell & Faust, Palm Beach, for respondent.
BOYD, Justice.
This cause is before us to review the decision of the District Court of Appeal, *131 Fourth District, reported at 229 So. 2d 3. Jurisdiction is based on conflict between the decision sought to be reviewed and the decision of this Court in Inglis v. Rymer.[1]
Petitioner was charged by affidavit with violation of ordinance 8.12-1 of the Town of Palm Beach, which ordinance provides as follows:
Prior to trial, petitioner filed motions attacking the constitutional validity of the ordinance as being arbitrary and not reasonably calculated to protect the public health, safety or welfare. These motions were denied.
The Judge of the Municipal Court found petitioner guilty of violating the ordinance. On appeal to the Circuit Court, the conviction was reversed on the ground that the ordinance was unreasonable, arbitrary and invalid. The Circuit Court held:
The District Court reversed, holding the ordinance reasonable and a valid exercise of the police power. The District Court concluded there was a rational relation between prohibiting surfing and making beaches safe and that it was not the function of the court to pass on the wisdom of the ordinance.
The decision of the District Court conflicts with the Inglis case, supra, wherein this Court held invalid, an ordinance of the City of Vero Beach prohibiting all skating rinks. The Court stated that a municipality may regulate skating rinks so as to forbid the operation in an objectionable manner but that they could not lawfully be prohibited since they were not inherently injurious to public or a nuisance per se.
A municipality may, under the police power, regulate and restrain activities which threaten the public health, safety and welfare. However, the power to restrain and regulate does not include the power to prohibit an activity which is not a nuisance per se.[2]
The Circuit Court, in the instant case, correctly stated the law in its opinion set out above. The Town of Palm Beach may regulate and control surfing and skimming in areas subject to its jurisdiction and may prohibit these activities at certain places along the beach. However, the complete *132 prohibition of this sport from all the beach area is arbitrary and unreasonable.
Accordingly, the decision of the District Court is quashed and the cause remanded with directions to reinstate the judgment of the Circuit Court holding the ordinance invalid.
It is so ordered.
ERVIN, C.J., and ROBERTS and ADKINS, JJ., concur.
THORNAL, J., dissents with Opinion.
THORNAL, Justice (dissenting):
I dissent. (1) I find no conflict; (2) On the merits I have the view that the ordinance is a valid exercise of the police power. I think the District Court is right.
[1]  113 Fla. 732, 152 So. 4 (1934).
[2]  Anderson v. Tedford, 80 Fla. 376, 85 So. 673 (1920); 37 Am.Jur., Municipal Corp. § 293 (1941).