They actually changed that Georgia law in 2012. Still rather restrictive, but it seems in the past it has been one of those laws on the books just in case law enforcement needed to use it for someone being abusive--like the typical loitering law.
I'll Never go to Florida Again
- Thread starter Roger Long
- Start date
- Status
Yes, rather restrictive. If you read the law as I did (I'm not a lawyer but I played a naval architect who was married to one on TV), it only applies to a few marinas that go through an extensive paperwork and inspection process. Hmm, I wonder who helped write the law?
Furthermore, it only applies to when you are tied up in that slip. If you leave your "approved" slip to go cruising, the 30 day count starts for each night you sleep aboard. The change only really effects people who want to use their boats as residences and not cruise.
Those of us who cruise through, spending maybe a couple weeks on the way down and a couple on the way back are still lawbreakers.
Cruisers Net has now published a definitive article with thanks to our own Kettewell.
It's ugly down there (the attitudes):
http://cruisersnet.net/important-florida-boat-registration-questions-answered/
I stand by my OP title. It's a big beautiful world. Why go where policies regarding cruisers at all levels from lawmakers down to the jackboot thugs we've heard so much about over the years are so unbelievably stupid? I'm glad my boat is capable of going to the Bahamas via Bermuda if I ever decide to go that way.
I know, there is lots of weird s--t in the Bahamas but you expect that when you go foreign, not when you are traveling innocently in your own country.
It's ugly down there (the attitudes):
http://cruisersnet.net/important-florida-boat-registration-questions-answered/
I stand by my OP title. It's a big beautiful world. Why go where policies regarding cruisers at all levels from lawmakers down to the jackboot thugs we've heard so much about over the years are so unbelievably stupid? I'm glad my boat is capable of going to the Bahamas via Bermuda if I ever decide to go that way.
I know, there is lots of weird s--t in the Bahamas but you expect that when you go foreign, not when you are traveling innocently in your own country.
Hopefully the message will travel far enough someone will hear it. Cruising Florida sounds like it could be a dream vacation, but not if your getting hassled by Police every time you turn around.
This has been educational, but I'm not convinced Fla. has a war on cruisers. I still think these laws are in part reaction to their ongoing problem with derelict boats used as housing. We're all (states) struggling with homelessness. Fla has the curse of uncountable miles of back water canals to anchor in. Substance abuse, mental illness, homeless, few jobs, same everywhere, only here a lot of it is floating.
I'm sympathetic to the all these problems, but I value my right to anchor my boat on federal waters. That alone gets sketchy as time goes on, but I don't want to lose anymore anchoring rights than I already have.
So I'm not so sure cruisers should simply pile on the side that is against Florida. I wasn't hassled on two trips through on a modest 28' sailboat. Maybe we're not as in this fight as some seem to want to be?
And Cheesiz Roger, pay the 20 or 30 bucks to register in Maine, we need the tax dollars too!
I may return to the Bahamas one day, Florida, count me out of the boycott please.
I am NOT going to West End Bahamas via Bermuda.
That doesn't count as a state registration. For a documented vessel, it's simply a local excise tax and doesn't help with the Florida situation.
Some of these laws have been justified by complaints about derelict boats, but then they come up with rules and regulations that mainly impact legitimate transient boaters. It's hard to see how not allowing documented boats from out of state a 90-day grace period to visit would have any impact on supposed derelict vessels. Most of the true derelict boats are owned by local Floridians, not transient boaters. Frankly, I think the whole derelict boat thing is way overblown by a few in order to chase away all boaters. For example, the recently enacted laws restricting anchoring in the Stuart/Martin County area basically make most decent anchorage areas off limits, including many areas where nobody was anchored.
Same thing in Massachusetts. Can you imagine going to the state bureaucracy and asking them to come up with a procedure to register just your boat alone out of all the thousands of documented boats in Mass. Ain't going to happen!
This issue was covered "lightly" in the current issue of BoatUS. Keep beating the weeds fellas, they will hear the racket sooner or later.
From BoatUS mag
"Steps in the right direction are being made. The U.S. Coast Guard administers a program called the Vessel Identification System or VIS. States willing to transfer their boat-registration data to the federally run system can utilize VIS at no cost. While VIS offers states a comprehensive vessel database to help with identifying out-of-state boats, currently it's not designed to provide real-time reporting of boat stops and boardings. At press time, 20 states have signed on to the VIS program."
"Steps in the right direction are being made. The U.S. Coast Guard administers a program called the Vessel Identification System or VIS. States willing to transfer their boat-registration data to the federally run system can utilize VIS at no cost. While VIS offers states a comprehensive vessel database to help with identifying out-of-state boats, currently it's not designed to provide real-time reporting of boat stops and boardings. At press time, 20 states have signed on to the VIS program."
Strangely, I've managed to keep my mouth shut during this debate, (Just look what you've started Roger, haha).
I really know no more about the machinations, nor motivations of this "law" than I did after reading the very first post.
Us paranoid people get bothered by ANY attempt by the government to keep track of us, be it VIS, AIS, MMSI, or even our own cell phones that we bought and paid for ourselves, and carry in our pockets for "big brother" to track. Not that they are, I'm about as important to some authority as my dog; but they can..
But I've said this for years, to most that are patient enough to stand still long enough to listen to me ramble; but it's about the money. It ALL is. Whenever there's a problem with most anything, look at the money, and there's your answer. The government loves this stuff, and has an insatiable appetite for it. I doubt Florida, or any other state for that matter cares one iota if you floated a fully armed nuclear submarine right off the coast line, as long as you pay them to do it. Derelict boats a problem? There's some wealthy, albeit influential group of people nearby complaining about it, that may be giving them......you guessed it, ..the money.
I mean, how else are they going to buy a hundred thousand dollar patrol boat, and hire a kid that's been promoted to his highest level of incompetence to run it?
MY guess is; your money..
Sorry Phil. I know, I know. Off to the war room with me.
I'll be good from now on, and won't do it again.
I really know no more about the machinations, nor motivations of this "law" than I did after reading the very first post.
Us paranoid people get bothered by ANY attempt by the government to keep track of us, be it VIS, AIS, MMSI, or even our own cell phones that we bought and paid for ourselves, and carry in our pockets for "big brother" to track. Not that they are, I'm about as important to some authority as my dog; but they can..
But I've said this for years, to most that are patient enough to stand still long enough to listen to me ramble; but it's about the money. It ALL is. Whenever there's a problem with most anything, look at the money, and there's your answer. The government loves this stuff, and has an insatiable appetite for it. I doubt Florida, or any other state for that matter cares one iota if you floated a fully armed nuclear submarine right off the coast line, as long as you pay them to do it. Derelict boats a problem? There's some wealthy, albeit influential group of people nearby complaining about it, that may be giving them......you guessed it, ..the money.
I mean, how else are they going to buy a hundred thousand dollar patrol boat, and hire a kid that's been promoted to his highest level of incompetence to run it?
MY guess is; your money..
Sorry Phil. I know, I know. Off to the war room with me.
I'll be good from now on, and won't do it again.
Sad to hear about the group of sailors not coming back to Florida. I guess the state might as well declare bankruptcy over the unexpected shortfall. I gather some find highly offensive that USCG registered boats do not enjoy the same 90 day visitation grace period as a state (any state) registered boat. Well the truth is that without a registration sticker there might not be a proper way to verify how long a boat has been in Florida waters. Think about it, that it would be highly offensive to resident boat owners that pay their fees to see others get by for free. The state is only reacting to a rather large group of boat owner who will not voluntarily pay for anything unless forced to do so. The system is not perfect and some boats overstay their 90 day grace period by moving around but sooner or latter they may realize it is cheaper to stay put and pay the darn registration fees. The State of Florida has a little known provision that a boat 30+ years old can apply for an Antuique Vessel Registration and be exempt from paying the yearly fee. Since many tightwads cruise around in older boats that might be an incentive. Florida has many faults and I would be the first to denounce them but to trash the state for making it difficult to evade fees paid by the locals is just a cheap shot.
Benny, I've often agreed with you, but this is, basically,
NONSENSE
Gee, how about getting the NAME of the boat?
How many "Wind Dancers" can there possibly be?
Golly, Chris, how come it took you so long?
Watergate... follow the $$$. So? What's new?
OUR $$$, and all it ends up doing is allowing some shortsighted control freaks to exercise their prerogatives.
Darn...
OTOH, there really are some good folks in LEO and we should support and promote (both ways) all of them that we meet.
One of the beauties of these kind of forums is that we can exercise our rights of free speech and let others know about the GOOD and the questionable.
Having read all the responses in this thread, I haven't seen person make a comment about fees. Fees arent the problem, confusing statutes and belligerent local police officers seem to be garnering the most attention. In fact, from what Ive read it looks like you could have all the numbers and registration stickers the state offers, and still get harassed.
That, in fact, is the exact reason for the title I gave this thread. Maine tax compliance drones have been engaged in paperwork harassment of out of state boats and aircraft that have cost the state thousands of times what might ever have been collected in taxes. It also lead to the well documented closing of a sawmill and the loss of 16 jobs in a small town. The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association promoted an official boycott of the state. Nothing changed except for many marina employees who lost their jobs.
However, this has been an aberration in a state where I have never heard of an out of state cruiser having a problem with someone in uniform unless they were truly doing something wrong. I used to be a Harbormaster so a member of a police department BTW, lest you think my left over 60's ism contributes to my tone about this issue.
In Florida, this foolishness comes on top of a pervasive pattern which one official admitted during the anchoring wars were intended to reduce the number of cruisers as well as influence the demographics by discouraging those who don't spend $100 - $1000 every night in a marina.
By "foolishness" I mean only the rejection of Federal Documentation, considered the "Gold Standard" by other nations, as being a registration and treating such vessels differently. I have no problem with Florida doing what many other states do and requiring some kind of registration if you remain in the state longer than for a vacation or annual cruise.
If this bit of foolishness were the only thing going on in Florida I would just say to myself, Every place has it's problems. Nobody knows about this quirk in the law except the uniformed thugs who have been justifying their taxpayer funded boating by ticketing people randomly for it. Keeping it quiet (the provision is so obscure it took lawyers a few days to figure it out once people started asking) was a "speed trap" generator of funds for local BIU (Boating In Uniform).
In New England and the Chesapeake, cruising is an activity treated with the respect skiing gets in Switzerland. The farther south you go, the less respect it gets. Once you cross the line into Florida, you cross the line to where it is thought of the same way we would feel if we looked out and saw a homeless person living in a car parked in front of our house. I coastal cruise because I like to see, enjoy, and interact with the life on shore. The pervasive Florida attitude just makes it not worthwhile being a bit warmer when the scenery is better and more interesting in Georgia.
I was given permission by the OP on Sailnet to repeat this post as a view of how some FL residents (former in this case) view the situation in their state:
My cousin has lived in south Florida for decades, and in fact moved there because he loved sport fishing. He said he sold his big boat and barely goes fishing at all anymore because of all the harassment and hassle he received the last few years, and spoke of all the "sanctuary" BS. So its not just out of state cruisers being harassed.
Nice to know it can all be avoided by simply sailing further south. Maybe someday.
Nice to know it can all be avoided by simply sailing further south. Maybe someday.
- Status