Dan Harris writes:

This form of local ordinance is fairly common along the beaches in
southeast Florida and includes parts of Pompano Beach and Ft.
Lauderdale as well as other municipalities.

True. The Florida Marine Partol officer called me back today, and said
that they were enforcing a town (Lauderdale-by-the-Sea in this case,
http://www.lauderdalebythesea-fl.gov/ on the Web, no ordinances online
however) ordinance, and that the beaches of the ENTIRE COUNTY were
covered contiguously by a patchwork of these local ordinances excluding
vessels.

Odd that commerical rentals of Jet Skis are permitted at a certain
nearby hotel's beach frontage. Do I have a right to land there? The
wet sand is public property, right?

Odd that Florida statutes prohibit localities from "regulating the
anchorage of non-live-aboard vessels engaged in the exercise of rights
of navigation." (FS 327.60, see http://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/ ).

I called the LBTS town hall and spoke to a clerk and to a code
enforcement officer. They were unfamiliar with the specific ordinance
and were startled themselves to learn when they looked it up that it
excludes everything that provides transportation on water, including
kayaks, canoes, etc., hard or inflatable, powered or not. Even toy boats
it would seem.

Specific exceptions allow surfboards and sailboards. These are not a
hazard to swimmers?

The intent is to limit the interaction between propellers and
swimmers! This is along the unprotected ocean. It is a dangerous and
risky practice to allow boaters along the surf line in close proximity
to swimmers.

Not necessarily. Why outlaw a kayak and paddle? An inflatable with
engine raised and rowed in? 24 hrs a day? Across the entire county?

This has nothing to do with fishing ...

Surf fishing is also excluded in another ordinance, I am told. I guess
fishhooks are always and everywhere a danger to swimmers.

or 9/11.

I don't mean 9/11 specifically, but a general tone of increased petty
security impositions in general, as a general tenor of the times after
9/11. These buoys appeared a year or two ago, and in the 40-odd years
previous that I have lived there, there were no such restrictions.

During WWII the above-water Copenhagen shipwreck, about 800 yards
offshore from this same spot where I was apprehended, was used for
bombardment target practice by US Navy aircraft!