On Mar 8, 1:43?am, "Keith" wrote:


Now how can FL tell you that your boat must be registered in some
state? Do they write the laws for the other 49 states? I think not,
and there is no Federal law requiring state registrations. Again (link
provided earlier) you can be from another state and cruise in FL for
90 days straight or 181 total within a year and not have to register
in FL. He doesn't care... you can be there 5 days and you get the
ticket anyway. Just revenue generation.

There's no doubt that this guy has a problem with his policing style,
or else he wouldn't have so many people upset with him.

There is no federal law requiring state registrations, but each state
has the right
to set its own standards. It isn't ridiculous for a state to declare
that if you are going to operate a boat on its waters you need to be
able to identify who owns the boat. Short of raising a hand and saying
"It's mine, officer", the accepted norm for that would be a state
registration.

You reference to the 181 days is not inconsistent with this water
cop's enforcement activities. You can boat in Florida with a boat that
is registered in any state. *After* you have boated there for 91
straight days or 181 within a given year, Florida wants you to get a
Florida registration- and that is very consistent with other state
laws that I am aware of. But even on the first day of use in Florida,
the boat has to have a registration from some state.

Because the State of Florida requires that a boat be registered in
*some* state
to be used on Florida waterways, the watercop is simply doing his job
when he cites a boat that has no registration from any state. Unless
the author of the linked newspaper article was lying, the watercop
only writes a warning ticket to owners of boats who live in states
where there is no state registration requirement. Under the terms of
the warning, the boaters still have two weeks to get their boat out of
Florida or get a registration. A Florida resident who is boating
without a registration doesn't have the excuse "I come from a state
where they don't require boats to be registered", and gets a ticket.

Consider a parallel situation with automobile license plates. If you
were driving around in FLorida, Michigan, or any other state with
either no license plates or with tabs that had expired 2-3 years ago
you wouldn't think it unusual at all to be stopped by a cop. There
proably isn't a federal law that requires states to license
automobiles, either, but telling the Michigan cop that your Montana
plates may be 2 years out of date but since you're not in Montana it
doesn't matter won't get you very far.