Complaints Lead To Alcohol Ban At Ponce Inlet Parks

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Ponce Inlet, FL - Complaints from Ponce Inlet residents have now made it even tougher to drink alcohol in public in the small beachside town.

At last week's meeting, the Town Council approved a new ordinance prohibiting the consumption or possession of open alcohol containers in public, especially at Lighthouse Point Park.

Ponce Inlet Police Chief Frank Fabrizio tells us his officers were dealing with a lot of complaints recently because of drinkers at the park, which sits at the town's southern border and connects to the Atlantic Ocean and the Halifax River.

"We actually had an ordinance [for alcohol in public places] that we just tightened up," Fabrizio added. "What we added to it was any parks that were in the city."

Even though Lighthouse Point is a Volusia County park and alcohol was already not allowed on the beach, the parking lots at the park are patrolled by the Ponce Inlet Police Department and that's where a lot of the issues were originating, according to Fabrizio.

"I started getting complaints from our residents that the clientele is really changing on the weekends," Fabrizio noted. "You're getting carloads of people [coming] down there. They're drinking beer, becoming obnoxious, leaving their beer cans all over the place. It's not a family-friendly environment anymore."

Fabrizio also said that the toll taker at Lighthouse Point Park has been instructed to inform drivers that there is no alcohol allowed in the park and that officers plan to educate and issue warnings first before writing tickets, and only then as a last resort.