Miami Beach police attack noisy spring breakers after days of runaway parties in the coastal city that included violence and drunken debauchery.
Mayor Dan Gelber said tens of thousands of visitors had overrun the Miami Beach Entertainment District – and the city will now step up police to curb behavior, according to the WTVJ.
The city is reportedly bringing in officials from nearby Miami to deal with the situation.
“When 50 or 100,000 people get there and only half of 1 percent is noisy or drunk or so high that they need to be controlled, it becomes a situation that is really messy and unmanageable,” Gelber said in a meeting of the virtual City commission on Wednesday.
About 150 parties were arrested over the weekend and one man was shot dead Monday, according to NBC’s South Florida subsidiary.
“It sometimes felt like this city was being besieged just because of the amount of people who were coming,” Gelber said, according to the station.
The mayor tore up the ruthless night owls, telling USA Today they “apparently forgot there was a pandemic”.
Gelber claimed the city was inundated with visitors who ignored security protocols, fearing that the maskless chaos could lead to a surge in infections immediately after the plateau.
“We have too many people, too many who come with a desire to go wild, and we have the virus … It really is a multi-faceted threat for us,” he told the newspaper.
But not everyone wants the party to stop.
Prana Cafe’s chef and manager Sergio Infantes told WTVJ that the spring breakers had given his pandemic soul food restaurant a much-needed boost.
“Now we’re very busy this season so we’re hiring more people across the business because we need more workers for the business,” said Infantes.
Tourists also told the station that they felt safe on South Beach.
“Personally, I do it because I travel a lot. I mean, it’s a different atmosphere, but I don’t think it’s unsafe,” said Rylan Brickhouse, a spring break visitor from Texas.
Some of the natives of the party town disagreed.
“Sometimes it felt like this city was just besieged by the crowd of people coming,” Mayor Dan Gelber told local media. AFP via Getty Images
“Please cordon off the residential areas immediately to protect yourself from the events in the area,” said Robin Andras reportedly during the public comment phase of the virtual meeting.
The celebrations in South Florida are not just limited to South Beach.
A Fort Lauderdale hotspot said last week it would not serve students outside of the state during the spring break after being cited three times in a day for non-compliance with pandemic security measures in November.
Last weekend, the United States had the highest number of air travelers since the pandemic began, when college students came to celebrate on sandy beaches in the south.
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