PANAMA CITY BEACH, Fla. (WMBB)– The Panama City Beach City Council has decided to give code enforcement more grounds to maintain order in the city.
On July 9th, the Council authorized under an emergency order for code enforcement to assist in writing civil citations for those swimming during double red flags or not following proper beach safety.
As of Thursday, code enforcement will also be able to hand out citations for the mask mandate, and restaurant capacity.
Councilman Geoff McConnell said that giving code enforcement more power will allow for pressure to be taken off law enforcement and beach safety surfaces, as the city is experiencing what he calls a “labor crunch.”
“With everything on our table for the police department to try to enforce from the mask mandate to the restaurant capacity guidelines we needed to empower our code enforcement folks to get on the beach and issue double flag citations and any other citations that can be had,” said McConnell.
Mcconnell also said that code enforcement will only have the power to right civil citations and will not make arrests.
