The Berrien County Board of Commissioners has approved some amendments to the county’s parks ordinance to make it easier for the sheriff’s department to maintain order at Silver Beach.
With three fights so far this year that prompted the department to shut down the park early, Sheriff Chuck Heit worked with the county corporate counsel to come up with the rule changes. Among other things, Heit tells us the new rules clarify which violations of county policies are misdemeanors and which are civil infractions.
“Alcohol on the beach or the marijuana, that’s a civil infraction but the fines have been increased,” Heit said. “The biggest thing it gives us too is the ability to deal with some of the situations we’ve had where if we have people not following the rules, we can actually trespass them off. That trespass will be for 12 months.”
So, for a full year, someone violating the park rules could be banned from all county parks. Heit says they have had repeat offenders in the past.
“We’ve noticed that a couple times out of the events, at least two of them, there were some people that had been there before that were partly in that group causing a problem. So, it’s just a tool to help us deal with that.”
The rule changes also add descriptions and enforcement options for violations of disturbing the peace and nuisance gatherings and assign prosecutorial duties to Berrien County Prosecutor. And they clarify the penalties for violations.
Commissioners on Thursday approved the amendments on a unanimous vote. They’ll take effect next Friday.
Heit says Silver Beach remains a beautiful park, noting there have only been the three incidents while the park is open every day. He also said there were no incidents over the Independence Day weekend.
