Few questions stir up more conflict along Florida’s coast than a simple one: who actually gets to stand on the sand? On February 19, 2026, a federal court in Daniels 100 LLC v. Town of Palm Beach gave property owners a meaningful answer, and it is one that every coastal landowner, developer, and local government in Florida should read closely.
The decision did not end the fight. It is a summary judgment ruling, and the core dispute is headed to trial. But it clarified two things that matter a great deal: a town cannot manufacture a public easement over private beach simply by trucking in new sand, and a town that strips an owner of the ability to keep people off private land may be on the hook for an unconstitutional taking.
Here is what the ruling says, why it matters, and what coastal owners should do about it.
The Short Version
- A beachfront owner in Palm Beach sued the Town after officials treated his private dry-sand parcel as open to the public, told police not to remove trespassers, and ordered him to take down boundary signs and cones.
- The court rejected the Town’s argument that a 2003 beach renourishment project automatically created a public easement under Florida Statute Section 161.141.
- The court held the owner’s “Private Property” signs were protected speech, and the Town’s sign ban swept too broadly.
- Whether the public earned long-standing “customary use” rights to the beach is still disputed and will be decided at a bench trial.
- The takeaway for owners: the right to exclude is powerful, and government cannot quietly erase it without consequences.
What Happened in Daniels v. Town of Palm Beach
Leslie Daniels leases a beachfront property on North Ocean Boulevard in the Town of Palm Beach under a 99-year lease, including a roughly 167-foot stretch of sand along the Atlantic. For years, the relationship with the Town was uneventful. The Town actually enforced trespassing on the sand and, at one point, instructed Daniels to install posts and cones so officers could keep the public off the private parcel.
Then, in late 2021, the Town reversed course. After receiving an outside legal opinion, officials began treating the dry-sand parcel as public. According to the court’s recitation of the record, the Town adopted a police directive not to remove trespassers, required Daniels to remove his boundary posts and cones, published a public FAQ stating that the public had a right to access privately owned beach, and repeatedly told Daniels his sand was no longer private.
Daniels sued under federal civil rights law, claiming the Town had effectively taken his property and violated his free speech rights. Both sides asked the court to rule in their favor without a trial. The court granted part of the owner’s motion, denied the Town’s motion entirely, and sent the central factual questions to trial. You can read the full opinion in Daniels 100 LLC v. Town of Palm Beach, Florida.
Two Rights on a Collision Course
Beach disputes pit two legitimate interests against each other.
On one side is public access. Floridians have used the state’s beaches for generations, and the public holds rights to sovereignty land below the mean high-water line, plus certain rights to dry sand where the law recognizes them.
On the other side is private ownership, and specifically the owner’s right to exclude other people. Courts treat that right as one of the most important sticks in the bundle of property rights. When the government forces an owner to let strangers onto private land, it edges into territory the Constitution protects.
The Daniels case is a clean illustration of where those two interests meet, and how Florida law sorts them out.
Customary Use: The Doctrine That Decides Many Beach Fights
Florida’s main tool for recognizing public rights on private dry sand is the doctrine of “customary use.” The Florida Supreme Court first laid it out in 1974 in City of Daytona Beach v. Tona-Rama, Inc.. Under that decision, the public can keep using the dry-sand area of a beach if the use has been “ancient, reasonable, without interruption and free from dispute.”
Those last two requirements are where the Daniels fight now lives. The Town argued the public had used Daniels’s stretch of sand for decades, going back to at least 1970. Daniels argued the use was neither uninterrupted nor free from dispute, pointing in part to the years when the Town itself enforced trespassing on his behalf.
The court found genuine factual disputes on both points. Neither side could win on customary use before trial, so a judge will resolve it at a bench trial. Federal courts applying this doctrine look to Florida law, as the Eleventh Circuit explained in Buending v. Town of Redington Beach, a 2021 decision that sent a similar customary use question back for closer factual review.
The practical lesson: customary use is not a label a local government can simply assert. It must be proven, element by element, on the facts.
The Renourishment Statute Does Not Create New Easements
The Town’s most aggressive argument was statutory. It claimed that when public funds were used to renourish and widen the beach in 2003, a public easement automatically arose under Florida Statute Section 161.141. In other words, the Town argued that pouring new sand onto the shoreline converted private beach into publicly accessible beach by operation of law.
The court flatly disagreed. As the opinion notes, despite being on the books for decades, no court had ever read Section 161.141 to impose a public easement on private land “solely because it was subject to the replacement of sand.”
Instead, the court read the statute the way its text supports. The law preserves and may expand a public easement that already lawfully existed before renourishment. It does not create a brand-new easement out of thin air just because the government added sand. If a beach project cannot be done without taking private property, the statute itself says the taking must go through eminent domain, with compensation.
This is a significant clarification. Coastal local governments routinely fund renourishment projects, and many owners feared those projects came with a hidden cost: a permanent public right-of-way across newly built sand. This ruling says that is not how the statute works.
The Right to Exclude and the Takings Problem
The reason any of this matters constitutionally is the right to exclude. The court leaned on Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid, the 2021 U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that when the government grants the public a right to enter private property, that can amount to a physical taking requiring just compensation.
Applying that principle, the court reasoned that if no public easement existed on Daniels’s sand, then the Town’s conduct could add up to a taking. Refusing to remove trespassers, forcing the owner to take down his boundary markers, publishing guidance that the public could access his land, and telling him his property was no longer private could collectively deprive him of any way to exclude the public. That is exactly the kind of government-authorized occupation the Constitution treats as a taking.
Whether a taking actually occurred turns on the customary use question. If the public already held customary rights, the Town was enforcing an existing limitation on the land. If it did not, the Town may have taken private property without paying for it. That is the issue the trial will decide.
A Statute of Limitations Defense That Did Not Stick
The Town also argued the lawsuit was too late, citing the four-year statute of limitations and pointing to a 2019 letter highlighting the easement language in Section 161.141.
The court rejected the defense. The key fact was the Town’s own behavior. For a year or two before late 2021, the Town treated the sand as private and enforced trespassing. The clock did not start until the Town reversed course on October 18, 2021, and began treating the parcel as public. Because Daniels filed suit within four years of that reversal, his takings claim was timely.
Limitations periods are fact-sensitive and often outcome-determinative, which is why timing analysis belongs early in any property dispute. The same theme runs through other Florida litigation deadlines, including the recent changes to the statutes of limitations and repose for construction and design defect claims.
You Can Say “Private Property” on Your Own Property
The owner also won an important First Amendment point. The Town had cited Daniels under a code provision banning “structures” on the beach, treating his signposts and cones as illegal structures even though they carried a “Private Property” message.
The court held that the Town’s reading banned too much speech. An owner has a free speech right to post a truthful “Private Property” sign on land that is, in fact, private. The Town’s suggested alternatives, like posting signs across the street or handing out leaflets, were not adequate substitutes for speaking on the very property at issue. On that narrow question, the owner was entitled to judgment.
For owners and developers, the point is practical. Clear, accurate signage is not just good risk management, it is constitutionally protected expression, and a local government cannot categorically forbid it.
What This Means for Coastal Owners and Developers
This ruling does not settle every Florida beach dispute, and it is a trial-court decision rather than binding appellate precedent. Still, it sends several useful signals.
Renourishment alone is not a giveaway. A publicly funded sand project does not automatically open private beach to the public under Section 161.141. Owners near restoration projects should not assume their rights have quietly evaporated.
Customary use must be proven. A local government cannot simply declare that the public has always used a beach. It carries the burden on every element, and consistent past enforcement of trespassing can cut against the claim.
The right to exclude has teeth. When government action eliminates an owner’s ability to keep people off private land, a takings claim may follow. That is true even when the government acts through inaction, such as refusing to enforce trespassing.
Document everything. The Town’s earlier trespass enforcement and its 2021 reversal were pivotal. Owners should keep records of access, enforcement requests, signage, and communications with local officials. That paper trail can decide both the customary use and limitations questions.
How Jimerson Birr Can Help
Disputes over easements, access, and the right to exclude sit squarely at the intersection of real estate and high-stakes litigation. Whether you are a coastal owner facing pressure from a local government, a developer evaluating title and access risk before closing, or a community association sorting out who may use what, the path forward depends on the facts and on getting in front of the issue early.
Our attorneys regularly handle property and access disputes, takings and regulatory questions, and the procedural strategy that makes or breaks these cases. If you are weighing your options, it helps to understand related tools and risks, including riparian and waterfront property rights, the statute of frauds and how real estate contracts are enforced, the rising threat of property and home-title fraud, the realities of recovering damages in commercial litigation, and how dispute resolution provisions in your contracts shape where and how a fight gets resolved.
When a transaction goes sideways, related questions often follow, from recovering a deposit after a failed real estate purchase and interpleader actions over disputed escrow funds, to commercial lease strategy and key provisions every landlord should insist on. Owners managing an estate or inherited parcel may also need to understand how to legally sell property of a deceased family member. And because cases like Daniels turn on careful proof, it pays to know how Florida courts handle litigation fundamentals such as qualifying expert witnesses, jury selection in contested matters, and doctrines like the independent tort rule.
To talk through a beach access, easement, or ownership dispute, contact our Business Litigation team. The sooner the facts are mapped and the timeline is locked down, the stronger your position.
Ready to Protect Your Property Rights?
If a local government, a neighbor, or the public is encroaching on land you own, do not wait for the problem to harden. Contact Jimerson Birr today to schedule a consultation with our business litigation attorneys. We will help you assess your rights, preserve your evidence, and chart the most effective path forward.