§ 1. General powers of the town.

The Town of Hillsboro Beach hereby created, established and organized shall have full power and authority:

(1)

Taxes and Assessments: To raise annually by taxes and assessments in said Town such sums of money as the Town Commission shall deem necessary for the purposes and needs of said Town, and in such manner as shall be hereinafter provided.

(2)

Occupational Licenses: To license and tax any and all businesses, occupations and professions carried on or engaged in, either wholly or in part within the corporate limits of the Town; to classify and define such businesses, occupations and professions for the purpose of imposing occupational license taxes or fees; and to impose on such classifications reasonable occupational license taxes, and the amount of such occupational fee shall not be dependent upon nor related to the general state occupational license for similar classifications, nor the amounts allowed under the general laws for municipalities incorporated under the General State Law.

(3)

Acquisition of Property: To acquire by purchase, gift, devise, condemnation, lease or otherwise, real or personal property or any estate therein, or riparian rights or easements therein, within or without the Town to be used for any municipal purpose; streets and highways; public parking lots or spaces, bridge sites; works and wells and other equipment necessary for supplying said Town with water, gas for illuminating and heating purposes and electric power for illuminating, heating and power purposes; the location of waterworks and sites for public utility works; jails, public parks, docks sea-walls, facilities for neutralizing or otherwise destroying sewage, garbage and refuse; for extension of sewer and drainage pipes and water mains; and for any public or municipal purpose; and to improve, sell, lease, pledge or otherwise dispose of same or any part thereof for the benefit of the Town, to the same extent natural persons might do.

(4)

Public Facilities: To build, construct, own, operate and maintain streets, highways, bridges and piers.

(5)

Franchises: To grant franchises of all kinds for the use of the Town streets, waters and water ways, public beaches and recreational facilities, lands and ways in the manner elsewhere provided herein.

(6)

Expend Monies: To expend the money of the Town for any and all lawful purposes, and to borrow money to meet current expenses and issue notes in the name of the Town for same.

(7)

To borrow money as hereinafter provided in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 166, Florida Statutes Revised, within the debt limitations prescribed in this Charter.

(8)

Special Assessments: To levy, impose and assess special assessments for benefits for improvements against adjacent or abutting property, specially benefitted, to pay all or any portion of the cost of such improvement as hereinafter provided, and to enforce payment thereof.

(9)

Streets and Sidewalks: To pave, re-pave, grade, regrade, macadamize, re-macadamize, hard surface, improve, landscape, lay out, open, widen, close, curb, vacate, discontinue, extend, demolish, rebuild, and otherwise improve streets, alleys, boulevards, avenues, lanes, sidewalks, including any bridges, culverts, fills, grades or other appurtenances which may constitute or form a part of same, and any parks, promenades, piers, docks, seawalls and adjacent or contiguous thereto; and to levy and assess liens for the cost of all or any part of such improvements as hereinafter provided.

(10)

Use of Streets and Sidewalks: To regulate the use of all streets, boulevards, avenues, highways and public ways with the Town Limits of the Town of Hillsboro Beach; to license, control, tax and regulate traffic and sales upon the streets, sidewalks and public places within the town; to regulate, suppress and prohibit soliciting upon such streets, sidewalks and public places; to license, cause to be registered, control, tax, regulate or to prohibit in designated streets or parts of streets, motor buses, motor vehicles, cars, taxis, or other vehicles for hire; to make, enact, adopt and promulgate regulations governing traffic on the public streets or parts of the streets as may be necessary or convenient; to provide for parking spaces on the streets, and at any time to discontinue the right to use parking spaces; to regulate the parking of vehicles upon any portion of the public streets of the Town of Hillsboro Beach; and generally to exercise any and all powers necessary for the regulation of traffic upon the public streets and highways within the Town Limits.

(11)

Docks, etc.: To construct, build, improve, acquire, maintain or discontinue, seawalls, docks, yacht basins, bridges, sewers, drains and canals, and to levy assessments and hold liens for all or any part of such improvements; to establish construct, maintain, operate and control public landings, piers, and docks within and without the Town, and to acquire lands, riparian rights or other rights and easements necessary for such purposes; to regulate the manner of using any and all and docks within and without the Town; to dredge or deepen the canals, waterways, or any branch or portion thereof within the Town.

(12)

Regulate Public Uses: To regulate and control the use and occupancy of the waters, waterways, water bottoms, causeways, bridges, beaches, streets, thoroughfares, alleys, parks, public lots and other public places in the Town; prevent the use of the streets and sidewalks by private persons for business purposes or conveniences; and prescribe or regulate the flying height and manner of flight and size of airplanes and other aerial conveyances over, above, and within the area of the Town Limits; and to impose and enforce adequate penalties for violation of such rules and regulations.

(13)

Buildings: To adopt a building code and suitable regulations governing the construction and erection of buildings in the Town; to regulate the moving of buildings from place to place within the Town and into the Town; to regulate the materials and type of construction of any building erected in the Town, or repairs thereto; and to provide reasonable rules regulating the use of such building and the repair thereof in order to protect the welfare of the Town.

(14)

Public Utilities: To furnish any and all local public services, including electricity, gas, water, sewage collection and disposal, lights, garbage collection or transportation and to charge and collect necessary fees or charges therefor; to purchase, hire, construct, own, extend, maintain, operate or lease any public utilities, including street railways, electric light system, telephone and telegraph system, waterworks and sewage collection and disposal plants, gas plants and distribution system, bus or transit systems, or other public utility; and to establish, impose and enforce rates and charges for supplying such services of conveniences by the Town to any person, persons, firm or corporation.

(15)

Cleaning Lots: To require owners of property, or other persons interested therein, to clear and clean the same of weeds, undergrowth, trash, debris, brush and unsightly and insanitary matters, and to fill insanitary excavations and depressions; and if the owner, or owners, or persons interested in such property, do not comply with any such requirements within the time limited and fixed by Resolution, the Town Commission shall make or cause said work to be done, and make the cost thereof a charge and lien against such property, of the same extent and character as the lien now granted, or which may hereafter be granted, to said Town by law for special assessments for the cost of local improvements as hereinafter provided; which charge and lien shall be forthwith due and payable, unless the time for the payment thereof shall be extended by the Town Commission, with the same penalties and the same rights of collection and sale and forfeiture as may be provided by law for assessments for local improvements.

(16)

Sewage Disposal: To collect and dispose of sewage, ashes, garbage, trash and other refuse by contract or otherwise, and to acquire and operate plants for the disposal or utilization of such materials or any of them; and to contract for and regulate the collection and disposal thereof.

(17)

Abatement of Nuisances: To compel the abatement and removal of all nuisances within the Town or upon the property owned by the Town beyond its corporate limits, at the expense of the person or persons causing the same, or of the owner or occupant of the ground or premises whereon the same may be; to require all lands, lots or other premises within the Town to be kept clean, sanitary and free from weeds, wild growth and trash, or to clean and make them so at the expense of the owner or occupants thereof; to prevent businesses from becoming nuisances within the Town; to prevent the carrying on of any illegal business, trade or employment within the Town, and generally to define, prohibit, abate, suppress and prevent all things detrimental to the health, moral, comfort, convenience and welfare of the inhabitants of the Town.

(18)

Inspections: To inspect, test, measure and weigh any commodity or article or consumption for use within the Town, and to fix a standard for any such commodity or article; and to establish, regulate, license and inspect weights, meters, measures and scales.

(19)

Enforcing Ordinances: To make and enforce all police, housing, zoning, sanitary or other Ordinances, rules and regulations necessary or expedient for the purpose of carrying into effect the powers conferred by this Charter or by any general law, and to provide and impose suitable penalties for the violation of such Ordinances, rules and regulations, or any of them, by fine as established by the Town Commission or imprisonment for a term not exceeding 60 days, or both such fine and imprisonment.

(20)

[Local Improvements; Assessments]: In accordance with the process and procedures set forth in Chapter 170, Florida Statutes, as amended from time to time, the Town, by its Commission, shall have power and authority to cause local improvements to be constructed, wholly or in part, at the cost of the property owners benefitted thereby, by levying and collecting special assessments, for the following improvements:

(a)

Installing, extending, enlarging or improving its sanitary sewer system, by constructing sanitary sewage mains, pumping stations, laterals, storm sewers, and other drains and sewers, and necessary appurtenances thereto;

(b)

Extending its waterworks system into new territory, by the construction of additional water mains, pumps, etc., and the laying or relaying of same, together with the necessary appurtenances thereto, either inside or outside of the corporate limits or partly inside and partly outside;

(c)

To pave, repave, grade, regrade, macadamize, re-macadamize, hard surface, improve, lay out, open, widen, close, curb, extend, demolish, rebuild and otherwise improve streets, alleys, boulevards, avenues, lanes, sidewalks, including any bridges, culverts, fills, grades, or other appurtenances which may constitute or form a part of same, or any parks, promenades, piers, docks, groins, seawalls and retaining walls, whether on salt, brackish or fresh water; to build, demolish, rebuild or otherwise improve any bridges, grades, fills, culverts and appurtenances; and anyone or more of such purposes may be combined in the same improvement.

(d)

To clear and clean real property of weeds, undergrowth, trash, debris, bush, and unsightly and unsanitary matters, and to fill unsanitary excavations and depressions; to remove dilapidated and unsightly buildings which constitute a nuisance or menace to the health or safety of the inhabitants of the Town;

(e)

Providing for storm sewage, surface water drainage, and beach renourishment projects;

(f)

To determine, order, levy and assess and collect all taxes and assessments as are permitted by law.

(21)

Beach Erosion: In addition to all other powers heretofore granted to the Town of Hillsboro Beach and to the Town Commission thereof, said Town Commission is hereby authorized and empowered to take such action as may be necessary from time to time, in protecting the interest of the Town's citizens from damage to public or private beaches caused by erosion, storms, tidal waves, tidal currents or high water.

(a)

The Town Commission of the Town of Hillsboro Beach is hereby authorized to construct sea walls, energy absorbing walls, groins, pumping stations, breakwaters or other structures and to cause sand to be dredged upon the beaches within said Town, and to cooperate with Broward County, the State of Florida and the United States Government or all of them in causing such work to be done for the protection of the beaches and properties within said Town, or to take such other action as the Town Commission determines to be necessary or proper in preventing beach erosion;

(b)

In order to maintain the established seawall line from encroachment by the ocean, the Town Commission, by ordinance may:

(1)

Require property owners to construct and maintain seawalls, groins or such other structures as may be determined to be necessary for the protection of their properties from erosion, and may levy a special tax upon properties so benefitted within said Town to pay for such construction and maintenance as hereinafter provided;

(2)

If the Town Commission, after considering the reports hereinafter provided, determines upon consideration of such reports and after public hearing as herein provided that construction of certain facilities or other action be taken for the protection of beaches, then the Town shall proceed with the necessary construction or action and with the taxation of properties benefitted thereby, with or without the consent of the property owners involved;

(3)

The maximum millage to be levied and used in the Town for the aforesaid purposes shall be the maximum allowed by state statutes;

(4)

Reserved.

(22)

Revenue Bonds or Revenue Certificates: For the purpose of obtaining money to make such improvements as are authorized by this Section, the Town shall have the power to issue revenue bonds or revenue certificates, payable solely from the income derived from the operation of such utility, or, where utilities are operated jointly or supplement each other, payable from the revenue derived from the operation of both utilities, or of either utility. Property specially benefitted by the installation or extension of the sewage system or the waterworks system, or both, may be specially assessed for the cost of such installation, extension, enlargement or improvement, either wholly or in part, by the levying of special assessment liens, it being recognized as a power of the Town in its proprietary capacity to levy special assessments against property specially benefitted by the installation or extension of sanitary sewage systems or waterworks systems, or both, in order to repay monies obtained by the issuance of revenue bonds or certificates. The monies collected from such special assessment liens shall be used to payoff and discharge any certificates of indebtedness, revenue bonds or certificates issued to obtain money with which to make such improvements.

(23)

Reserved.

(24)

Reserved.

(25)

Reserved.

(26)

Reserved.

(27)

Reserved.

(28)

Reserved.

(29)

Reserved.

(30)

Reserved.

(31)

Reserved.

(32)

Reserved.

(33)

Reserved.

(34)

Reserved.

(35)

Reserved.

(36)

Reserved.

(37)

Reserved.

(38)

To exercise all the powers of local self-government; to do whatever may be deemed necessary or proper for the safety, health, convenience or general welfare of the inhabitants of said Town; to exercise full police powers; to do and perform all acts and things permitted by the laws of the State of Florida, and comprehended as duties in the performance of anything recognized as a "municipal purpose" , whether now existing and recognized, or hereafter recognized as municipal purpose by Statute Law or court decision.

(39)

To impose and foreclose Municipal Tax and Special Assessment Liens in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 173, Florida Statutes Revised, and the procedures outlined therein.

(40)

To zone all areas encompassed by the Town in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 166, Florida Statutes Revised, and the procedures set forth therein.

(41)

To have the powers and privileges granted generally by Chapter 166, Florida Statutes, the same as if said powers and privileges were herein recited in full.

The enumeration of particular powers by this Charter shall not be held or deemed to be exclusive, but in addition to the powers enumerated herein, implied thereby, or appropriate to the exercise thereof, the Town of Hillsboro Beach shall have and may exercise all other powers which under the Constitution and Laws of Florida it would be competent for this paragraph specifically to enumerate.

(Am. Ord. 244, passed 12-2-2008; Am. Ord. 245, passed 12-2-2008; Am. Ord. 2016-293, passed 12-6-2016)