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7. The Florida Legislature passed and the Governor signed into law House Bill 631, Florida Chapter 2018 - 94, to be codified as a new section to the Florida Statutes. The new section, Section 163.035, Florida Statutes, provides a difficult, impractical and expensive legal process to ensure public access to beaches for local jurisdictions which fail to enact a customary use ordinance prior to July 1, 2018. 8. An amendment to House Bill 631, Florida Chapter 18-94, was added on the floor of the Senate and adopted by the House, which granted more leeway for the County to adopt a customary use ordinance prior to July 1, 2018 as follows: "APPLICABILITY.—This section does not apply to a governmental entity with an ordinance or rule that was adopted and in effect on or before January 1, 2016, and does not deprive a governmental entity from raising customary use as an affirmative defense in any proceeding challenging an ordinance or rule adopted before July 1, 2018." (Emphasis added) B.) Customary Use of the Beaches of Flagler County 1. The public has utilized every part of the dry sandy (and in some cases rocky) areas of the approximately eighteen miles of the Atlantic Ocean beach of Flagler County landward of the mean high water line to the easternmost seaward side of any sea wall, dune bluff, dune crest, rock revetment crest, or line of permanent dune vegetation, (the "Beach") for fishing, bathing, sunbathing, walking, navigation, surfing, exercising, kiting, photographing, picnicking, and other recreational activities without dispute or interruption since time immemorial (collectively, "Customary Use"). 2. There is extensive documentation of historical Customary Use of the Beach. Numerous members of the public submitted testimony, photographs, records, and statements demonstrating longstanding, continuous Customary Use of the Beach, which statements have been made part of the record of this Ordinance's adoption. 3. County staff has .also documented some of the historical Customary Use activities in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and the County will continue to further document the public's ancient, historic and more recent Customary Use of the Beach and will enter such documentation into the record of the Board of County Commissioners (the "Board") at its public hearings. 4. Public access to the Beach has never been hindered, nor has the Beach ever been segmented by fencing, barriers or other obstructions, and the Customary Use of the Beach has been without dispute and uninterrupted since ancient times. There has been no Page 5 of 11 203