Right to vote in jeopardy for FL RVers (Specifically St Brendan?s Isle users)

We are customers of St. Brendan?s Isle and have our legal address there. We also voted in the last presidential election, but we don?t vote in local elections.

http://dos.myflorida.com/media/699707/de1809.pdf

More links: http://www.technomadia.com/2018/07/urgent-advisory-right-to-vote-in-jeopardy-for-rvers-and-cruisers-st-brendans-isle-clay-county-florida/

Wow. The potential implications of this opinion reach well outside FL

Sun2Retire said:

Wow. The potential implications of this opinion reach well outside FL

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A legislator in SD was pushing for a law to do the same thing a couple of years ago but it didn't pass.  In SD the license and registration money from RVer residents is probably a more significant $$ factor than it is in FL.

I don't see any new info in that legal opinion, but it's an excellent re-hash of the legal gray areas involving residency, domicile, voting right, driving & vehicle licenses, etc.    We have repeatedly stated here that merely having a PMB (Private Mail Box) or making a Declaration of Domicile does NOT confer residency, in Florida or anywhere else.  The Florida State Dept reiterates that the status must be evaluated on a case-by-case basis and cites Florida court decisions as legal precedence in support of that.


St Brendans has perhaps been telling customers ways to fill out forms to accomplish things, or maybe some enterprising local attorney is simply employing their address & mail services.  Giving the psuedo-address of the county offices (1 Clay County) sounds  like something a legal beagle might come up with.

It appears, though, that the Clay County Elections Supervisor is either preparing to crack down on some voter registrations, or is investigating a complaint about illegal voter registrations.  It's not unusual to hear of local protests claiming large scale voter registration fraud using large mail services, though typically these turn out to be vastly overstated.  Polk County Texas (home of Escapees Club and mail service) elections officials went through a similar thing a few years back.

The PDF sates " the  common thread through the four scenarios is  the lack of  a valid residential address and no  meaningful contacts indicating the  requisite intent and  physical presence in the county. The use of the Mail Forwarding Service and its advetised services alone including the Declaration of Domicile without a valid residential address are insufficient to satisfy the requirements for legal residency in Clay County for voter registration purposes.
It is not that you are in an RV as the opinion states;
"Therefore, under the circumstances you describe, the driver license does not establish legal residence. That is not to say that the definition of legal residence requires a  residence made  up  of  a  four-walled  dwelling. The  definition is  broad, encompassing a wide  range of nontraditional abodes. A legal residence may even, for example, be a park bench,  but cannot be a commercial mailbox. A residence
plainly is not a place where people do not have a physical presence to reside.

You could change your lifestyle in order to vote but do not expect the law to accommodate you when you have no intention of being in the county your are registered in.

I assume you declared Florida for your "residence" in order to avoid taxes Etc from another state.
You had no intention to ever live in the state why should this be allowed.
Notice that if you left the county temporarily (temporarily is not defined)and intended to return you would be okay and if you moved overseas even permanently and you where a resident BEFORE moving you would be okay and able to vote.
You on the other hand have no ties to the community. The implications go far beyond voter registration. Suppose something happened and you needed welfare, medicaid or other government assistance from that county; Does the fact you have a PO BOX make you a resident for those purposes.


As Judge Judy says " Sometime you play the system sometimes the system plays you.

I assume you declared Florida for your "residence" in order to avoid taxes Etc from another state.
You had no intention to ever live in the state why should this be allowed.

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You know what they say about assuming. We declared residency in Florida because that?s where we live during the winter. We also have family and friends living in the area where we spend the winter. We like the weather in southern Florida during the winter. Taxes was at the bottom of the list of reasons for us moving to Florida. Family, friends, weather and location were more important than the little bit of money we save on taxes.

We declared residency in Florida because that?s where we live during the winter. We also have family and friends living in the area where we spend the winter.

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Right, and therefore there is a good chance that an evaluation of YOUR case would show that you are a bona fide Florida resident, though perhaps not a Clay County resident (depends on other physical factors).

Because of a large snow bird population, the presence of many pleasure and commercial boat live-abords, and a large migrant worker community, Florida law and legal precedent is actually reasonably accommodating to people who do not have a fulltime, fixed abode in the state.

Might be the reason why South Dakota requires you to show a receipt for a one nights stay in the county you?re registering in.

Dragginourbedaround said:

Might be the reason why South Dakota requires you to show a receipt for a one nights stay in the county you?re registering in.

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With all due respect, I don't think the hotel receipt has to be from the County you are registering in.  We stayed the night in Sioux Falls and then drove to Madison in Lake County and no one questioned our receipt.

For Florida, it could be that if you don't qualify to register under the "Mobile" legal residence category, you might be able to claim registry under the "Homeless" category:

Legal residence-Mobile. For a person with a nontraditional abode (e.g., boat, motor home, etc.) who intends and has presence in the county and intends for county to be residence county, acceptable addresses include: 1) the place where messages regularly received5, 2) the general delivery address at a specific post office, or 3) the address for the campground or docking site (mail is received there).


Legal residence-Homeless.  It is against Florida and federal laws to discriminate against a homeless person. The voter registration laws cannot be applied in a manner to deny such person the right to register to vote.6  Therefore, a person who is homeless or without a permanent ?traditional? home but intends to remain permanently in the locale can register using an address for: 1) place where he or she regularly receives messages, 2) the church if it agrees to accept mail or messages on the person?s behalf, 3) the shelter or other local that a person frequents and could be reached,  4) the specific post office for general delivery. It may even be a specific street corner, park bench, vacant lot, etc., to where the person frequently rests or returns and intends to serve as the ?home-base?.7 The general point is to be able to generally locate and assign a precinct that corresponds with that location.

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https://soe.dos.state.fl.us/pdf/guidelinesvoterresidencyupdated_02-2012.pdf

Dragginourbedaround said:

You know what they say about assuming. We declared residency in Florida because that?s where we live during the winter. We also have family and friends living in the area where we spend the winter. We like the weather in southern Florida during the winter. Taxes was at the bottom of the list of reasons for us moving to Florida. Family, friends, weather and location were more important than the little bit of money we save on taxes.

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Then if you are there during the winter IN THE COUNTY you are registering in you have no problems and you can always use your winter address as your legal address and have the POST OFFICE forward your mail once a week

darsben said:

Then if you are there during the winter IN THE COUNTY you are registering in you have no problems and you can always use your winter address as your legal address and have the POST OFFICE forward your mail once a week

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Not all RV parks will let you receive mail at their address...

NY_Dutch said:

Not all RV parks will let you receive mail at their address...

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.
Then rent a PO BOX at the Post Office nearest and have your address as
John Doe
PO BOX 7734
Address of RV PArk
City and state
Then have it forwarded to you in the winter.
That is what I used to do at the Fishers Landing NY Post Office until I sold my summer home i the Thousand Islands
or MOVE TO A NICER PARK.
But monthly or seasonal rent receipts and/or utility/cable bills will go a long way to proving residency

darsben said:

I assume you declared Florida for your "residence" in order to avoid taxes Etc from another state.
You had no intention to ever live in the state why should this be allowed.

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Sooner or later I figured the shoe would drop on this issue.

From RVer online conversations I've read over the years, I know some (many? most?) RVers who select SD, TX, or FL as a domicile have no intent to actually domicile or "live" there.

I used quotes because I don't know how many RV forum postings I've seen in which the poster states he/she will "move" (their quotes) to FL (or wherever) for less taxes, health insurance, etc. This is a full timer dirty little secret.

And some of us (I am full timer) are really stupid about keeping it a secret. For example, I remember one woman who described in detail on a forum how she set up "domicile" in FL in 24 hours . . . then flew back to where she really lives. Never to return?

In the 2001/2002 Escapee voting rights case, the Escapees won the case because the Polk County tax accessor tried to throw out the Escapees en masse -- not case by case.

On the other hand, it appears FL will be proceeding on a case-by-case basis.

If FL is successful in removing mail service folks from voting rolls, this may have other ramifications -- driver license renewal, health insurance eligibility, etc.

Fasten your seatbelts.

  Are there parks/campgrounds in Clay County?

  Also it appears that the official is targeting SBI customers while ignoring UPS Store mail-forwarding customers. There's a UPS  Store in the county.

When I see word like "targeting" and "ignoring", I think you are jumping to conclusions.  All we know at this point is that voter registrations using SBI addresses are being reviewed and new ones are not being accepted at this time.  It appears from the State Legal Opinion document that at least some fraudulent voter registrations have been found, so I would hope and expect the Clay Supervisor of Elections to look into it closely.  On the other hand, it is also clear from the Legal Opinion and the statutes that NY Dutch cited that Florida is not going to just dump all RV or vessel related registrations, since that would be clearly illegal in Florida law.

The downside for Rvers is that current and new voter applications are going to be scrutinized very closely and clerks will surely err on the side of caution for the next several months or more. It's going to be tough to get new applications approved for awhile.

The document from the Florida Department of State discusses voter registration, and bases it largely on what constitutes "legal residence" in Florida. The implication being that are full time RVers using a mail forwarding service "legal residents" of Florida? Possibly in Florida the amount of full times RVers is not significant when compared to the general population.

Out of the 3 states most popular with full time RV travelers, I can see SD being the least likely to insist that RVers not be allowed domicile there.  With SD ranked #46 (800 thousand people) in terms of population, Florida is ranked #4 (almost 19 million people), and Texas #2 (25 million people). (Figures taken from the last Census in 2010). SD gets a significant bump from the RVers that claim it as home. 

So if there ever is a push to claim that full time RVers are not legal residents, IMHO South Dakota would be the last one  to jump on that train.

That battle has already been through the courts in Texas. And fulltime RV'ers won thanks to the efforts of the Escapees RV Club management.

NY_Dutch said:

That battle has already been through the courts in Texas. And fulltime RV'ers won thanks to the efforts of the Escapees RV Club management.

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That's only because the Polk County tax accessor wanted to remove ALL the Escapees from the voter rolls. FL is going case by case. If some official decided to do the same in TX or SD, it could be very bad news for a lot of RVers.