MIAMI-DADE

age in more than a week’s worth of demonstrations, and the county’s Corrections Department stopped reporting protest-related arrests June 3 because only two people had been taken into custody the night before.

The mayor did roll back the curfew to midnight last week, then shifted it to 9 p.m. by the time the weekend ended. The measure forced restaurants to close, drawing criticism from the industry and from city leaders who saw a countywide curfew as too broad.

“It was certainly helpful during the first two nights, when there was vandalism in the city,” said Miami Commissioner Ken Russell, who said it’s a challenge to balance public safety against restrictions that hurt businesses. “I just think a more nuanced approach is able to strike that balance better. By nuanced, I mean more local.”

Gimenez’s lifting of the curfew caught Victor Muñoz by surprise as he was preparing to close his Miami racket clinic at 8:30 p.m. to comply with county rules Monday. “I wasn’t aware,” said Muñoz, owner of Real Padel Miami, after learning of the curfew suspension from a Miami Herald photographer. “I thought it was nine.”

The planned reopening of Miami-Dade beaches follows a string of other county restrictions lifted

Monday, including closure orders on gyms, massage studios and tattoo shops. Those changes were announced last week, along with lifting a closure on dog parks across the county. Over the weekend, Gimenez changed that order with a significant new restriction: Dog parks could be open, but dogs must remain leashed while inside them.

For beaches, new rules ban clusters of more than 10 beachgoers, and no coolers unless they’re shared by members of the same household. Dogs are also banned from beaches countywide.

The beach closures began March 19 from an emergency order by Gimenez in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus. He had planned to lift that order June 1.

Then he canceled the reopening eight days ago on the heels of some Miami stores being ransacked and police cars burned.

At the time, Gimenez said beaches would remain closed as long as a curfew was in place. Sunday night marked the ninth day of the curfew.

Monday’s announcement followed a press conference at the MiamiDade County Emergency Operations Center in Doral where Gimenez said he was ready to end the curfew but that beaches wouldn’t reopen immediately.

“We needed a little bit more time for people to prepare,” he said.