Fewer snowbirds flocking to Florida this year amid pandemic
FORT LAUDERDALE — The annual migration of snowbirds has begun, but they may be hard to notice.
As COVID-19 cases spike across the nation, South Floridians who usually watch beaches and restaurants fill up with out-of-towners are wondering the same thing: Howbig will this year’s flock be? Not as big as usual.
Each year, thousands of residents from northern U.S. and Canadian cities leave their homes to escape the bone-chilling cold of winter and head south to Florida for extended stays that often last into the early spring. Theycomeby planes, trains, cars, luxury motor coaches and RVs with small boats in tow.
Tourism bureaus don’t closely track snowbird traffic. But at the start of the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show, Mayor Dean Trantalis estimated that the number of seasonal visitors could be off by as much as 20% to 25%.
Themayor said he has a brother in Connecticut, who, along with his wife, elected to stay home this year.
For some full-time residents, this year will be what they always hope for: Fewer people clogging roads with cars bearing out-ofstate plates. Fewer beachgoers angling for space on the shoreline. Fewer diners fighting for restaurant reservations.
But the smaller gaggle of snowbirds is not good news for businesses that will suffer in a year when they’ve already suffered too much.
And that adage that it’s the visitors who foot the bill for the amenities of paradise could boomerang. Sales and bed taxes will decline, and employment could fall further.
Restrictions upon landing
The snowbirds who do come can expect some pandemic-driven changes fromlast year, particularly at condo complexes and RV parks that are determined to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
“My best advice for people coming down is to contact their association and see what the protocols are,” saidDonnaDiMaggio Berger, a longtime condo and homeowner association lawyer at the Becker firm in Fort Lauderdale.
She said a number of her association clients are informing snowbird residents “that they are not going to be able to use amenities for a certain amount of time.”
“Even the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] has said the risk for transmission increases when you have people coming from other spots,” she said. “In 55-and-over retirement communities, the stakes are higher. They have a vulnerable resident demographic.”
Many complexes and high-rises have closed their gyms, community rooms, gameroomsand libraries since the pandemic struck in March.
Nancy Schreiber, property manager at the Paradise Island RV Resort in Oakland Park, said she’s worried about travelers fromstates that lack safety mandates that are prevalent in South Florida.
“They’re coming from states that don’t knowwhat a mask looks like,” she said.“We tellthemwhat’s going on here in Broward and Miami Dade. Hopefully, they don’t book and feel they’ve got the free run of the place.”
Schreiber said her snowbird contingent is usually composed of 65% French Canadians from Quebec. “They’re the ones that are not coming because they can’t cross the border with their RVs.” The U.S.-Canadian border has been closed for months.
“My friends from the Northeast that typically come are coming,” she said. “But I am filling the void with domestic travelers. I am seeingmore fromthe Midwest.”
Vacant second homes
Thus far, snowbird traffic also appears to be down from 2019 among second-home visitors in association-controlled communities, said Bruce Masia, a Broward County area regional vice president for KW Property Management,
“You can feel a lightness in the communities,” he said. “You usually see in the beginning of October an influx of people coming down. We’re definitely seeing less of that right now. It might pick up. Maybe people are hanging out to be with their families through Thanksgiving.”
The rise in factor, he said.
“I think people are taking the precautions,” Masia said. “Florida is becoming hot again. We were
COVID cases is a very calm for the last four to six weeks. Now our numbers are rising again.”
“People are saying to themselves, ‘Where amI better off?’” he said. “’Am I better off staying where I am? Or am I better off coming to Florida?”’
The Canadian border
A major factor in the traffic decline centers on the U.S.-Canada border, which remains closed to all non-essential land travel until at leastNov. 21.
TheCanadianSnowbirdAssociation, which says it serves as an advocate for more than 100,000 cross-border travelers, said it discussed the issue with government agencies in theU.S. and Canada.
“Ultimately, based on these discussions, the current travel restrictions at the land border crossings could possibly extend well into 2021,” the group said in a statement. “At this time, the onlyway in which Canadian citizens are permitted to travel to the United States is by air.”
Some restaurant owners who rely on snowbirds as regular winter customers are edgy about the thin flowof out-of-town visitors.
“They’re not here,” said Paul Mangiardi, owner of the Delacaseas Café in Lauderdale-by-theSea. In past years, he said, “there were at least 10 couples” from Toronto, Quebec and the Boston area who would regularly dine at the café.
“If theywere all here, wewould be open for dinner,” he said. These days, the restaurant focuses on breakfast and lunch with occasional wine-with-dinner nights.