Neighbor cannot compel city to enforce zoning ordinance

The Florida Supreme Court has held that cities cannot be compelled to enforce zoning laws. In City of West Palm Beach v. Haver, 2021 Fla. LEXIS 1572 (Fla. 2021), a neighbor sought a court order to force the city to enforce a zoning prohibition on a group home. The court ruled that it would exceed the legitimate role of the courts to order city officials to comply with local zoning laws when the decision in question is one that has traditionally been discretionary on the part of public officials. The court would not interfere with “administrative enforcement decisions of a kind that traditionally have been considered discretionary and that embody value-laden judgments about the proper allocation of scarce governmental resources.”
See also: Zoning