The Friday night incident involved a large crowd that was “disorderly and surrounding the police,” said another tweet. Miami Beach police tweeted that they used pepper balls to disperse the group.
The nearly 100 arrests over the weekend, including some for gun and drug seizures, Miami Beach city spokeswoman Veronica Payssé told CNN on Sunday.
Spring break during a pandemic
Payssé said the problems are typical for spring break crowds each year, but that Covid-19 protocols make the task of policing the crowds twice as difficult.
The state of Florida does not allow local jurisdictions to fine people for violating mask orders, and the city can only offer free masks in the hope that people will wear them, she said.
Florida is a popular spring break destination and some of its beaches are crowded.
“We are seeing a lot of spring break activity,” Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber told CNN on Saturday morning. “We have a problem with a lot of people coming here, we have a problem with a lot of people coming here to let go.”
“We are concerned,” said the mayor. “It is very challenging.”
The Florida Department of Health reported a total of 1,973,109 cases of Covid-19 on Saturday, an increase of 5,167 cases since Friday.
Florida cases have increased in the past five days, after seeing a decline in previous days, FLDH panel data show.
The state health department website shows that the majority of the new cases were in Miami-Dade and Broward counties, with more than 677 new cases reported in each county.
Hollie Silverman and Amanda Watts of CNN contributed to this report.