He has blamed some of the contagion on travelers from New York and Louisiana fleeing hot zones there and ordered those visitors to quarantine. Florida has closed restaurants except for takeout and delivery, urged people 65 or older to stay home, suspended vacation rentals and taken other steps, but it has not ordered a statewide shutdown of nonessential businesses or beaches.

The editorial boards of local newspapers have clamored for the governor to take bolder action. Physicians in Southwest Florida who are worried about hospitals becoming overwhelmed have asked Collier and Lee Counties, home to Naples and Fort Myers, to shutter nonessential businesses and order people to remain at home. County commissioners have refused to go that far without guidance from the governor.

Wildly different approaches by local officials have prompted outrage, especially online. While the city of Jacksonville, in Duval County, shut down its beaches, St. Johns County to the south did not. A striking aerial photo over the weekend showed bare beaches on one side of the county line and crowded sand on the other. (St. Johns County later closed its shoreline.)

“It’s really rather scary, because my neighbors aren’t really paying attention — and I live in an elderly community,” said Vicki Stanbury, 59, of Boynton Beach, a city in Palm Beach County. She said she was aghast to see people packed inside Walmart and Publix over the weekend without any apparent attention to social distancing.

“There was a little strip mall — Pet Supermarket, open. AT&T store, closed. Post office, open. Laundry center, open. Beauty school, closed. G.N.C., closed. Panera Bread, open,” she said. “I would like to hear the message that this is really serious: ‘Stay home, do not go out. Do not go to religious services. Do not be wandering around Atlantic Avenue with 15 of your friends. Do not go down by the beaches.’”

Democrats have called on the governor, a strong supporter of President Trump, to issue a statewide stay-at-home order, but he has insisted on what he calls a “tailored” approach.

That allowed Hillsborough County to order that people stay at home — and it was that local order Mr. Howard-Browne defied, even as religious services of all kinds have been canceled across the country, or moved online.