Panel wrestles with proposed golf cart ordinance

What’s your opinion? Email your thoughts and ideas about the proposed golf cart ordinance to the Lee County Department of Transportation. Deadline for comments is Friday, March 7.

New island golf cart regulations are one step closer to passage as the Boca Grande Community Planning Panel agreed with Lee County on most of its proposed golf cart ordinance at their meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 19.

Panel member Ted Hoopes said he had spoken with commissioners, who said the reason behind the proposed ordinance was that they had received numerous complaints about children driving golf carts, erratic driving and too many people riding in the carts.

The panel agreed with almost everything in the new ordinance, including the fact that golf cart operators must have a valid driver’s license and be 16 years of age. This would exclude drivers that have suspended licenses due to traffic violations or driving under the influence of alcohol, and those that have lost their driving privileges due to poor vision and infirmity.

When Hoopes asked if the ordinance would prohibit people from driving golf carts who have lost their license due to problems related to aging, Panel Chairman Lynne Seibert suggested that an addendum be added to exempt drivers 65 and over from the license requirement.

But panel member Linda Aley and Cpl. Bill Held of the Lee County Sheriff’s Office both argued that if a driver couldn’t legally operate a car, that person shouldn’t be operating a golf cart.

“It’s not like we’re trying to keep anybody down or at home,” Held said. “It’s strictly a safety issue. That’s just what it is.”

When Hoopes asked why the county would want to change the legal golf cart driving age from 14 to 16, Held said it would make their job much easier.

“It’s much easier for us to enforce,” he said. “We can pull up any individual from any state with their driver’s license. The main purpose of this whole thing is safety, and this ordinance would make it so that drivers would be a little bit more mature.”

Held said that violations while driving a golf cart would be treated, under the proposed ordinance, the same as non-moving infractions in a regular passenger vehicle.

Seibert then asked what would happen if a child under the legal age to drive was ticketed. Held said the ticket would then be given to the child’s adult guardian for allowing an unauthorized person to drive.

Sgt. Brian Amburgey, who attended the meeting with Held, said that local officers have often witnessed children driving underage or recklessly.

“They usually aren’t cited, but turned over to an adult guardian,” he said. “It is a difficult situation to enforce, and when officers see what they believe to be a violation of the law or a public danger, they attack and resolve it.”

The panel also agreed with the seat belt and child seat restrictions in the ordinance, which would require that all children under the age of 18 be securely belted in. For children under the age of 5, a child seat would be required.

Discussion then centered around the fact that most golf carts do not have seat belts. Held said that any golf cart can be fitted for seat belts, and most new models have them now. Seibert said that all golf cart rental businesses should be required to retro-fit their older-model carts with seat belts as well.

“One of my pet peeves I see all the time are adults with small children or babies on their lap,” Held said. “I stop them and tell them ‘that’s a real cute airbag you’ve got there.’ We can warn them once, and cite them if we see them doing it a second time.”

The panel also agreed with the ordinance that says the number of occupants in the golf cart should be limited to the amount of seats, and that no one should stand while the cart is in motion. They also supported the section of the ordinance that states golf carts are confined to a maximum of 20 miles per hour, and that all golf cart drivers must have liability insurance.

Hoopes said he also noticed something else within the wording of the ordinance that, according to him, might take away the right to drive a golf cart from First Street south to Belcher Road on the macadam path, the path that most golf carters use.

Hoopes brought the problem to the attention of the panel and read the Florida Statute which pertains to it.

“The county may not designate a bike path or sidewalk for use by golf carts … it’s a state law,” he said.

Florida Statute 316.1995 states that “No person shall drive any vehicle other than by human power upon a bicycle path, sidewalk, or sidewalk area, except upon a permanent or duly authorized temporary driveway. A violation of this section is a noncriminal traffic infraction, punishable as a moving violation as provided in chapter 318.”

Currently there are no signs marking what type of path runs through the macadam.

“This raises an issue that few of us realized exists,” Hoopes said. “All these years people have been driving golf carts on the bike path from First Street down to Belcher, and it’s not been legal. And it’s never been enforced.”

The GICIA portion of the bike path is privately owned and the ordinance does not apply.

Hoopes said one alternative would be for the county to designate Gulf Boulevard for use by golf carts, but that the idea wouldn’t necessarily be a safe one.

“What this ordinance recognizes is that golf carts cannot be used on any county road unless the county designates the road for use by golf carts,” he said. “In February of 1997 the county designated every road in the Lee County portion of Gasparilla Island as usable by golf carts, except Gasparilla Road and Gulf Boulevard. So the only way anyone can go from First Street to the lighthouse is by foot or by car - which is totally opposite of everything we’re trying to do.”

Hoopes said he couldn’t imagine that the county would exercise its right to designate Gulf Boulevard for golf cart use.

“It would be a license to kill,” he said. “So we have a major problem here.”

Local Lee County law enforcement agreed.

“The law has been there because people and pedestrians as well as bicyclists do have the right-of-way on the bike path,” Amburgey said. “We don’t want golf carts driving down Gulf or Gasparilla Road. We have to do something that will designate that area as a path for bicyclists and pedestrians and golf carts.”

When a Gilchrist Avenue resident asked whether it would be better to change the speed limit from 30 to 25 miles per hour on that street if golf carts were to share the road with cars, Seibert said that traffic engineer Ted Treesch had already suggested that as part of his recommendations.

The panel determined they would explore several options as to the problem, including coming up with a separate Gasparilla Island bike path ordinance, or possibly the renaming of the path to include all non-gasoline powered vehicles.

The panel will be sending their remarks to Lee County, and Seibert urged the public to give their input before the deadline of March 7. Residents can email jansensj@leegov.com.