• Vero Beach Councilman John Carroll is seeking ways to enforce golf cart safety regulations and educate the public on safe operation.
• Law enforcement officials encourage residents to report violations, emphasizing the potential dangers posed by unsafe operation of golf carts and low-speed vehicles.
• The increasing popularity of golf carts and similar vehicles, coupled with existing traffic, creates a hazardous environment, particularly for untrained or underage drivers.
• Accidents involving uninsured or unlicensed drivers, including those potentially ineligible for licenses, can lead to increased insurance premiums and out-of-pocket expenses for insured drivers.

With all the significant concerns in our community — from health care and growth to immigration enforcement and water quality — one issue was in focus at a recent Vero Beach City Council meeting.

It started off with Mayor John Cotugno introducing Councilman John Carroll as “Mr. Golf Cart.”

Carroll has been trying to find a safe way for folks to take their golf carts from their homes to their courses and for road-worthy low-speed vehicles with license plates to be operated safely.

Perhaps because of his duffer-related moniker, Carroll said he gets a lot of feedback from residents about violations of cart rules.

Where do Vero Beach violations occur?

“We have a great ordinance, but it has to be enforced,” Carroll said, citing complaints about low-speed vehicles operating on McAnsh Park and Central Beach roadways by children who don’t have driver’s licenses.

And while it’s OK to drive your golf cart to Riomar and Vero Beach country clubs, it’s not OK to drive it to Publix on Miracle Mile, where Carroll, chuckling, said he saw one recently.

He’s received complaints about and seen more occupants in carts and low-speed vehicles than the number of seats, and children sitting on laps and hanging onto roof supports.

“We need to get some enforcement going before somebody gets injured or worse,” he said, suggesting flyers be put in city utility bills to explain the rules.

City Manager Monte Falls said police could use the public’s help.

What can Vero Beach residents do to help?

“If you see that going on …. Call the police non-emergency number (772-978-4600)” Falls said, noting he’d work on educating the public through social media.

Initially, in part because of some chuckling, I thought Carroll’s concern was a bit provincial. With all the other issues we face, golf carts are a focus?

Then again, while it might not rise to the level issues like immigration enforcement, health care, water quality or growth, safe operation of moving vehicles ― regardless of how much they weigh ― should be important to all of us.

Making laws to ensure safely operated vehicles in specific neighborhoods, after all, should be the purview of local government.

While I don’t have a golf cart, four-wheeler, all-terrain or low-speed vehicle, I see them all over my south Indian River County neighborhood.

And ― thinking of Falls’ request — if I called the Indian River County Sheriff’s Office every time I saw what I thought was a violation, my cellphone battery would go dead.

Falls’ request is not unique. Sheriff Eric Flowers told me he’d like us to call his non-emergency number, 772-569-6700, when we see issues.

Sometimes, after all, operating such vehicles could be a matter of life and death.

Vero Lake Estates incident a lesson

Scene quiet where 15-year-old boy died in ATV crash in Vero Lake Estates

Scene quiet Monday, Oct. 5, 2020, where 15-year-old boy died and four others injured in an ATV crash on Sunday, Oct. 4, in Indian River County.

Will Greenlee, will.greenlee@tcpalm.com

Flowers cited the 2020 case of Jake Beecher, 15, a Sebastian River High School student who died after being thrown from the bed of an ATV when it failed to negotiate a turn in Vero Lake Estates. Four other boys ages 13-15 were injured.

Flowers also remembered several other cart-type wrecks that seriously injured teenagers in the county.

They’ve happened in more developed neighborhoods and in rural parts of the county, which has way more traffic than it used to.

“There are people who are in denial,” Flowers said, suggesting some longtime residents must realize some things they did years ago ― riding bikes across intersections on busy highways or off-road vehicles on streets — are no longer safe. “We have too many people on the roads.”

The ever-growing traffic leads to dangerous situations.

“We’ve got to try to save lives,” Flowers said, noting his agency sees in the unincorporated county the same dangers Carroll cited.

So do I. I see lots of golf carts and similar vehicles — with and without license plates ― driving on local roads, sidewalks and rights of way. I don’t know if younger people driving them have licenses.

Flowers said registered vehicles may be operated on roads, but motorists must have licenses and be able to provide proof of registration.

Without that registration, such vehicles may be driven only on private land and roads, such as in gated communities, in areas designated by local government, such as near Vero Beach golf clubs.

In the past, Carroll has emphasized safety to ensure licensed low-speed vehicles can ride on the wider State Road A1A sidewalk between the Village Beach Market and Jaycee Park.

“The safety features that low-speed vehicles require are windshields, seatbelts, mirrors, lights and a reflective orange triangle,” Carroll said in a 2024 TCPalm article. “I think one of the most important aspects is that you cannot have more people than seats inside the low-speed vehicle.”

Carroll and Flowers are right. The confluence of cars, SUVs, tractor-trailers, bicycles, four-wheelers, golf carts and pedestrians can be a recipe for danger.

Consider auto insurance rates, damages

When untrained, uninsured or underage golf cart or low-speed vehicle operators get into accidents, they might not be the only ones getting hurt or having to pay damages.

In some cases, they might be like undocumented immigrants, who are ineligible for driver’s licenses and, thus, are uninsured motorists. And when they get into wrecks with folks who do have insurance, guess who pays ― in the form of higher premiums (among the worst in the nation) and out-of-pocket expenses?

The rest of us do.

So let’s focus on golf cart and low-speed drivers, too.

This column reflects the opinion of Laurence Reisman. Contact him via email at larry.reisman@tcpalm.com, phone at 772-978-2223, Facebook.com/larryreisman or Twitter @LaurenceReisman.

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