Granny’s golf cart grounded

By Mike Trask (contact)

Friday, Jan. 26, 2007 | 8:43 a.m.

Sheila Fava plans to take on City Hall - at 8 mph.

Fava had been cruising around Boulder City since the days of Devo and "E.T." - not in a car, truck or SUV, but in a fully loaded electric golf cart.

A depth perception eyesight problem requires the 66-year-old Fava to walk with a cane and keeps her from getting behind the wheel of a normal car. But she can handle the slow-moving cart.

For now, however, she's stuck in park.

This month, a city crackdown abruptly ended Fava's years of cart driving. After police began ticketing people using off-road vehicles, the city was forced to warn Fava that her cart was not street legal.

"Technically they are against the law," City Attorney Dave Olsen said. "When we enforced the rule with the off-road vehicles, we had to enforce it with the golf carts."

By all accounts, Fava was the only one regularly using her cart on the roads in Boulder City, although a few people occasionally used the carts to drive to the city golf course.

Now the $3,700 cart - complete with rearview mirror, headlights, turn signals, brake lights, seat belts and roof - sits in her garage. And that means Fava has not been doing much of anything lately.

"They put the kibosh on everybody," she said.

When she was able to drive the cart, Fava avoided busy city streets, confining her travels to quiet side streets.

"As a kid I rode in it all the time," her daughter, Cynthia McLoud said. "She's always safe."

Fava says she has never even had a close call: "Never had a ticket, never had an accident."

Even Olsen acknowledges there have been few problems over the years with the golf carters in Boulder City. "We've tolerated them," he said. "There's never been any accidents or anything that would mean they are unsafe."

Soon, the city may go back to tolerating Fava's cart.

Olsen, with help from the Nevada Public Agency Insurance Pool, has been researching legalizing carts on city roads. The key to doing so, officials said, might be differentiating between off-road vehicles and golf carts.

There are places in Southern Nevada where it is legal to drive golf carts on streets, mostly master-planned communities such as Summerlin.

"It is a mode of transportation that's getting more popular in small communities throughout the country," Olsen said.

Fava doesn't care much about popularity. She would settle for being able to get to her grandson's soccer games.

"I just want to drive to the same places I did before," she said.