Council Prohibits Skateboarding on Sidewalks

The South Gate City Council voted in favor of strengthening their current skateboarding restriction ordinance, across all business district sidewalks through out the city, by fully prohibiting the practice. All, but Councilmember Maria Davila, who left the meeting early,  voted in favor of this update to the ordinance. Safety was the main driver for its aceptance.

“A lot of the local businesses claimed that their shoppers did not have enough protection from skateboarders,” said South Gate Vice- Mayor Gil Hurtado, who added that people on skateboards could also be hurt when crashing into pedestrians. “This will look out for everyone’s safety.”

The former ordinance was also said to lack adequate enforcement capabilities. City officials are confident that they will have more success with the strength of this ordinance.  

“The ordinance has some teeth now,” said George Troxcil, South Gate City Manager, who further said that the new approved ordinance requires prohbition signs to be posted within the sidewalks of commercial areas.  Tweedy Boulevard, El Paseo, as well as any future retail development in the area, are just some of the few places that will have this code “This will now give us the opportunity to cite and confiscate the boards. ”

The South Gate Police Department will be given the power to both cite and impound skateboards that violate the ordinance.  In-line skates, along with roller skates, and any other form of similar traffic, will also be included in the impund list.

Those who have their equipment confiscated will be given a receipt that will tell them the hours, location, time frame and manner of which they can retrieve their property. Minors will need a parent to claim their equipment. The police reserve the right to auction off the seized recreational equipment within 60 days of it being impounded.

City officials insist that this new ordinance is just a way of putting and end to the bad practices of some careless skateboarders. 

“This will give us some more teeth, to get people to comply,” concluded Troxcil. “Our goal is not to impact people financially.”  

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