August 14, 2025 – Belwood Cabana
On August 7, our community had its first board meeting about updating the e-bike ordinance. The goal was to talk about how we can keep people safe, especially kids, while still letting people use e-bikes responsibly. A lot of the conversation was about the difference between e-bikes and e-motorcycles, since they aren’t the same thing and have different safety issues.
What People Are Worried About
Parents, neighbors, and police officers talked about a bunch of problems they’ve been seeing:
- Kids riding without helmets or carrying friends on the same bike.
- Pulling dangerous stunts like wheelies in the middle of traffic.
- Riding at night without lights.
- Riding in big groups or on sidewalks, blocking traffic.
- Noise from engines and speeding.
- Misinformation online about what’s legal.
- In some cases, e-bike riders being connected to vandalism or fireworks.
- Parents not always helping police enforce rules.
A lot of people agreed that the biggest issue is lack of education. Many students (and parents) don’t know the rules for riding, and some just don’t think about how dangerous certain behavior can be.
Ideas for Fixing the Problem
Two main types of solutions came up: enforcement and education.
Enforcement ideas:
- Make a clear definition of what counts as an e-bike vs. an e-motorcycle.
- Have police focus more on e-bike safety at the start of the school year.
- Require all e-bikes to have lights turned on.
- Make a list of which e-bikes are legal.
- Give rewards to riders who follow the rules.
- Require e-bike insurance.
- Create punishments for kids who keep breaking the rules.
The police mentioned they can’t be everywhere at once, so even with new rules, there’s still a limit to how much they can enforce.
Education ideas:
- Make students and parents take a safety course before riding.
- Have officers visit schools to teach the rules.
- Ban e-bikes for middle school students, like some other districts do.
- Share a list of legal and illegal e-bikes with schools and officers.
Where Things Go From Here
Rob, who spoke for the police, said the laws need to be realistic so officers can enforce them without going against people’s rights. He also said parents have to be more involved if we want things to change.
This meeting was just the first step. The board will keep collecting ideas before deciding on a final set of rules to recommend to the town council.
