Can anyone just ride on through?

On a recent Friday afternoon, Watercrest Condominium Association employees John Coppenhaver and Ricardo Taliaferro had partially disassembled an emergency-only gate at the back of the Lakewood Ranch condo complex.

Coppenhaver and Taliaferro found that someone had removed the covering to the gate’s electronics box and installed a wire to trick the system. Any remote control device would trigger the gate arms to raise.

The box around the control has since been locked.

Other East County communities that have emergency-access gates have experience similar problems and are seeking solutions.

In the case of Watercrest Condominiums, the condo association has a private resident-only road, but it has an emergency-only gate that connects it to the neighboring Watercrest community, which has public roads.

The gate is not intended for through traffic, but Watercrest homeowners have seen delivery vehicles, among others, access the gate. 

“It’s for emergency-use only,” said Jerry Twiggs, a board member on the Watercrest Condo Association and a supervisor on the Lakewood Ranch Community Development District 2 board. “That was the intent.”

Twiggs said he sees FedEx trucks use the gate all the time.

Other vendors also have found ways to get through the gate, and it appears many have the electronic code intended only for emergency personnel. It creates a flow of traffic unwanted by those who live in the neighborhood.

“I don’t have a solution for it,” Twiggs said. “It’s going to take the county to address it.”

Manatee County Public Safety Director Bob Smith said as long as emergency responders have gate access, there’s no problem from a provider standpoint. 

However, Manatee County might re-evaluate a 2004 ordinance regarding emergency gates.

“The biggest problem is that the current ordinance doesn’t give enforcement power,” Smith said. “It’s technically not illegal to have that code if you’re not public safety or don’t live in that community. Part of what we need to do is to look at the ordinance to see if we can give it some teeth.”

Similar circumstances in Riva Trace and the University Place neighborhoods resulted in Riva Trace’s successfully petitioning Manatee County in December to remove its emergency-only access gate.

Lakewood Ranch Golf and Country Club has two public gates. Others are transponder-only, limited to residents and emergency vehicles. It’s seen vendors use those gates, as well, and CDD supervisors have raised concerns about that situation.

East Manatee Fire Rescue District Chief Lee Whitehurst said the issue came to the district’s attention when it learned someone was giving out the EMS transponder code information. East Manatee passed the information to the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office, which verified there was no legal issue.

Smith said Manatee County is working on temporary and long-term solutions.

Manatee’s P25 radio system, which goes into effect in early 2018 for emergency responders, can routinely change the code used by emergency vehicles. However, it’s an unbudgeted system upgrade at this point. Plus, it doesn’t prohibit vendors from using codes or transponders given to them by homeowners.

Smith made his request to the county attorney’s office for options in late February. The item has not yet been slated for discussion by the Manatee County Commission.