Banning Fireworks

Last October the Irvine City Council voted to ban the sale and use of all fireworks in the city. In November Anaheim did the same. Los Alamitos followed in December. Last week Huntington Beach could have become the 12th city in Orange County to take the truly “safe-and-sane” approach and ban all fireworks. Unfortunately, it did not.

Instead, the City Council decided to delay action on the fire chief’s request until July 6. Waiting to act until the July 4 holiday passes may have been politically safe and avoided offending community groups that sell fireworks each year. But it was not the prudent approach, considering the fire and health dangers that fireworks pose.

The danger is especially great in a community such as Huntington Beach, where many homes and apartments with highly combustible wooden roofs are built close together. One roof ignited by a spark from a “safe-and sane” firework could mean disaster if flying embers spread to nearby roofs.

Community groups in other cities now prefer to raise funds in ways other than the sale of fireworks. These groups reason wisely that the potential cost to the community in property damage, firefighting expense, serious injury and even death is far greater than the income that fireworks sales could generate.

In 1980, a sparkler igniting a roof burned a 90-unit apartment complex in Tustin to the ground. This tragedy prompted that city to ban all fireworks. A $2.2-million fire last July that burned 94 apartments in Anaheim was the main motivation behind that city’s decision to ban all fireworks.

Huntington Beach, and the other cities that still haven’t enacted similar bans, shouldn’t wait for disaster. A ban makes it easier to control the use of illegal fireworks, too. And fewer fireworks mean fewer fires, injuries and monetary losses.