La Verne Residents OK Fireworks Ban

Residents voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to snuff out traditional Fourth of July backyard fireworks, making La Verne the 15th San Gabriel Valley city to ban so-called “safe and sane” pyrotechnics.

With 25.1% of La Verne’s 16,000 registered voters turning out for the special election, 3,183 of them--75%--voted to ban fireworks, while 1,059 voted against the measure.

The City Council voted to prohibit fireworks last August, but local service organizations, which derive much of their annual income from fireworks sales in the two weeks before July 4, vigorously opposed the ban. After opponents collected more than 1,600 signatures, the council voted to hold a special election on the issue.

“I really did expect that more citizens would want fireworks,” said Charlene Burns, founder of Citizens for Tradition, a group that led the opposition to the ban. Burns is involved with La Verne San Dimas Pop Warner Youth Football, which earned a third of its $30,000 annual budget through profits from sales at its fireworks stand.

“I’m happy the citizens had their say,” Burns said. “Now we need those citizens to support all of those organizations (that depended on fireworks revenue), to open their pockets.”

La Verne had been one of 14 San Gabriel Valley cities that permit “safe and sane” fireworks, which emit sparks but do not shoot into the air or explode.

Although La Verne voters rejected a fireworks ban in an advisory vote three years ago, residents’ ardor for pyrotechnics has been dampened within the past year by two major fires.

A brush fire in July, believed to have been started by fireworks, blackened 75 acres and increased sentiment in favor of a ban. A Dec. 8 firestorm that destroyed eight houses, while not related to fireworks, made clear the ever-present danger of catastrophic fire in La Verne’s brush-covered foothill areas.

‘Level of Awareness’

“I think (the fires) raised the level of awareness in the community,” Councilman Patrick Gatti said, adding that support for the ban was strongest in the city’s northern foothill areas. “The results indicate that the people in the southern areas of the city were not as overwhelmingly in favor of it as those in the north. In some (northern) areas, the vote was 6 to 1 in favor.”

The West Covina City Council also voted to ban “safe and sane” fireworks in August, but--as in La Verne--service clubs and fireworks manufacturers protested.

West Covina voters will decide the issue March 7. In November, voters in Temple City and Azusa rejected fireworks bans in advisory votes.

La Verne

11 of 11 precincts (FINAL)

BALLOT MEASURE Shall the sale and use of fireworks be prohibited in the city of La Verne as provided in Ordinance 768 adopted by the City Council on Aug. 15, 1988?

Vote % Yes 3,183 75.0 No 1,059 25.0

Voter turnout 25%