STANTON : Fireworks Firms Ask City to Reconsider

Following the city’s fourth July 4th holiday without fireworks sales, representatives of two fireworks companies have asked the City Council to reconsider the city’s ban on even state-approved fireworks.

But a County Fire Department official warned the council that even the so-called “safe and sane” fireworks are a hazard that cause both injuries and property damage.

Council members asked for updated statistics on injuries and damage in neighboring cities that allow fireworks and indicated they will discuss the issue at a future meeting.

The council four years ago decided to ban fireworks sales in Stanton after city voters rejected an advisory measure that would have allowed the sales to continue. Only four Orange County cities now allow fireworks sales: Costa Mesa, Garden Grove, Santa Ana and Buena Park.

Representatives of Freedom Fireworks and American West Marketing last week reopened the debate over fireworks sales by reminding the Stanton council what a lucrative fund-raiser the sales are for charity groups and that voters only narrowly defeated the 1988 measure by 85 votes.

John Kelly, general manager of Freedom Fireworks, said that his company is committed to intensive safety education efforts and that most of the reported injuries and damage are caused by illegal fireworks, not the strictly regulated, state-approved fireworks.

Kelly said his company also decided to stop selling sparklers after learning the popular hand-held items were to blame for half of the small percentage of injuries caused by state-approved fireworks.

Tad Trout, vice president of American West Marketing, said fireworks sales grossed $108,000 in Stanton the last year they were allowed, with about half of the money going to local charitable groups.

Patrick McIntosh, assistant fire marshal for the Orange County Fire Department, which provides fire protection services for Stanton, argued that there are other ways for groups to raise money and that state-approved fireworks “may be safer but they still are dangerous.”

Reading from statistics culled from June 18 to July 15, 1991, McIntosh reported that at least three of the 20 fires reported last year in the four cities that still allow fireworks were attributed to “safe and sane” fireworks.

Any time fireworks are placed in the hands of untrained individuals, particularly children, there will be fires and injuries, which in the past have included amputation of fingers and hands and temporary blindness, McIntosh said.

“America’s children suffer the most,” he said.