The Fight Against Crime: Notes From The Front : Holding Hope for a Safe and Sane Holiday

Today, of course, is the Fourth of July--and time for the annual warning.

So, to borrow, and perhaps to refine, the words of Martha Stewart: Fireworks can be a good thing; but in the wrong hands, they can be a bad thing. A very bad thing.

Indeed, the Fourth of July has become a pretty dangerous holiday. Maybe that’s fitting because, after all, the inspiration for the holiday was the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, which occurred at the outset of a long and bloody war.

But 219 years ago, it was cannon and muskets and infantry charges.

Today, we have car wrecks caused by drunk drivers, celebratory gunfire that hits unsuspecting people miles away; and of course, fireworks that mutilate inexperienced hands, unwatchful eyes and stationary feet.

The latter are the parts of the body fireworks are most likely to hurt, according to fire and hospital officials.

During the Revolutionary War, historians tell us, the killing and wounding was done for a higher purpose: freedom from tyranny. But now that Americans have that freedom, some of us are only too glad to use it maiming ourselves and others every July 4.

Nowhere in the Declaration does it state that we have the right to fire volleys into the air, drive drunk or start grass fires with fireworks.

Consider: On the Fourth of July weekend last year, the California Highway Patrol arrested 338 overindulgent drinkers in Los Angeles County--74 in the San Fernando, Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys, and almost half of those in the West San Fernando Valley.

In a recent study of gunshot injuries from 1985 to 1992, a physician at King/Drew Medical Center found that 118 people had been treated for wounds caused by bullets fired randomly into the air on the Fourth of July, and its gun-happy cousin of a holiday, New Year’s Eve. Seventy-seven percent of the victims were hit in the head. Thirty-eight of the 118 died.

And finally, according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department, illegal fireworks caused 116 fires totaling $2 million in damages in Los Angeles County, and 100 injuries, mostly to hands, fingers, faces and feet.

To stop at least some of this accidental carnage, the county Fire Department offers “Catch the Spark at the Park”--a phone hot line that lists public fireworks shows around the county. The number is 1-800-900-FIRE.

As is true in all of the city of Los Angeles, fireworks and firecrackers are illegal in the San Fernando Valley. But 37 of the county’s other 88 cities, including Palmdale, do allow them.

So, if after all this, you are buying fireworks in Palmdale and need to discern what is legal, fire officials caution that you make sure the outer package is labeled “California State Fire Marshal Certified.”

Further, said Fire Capt. Steve Valenzuela, the illegal ones, which include rockets, M-80s and other firecrackers, are easy to tell from the so-called safe and sane variety sold at legal fireworks stands.

“If it blows up, flies in the air or scoots across the ground, it is generally illegal,” Valenzuela said. “Those are the kinds that hurt people.”

Even with the legal variety, Valenzuela cautions, “They can be fairly safe, as long as you don’t point them at someone, alter them, throw them in a brush area or relight a dud.”

And more so than in recent years, fire officials are concerned about the possibility of a large blaze caused by fireworks.

“There is a lot of brush out there because of all the rain,” he said. “The potential is there.”

The potential is also there for a peaceful, relatively uneventful celebration of our country’s birthday.

Fat chance.