Police Will Do Their July 4 Duty When the Time Comes

City officials here apparently didn’t spring forward with the rest of the country when daylight saving time started on April 6.

The city’s long-debated ordinance aimed at quelling July 4 riots by regulating public drinking officially runs from noon today until noon Sunday PST. That’s Pacific Standard Time.

Trouble is, we’re on Pacific Daylight Time.

Noon today, Pacific Daylight Time, is 11 a.m. Pacific Standard Time.

Does that mean police can start cracking down on drinkers an hour earlier?

“That’s an interesting question,” Deputy City Atty. Sarah Lazarus said Wednesday. “We shouldn’t have put in Pacific any time. The intent was to make it noon to noon. I’ll have to call the Police Department.”

The time change is the latest hitch in the city’s labors to craft an ordinance regulating drinking in public year-round and on some private property during the Fourth of July holiday period. Police Chief Ronald E. Lowenberg said the law is needed to prevent people from drinking alcohol in public, and thus avert the drunken brawls and ritual couch burnings that have marred previous July 4 celebrations.

A Municipal Court judge threw out four holiday arrests last year, saying the law’s definition of “public place” was unconstitutionally vague. City Council members chewed over various amendments to the ordinance this year, and even gave one version initial approval. But after weathering residents’ criticism that the law went too far and shouldn’t be in effect year-round, the council passed the current version, with the very specific time limits.

The ordinance expires after this year, so the council can examine how well it worked.

Huntington Beach Police Lt. Dan Johnson laughed when asked if the time discrepancy will cause problems for the department.

“If it does, it does,” he said.

And Lt. Jon Arnold, the department’s south area commander, said he didn’t expect his officers to make that many drinking arrests this afternoon anyway.

After conferring with police, Lazarus said officers will start enforcing the ordinance at noon today and then quit an hour early on Sunday.

“We’ll lose an hour of enforcement on Sunday, but that’s no big deal,” she said. “And then next year we’ll fix the ordinance.”