Kempner’s Unofficial Business
This is a new column by me, Matt Kempner. I’ve been a reporter or editor since gas was about a dollar a gallon and “Hands Across America” was a thing. I’ve spent lots of time covering government, the environment and, for most of my career, business. But I don’t daydream about fiscal policy and corporate earnings. What I love about business is the strategy and the people and the journeys that those people take. I like irony and surprise and nuance. I’ve interviewed soldiers, oystermen, football stars, chicken plant workers, Fortune 500 CEOs, suburban activists and entrepreneurs dreaming big dreams. How cool is that? I’ve teared up in interviews, laughed inappropriately, been yelled at and snookered. I do like an adventure. Let’s see where this one goes.
Fireworks Safety Tips
•Store fireworks in a cool, dry place
•Always read and follow the directions on the label
•Always have an adult present when handling fireworks
•Never give fireworks to young children, even sparklers!
•Use fireworks outdoors in a safe, non-wooden area
•Having a working garden hose or bucket of water handy
•Keep everyone a safe distance away from fireworks
•Light only one firework at a time
•Never re-ignite a firework that doesn’t light the first time or one that has finished its display
•Never carry fireworks in your pocket
•Don’t throw fireworks at another person
•Keep pets indoors and away from fireworks
•Never shoot fireworks in metal or glass containers
•Keep spectators at a safe distance
•Always wear safety glasses when igniting fireworks
Source: American Pyrotechnics Association
Fireworks Safety Tips
•Store fireworks in a cool, dry place
•Always read and follow the directions on the label
•Always have an adult present when handling fireworks
•Never give fireworks to young children, even sparklers!
•Use fireworks outdoors in a safe, non-wooden area
•Having a working garden hose or bucket of water handy
•Keep everyone a safe distance away from fireworks
•Light only one firework at a time
•Never re-ignite a firework that doesn’t light the first time or one that has finished its display
•Never carry fireworks in your pocket
•Don’t throw fireworks at another person
•Keep pets indoors and away from fireworks
•Never shoot fireworks in metal or glass containers
•Keep spectators at a safe distance
•Always wear safety glasses when igniting fireworks
Source: American Pyrotechnics Association
For years, Georgia was a grumpy old man on the idea of buying fireworks.
The state scolded that you couldn’t buy high-flying fireworks cause you’d end up putting your eye out. Or catching the neighbor’s roof on fire. Only in recent years did Georgia allow even the baby fireworks, the kind that are hand-held (sparklers) or sit near the ground (boring).
Now, with a change in state law that takes effect Wednesday, Georgia is about to become that parent who might be just a bit too cool for anyone’s good.
The new law doesn’t just address sales of aerial fireworks from bottle rockets to roman candles. It also talks about where you can shoot them. Which, unlike many other places in the nation, will be pretty much anywhere.
Nuke plants and gas stations are off limits. And you aren’t allowed to shoot them indoors.
But essentially it’s a free for all, and every other swath of God’s country could be fireworks central. The new law says cities and counties can’t ban fireworks from being sold or used in their communities, which I’m told is unusual if not unheard of in the nation.
On the lawn of City Hall? In the crowd at a street festival? In front of a police station? Out the window of an 18th-floor condo in Atlanta?
Really?
Near nursing homes or hospitals? Beside a stash of propane tanks?
Don’t think fireworks will be limited to isolated mom-and-pop emporiums. Mighty retailers including Kroger and Costco have won licenses to sell the newly legal aerial fireworks starting Wednesday. So has the mightiest of them all: Walmart, which is putting the good stuff in nearly 150 of its Georgia stores.
When the changes were proposed earlier this year, folks at the Georgia Municipal Association, which represents the state’s cities, warned state lawmakers that the open-ended nature of the legislation would pose public safety issues.
So I had a question for Justin Kirnon, a GMA lobbyist on public safety issues. Is this law dumb?
Kirnon laughed. “I’m not going to say it is dumb. I’m going to say there are still public safety issues that need to be taken into consideration.”
He’s hoping to push for changes next year.
Jay Roberts was the state representative who led the push for the new law.
Georgians were buying big fireworks before, he pointed out to me. They just crossed the state line to do it, spending their money in another state, then sneaking back home. That seemed economically crazy to Roberts.
A farmer from Ocilla, in south Georgia, Roberts recently left his legislative seat after the governor picked him to be the state’s transportation planning director. I guess that means he’s a big picture kind of guy.
He tried to help me understand why he didn’t think cities should have a say on allowing fireworks in their own community.
“You can argue local control on a lot of issues, but at some time you’ve got to look at whether we are going to pass a statewide law,” he said. “You have to look at the big picture.”
I’ve had a conflicted relationship with fireworks. I see sparkly lights and big noise and my wife has to tell me to wipe the drool from my gaping mouth.
But I also remember my time at one of our esteemed institutions of higher learning. There was a spate of people being “pennied” into their dorm rooms (pennies were shoved into the gap between the door and door jamb, making it impossible for the occupants to unlock their door and get out). Bottle rockets were then inserted under the door and fired into the room at the vulnerable occupants. This was done by some of their closest friends. Ahh, college.
States around the nation have generally been easing up on fireworks restrictions, and the industry is expecting record-breaking sales this year.
But I was surprised to find that even some people in the fireworks industry sound a bit concerned about safety during the transition to the new system in Georgia. Wouldn’t you think they’d be all giggly over a freer free market and a law that gives consumers more choice?
Julie Heckman of the American Pyrotechnics Association, which represents the industry, said she’d never heard of a state law banning local governments from outlawing fireworks.
I asked her why she sounded worried.
“I put my safety hat on first,” she said. “I hope there’s a concerted effort to put out a public education campaign so people know how to use these devices appropriately.”
Greg Shelton runs a chain of cavernous, year-round fireworks stores in four states. Two – in Alabama and South Carolina – are just over the Georgia line, where he aimed to be the most convenient spot for border crossers.
Government regulation giveth and government regulation taketh away.
He uses words like “reckless” and “wild, wild West” to describe Georgia’s new openness to fireworks without local government say. He can’t imagine non-professionals being allowed to barrage downtown Atlanta with fireworks. He predicts a backlash will lead to tightening up the law soon enough. And he said he isn’t planning to open a business in Georgia until all that shakes out.
Of course, we fireworks fans aren’t completely unshackled. Noise ordinances and public nuisance laws still exist. There’s such a thing as not only personal responsibility but also personal liability.
Before he was executive director of the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police, Frank Rotondo worked in a homicide unit in New York. One of the last cases he caught was of a guy who stuffed a canister full of fireworks and lit it. Shrapnel killed a bystander.
If I want to light fireworks, I better use common sense.
“If you do something that is goofy,” Rotondo said, “you are going to get in trouble.”
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