The 4th of July is my least favorite holiday. It is a hellish day and I am always happy when we get past it. This year neighbors were blowing up some large loud fireworks in the street. They were loud enough to shake the house. Several of us asked them to stop. They said “f-u”. A few of us called 911. It was noisy and the fireworks were close to houses and some of the people detonating them were children who looked to be under 10 years old.
Eventually, a squad car came by and the officer asked the neighbors to stop lighting fireworks. No one said “f-u” They were polite and told the officer they were done. After the officer left they started up again and we called 911 again.
Even though fireworks are illegal in Minnesota (In Minnesota, fireworks that explode or shoot into the air are illegal for use by the general public) in St. Paul there doesn’t seem to be any penalty for the people who play with them other than the injuries they get. Usually, there is a penalty for breaking the law. The penalty for detonating fireworks in the city should be a fine of at least $1000 and it should double if those fireworks are detonated within 20 feet of a house or building. The fine should triple of people under the age of 18 are lighting the fireworks and quadruple if they are under 10.
Repeat offenders should be fined and sentenced to community service which would involve going around the city and picking up the debris from fireworks and all other July 4th trash.
In Minneapolis, people were arrested for detonating illegal fireworks. it will be interesting to see how that worked out.
The hellish day is behind us but we still have a few more nights of illegal fireworks in the streets. It gets worse every year.
