Previously: For months, the Board of Clark County Commissioners have been discussing what changes, if any, they should make to a fireworks ordinance that applies to unincorporated Clark County.
What’s new: A proposal calls for having different fireworks restrictions apply to the northern and southern parts of the county.
What’s next: Commissioners plan to hold a hearing on the changes on Sept. 16.
• Unincorporated Clark County, Amboy and Yacolt: June 28 through July 4.
• Battle Ground and Ridgefield: June 28 through July 5.
• Camas: July 1-4.
• La Center: June 29 through July 4.
• Vancouver and Washougal: July 4.
Clark County Commissioner David Madore is floating a new proposal to regulate fireworks in unincorporated areas by bisecting the county and having different discharge dates for areas north and south of 179th Street.
Previously: For months, the Board of Clark County Commissioners have been discussing what changes, if any, they should make to a fireworks ordinance that applies to unincorporated Clark County.
What's new: A proposal calls for having different fireworks restrictions apply to the northern and southern parts of the county.
What's next: Commissioners plan to hold a hearing on the changes on Sept. 16.
The proposal, first presented to commissioners Wednesday, will be discussed at a Sept. 16 public hearing. Commissioners plan on taking testimony from the public about the proposal, which would take effect in 2016 if it’s executed before the next Fourth of July.
Talk among commissioners of implementing a new fireworks policy was renewed in June, seven months after a majority of county voters approved an advisory vote calling for tighter restrictions on fireworks in unincorporated areas. Since then, commissioners have worked to finesse a proposed policy ahead of holding a public hearing.
A plan to weigh public reaction to different proposals using an online survey was scuttled last week amid concerns from Madore that people would be able to “game the system” by voting multiple times.
Madore’s proposal calls for splitting the county in half, with different rules applying to the rural and urban areas. The cut-off point of 179th Street was reached by a consensus of commissioners, but not without Commissioner Tom Mielke remarking that Madore was trying to “please everybody.”
Mielke came on board with the proposal after it was explained that the number of sale and discharge days for the northern part of unincorporated Clark County would not be reduced below what’s already allowed in Ridgefield, Battle Ground and La Center.
The county’s policy would not apply to city jurisdictions, which set their own dates for when vendors could sell fireworks and when residents could set them off. Commissioners have attempted to balance any new regulations on fireworks for unincorporated Clark County against what’s already allowed in incorporated areas. But, with varying restrictions in place, that’s been difficult to accomplish.
The new proposal calls for restricting the discharge of fireworks in unincorporated areas south of 179th Street, with those days limited to July 4 and New Year’s Eve. The period in which people could legally buy fireworks wouldn’t change, however, with that period remaining June 28 to July 4.
Currently, the county also allows residents in unincorporated areas to set off fireworks between June 28 and July 4, within specified hours.
• Unincorporated Clark County, Amboy and Yacolt: June 28 through July 4.
• Battle Ground and Ridgefield: June 28 through July 5.
• Camas: July 1-4.
• La Center: June 29 through July 4.
• Vancouver and Washougal: July 4.
Unincorporated areas north of 179th Street would see no change. Madore said the reason for the two-tier approach was to take into account how voters in the northern parts of the county disproportionately disapproved of the advisory vote restricting the sale and discharge of fireworks, despite its passage with 60.26 percent of the vote.
“The basic idea is to separate the north from the south,” Madore said, “because they have two different results from the election.”
While November’s advisory vote also called for the county to drop the number of days fireworks could be sold from eight to three, mirroring a new ordinance Vancouver put in place this year, commissioners chose not to pursue that option so it wouldn’t affect revenue for vendors selling fireworks.
Madore put a positive spin on the proposal, calling it the “best approximate representation” of what voters asked for in the advisory vote.
It will be vetted by county staff ahead of the Sept. 16 hearing. The issue of how to enforce a new policy will be a topic of discussion, but some fire officials say it may be difficult to do.
The proposed restrictions would have more teeth if they also applied to sales, said Tim Dawdy, a battalion chief with Clark County Fire & Rescue.
Even though vendors would take a hit to their bottom line, Dawdy said, restricting fireworks sales would more likely cut down on people setting off their pyrotechnics negligently.
Fireworks pose serious fire hazards, Dawdy said, particularly during dry years, and there have been cases of buildings burning as a result of wayward sparks.
“These things are more dangerous than people understand,” he said. “The cost versus the benefit just doesn’t add up.”
