Bend’s illegal fireworks crackdown gets mixed reviews

(Update: Adding police info, seizures)

For this year’s Fourth of July holiday period, the Bend Fire and Police departments teamed up to create a joint task force targeting illegal fireworks. NewsChannel 21 followed up with them and area residents Wednesday to find out how effective it was.

Bend Fire Battalion Chief Dave Howe said he believes the effort, which included five days of neighborhood patrols in problem areas by members of both agencies, was “really successful, for its first year in existence.”

Howe said the fire department typically gets between 60 and 75 calls every year on the Fourth of July. This year, that number dropped to just over 50.

Howe said that’s still nearly double the amount of calls the department receives receive on an average day. But most of them were medical calls.

Police Lt. Clint Burleigh said a dozen illegal fireworks were seized and one citation issued, with ” a lot of focus on education. ”

” When our patrols were out, (there was) very little firework activity, ” he said Thursday. ” The feedback we have received were lower amounts of illegal fireworks leading up to the Fourth, but normal activity on the Fourth. ”

The main reason Howe said he felt it was a success is that there were no brush fires on the holiday, which is something he said the fire department usually gets called to.

Howe noted certain people are going to use illegal fireworks no matter what, but he hopes the task force will eventually change that.

“If we can do that, we can start to nibble away at the edges of that demographic and make the incidents of illegal fireworks a little bit smaller every year, ” Howe said. “That’s our goal. We’re not going to stop it cold, but we want to make it so that it becomes less and less socially acceptable. ”

Howe acknowledged the lower number of calls and absence of brush fires can also be credited in part to the cooler, rainy weather in Bend leading up to the holiday.

The task force identified Daggett Lane in northeast Bend as a neighborhood that’s been a problem in the past. One person who lives in that area said she’s not convinced the patrol reduced the use of illegal fireworks.

“It was pretty loud, ” Brittania Masten said. “We got them all way until 2 o’clock in the morning. We’d be sitting in our living room, and the whole living room would light up. They were big. ”

But Beth Hoover, chair of the Mountain View Neighborhood Association, lives just a few blocks away from Masten , and said she believes use of illegal fireworks was greatly reduced.

She said that can be credited in part to the more than 50 signs the association handed out to people living in the area, reminding people not to use illegal fireworks.

“I think it has educated our neighborhoods, ” Hoover said. “People are more aware of not only the animals being affected, but veterans, people who really shouldn’t be subjected to that kind of noise and explosions. ”

The Bend Police Department issued five citations for illegal fireworks this year: one July 1, two July 4, and two July 9. Last year, officers said there were no citations, and just one warning.