In the matter of the knuckleheads versus civilized society, it seems that the knuckleheads are winning.
State Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole (D, Kaneohe-Kailua) has provided an apt description of what’s at the root of the state’s gnarly fireworks problem — “knuckleheads out in our community who know that they can get away with it.”
Despite a ban on most fireworks enacted by the city in 2010, the masses addicted to things that go boom have been able to secure their drugs of choice, then inflict their noise, smoke and fire danger on the rest of us.
In fact, it is one of the great Oahu jokes that fireworks are allowed only between 9 p.m. New Year’s Eve and 1 a.m. New Year’s Day, and only if you paid for a permit. In fact, the booming starts noticeably some 1,500 hours before 9 p.m. on Dec. 31 — back around Halloween, with persistent, intermittent blasts pretty much year-round. And very few of the noisemakers are legally obtained.
The continued, seemingly widespread, availability of fireworks — particularly illegal aerials — is a case study in black-market supply and demand.
To wrest control of the situation, the advisable path seems to be targeting importers and sellers; in this we need solid information. Public hearings on proposed state legislation this session should focus on what law enforcement officers know about how illegal fireworks get into Hawaii and how they reach buyers. What do they learn up the supply chain, for example, from the few arrests they are able to make? Or if they don’t know much about the sources, what tools do they need to find out?
The problem is intractable and has been with us, it seems, forever. “The Fire and Police Departments say indiscriminate use of firecrackers is a threat to life and property. The Hawaiian Humane Society cites the distress of animals from the racket in residential neighborhoods.” The New York Times published those words in an article about Hawaii’s conflicted relationship with fireworks — in 1982.
It gets better, it gets worse. New Year’s Eves in 2011 and 2012 were quieter in many Oahu neighborhoods, just after the city’s ban went into effect, but that didn’t last long. Illegal aerials and ground-shaking bombs are worsening every year. Complaints, citations and fireworks-related injuries were all up this New Year’s season.
On the plus side, in general the blinding smokiness of the pre-ban years has lessened (yes, it used to be way worse than it is now), with fewer strings of paper firecrackers going off in the streets. The permit system has curbed that, although it likely sent the scofflaws in the direction of more dangerous alternatives.
All the more reason that cutting off supply is key among a mix of solutions, a number of which are now before the Legislature.
Keohokalole has introduced legislation to create an undercover unit in the Honolulu Police Department to hunt down illegal use. Other bills would increase fines and set up a program for random inspections of shipping containers to seize the explosives before they’re put up for sale.
Such ideas have been floated before. A legislative task force report in 2011 recommended actions such as cargo inspections and decriminalizing fireworks offenses in favor of civil penalties, which can be easier to enforce. In more than a decade, little has come of them.
It’ll take government will, fueled by public outrage, to move the needle on thorny problems like this one. And so we keep trying, as we must. Community pressure tends to heighten around the holidays; we must remain persistent even in the quieter months.
To give up means risking deadly fires or deadly injuries — caused by knuckleheads.
