City Council - Special Meeting

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HAB-Masyn Moyer- Actually attorneys, you can I can.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- That is your ancillary role. HAB-Masyn Moyer- That is my role, I mean I played one on TV.

see Alex's thoughts. So he's going to have two officers. Yeah, it's weird. Thank you. If you're not five minutes early, you're late.

It's my dad's attitude.

Okay, it is six o'clock. So I'm going to call this meeting to order. This is a special business meeting of the Syracuse City Council. In a special business meeting, we will begin with an invocation, which I will deliver. And then, Abe, would you lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance after that? I would. Our Father in Heaven, we are grateful to come together as a city council to debate the issues of the city and find a process forward that we hope will serve all of our citizens well. We are grateful for the many blessings and bounty that we have in this city. We're grateful for the prosperity of the community. We're grateful for the blessings of moisture when we can get it and we're grateful for the blessings of a great city to live in and the prosperity that we enjoy at this time we pray for thy spirit to be with us that we will be able to debate respectfully and discuss the issue at hand and come to a conclusion that we can all accept and i say these things humbly in the name of thy son jesus christ amen

indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Ladies and gentlemen, the special meeting has been called to deal with the governor's announcement that he has changed the fireworks situation for the year. I want to be clear about what we're going to do here tonight. For starters, we will have public comment. Public comment, it's not an opportunity to filibuster, so it will be limited to three minutes. And hopefully you can collect your thoughts within those three minutes. Public comment is not a debate, meaning we're not here to answer questions back and forth. You can share your thoughts freely and they will be considered in this meeting. You may or may not hear an answer when we debate the issue here at the table. But it is the boundaries of the state law that we don't turn public comment into some kind of forum or debate. So I just want to be sure that everybody understands that. Before we begin public comment, I'm going to read off a couple of carefully researched factual points because there's been a lot of misinformation out there about what is actual part of the governor's order, what's not, what's within our purview, what's not. You may or may not agree with what I read off, but since Thursday's announcement, we've spent a lot of time, including the city attorney, trying to get down to what is correct and factual. So what I read off will be the points that we will be working from. There's certainly going to be strong opinions on both sides. I've heard from a lot of people who've called me directly and told me they have very passionate points on one side or the other. It is very important in this room that we are respectful in the way that we approach each other. The only way that we can allow everyone to freely speak is if we are direct and not, we can't show big emotion. There will be no applause. If you decide that this is going to be some kind of pep rally, you'll be asked to leave because we want people on the other side of the issue to also feel like they can share their opinions. You don't have to agree with it. We just have to give equal opportunity for people to share their thoughts. The decision that will be made later, we want everyone to feel like they had an opportunity to be considered. So the respect issue is very important. So I'm just going to go through a couple of things that have been some misconceptions. You may already agree with these points, but I wrote them down so that we at least begin from a common perspective. The first one is fireworks are currently legally sold throughout the state. That hasn't changed. The purchase of fireworks has not been affected by the governor's order or the current state law. And we as a city have not been given the authority to change the sale of fireworks. So that is not in our purview. The discharge of public fireworks without a professional permit would not be legal until July 2nd. So no action and the fact that we have not yet taken an action has not affected anybody's ability to do fireworks or not. So that's not been affected because I've had some people concerned. Three, professionally licensed fireworks are not affected by the governor's order. So those who have permits and those who have set up professional shows, that's not affected and the city does not have the power to change that. So that is not something we're given charge of. So that's not gonna be a part of our discussion. Number four, the governor's order does not allow cities to change the days of just discharge, though it does imply through the state foresters order in banning the entire state. So this is a little unclear, but it was pretty clearly represented in some of the meetings that were held after the governor's order on what this does give and what this doesn't give. It is interpreted as law that the governor only has the power to suspend state law. state law does not give cities the ability to change the dates of discharge so while i've heard some cities say they're considering that the legal interpretation we have is that that's not within our power and so they may be corrected if they if they do change that but so the dates of discharge is not on the table for as far as i understand it Number five, current state law, though being suspended by the executive order of the governor, requires cities to provide historic data of wildfire problem areas in order to consider banning fireworks. The governor's order does supersede that requirement, but it is important to note that no area in our city has ever actually qualified for that ban. So like it or not, if John Gerstle, The governor hadn't acted, we would not have that power it, we would certainly be under the law of the state legislature that says, historically, we do not have a danger area so that is fact. John Gerstle, Number seven historically, we have not had fires every year caused by plate or historically, we have had fires caused. every year, but it is the most common issue is because people spent hot or still lit remains in their garbage cans. We have not had historical fires that have spread other than that. We almost have one every year. Somebody puts in the garbage can a spent shell, it's still hot, it lights their garbage on fire. That's just your responsibility. And that wouldn't change if we banned fireworks or not. So we just need to know the historical data. Historically Syracuse has a wild lands fire crew that is trained to fight wildland fires, but that is because in our service area, we also serve Antelope Island. So that's that crew is on staff. Historically, they have not fought any wildfires in Syracuse or near our borders. So we do have a crew. They have always been on alert. on firework discharge nights, that's a part of our standard operating procedure. Number eight, most of the open lands and wild areas are outside of the city limits, meaning they're in the county lands. So fireworks remain prohibited in all of the county lands, no matter what Syracuse chooses to do. So out on these fringe areas that are big wild areas, That doesn't change. I have no authority there. So just want to be clear. Number nine, Syracuse grew as a historic farming community. And as such, we have many farm fields still intermeshed with part of our city. Farm fields would still be considered high risk and high impact areas. We have to be respectful and understand that is a real threat that exists whether we have drought or not. Number 10, the governor's order is limited. It may extend or be amended, but as of tonight, the extent of the governor's order is only for us to lift the ban through July 5th. So what happens after this? We'll probably hear from the governor again. I just want to be clear that our authority tonight only deals with up until July 5th, where it is current order extent so I want to be clear about that um I have the governor's order here uh we're not going to go through it point by point but understand that our goal here tonight is to make a wise decision that is best for our city and our circumstances you may have another opinion and that's okay you are We have not made a decision. In the end, it is up to myself and the fire chief to agree on a decision. But I'm called this meeting because our form of government is a city council with five city council members. I want to hear all their opinions. I have done a lot of data gathering, but I really do care about what they will support as well. So no decision has been made so far. We have multiple options that are allowable. and we will talk about those after we hear from you. So again, I'm gonna open up public comment at this point. You have up to three minutes. We will carry a timer because I need to keep this meeting to a point where we can go home by midnight. So you'll have up to three minutes to please make your point. And again, I urge you to be courteous and understand that there will be other people in the room who have a different opinion. We are not making them feel like they're unwelcome. Every opinion is welcome to be part of the discussion. We will then make a discussion after that. I hope that's clear to everybody. So I'm gonna open discussion with the public comments that were sent to us by email for people who couldn't attend. And Cassie, would you read those?

Yes, this first public comment says, dear Mayor Mon and members of the city council, thank you for holding a special meeting and carefully considering Syracuse City's response to the statewide fireworks ban. I appreciate the difficult position the city is in as it balances public safety, agricultural interests, local traditions, and the economic impact of fireworks vendors. While Syracuse has historically experienced relatively few wildfire incidents related to fireworks, our community still contains significant agricultural land and open spaces that are especially vulnerable during the current drought conditions. I believe protecting homes, crops, and public safety should remain the city's highest priority. i support a cautious approach that allows fireworks only in areas sufficiently separated from open fields and other combustible areas the suggested approach of maintaining a buffer around open spaces appears to provide a reasonable balance between safety and allowing residents to celebrate independent state traditions If the city elects to allow fireworks in designated areas, I encourage the city to provide clear maps and robust public communication so residents understand exactly where fireworks are permitted and to continue emphasizing proper disposal of spent fireworks. Thank you for your service and your thoughtful consideration of the issue. And that's from Eric Willison. And then the second one says, dear city council members, I would like to say for the record that I am against allowing personal fireworks this 4th of July weekend. As a family, we shoot off fireworks every July 4th and 24th, and even sometimes on New Year's. And I was looking forward to celebrating our 250th birthday with more fireworks. But there are just too many fires right now, and it is not worth it. We have already lost some firefighters. We need to not risk any more lives. Thank you for listening to my opinion. And that's from Mary Keaton.

Okay. Both very respectful comments. I will now open it to the floor. If you would like to make a comment, raise your hand. I'll call on people. You get one turn. You don't get to keep coming back. But I will take comments up to three minutes from as many of you as we'd like before we begin our discussion. Who'd like to start? Go ahead. I have to ask everybody, you have to, for the record, state your name and address. That's required by state law. Stand right here. Yeah.

My name is Darren Watson. I'm at 1765 West 2775. rc willie um i i've lived here for over 20 years i've had kids go through the high school system i'm a very prominent person in the community i'm not just somebody coming in and i am involved in fireworks i've been i've been involved since my parents started this 47 years ago and we've been celebrating every every year since i I feel like common sense approach is what we should really be looking at which I feel is the tone here feeling that. You know we protect the areas as an email said that are high burn farms, you know props I totally support that, but you know the other email. there's fires in central utah but Syracuse is not located in central utah and I think the taking that the statistics that you brought up. aren't a high fire issue or area. Taking that into consideration, I think, is common sense. I think that freedom and agency is another thing. You know, we have our biggest thing that we have in the U.S. is our agency and our freedom.

And if you choose not to want to support fireworks, then don't go buy fireworks.

If you do want to celebrate our country's birthday, then come and join us with some fireworks. I just I just feel like there's always going to be a division, either nationally statewide citywide some people are for some people are against. I think that we should really look hard before we take the right of somebody away because the opinion of somebody else, and I hope that, as you consider this there's so many good things that bring families together. Thank you very much, appreciate your time to be here.

Anyone else? Go right ahead, sir.

Yes, sir. My name is Devin Allred. I live at 1258 South, 4465 West Syracuse. So I don't have social media. on purpose because i you know like to debate and such um but i've made the mistake of bruising my wife's facebook page ever since the governor announced that and from what i can gather a significant amount of consternation with heart recipient, I love fireworks and go boom all day. So Richfield, Utah, I grew up there, they just came out, and they are allowing personal fireworks within the city. Richfield, Utah is about 45 miles north of the of the Beaver fire, the Conway fire down there. And they are just as wide open the more so I would say. So touching on his point, it is about freedom. It is about our choice. It's about us doing what we want. Fireworks aren't the hill to die on, but I just have a big issue being told that I can't do something as traditionally awesome for our country's 250th birthday. Because I sure as heck, I'm not going to make the 300th. So I would like to make this as memorable for my children as humanly possible. And just, you know, big kid rules apply. Don't be stupid. no matter what law you impose. But yeah, just because some folks are dumb doesn't mean that everybody else is a sucker. So I appreciate you holding this and letting us have a voice in it, sir. Okay.

Who'd like to go next?

Go ahead. Sorry. Thank you. Could you guys help me remember stuff I was going to say? I appreciate this meeting as well. um my the very when i first heard about the ban i immediately also personally took it personally as this is um who is the government to tell me that i'm dumb can't be safe can't be smart i've been letting off fireworks my entire life and i definitely won't make it to 250 because i'm definitely I might even make it to that 250. You're there. Yeah. Not quite. Every year I do fireworks. It's also my birthday. And so it's kind of our, it's just, we've been doing it forever and ever. And it is our last year in this community. We are selling our house. I was really looking forward to going out, you know, obviously coinciding with 250, my birthday. Growth Team, And moving so um but mostly the free agency, I obviously feel like I think it's important that we don't assume everyone is going to make mistakes. Growth Team, I think history matters, so thank you.

Growth Team, Go ahead. Growth Team, Oh. Growth Team, All right. Growth Team, Is there anyone else that would like to go. Growth Team, Go ahead, sir.

My name is Jeremy very 3420 West 2280 South Syracuse i've been here for over 20 years.

store I love fireworks myself over the last 10 years, I have not been able to enjoy them because sitting in my front lawn.

I would have just be read on the firework beat debris my neighbors buying aerials and they go to Wyoming buy them and they just landed my last year they broke a window with a rocket. And had flaming pieces landing on my yard and come out and put them out, so it is stuff like that that kind of concerns me this year with the drought we've been watering our lawn less sorry our lawn is very dry.

So that was great go ahead like those off in the street, but the areas are working. Anyone else.

i think dan nelson 1982 south 800 west i've been at syracuse for 22 years quite a while we've lived fireworks off every year since we've been here it's a family tradition we have a big party barbecue probably 60 70 80 people come to our house um i think people need to be smart we're smart if If you're living next to a field, I can understand the fire department saying, no, you're off limits. You shouldn't be lighting bottle rockets. You should call the cops on those people. It's, you know, that's, they're illegal anyways. So I think legal fireworks to a degree, as long as you're not living next to a fire hazard, the wind isn't blowing at 20 miles an hour. I think everybody should be smart about it. and be allowed to light their fireworks up, keep their freedoms, keep their traditions.

That's all I got to say.

And be smart.

And be smart.

Thank you. And prepared.

Do you want to go next?

Sure. I'm Jess . I'm at 2115 South 1300 West in Syracuse. I've also been involved with fireworks for like my whole life. And I feel like it really is about just being like smart and responsible and like listening about your neighbors super super frustrating like don't get me wrong, but also those things are coming from illegal fireworks that are like. Wyoming those aren't ever got involved rockets like those are people making stupid choices, and so I just feel like we have a lot of our agency already like we're already told kind of what to do about a lot of things are like let's just was like one that feels. A little bit more personal to a lot of us. Just like our freedom and celebrating and you know it's about our nation. So hopefully people can just be smart and use the legal stuff and do it.

Anyone else? Just fair warning when I cut off public comment, the discussion will only be at this table. So if you want to give input, Now is your chance.

Can you talk if you're not from Syracuse?

Yeah, you can speak.

My name's Scott Hall. I live up in North Lockton. And I work in the fireworks industry doing the tents and things. And so what I've noticed is I lived in California for a lot of, I grew up here, moved to California, came back, and fireworks were legal. And it seems like that the approach that Utah has taken, you know, with the way the fireworks are done, they've mapped out everything. that, you know, most of the fire restrictions have all been in place for the full 10 years I've been here. And that the fireworks, like when we talk about rockets or things that artillery shells, that Roman candles that can be pointed, they made those illegal because that makes sense that the ones here in Utah, you know, you have to put on the ground and it has to, you know, it has to be able to control which direction the fireworks are going. So I think that, you know, they've taken the government, you know, the Utah government had made reasonable rules for fireworks, and I think they've been pretty effective. And then my second point is that doing it for 10 years, that this year doesn't seem, you know, they say drought and everything, but it's not. We've had worse temperatures. I've been in a tent that's 104 degrees all week, and the temperatures and the climate have been worse than it is this year. And so this year seems like a really pretty mild as far as the weather's concerned. And I think that doing it responsibly and following the laws that they originally created makes sense to me. Thank you.

Anyone else? Go ahead.

There should be those things looked at. But I think that where we live, I used to shoot off a lot of fireworks. My wife now sells them. I support her and what she does. So I don't shoot nearly as many off now because we're working. And so I watch it, I see it, I enjoy it. I like being able to choose what we do and how we do that using common sense. And sometimes I feel lately that common sense just seems to be missing in a lot of the issues at hand that we face. So my ask to all of you as you sit down and talk about it now, even if I'm the last person speaking, is that there are people out there that use common sense. There are individuals out there that make bad choices to buy the ones that they should be and I support that they should be. fine to the full extent of the law, I do, because it creates a bad issue for the large majority of the public that care for what they do out there, the right way and put them out. So I just. about that and consider that, that we're not always going to be able to keep in check the ones that are going to do what they want to do anyhow, no matter what anybody tells them. And I think from what I've seen so far, a large majority of us here are supportive of being able to celebrate that freedom that we have and do it respectfully and responsibly. And that's it. Thanks. Okay, thank you.

Anyone else? Go ahead, sir.

So we weren't able to voice our opinion. So thank you. Just kind of echoing the words that have gone around, just common sense in those things. And if there's, you guys have put, the fire department's put a lot of time and effort into making maps of where we can and can't light. And I assume it's a fair assumption to make. allowing us to have the opportunities to light this year. And we can, if our department can look again at certain areas and if we need to make a couple of adjustments this year, just based on the conditions and stuff like that, I think that would be great. That could be helpful as well. Still allow us the opportunity to celebrate 250. Thank you guys. Thank you.

Anyone else? Fair warning, last call. Okay, I'm gonna go ahead and close public comment and bring the discussion back to the table. Council, one of the reasons why this is so important to me is I'm hopeful that we can leave tonight with an agreement that you can all support because having a supportive council when there will be people who disagree with our decision is very important because we're gonna all have, we'll all get phone calls, John Gerstle, Be told what other people's opinions are and that's fine that's part of the job will be with it, but I do hope that. John Gerstle, We can arrive at something that we can agree on a couple of things that I want to be clear that had come up during public comment number one. John Gerstle, We have been investigating. whether we have the right to ban certain kinds of fireworks. I know that there is another city who is also investigating whether they can ban aerial fireworks because there is a difference and there is a greater risk when you use fireworks that shoot up into the air. It's the opinion at this point of legal counsel and our interpretation John Gerstle, That that's not within our our purview, because if the governor's only allowed to suspend law he's suspending the law that says, these are the things that are legal, but then the foresters given the right to say i'm now suspending areas. HAB-Jacques Juilland, That would mean that we either have the ability to turn on areas or not not choose the fireworks that has been decided by legislature. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Whether I agree or not, is a different subject, because I remember a time in utah's history when that wasn't a part of our you know legal state but. There will always be people who break the law. That is just something we can't get around. There will be people who go up and buy things that are not legal in this state and bring them back to this state. That is no different than every other year. The other thing that I would point out is that, um, we historically have monitored conditions. We have a forecast that none of the days of lighting fireworks, uh, would be over, um, John Potter, 10 miles an hour winds, it is expected to be around five most days of the lighting days that's still within tolerance. John Potter, For low risk, I would ask that throughout our discussion. We'd be very careful with the wording of what we go forward with regarding fireworks and risk. Fireworks carry a risk period. That's just life. So we can't use the word, this is a safe zone or a safe firework because there is always risk. So in whatever order we put out, I will not be declaring a safe zone. I will just say lower risk because there is always risk in fireworks. That's just life and we have to respect that. Now, as I put in the packet of information, I pointed out several things that we determined to be fact. I mean, we have options. We can uphold the ban and just not let them be here. modify the ban by lifting it in lower risk areas, which is one option. Or we could just lift them blanketly in the city and go back to whatever the state lies. We might be able to do something in between that, but those are basically our three options to discuss. I do want to give a moment to our fire chief, Aaron Byington, to present some of the facts he gathered and that we, this is all moving because We've been gathering data literally since Thursday's announcement. I've been straight researching this so that we don't make decisions based on nothing but actual facts. So Aaron, I'll turn it over to you.

Well, first off, I think it's important that we see what communities around us are doing as well. One of the challenges are if we do choose to open up HAB-Jacques Juilland, areas for fireworks to be discharged and everybody else bands or upholds the band for fireworks that everybody else comes to Syracuse city and now we go from a population of 40,000 to. HAB-Jacques Juilland, With latent city and everywhere else, but it looks like that the majority of the Community surrounding us as they there's still a couple out there, the majority of the Community surrounding us have. HAB-Jacques Juilland, they've. restricted areas and they're allowing fireworks. So they do have maps out and have restricted areas. I spent this weekend, several hours over this weekend, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, driving through the entire city and looking at areas where there is agricultural land, where there's heavy vegetation. I looked at areas where there would be challenges for firefighting if there was an incident. I looked at areas of higher risk, which I would consider our commercial areas in that. And I also looked at areas where there are, unfortunately, there are a lot of residents in our community who haven't kept up their properties very well, which pose a fire risk as well. So I looked at those areas based upon those areas looking I have two options that I would support. I've talked to the mayor about this. I would support restricting areas in the city where we found that had heavy vegetation, agricultural areas, so we can protect the farmers and what they have, their investment. We can homes in various stages of construction, which are basically tinderboxes. So if we've got neighborhoods that are in the process of being developed, HAB-Jacques Juilland, And we have homes that are maybe framed up things like that, I think we need to look at that area as well. HAB-Jacques Juilland, and creating a map that is one of the options and then, of course, the other option would be if, based upon what the Council wants to do, I would also support upholding the fireworks band so in either case, my number one choice and where I came. when we had our first discussion was that we find an area to restrict. I think if we look historically, and I went back over, I went back through 2020 and looked at all of our fire calls over the July 2nd through the July 5th time. I also looked at the state of emergencies that were issued by the government or by the state by that time because of drought conditions. And I also looked at the stage two fire restrictions that were issued by the state forester. Every single year in the past six years, they've had stage two fire restrictions. And one, two, three, four of the last six years, we had a state of emergency due to drought. So looking back historically, this is unprecedented for us because I think this challenge that the governor has put out there for us is based off of what is happening in central Utah, based off the heavy wildland fire season that the state has seen, which is higher than any year that I can remember. There's a lot of fires in Utah. They are in central Utah, though, and it is in a wildland urban interface area. So that's my position and where we're at moving forward as part of the discussion. If there's any questions you have, I'd be more than happy to answer.

I want to point out a couple of things. There is some chatter online that is unverified that a large majority of the fires that are in central Utah are started by fireworks. even if that's true, because I don't know for certain. So I don't want to put that out as fact. But if it were true, those are already illegal because we are not during the discharge days that the legislature has set up. So we're responding to a legal activity, not to legal activity. So that's one consideration. The other thing that I would point out is that the governor made the statement the same day And this is verified. He said, I'm not trying to stop neighborhood fireworks. I'm trying to empower people to protect the wild areas that interface with cities. So with that comment, he is expecting that some cities will list lift bans. I know that there are areas throughout the state where they've just said, we don't care. We're just going to force the ban. I think the intention was clearly framed that it was not that everywhere in the state would be completely free of fireworks. So I leave those with you and then go ahead.

I just want to add one more thing that I thought about. In the past six years, we have had fireworks caused fires, whether they were due to not properly disposing or something catching a small field or some brush on fire or fitzer bushes or whatever it is, we've had those. Whether or not HAB-Jacques Juilland, No matter what we decide on for tonight will still happen they're going to happen. HAB-Jacques Juilland, The other thing that with this options for support the support options for restricting the areas looking at those areas it's going to be heavily restricted, especially further West of where there's more open law more open lots and areas. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Is where we were looking. The other thing is that I think is important to note is that we do have a safety plan in place. We are bringing in extra staffing for the fire department. The police department is looking at bringing extra staffing. We're already working with code enforcement right now to work on some of the weed and the abatement issues that we have that could cause potential risk. So we do have a good solid safety plan in place to also help with this if this is the option that we choose moving forward.

And you guys know that what I like to do is kind of investigate the different choices that you have so that we're prepared to answer questions before a meeting. So we have investigated what does it look like and what would happen if we upheld the ban. One of the concerns is it would be harder, there would be more effort to deal with enforcement because we are a 10 square mile city. So it could be difficult to enforce and not everyone obeys the law. We have looked at what would it look like if we were to decide to ban just high-risk areas. And staff has put in a tremendous amount of time over the weekend and today to look at kind of some parameters that I suggested on what would constitute an areas ban. If that's the way you want to go, we'll talk about that and get your agreement with those ideas or not. But again, we prepared for that. And then lastly, what would it look like if the areas around us didn't lift the ban, and we did, and we just had a massive influx of people. Fortunately, I think we've found out, because I've been in touch with the other mayors quite a bit today, we found out that most are going to have some accessibility. So that is probably not an avenue we have to consider. That all said, who would like to start? Because I want to hear from all five of you before we move forward.

i'm happy to start thank you brett with what i do for a living we rely a lot on experts i'm not a firefighter i'm not a fireworks person i'm concerned about our city and if the experts and i think i'm hearing chief myington say that the risk is manageable and that there's adequate staffing those were the two things that i was concerned about And if the police are able to provide enforcement as well, I think we have to be very careful with everything. And I'm mindful of the issues that are out there. But if things can be managed appropriately and we have adequate staffing, I would be supportive of a restricted plan, but still allow

Thank you. Just to elaborate a little bit on the staffing for the fire department, we are planning on bringing in our seasonal wildland team. They are not deployed out on any fires right now. So we will have a brush truck, a first quick attack brush truck that'll be out moving and just driving throughout the city. I know I'll be out on all those nights as well to kind of help in areas. We will also bring in additional staffing so we can fully staff station.

We chose restriction and that crew were out to be dispatched. Will we still be able to handle things within the city?

We will be able to handle whatever we can within the city. I mean, it's really difficult. I mean, a house fire of any sort takes a lot of resources. And that's why we rely on mutual aid or automatic aid. And that's one of the challenges any time that we have. firework season or this time of year that that one community could be could have a house fire. And we're helping them out. And then something else happens here and another community helps us out. And that's just how we've operated for the 32 years I've been in the fire service.

And we've only sent the wildland team out on wildland fires when there is adequate staffing.

What I'm hearing you saying is that whatever staffing

I appreciate you going first and sharing your thoughts. I always like hearing what you have, and I agree with you. Initially, my reaction was because of the state of affairs where we are to restrict. And then as I pondered and prayerfully thought about it, my leaning is to choose freedom over safety and to allow people to be free to choose. And I do think that my opinion is that it's our job as a city to be prepared to respond to whatever the consequences of that are. But I would be willing to support whatever you decide. I would be totally on board with the partial restriction. But I do feel like I've come away from a full out ban that I don't feel like that that's HAB-Jacques Juilland, That is the position government should ever take is restricting its citizens to tell them what they can and cannot do.

HAB-Juliette Boone, Not going.

HAB-Juliette Boone, I will. HAB-Juliette Boone, I I I like option B in the packet Thank you for putting that together. HAB-Juliette Boone, And I think that. to minimize the risk, I think the best option would be to expand the areas of restriction in certain areas under our chief police's recommendations and the mayor, and I think that's... Chief of fire. I mean, chief of fire. What did I say?

Police.

I play one on TV. So I think that that's going to be, you know, the best decision for our city having a safe and enjoyable 4th of July.

I totally agree. Option number two seems reasonable with limited restrictions and like to be able to trust in our citizens. We love this city and we're going to do the right thing. So I believe it sounds like the cross section here believes that too. So as long as you think that's a safe, smart decision, we'll go with that.

So a couple of points that I have. So there's been a lot of hysteria online. And granted, there's a lot of wildfires in the state, but those are in areas that are in central Utah, which we've discussed. We don't have forests that border our city. As the chief said, we're a fairly low risk community when it comes to fireworks. As far as drought years go, as long as I can remember being on the council, we've had watering restrictions for our citizens to help with the drought. And so we get to water three days a week during this time of year. My lawn is green. My bushes are green and healthy. So I don't think that's a valid excuse. Houses are all... HAB-Jacques Juilland, A drought does not affect the flammability of a house that we're not watering our houses, and so that risk is inherent with with fireworks. HAB-Jacques Juilland, I would say, you know chief I know you mentioned that you know there's new construction and things like that that could be you know the tender boxes do we ever restricted near new construction before. there have been no restrictions historically in Syracuse ever. So I don't even know that a drought year changes something like that. So like many have echoed, I think the freedom of choice is important. I think it's important for people to be responsible. But it sounds like we've got a very well-prepared fire department. Historically, we don't have higher

you know high fire incidents or high risk areas in the city and i don't know that this year changes much with that so i'd be in favor of a of a ban restriction in full okay so my concerns um sorry lifting the band right sorry so hearing that most of you are on the same page uh i'm going to take the next step and talk about what that might look like i have with staff prepared a map, Noah did most of the work, but under certain guidelines. I'm going to show this to you and I'm not putting this out in the public on purpose because it is not official and it is not a done deal. This is a work in progress, but I want you to take a look at it and understand what some of these ideas are. One of the things that I said was we probably need to uphold a ban Anywhere next to a farm field, because we do have some in the city of more than an acre, because I have already spoken to at least one farmer who said, if my wheat's going to be ready to harvest, it's going to be as dry as it can be. If we could ask somebody to move 100 feet to the neighbor's house to make that more possible that he doesn't lose a field, we're still letting people operate in the city without, you know, I don't think everybody has to have like driveway access. If there's operational ability in the city with keeping that risk safe, I think that that's reasonable. That's just my opinion, but that's what I asked for. Hal Hallstein, We have marked the county lands in red because we can't change that, but it is in our service district, so if you see the black line that it. Hal Hallstein, indicates where it city order currently stops and you see read beyond that that's because that is already a given I can't change that so. The other thing that I would say is we have tried to leave all neighborhoods open. We shut down parks because parks are wide open spaces and could get out of control. We shut down churches because they're not open to everyone. They are private. They're owned by and they would have say over that themselves. We shut down schools. I know that the school district has asked us to just stay away from their property. So that was left out. But, and we shut down the large commercial spaces. So the large commercial spaces are of concern because again, loss of property, if you burn down somebody else's business, you take away their livelihood. So with that in mind, that's what this reflects. There is one neighborhood issue that I did shut down. You'll see in the south part of the city between Jensen and 3000, there is a strip of red that I'm suggesting we ban fireworks because those neighborhoods are built around wild spaces that have just unkept weeds in amongst the homes. So that's a little higher risk. And those people could visit a friend and still light off fireworks and be happy. So if you're next to one of the wild spaces that would be dried out and of concern, I'm suggesting that, and those are choices, you know, they could have chosen to develop differently, but they chose to leave wild lands in and amongst their neighbors. Does anybody have any questions on those choices or feelings? Hal Hallstein, That we went too far or not far enough.

Like this is far enough.

Hal Hallstein, No, as I said, I drove. The intent for me was not to sit and just pick places that we're going to uphold the ban in and then allow fireworks in other areas. I specifically went over a lot of this area is not even covering homes. It's covering the agricultural areas, you know, open spaces. So if you notice that, I mean, it looks like there's a lot of red on here, but it's covering, we've got a lot of open space. And so, I mean, there are... HAB-Jacques Juilland, You know, there are some areas and there are some homes and some streets that are next to those large areas. HAB-Jacques Juilland, And to try to keep to keep and protect those areas, I guess, this is where I felt based off of that information we did have the discussion and and added a few areas, but I think this. whatever your guidance is. I feel comfortable with this. I also can look at other things. I mean, we had the discussion about, you brought up that maybe if you feel like it's too much, we can look at that as well.

We could open this up a little bit more. I mean, mostly I'm of the opinion that if you're right there next to somebody's open field, an agricultural land where somebody could lose this entire crop, that's a lot to lose because of somebody's carelessness. I would prefer to say, walk across the street and share with your neighbor's driveway because that extra 100, 150, 200 feet, whatever it is, that extra little bit could mean extra or less risk. So I'm not trying to ban anything. I think everywhere in the city can get to somewhere fairly close. And in the middle of neighborhoods where we have irrigation now, in this month at three times a week, you should be safer than normal. So we're trying to make it possible if this is the route we go.

And when you look at this map, I want you to look at this map as we're not banning anything. It's lifting the ban. If you can think about this thing entirely red from what Governor Cox said in the State Forester, And then we've gone through and said these areas would be okay. We feel safe in these areas. So it's not us choosing to ban anything. It's just choosing these are the areas that we feel comfortable with. Choosing the least amount of risk.

I would probably estimate on the working draft of the map, if you just consider residential neighborhoods, you're probably lifting the ban on 85 to 95% of residential neighborhoods.

Yeah, and there will be some outskirts. If you border somebody's field, we will probably ask you to go across the street. That's not that big of a task. All right, if nobody has any comments about the map, I am going to collect those and destroy them and finalize the map. This is not official yet, and we are still working on it. We've spent a lot of time trying to determine what's safe. And fireworks are never safe. So they're just lower risk.

Yeah, I wonder if when you make a decision, Dave, if we can just make a decision that we just encourage our community to be very cognizant of what the governor said and that we're choosing to choose freedom over that and be kind and be cautious and don't shoot bottle rockets through your neighbor's house, maybe. That would be great. You know, like be more cognizant of that. But I feel like letting people have their choice is really good. And I think we've made the appropriate measure with staff, making sure the fire department's prepared, our police department's prepared, our public works are already out doing enforcement. I think that's really the right thing to be doing. And I think we've done that. So I applaud you, Chief. Thank you for your hard work.

To be honest with everybody, I came to this meeting not knowing if I would get a lot of people supporting it or a lot of people against it. And I was willing to hear from the community at large. I am sure that someone out there is going to be upset. No matter what we choose, there will be those who are not happy. But I really felt it was important to get your input. We're in this together. This is not just one person making decisions. Okay, with that, does anybody else have anything to comment on this subject? I appreciate the extra hour of your time tonight. Thank you very much, and I will declare this meeting adjourned. We'll put something out tomorrow. We have to put it out by 5 o'clock.

Will you actually ask for a motion to adjourn?

Yeah, this is an official meeting. Sorry, this is not a work session.