The Warsaw City Council will take a look at the fireworks ordinances within city limits after a war veteran with PTSD expressed how the loud booms affect him.
A couple who lives on Center Street in downtown Warsaw appeared before the City Council Monday and asked the council to regulate fireworks within city limits.
“I get the fireworks. They are so pretty, and the boom that goes with them is so exciting,” Cory Hoffhien said, adding sparks carried by a gust of wind could land on a home’s roof and put possession and families at risk.
“That right there makes it enough of a reason to evaluate the ordinances of our fireworks,” she said, before pointing to her husband, also present, who she said is an Afghanistan war veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder. She said around 10 p.m. recently a firework with a big boom went off and woke her and her children from their sleep, so she took them downstairs to sleep on the couch and calm down. But her husband, she said, could not calm down.
“He’s been trained by our government to expect an attack at any time. That is a bomb to him. It is our safety that is in danger, so he was white, shaking uncontrollably, pacing from window to window looking for this threat that’s going to get his family,” she said. “And then we saw the green sparkles above the treetops.”
She added that “especially with the protests going on, you never know what could happen. I can calm down, but he can’t calm down as a war veteran. I’m not saying we should take away the right and the fun, but there has to be a way to have fun responsibly and with so much less anxiety.”
Councilman Jerry Frush agreed and asked city lawyer Scott Reust to look into the matter.
“I think they start around Memorial Day,” Frush said. “Memorial Day to me is not a day to be firing fireworks, it’s a day to honor our veterans and stuff like that, not to scare them to death.”
Councilwoman Cindy Dobbins, who also lives downtown, said she thinks the fireworks have been worse this year than years past.
Warsaw Mayor Joe Thallemer said the State of Indiana has laws that can be overridden by local ordinances but there are certain times that cannot be overridden.
Reust said those times are June 29 to July 3 for two hours past sunset, and then on July 4 from 10 a.m. to midnight and July 5 to July 9 for two hours past sunset, and lastly Dec. 31 from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. on New Year’s Day.
The war veteran, who was not named, asked if the council could consider putting in a noise ordinance.
“Because it’s really just the noise explosion. We can go down to the VFW and talk to some veterans who will tell you they crawl under the bed because they think they’re back in the fox hole,” the man said. “If we need to take the suggestion to the state level, then that’s what we’ll do.”
Thallemer said he will have Reust look into the difference between consumer and commercial fireworks as far as what’s allowed and also into what restrictions can be put in place on a local level.
Reust said consumer fireworks are limited to ground devices that contain 50 milligrams or less of explosive composition, and aerial devices have to have 30 milligrams or less.
“There’s a long list of definitions about what’s a firework and what’s not, so it’s a lengthy code set forth for the fire marshal to be able to regulate fireworks in a community,” Reust said.
“I think it’s appropriate for Scott (Reust) to dig into this a little deeper,” Thallemer said. “I appreciate you bringing it to the council. I know there’s a lot of people who have that same feelings. I’ve gotten the calls, and I certainly understand children are getting to bed, and it gets to become a nuisance at some point.”
Also Monday, the council approved an ordinance for the council have to its own independent legal counsel, should the need arise.
A long-discussed matter was finally settled Monday with an unanimous vote to allow the council to have an independent attorney for legal advice on an issue, if the council decides the advice is needed by a majority vote.
Councilman Mike Klondaris applauded Reust for getting the ordinance put together for the council.
“I think we, as a council, and as a city, we should all be pretty proud of this,” Klondaris said. “This is first in the state that I’m aware of, and I’m sure there are going to be other Class 3 cities and towns looking to use to see what we did, how we did it. We’re a leader here, so I’m real proud of it.”
Councilwoman Diane Quance echoed those sentiments saying this will allow the council to have equal access “to what’s going on.”
The council also:
• Approved to continue Whimet Inc.’s 10th year of tax abatement. City planner Jeremy Skinner said Whimet supplied their compliance form for their real and personal property. The company orignally estimated adding 15 jobs and have added 36 new employees and invested $890,000 in personal property improvements.
Also approved for their seventh year of tax abatement was DePuy Orthopedics Inc., who was granted a 10-year personal property abatement for new manufacturing equipment in 2011. Skinner said DePuy has purchased around $20 million in new equipment over the last seven years and that there were no employment requirements associated with this tax abatement.
• Approved Skinner’s request to transfer $5,500 from the Redevelopment Allocation TIF fund’s improvement budget to the debt service budget to make payments on the Buffalo Street bond. Skinner said the original payment sheet provided at bond closing is different from the payment schedule provided by the bond holder.
The council also approved Skinner’s request to move $200,000 within the Northern TIF for ongoing professional services for the Airport Industrial Park and CR 300N project.
• Heard from Thallemer, who attended the meeting online, that he appreciated Councilman Jack Wilhite running the Monday meeting. Wilhite also abstained from voting Monday.
“I appreciate you for pinch-hitting tonight,” Thallemer said. The mayor announced last week he had tested positive for COVID-19 and has been working from home since late June.
“I’m feeling very good, I?came out of isolation last Friday and I’m taking a few extra days. I?tentatively plan to be back in the office Wednesday. I have no symptoms. I just want to make sure everything is fine, but I’m well beyond the period of isolation that’s been CDC and state recommended, and I?feel very lucky for the way this whole thing has turned out.
“It was certainly a bump in the road, but I?just hope that if anyone else unfortunately tests positive, I hope their overall experience is similar to mine with minimal or no symptoms at all.”
