Brampton City Council Just Made Personal Fireworks Illegal & No One Thinks This Will Work
The city has been dealing with a flood of complaints.
A fireworks display.
Personal fireworks are now officially illegal to buy, sell, or set off anywhere in the city of Brampton.
A bylaw was amended Monday night that put the fireworks ban in Brampton into place, effective immediately, all in response to a growing number of complaints.
Newly elected Regional Councillor Dennis Keenan brought forth the motion on November 23 to put the ban into place for all, excluding the film industry and city-run events, and to increase fines.
"With a significant increase in resident fireworks complaints, and a unanimous vote to pass my motion, it is clear that the current fireworks by-law needed amendments and harsher penalties," Keenan said in a news release.
The city said that so far in 2022, it had received 1,491 calls related to fireworks and has issued over $38,000 in fines.
Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown said the proposed ban showed the city is listening and responding to resident concerns.
\u201cThe people of #Brampton have spoken. We heard these fireworks concerns loud and clear at the door steps during the recent election. Well done @Keenan4Brampton & @gurpartapstoor \ud83d\udc4f\ud83c\udffc\ud83d\udc4f\ud83c\udffc\u201d— Patrick Brown (@Patrick Brown) 1669243505
As of Tuesday morning, a petition to ban fireworks in Brampton had received over 10,000 signatures.
The petition lists several "issues of concern" including air pollution, which Environment Canada even echoed in a special air quality statement issued in October ahead of Diwali celebrations — the decision to name Diwali in that statement received widespread criticism and the agency later changed its wording.
@narcitytoronto Personal fireworks are now officially illegal to buy, sell, or set off anywhere in the city of Brampton. #brampton #fireworkban #diwali #fireworks #news #torontonews
But amid all the complaints and controversy regarding fireworks in Brampton, until Monday night's amendment, only fireworks that can travel up to three metres were actually legally allowed to be used in the city.
And these were only permitted to be set off on Victoria Day, Canada Day, Diwali and New Year’s Eve, until 11:00 p.m.
That has many questioning whether this ban will help much at all since many people already choose not to follow those rules.
"Both my daughter and I were woken at 3 a.m. because of our neighbours," wrote one Twitter user. "Won't mean a thing though if they don't enforce it."
"Why should I believe that you will enforce a ban next year?" another person said, questioning the legitimacy of the move.
According to The Canadian Press via Toronto Star, none of the delegates who spoke at Monday night's council meeting were in favour of the fireworks ban.
This article's cover image was used for illustrative purposes only.