By GARRET JAROS/YachatsNews
WALDPORT – The Waldport city council approved a fireworks ban and an increase in lodging taxes during its first meeting of the year.
Both decisions Thursday moved in lockstep with Lincoln County which also recently banned fireworks and raised the lodging tax on vacation rentals and motels in unincorporated areas from 10 percent to 12 percent.
Lincoln County residents voted overwhelmingly to raise the lodging tax in unincorporated areas Nov. 7 and county commissioners revised an ordinance Jan. 3 making it illegal – effective immediately — to sell, possess or use any type of fireworks in unincorporated areas.
Both subjects were open to public comment prior to the council’s decisions. No one spoke in favor or against raising the lodging tax and it was passed without discussion by the council.
“I think we are right in line with everyone else,” said mayor Greg Holland.
At the council’s Dec. 27 meeting, city manager Dann Cutter said Waldport has historically tried to match what the county and other municipalities were charging in lodging taxes and that the city had the support of one of the its “larger stakeholders.”
In addition to the county, Waldport joins Newport, Lincoln City and Depoe Bay at 12 percent. Yachats is studying whether to increase its current 9 percent tax.
Waldport has 44 active short-term rental licenses available with no cap on the number it issues. Those licenses, which include vacation rentals, motels and RV parks in the city, garnered $216,000 this year. Last year the city collected $175,000. Cutter credits the increased amount to more successful collection efforts.
He estimates the 20 percent increase will bring in an additional $40,000 a year. Seventy percent of the tax collected must be used for tourism promotion and 30 percent goes into the city’s general fund.
Fireworks ban
After hearing public testimony from three locals in favor of the fireworks ban and two out-of-town fireworks sellers opposed, council members acknowledged it was a tough call during a short discussion before deciding to follow the advice of local fire officials and ban the sale and use of fireworks inside city limits.
Before the public testimony Cutter made clear that previous discussions around a ban hinged on whether the county would ban them because it made little sense for Waldport to implement a ban when county land is within view of council chambers.
“At the last meeting the discussion was that if the county did bring a ban, we would then bring the same ban before you today, which is pretty much word-for-word what you have (before you) …” Cutter said. “I would also say that at a meeting of city managers, Lincoln City has a ban in place, Yachats is pursuing a similar language ban and Newport is going over the details of the county ordinance as well.”
All three members of the public who spoke in favor of the ban mentioned the fire danger brought by fireworks, the stress on pets and people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and the refuse left behind.
“Fireworks started a brush fire near where I lived and we had to evacuate our homes and I had to throw everything that I wanted to keep into my car including my dog and leave,” said Penny Burt who lives just outside city limits. “We had to leave right away.”
The fire was started by people lighting fireworks on the beach, she said, then added that anyone who needs a “fireworks fix” can go see the public display which is much better than someone can do on their own.
Burt’s neighbor Martha Mills said her RV park was threatened by the same firework-caused fire.
“My personal feeling is it would make more sense to have a uniform ordinance throughout the entire county so that sheriffs can equally inform everyone, and the message to inform everyone can be more efficiently distributed.”
While the county has 50,000 residents, it is also the important to consider visitors to the area who have no idea whether they are in city limits or in an unincorporated area.
“To them that message is blurred,” said Mills, who also proposed the public display be a laser-light show carried out with drones (which some communities have done) in order to eliminate the noise stress on animals.
Speaking against the ban was TNT Fireworks representative Jason Trout of Eugene. While sympathetic with those who spoke out in favor of the ban, he said they were talking about fireworks that are already illegal in Oregon .
The ones that started the fire and the ones that “scare vets and pets, those are illegal right now,” Trout said. “The fireworks that we sell legally … are pretty much glorified sparklers. They stay on the ground and just emit small showers of sparks. They don’t go up in the air and they are not loud. They are not mortars that go up in the air and scare all the pets.”
Trout questioned the ability of law enforcement and fire officials to enforce a ban and said that one of the unintended consequences after the first year Eugene banned fireworks was a marked increase in illegal fireworks, more public complaints about fireworks going off, more fires — and no citations issued.
“And I know there are a lot of people who like to legally celebrate and have that option to legally and safely celebrate the Fourth of July with their families,” Trout said.
Eugene banned fireworks in October 2022 with fines not to exceed $500.
Waldport councilors agreed that illegal fireworks are the biggest concern.
“But I think if you had the ban, then it would be easy to identify who’s not following the ban,” said councilor Susan Woodruff.
Councilor Jayme Morris countered that officials can already identify who is using illegal fireworks under the current law but it is still not being enforced.
“I’m not saying we shouldn’t do it, because if the county’s doing it, it’s really complicated if we don’t,” Morris said. “I’m just saying there’s no fix for it. They’re still going to do their fireworks. It’s going to be even more illegal. They are just going to try to hide it which could then cause more fires because they’re not getting rid of them correctly.”
Burt spoke up from the audience to ask if by that reasoning it meant there should be no traffic laws because some people are not going to follow those as well?
Holland interjected that perhaps by going after the most obvious offenders if a ban was put in place, then perhaps it would lead to less people doing them in the years that follow. Then he reminded everyone that the ban is endorsed by Central Coast Fire & Rescue chief Jamie Mason.
Before the vote to ban, councilor Greg Dunn said he believes the majority of the people who use the “safe and sane fireworks” use them properly and the biggest issue would remain the use of already illegal fireworks.
Having worked for the fire department on the Fourth of July, Dunn said it is very difficult to catch the people using illegal fireworks and that even when you do – they are often belligerent and will shoot them off in front of you while asking “What are you going to do arrest me?”
“But I do think that it’s time that we revisit something like this,” Dunn said. “Because I just think it’s time we go a different direction and maybe just have the fireworks show instead of fireworks all over town. Are we still going to have illegals and fireworks brought in? Absolutely…
“It’s a tough call, I have kids, I love fireworks,” he concluded. “But I also look at the community as a whole. And I look at the fire side and the potential for fires and I think it’s probably time that we look at a county ban with fireworks, unfortunately.”
- Garret Jaros is YachatsNews’ full-time reporter and can be reached at GJaros@YachatsNews.com
