Travis County Commissioners Court

June 12, 2012 - Item 3
Agenda

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>> Number 3 is receive briefing and take appropriate action on the regulation of fireworks in unincorporated Travis County.

>> Good morning, judge, Commissioners, Herschel Lee, Travis County Fire Marshal.
With me is Lisa Block, Travis County Public Information Officer.
This is the last voting session that will occur prior to the deadline when Commissioners court could take action if the conditions warranted.
By state statute, court would have to take action by June 15th to restrict any fireworks, but that would only be available to you if the drought index were 575 or higher by June 15th.
Our current drought index is 366.
So that action is not available to you today.
We have sent out information to all of our fireworks vendors.
We anticipate permitting approximately 45 stands in Travis County as we normally do and so today we wanted to come to you and to tell you that we anticipate an increased number of calls this year just because of an increased level awareness of people because of last year's wildfire.
And encourage the public to act responsibly if they choose to use those fireworks.
We again encourage people to attend public displays.
There are a number of that are already being mentioned, attend those public displays.
Every year when consumers have fireworks, the number of fire increase this the unincorporated areas of Travis County.
That's generally due to people not using them appropriately.
There are a number of ways that fireworks could be used and if they follow all those manufactures' recommendation and everything is done appropriately, they can be used in somewhat of a safe manner.
Every year we see the number of fires increase.
We anticipate the number of calls will go up this year, but we want to encourage people to act responsibly and safely.
We do plan some public service announcements to be delivered.
I'll let lisa tell you about that though, how she plans to get the word out, to assist us in getting the word out.

>> So this afternoon we'll put out a press release just to let the media know and to educate the public about what they can do to decrease the risk of fire.
and we'll also be posting that information on facebook and twitter.
and we had a call from the statesman yesterday so we're hopeful that the rest of the media here in the area will pick it up.

>> There are also a number of other things that we would like to take this opportunity.
fireworks are not legal inside the city limits of Travis County and the city of Austin particularly does not allow the sale or use of fireworks within the city.
part of Cedar Park is within our county and Cedar Park enforces their E.T.J. rules very strictly in their area.
there are a number of other cities that are also the same way.
so if you are going to buy consumer fireworks, you need to know where you are and know that you have authority to use them at that particular place.
there are a number of places you can't use them.
around day cares, schools, nursing homes, within 600 feet of churches.
there are a number of places you should not use fireworks at all even though you might think it would be safe, it just -- the state statute does not allow the use there.

>> What role will the esds play in this preventive action as far as ensuring that we have a safe holiday and discharge of fireworks won't be as harmful especially with our latest wildfire incident that happened within Travis County, bastrop county.
What type of role will the esds play with you in this particular effort?

>> There are four emergency service districts that have adopted fire codes.
Es dis.
2, 3, 6 and 9 have adopted fire codes.
They inspect the retail fireworks stands in their area.
They also permit any public display that is in their area.
Every year when we are out during fireworks season, we come across their inspectors out in the field as well checking the fireworks stands and looking at noise and things of those nature.
Those esds with fire codes are proactive in their meeting with the public about fireworks.

>> Okay.
Thank you.

>> Let's say that the drought conditions worsen between the 15th of June and July 4th.
Many of our residents call the county judge and ask him to impose on an emergency basis a fireworks ban.
What legal requirements are we guided by?

>> I'm going to ask our attorney to jump in for me.

>> The county judge has the authority under the

>> [inaudible] act to declare a local disaster and to immaterial proceeds restrictions on the sale or use of fireworks.
If there is an imminent threat of disaster, that being a widespread or severe damage due to fires.
And we have used that in the past.
So that would -- the way that would operate, if the circumstances justified it, would be that the county judge would issue a disaster declaration, imposing fireworks restrictions.
The way the statute is written now, those fireworks restrictions cannot last longer than 60 hours without the consent of the governor.
So what we did last year in July, you may recall, we did use the disaster act to issue a disaster declaration and we did request consent from the governor's office to extend that beyond 60 hours which the governor did do.
And disaster declaration also can't last more than seven days without consent of the Commissioners court.
So it begins with the county judge and after seven days it has to have consent of the Commissioners court, but restrictions on fireworks in order to stoned beyond 60 hours, you have to have consent of the governor.

>> Imminent threat documented by facts.
Not the judge's objective opinion, I take it.

>> Well, I think it would be good to have something to back that up.

>> That's why we have a good lawyer giving us advice.

>> Judge, if the current conditions continue, I went back looking at other times when the forecasts were similar and when we were about the same place, and in June 2005 the drought conditions were -- or the drought index was similar, and by the time we got to the fireworks season or by the end of the fireworks season, we were well over 500 on our drought index.
So if we don't get any rain, it is going to be dry.
It may be approaching 575 by July 4th if we do not get any rain between now and then.
Hopefully we will.

>> What's the current index?

>> 366 yesterday.

>> 366.
Okay.

>> In looking at the historical data, we have less fires when we have anywhere from one-half to an inch and a half of rain during the selling season.
Those are the most beneficial rains as far as preventing fires during a fireworks selling season.
Too far ahead for us to guess that, but if we keep going the way we are right now with no rain, historical data says we're going to be approaching 575 by July 4th.

>> To answer your question, judge, there is no set -- statute doesn't set a certain kbdi index number that have you to have, so to some extent it is really is sort of subjective.
But I think you would receive input from the fire marshal and the other chiefs about how the conditions were out there and whether or not you think that there is an imminent threat.

>> Well, you will monitor the situation.

>> Yes, sir, we will.

>> Okay.
Anything further?
No action, just a briefing, right?

>> That's correct.

>> Thank you very much.

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