Councillors push decision on new fireworks restrictions to next spring

Fire prevention officers will meet with cultural groups and fireworks sellers to talk about conducting safe celebrations, but the city won’t impose any bans or create new bylaws before next year.

City council’s community services committee heard from the Winnipeg Fire and Paramedic Service Tuesday and from speakers arguing both for and against additional fines, enforcement or restrictions around the sale and use of fireworks.

The committee was split on how to approach new fireworks bylaws and eventually voted to revisit the issue next March, promising to create a working group to explore the issue further, in the meantime.

“I think it’s a very complicated file, and it’s important that we’re able to hear from the councillors on what direction they want this to take for the city,” Lisa Gilmour, the WFPS’ assistant chief of community risk reduction, said after Tuesday’s meeting.

“So this gives them an opportunity to speak to their residents more and bring back that direction and ensure that we’re enacting something that aligns with where the city and all the residents want it to go.”

Waverley West councillor Janice Lukes called for the public service to review the city’s current fireworks bylaws last fall following an unsanctioned Diwali celebration at Valley Gardens Community Centre that left a sports field surrounded by schools littered with hundreds of spent fireworks casings as well as unlit fireworks, matches and lighters the next morning.

A formal, city-permitted display earlier the previous evening at a nearby site was in recognition of Diwali, an important five-day celebration in Indian culture that is also known as the festival of lights.

Several hundred people who attended that display then made their way to the community centre. Some arrived with their own fireworks.

While the WFPS has previously sent fire prevention officers to speak with retailers before New Year’s Eve and Canada Day, along with visiting cultural centres before events such as Diwali, staffing issues didn’t allow that to happen last year, Gilmour said.

As a result, the number of calls about fireworks increased. The WFPS will try to resume those community discussions this year.

“We felt it made a difference in the calls,” she said.

There were 306 fireworks-related calls to the WFPS last year, compared to 256 in 2024.

The city requires a permit held by someone over the age of 18 for fireworks displays, which must be at least 30 metres away from buildings and trees, eliminating the vast majority of private residences.

There were 144 consumer and professional permits issued to use fireworks last year.

The fine for breaking bylaw restrictions is up to $500, but enforcement continues to be a challenge, said WFPS Chief Christian Schmidt.

“I do believe it’s going to be a combination of a number of things here, it’s not just about enforcement, not just about education,” he said. “And yes, there may be particular items that we could look at banning for sale within the municipality, but they (could be) procured outside the municipality.”

The WFPS is releasing its bylaw-enforcement strategy in November, which will be accompanied by further recommendations regarding fireworks.

Lukes said she doesn’t believe an education campaign will work and wants to see additional restrictions imposed.

Community services committee member Coun. Matt Allard (St. Boniface), said he didn’t want to see the report move further at all, and said the possibility of additional fireworks restrictions an unpopular idea in his ward.

“I just think we’re making a mountain of a molehill, and I think we’re creating ourselves more problems than we’ll be solving if we continue down this path,” he said.

The Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs recommended a ban on the sale and use of consumer fireworks in Canada in 2022 due to safety concerns.

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca