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There will be no fire in the sky this Fourth of July in Livermore as the city announced that the annual fireworks show will be replaced by a reimagined family-friendly celebration.
Citing a need to prioritize public safety, the city and the park district have decided that crowd sizes, parking and traffic impacts and staffing challenges, among other reasons, have led to a need for change.
“Over the years in Livermore, the Independence Day celebration has grown significantly into a regional event. What was once intended to be a community celebration has attracted visitors from all over the Bay Area. Last year, the city partnered with the Livermore Area Recreation and Park District (LARPD) to host a fireworks event. Over 60 percent of the over 12,000 people who attended the event were not from Livermore,” according to the city’s website.
“The growing popularity of the city’s Fourth of July event has made it clear that neither the city nor LARPD have the resources or infrastructure (such as roadways and parking) to ensure a safe, family event that the Livermore community can access. Finding additional staffing has been extremely challenging due to the holiday, and regional events that had been held in the past have all been canceled for the same concerns, which has driven more attendees from the region to the City of Livermore event,” officials added.
Livermore Police Chief Jeramy Young and City Manager Marianna Marysheva also collaborated on a joint video posted to social media last week reiterating the points made on the city’s website.
In his own effort to help clear up some misinformation on social media, City Councilmember Evan Branning shared a post on Facebook further elaborating on the safety concerns that led to the difficult decision to end the fireworks. He noted that the event was moved from downtown last year to Robertson Park for similar reasons.
Last year, the city told Livermore Vine that they expected the venue change to “offer better crowd management and safety.”
According to Branning’s post, however, some issues still surfaced.
“We had high hopes for the Robertson Park as it used to be there. Unfortunately, the number of attendees far outstripped the capacity of our roads and parking,” Branning said. “There were a number of minor incidents which raised red flags, if they had been major incidents police or paramedics would have been unable to respond. Because of that we needed to look to an alternative. I’m a big fan of fireworks and the 4th, but we couldn’t find a working solution for fireworks that did not present a major safety risk,” he added.
While the city has not yet announced details of the reimagined celebration and what it will entail, the statement on their website said it will be “a daytime celebration for the Livermore community at the Livermore Municipal Airport, potentially with additional opportunities in various city neighborhoods.” Additional information will follow “in the coming weeks,” officials said.
The decision for the city to no longer host a fireworks display also follows the council’s vote last year to adopt an ordinance that added prohibitions and penalties for residents using fireworks to the existing municipal code.
The amended ordinance, which went into effect last June, includes a social hosting provision that makes hosts liable for the actions of their guests on their property — or within the public right-of-way adjacent to their property — when an individual violator cannot be identified. Officers can then issue an administrative citation not to exceed $500 to the homeowner or person in charge of the gathering. Additional penalties could also include cost recovery fees related to the law enforcement response.
Officials said they will share updates about this year’s July 4 festivities on social media and a webpage available at livermoreca.gov.
