Rocket red glares
Fireworks surge around city stirs calls to 311 and ...
Complaints about fireworks are exploding in the city, data shows.
The city’s 311 system received 1,249 complaints between June 1 and June 14 about illegal fireworks, according to a city government spokesman. That’s compared with a mere 21 complaints during the same period last year.
Gripes about rogue pyrotechnics spiked over the weekend. The city received 455 fireworks complaints on Sunday alone, data shows. On Saturday, 282 complaints were filed about the nightly displays.
A 311 spokesman cautioned that its system started allowing fireworks complaints to be made online this year, which likely contributed to the increase.
Still, New Yorkers have complained on social media that the fireworks are unusually loud and frequent this year.
Debates are raging in some neighborhoods about whether the displays are a nuisance or harmless sign of summer.
On a Prospect-Lefferts Gardens, Brooklyn, Facebook group, a division has emerged between longtime residents and newer arrivals who say the fireworks keep them up at night and scare pets and children.
In Ditmas Park, a resident sparked outrage by creating a “Peaceful Ditmas Park” Facebook page that urged the NYPD and Mayor de Blasio to take action against the noisy explosions.
Another local advocacy group, Equality for Flatbush, said the complaints prompted NYPD cops in “riot gear” to swarm the neighborhood and try to enter black residents’ homes in response to fireworks complaints.
Many New Yorkers blame a fireworks boom on neighbors weary of their coronavirus quarantines.
“I think people are just bored,” said Amanda McMeo, 25, of Flatbush.
“They’re going off literally every night,” said Jerry Maass, 71, of Kingsbridge, the Bronx.
“People are probably complaining more because people are always home when they start,” said Maass. He said in his neighborhood, the fireworks start shortly after “the banging of the pots and stuff” for health care workers at 7 p.m.
A resident of Inwood in Upper Manhattan said complaints might be rising because more people with money are moving into the area.
“The middle and the higher class — they’re gentrifying. I’ve noticed that. All the way from Fort Washington to Inwood,” said Larry Rodriguez, 44.
Another Inwood resident, Jay Amari, 64, said he thinks complaints might be up because Inwood itself is a calmer place.
“This is a quiet, family neighborhood, so maybe parents and elderly people are filing them,” said Amari, 64.
“In the 20 years I’ve been here I’ve never had a problem,” Amari said. But he knows plenty of people use fireworks.
“I’ve been hearing it all around,” Amari said. He especially hears explosions in one of the neighborhood’s parks. “They’re shooting M80s — big things — because it sounds like shotguns,” he said.