St. Martinville suspends fireworks law

An ordinance requiring a two-day gap in year-end fireworks sales was eliminated for St. Martinville.
At the Dec. 21 City Council meeting, the ordinance was amended to allow sales from midnight Dec. 22 through midnight Jan. 1, without the 2008-enacted moratorium on Christmas eve and Christmas day sales.
Mayor Thomas Nelson and Police Chief Calder Hebert both favored the amendment on the grounds that it had no real effect other than limiting local vendor’s revenues. Nelson said that buyers were making purchases ahead of time or driving the few miles necessary to buy their fireworks out of town, so there was really no effect on their use on those two days.
The council also discussed the Kiwanis Club’s Dec. 20 Christmas Parade and the Main Street Association’s Christmas on the Boulevard. Attendance was probably somewhat less than previous years, according to Hebert – possibly due to the postponement of the event from the previous Sunday due to weather.
There was a fair crowd, though, and the parade ran smoothly, he said. The only issue mentioned was the presence of a contingent of off-road four-wheelers in the parade, which should have been prohibited.
Riders of the dozen or so of the vehicles in the parade frequently slowed to allow a space to open ahead of them and accelerated too quickly, some thought, for safety. This is part of what got them banned in the first place, Hebert said. Some spectators in the crowd could be heard shouting for them to slow down.
Finally, Mark Dubroc of Dubroc Engineering Inc. reviewed construction bids received for the extension of water service to the new South Louisiana Community College campus. Dubroc recommended acceptance of the lowest bid of the five received, which was $115,395.80, from Bihm Construction Co. Inc. Other bids ranged up to $165,000.