ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - St. Louis Fire Chief Dennis Jenkerson says the city needs to start holding people accountable for breaking fireworks laws. It comes after his department put out 54 dumpster fires, 21 grass fires and 11 building fires that were started by illegal fireworks on July 4, he says.
Fireworks are illegal in St. Louis and every year calls from area officials, police and fire departments go ignored by thousands of people.
"You can't go after everyone in the city," Jenkerson says. "But I think there needs to be a starting point where we look at this and say, 'Hey, this is causing damage in our city.'"
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Jenkerson says someone put on a large scale fireworks display in Carondelet Park Sunday night, with 200 people sitting on a rock wall watching--close enough he says to get hit if a shell had misfired.
Citywide there was only one minor injury reported from July 4 fireworks.
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