The head of the City of Ottawa’s Emergency and Protective Services says he is sorry for the unannounced fireworks show last Thursday that surprised residents and drew criticism from city councillors.
The unused fireworks from the rained-out Canada Day evening show were set off at the end of the first night of Ottawa Bluesfest, but there was no advance word to the public.
Last week, Emergency and Protective Services general manager Ryan Perrault said the decision not to advertise or proactively notify residents of the fireworks display was made by the city’s Special Event Advisory Team in an effort to avoid additional crowding as Bluesfest was letting out. Canadian Heritage, meanwhile, said the fireworks had already been primed and disarming them would have posed a safety risk to the fireworks crew.
Speaking to reporters on Monday, Perrault apologized for the confusion.
“It’s very clear to me that it had impacts on the community and for that, I’m extremely sorry for that experience that those residents felt,” he said, “and that’s something that we’re going to have to take away and look at that as part of our processes.”
Mayor Mark Sutcliffe said he was not aware of the decision to set off the fireworks on Thursday night.
“I’ve been preoccupied with the flooding situation. I haven’t really spent a lot of time on this issue. I wasn’t aware in advance of what the plan was,” he said.
“In fairness to the people who made the decision, I think they were trying to make the best of a bad outcome on Canada Day, where the fireworks were not able to be deployed, and where the determination was made that it was safer to send up the fireworks than to dismantle them.”
Ottawa Bylaw Services said it received 38 complaints about the fireworks, which were set off just before 11 p.m.
Some city councillors and a downtown MPP blasted the move, calling it unacceptable and “a clear sign of gross mismanagement” on behalf of the city.
Perrault called it a difficult decision on Monday.
“We have a special events advisory team here at the City of Ottawa that includes our city departments as well as other service areas like the Ottawa Police Service and partners from Ottawa Public Health. And in this case, given the nature of the event, it also included Heritage Canada,” he said.
“So, together, we had to make that difficult decision. But as I mentioned, it was it was to have public safety at the forefront of that decision.”
