San Bruno sees marked reduction in firework service calls for Fourth of July

Overall, the amount of calls and citations issued has reduced so drastically that the police department will be moving toward a reduced operational approach in future years, Police Chief Matt Lethin said.

San Bruno received only 49 calls for service and issued eight citations this year, compared to 113 calls and 12 citations in 2025 and 179 calls and 25 citations in 2022, Lethin said.

“We were a little curious how it was going to go because it was falling on a Saturday, as well as the 250th anniversary of our country,” he said. “While for an hour or two it was active and our staff was busy, it was a marked decrease.”

The city also deployed other management techniques, like turning on park sprinklers at night to prevent any fires or illegal gatherings, Lethin said.

Firework management cost the city around $61,000 this year, which is around $2,000 to $3,000 less than last year, he said. The recap comes as San Bruno is planning for a ballot measure that would allow voters to ban the sale of safe-and-sane fireworks in the city, with some councilmembers citing the cost of public safety enforcement, as well as fire danger, as a major concern.

Before state law capped cost recovery efforts for firework enforcement at 7% of gross sales, the program was financially net neutral for the city. After that program implementation, however, San Bruno has had to spend additional money on enforcement and cleanup.

Advocates for safe-and-sane fireworks sales, which generate revenue for local nonprofits, argue it’s illegal fireworks that cause most of the damage and danger and would not be eliminated if legal fireworks were prohibited.

This year, however, councilmembers noted that they had seen a marked decline in fireworks-related problems over the Fourth of July, with Councilmember Tom Hamilton calling it a “huge change.”

“Usually it’s many, many of my neighbors putting on illegal shows, and none of that happened,” he said.