{"id":1204,"date":"2017-04-24T16:49:39","date_gmt":"2017-04-24T20:49:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/?p=1204"},"modified":"2017-04-24T16:49:39","modified_gmt":"2017-04-24T20:49:39","slug":"iowa-legslature-passes-fireworks-bill-awaits-governors-signature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/iowa-legslature-passes-fireworks-bill-awaits-governors-signature\/","title":{"rendered":"Iowa Legislature Passes Fireworks Bill, Awaits Governor&#8217;s Signature"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Iowa fireworks ban just might be over.<\/p>\n<p>This past week, the Iowa legislature voted 56-41 to pass a fireworks bill that would, pending Gov. Terry Branstad&#8217;s signature, allow fireworks sales in the state.<\/p>\n<p>This is big news for a state where it&#8217;s illegal to use and sell fireworks of any kind, per <a href=\"http:\/\/coolice.legis.iowa.gov\/cool-ice\/default.asp?category=billinfo&amp;service=iowacode&amp;ga=83&amp;input=727.\" target=\"_blank\">Iowa Code 727<\/a>. Iowa residents can currently only use novelties, such as snakes and sparklers.<\/p>\n<h2>More on the Iowa Fireworks Decision<\/h2>\n<p>James Q. Lynch, a reporter with Cedar Rapids&#8217;\u00a0<em>The Gazette<\/em>, said in an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thegazette.com\/lifting-iowa-ban-on-fireworks-on-way-to-governor-20170419\" target=\"_blank\">April 19 article<\/a> the bill has been a long time coming.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Long a topic kicked around by lawmakers, legalizing consumer fireworks in Iowa would place the state among 43 others \u2014 including Iowa\u2019s neighbors except Illinois \u2014 that allow them,&#8221; Lynch wrote. &#8220;In fact, Iowans already are buying fireworks \u2014 just not here.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Rep. Matt Windschitl, one of the bill&#8217;s big backers, told us via email that many Iowans wanted fireworks and that they are an important part of holidays like July 4th.<\/p>\n<p>According to the bill&#8217;s official text, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legis.iowa.gov\/legislation\/BillBook?ga=87&amp;ba=sf489\" target=\"_blank\">Senate File 489<\/a>, the legislation is called, &#8220;An Act Relating to the Possession, Sale, Transfer, Purchases, and Use of Fireworks, Providing Penalties, and Including Effective Date Provisions&#8221;.<\/p>\n<h2><\/h2>\n<h2>When You Can Use Fireworks in Iowa<\/h2>\n<p>Page 10 of the bill reveals the time and date restrictions on fireworks use. Here&#8217;s a\u00a0quick breakdown of when you can use fireworks, should the bill be ratified:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>General dates and hours:<\/strong> 9 a.m. to\u00a010 p.m. from June 1 to July 8 and from Dec. 10 through Jan. 3<\/li>\n<li><strong>Special July 4th hours:<\/strong> 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. on July 4th and the preceding Saturday and Sunday<\/li>\n<li><strong>Special NYE hours:<\/strong> 9 a.m to 12:30 a.m. on NYE and 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Saturdays &amp;\u00a0Sundays preceding &amp; following NYE<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>You&#8217;re only authorized to shoot fireworks on your property or on the property of someone who says it&#8217;s okay to shoot on their land.<\/p>\n<p>Violations of these rules, the bill says, are a simple misdemeanor.<\/p>\n<h2>When Retailers Can Sell Fireworks in Iowa<\/h2>\n<p>Based on what we gathered from the bill, businesses selling fireworks in a permanent structure can sell from June 1 to July 8 and from December 10 to January 3.<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;re selling from a temporary structure like a tent, you can sell between June 13 and July 8. As far as we can tell, the bill doesn&#8217;t allow tents to sell during the NYE season, even if you&#8217;re willing to brave the cold.<\/p>\n<h2>Fire Marshal Will Oversee Selling Licenses<\/h2>\n<p>We looked into the bill to pull out some specifics, and found that the state&#8217;s fire marshal will &#8220;establish a consumer fireworks seller license.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>This is essentially standard practice in most states &#8212; fire marshals can also call bans on fireworks sales during droughts.<\/p>\n<p>Fireworks sellers will have to pay a fee in order to sell product, and any individual, company or organization selling fireworks must do so according to national fire protection standards.<\/p>\n<p>The state fire marshal will oversee the fees generated by licenses and will use those fees, according to the bill, &#8220;fulfill the responsibilities of the state fire marshal for the administration and enforcement&#8221; of the bill&#8217;s regulations.<\/p>\n<h2>We&#8217;ll Keep You Updated About Iowa&#8217;s Fireworks Law<\/h2>\n<p>Local news stations seem to indicate that Iowa&#8217;s governor will sign the bill, but, until he does, it&#8217;s not official.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;ll keep you updated on any developments, so stop by our blog for more information or give us a call at 904\u2011213\u20110615.<\/p>\n<p>We keep a close eye on fireworks legislation developments, and we can answer any questions you have about shipping fireworks from our Florida warehouse to Iowa.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;re also happy to talk to you about <a href=\"http:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/wholesale\" target=\"_blank\">our product line<\/a> which, if everything goes as planned, will be available to you once the governor signs the dotted line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Iowa fireworks ban just might be over. This past week, the Iowa legislature voted 56-41 to pass a fireworks bill that would, pending Gov. Terry Branstad&#8217;s signature, allow fireworks sales in the state. This is big news for a state where it&#8217;s illegal to use and sell fireworks of any kind, per Iowa Code [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1214,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[10],"class_list":["post-1204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-superior-fireworks-wholesale"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IowaFireworksBill2017.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4JdUR-jq","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1204"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1216,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1204\/revisions\/1216"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.superiorfireworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}