To the editor:

In response to Sue Novak’s question of Oct. 30: “Where were you all the night the Lawrence City Commission heard the public’s views on fireworks?” I was going about my usual hectic routine of leaving work, picking kids up from school and day care, arriving home around 6:15 p.m., making dinner for my family and spending the precious few minutes I am allotted for family with my family, all the while assuming that the commissioners were simply going to ban a select few fireworks rather than all fireworks, which seemed to be a fair compromise.

My opinion to not ban fireworks was forwarded to the commissioners along with a request that they put the issue to vote so that people like me, who don’t have time to sit in meeting after meeting to voice my opinion, can have an opportunity to voice it by ballot. Voting only takes five to 10 minutes out of one of my days. This city never seems to vote on issues. Why? Must the city be run by five “powers-that-be?” Independence Day is about freedom and the right to decide how to celebrate that freedom. This issue should have been put to vote.

Additionally, patriotism is not about having or not having fireworks; it’s love of and devotion to one’s country. Fireworks have been the symbolic way to display one’s patriotism since the early 1800s. This age-old tradition has been squashed by city commissioners. No ballot, no vote, just the “powers-that-be.”

Tom Nau,

Lawrence