Today is July 11, 2024.

• Good morning! That blanket of mugginess that’s wrapped itself around us recently should lift today, albeit briefly. The forecast calls for breezy conditions this morning, with variable cloudiness throughout the day and less humid. The high will be 79 degrees, with a low of 61 tonight. Then the summer heat machine cranks back up, reaching a high of 91 on Tuesday — and bringing the humidity and thunderstorms along with it. It is July, after all.
  

• DOG DAYS OF SUMMER: We are now in the “Dog Days of Summer,” which go from July 3 to Aug. 11 each year. The Dog Days are usually the hottest and most unbearable days of the season in the Northern Hemisphere and can be traced back thousands of years to the days of the Roman Empire. Read more about the science and mythology of the Dog Days here.
  

• LIONS CLUB SEEKING RESCUE GROUPS FOR PAW FEST: The Stow-Munroe Falls Lions Club is looking for rescue groups in Summit County to be vendors at its 2024 Paw Fest event, which will take place Sunday, Sept. 15 at Bow Wow Beach Dog Park in Stow. If interested, contact Chair Marty Dennis at [email protected].
  

• KIWANIS CLUB MEET AND GREET: The Kiwanis Club of Stow-Munroe Falls will host its annual “Meet and Greet” get-together from 5 to 7 p.m. Friday, Aug. 23 at the Stillwood Pavilion in Stow, located just south of Kent Road at the Stillwood Estates. Anyone interested in the Kiwanis slogan, “Changing the world one child and one community at a time,” is invited to spend a few hours sampling various wines, cheeses and other goodies with more than 40 local Kiwanis Club members. Learn about the club and its service projects, fundraisers, diverse donations and many other activities impacting our local communities. Wine, light refreshments and good conversation will be served.
  

• TRAFFIC ALERT: The State Route 91 Bridge Replacement Project in Hudson is underway. Work began July 8 on the bridge, which goes over Brandywine Creek just south of State Route 303, and will close Route 91 between Veterans Way and Ravenna Street for 16 days. The detour if you’re traveling north on Route 91 from Stow is: Terex Road to Route 303 to Route 91. Go here for updates.
  

• STOW PUBLIC HEARING NOTICE: Stow City Council will hold a public hearing at 5 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 1 in Council Chambers at Stow City Hall to discuss Ordinance No. 2024-136, “Zoning District Maps.” City Hall is located at 3760 Darrow Rd. Go here for more information.
  

• WHERE DO YOU STAND ON THE SMF SCHOOLS BOND ISSUE? The Spotlight is taking the pulse of the Stow-Munroe Falls community on the upcoming $238 million, 35-year bond issue the school district is putting on the November ballot. Send us your comments on the issue, and we will publish them as we get them in our new “Reader Spotlight” feature (detailed below).
  

• The Spotlight has a new feature called “Reader Spotlight,” where you can send us your comments, concerns and suggestions on anything going on in our communities of Stow, Munroe Falls and Silver Lake. Send your email to [email protected], put “Reader Spotlight” in the subject line, and please include your name and town. We will publish comments as we receive them.
  

• If you just subscribed or missed something in an earlier newsletter, don’t fret: Subscribers have access to every edition of The Spotlight at www.stowmunroefalls.com. Check out back issues to catch up on everything that’s going on in our communities — you never know what you might have missed!

⭐ Several stories in this issue are only available to premium subscribers: Zoning reviews, possible flag redesign, camping in Munroe Falls, Pizza Cat, mosquito spray and more local news. Full access is $2.99/month.

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Stow

Things that go BOOM in the night: Fireworks debate heats up in Stow after another explosives-filled holiday

The Fourth of July celebration is over, but the debate over whether fireworks should be banned in Stow continues to rage.

The City of Munroe Falls and Village of Silver Lake have ordinances banning the sale, use and possession of fireworks and related explosives in their municipalities, but the City of Stow allows its residents to detonate and shoot them off at certain times of the year. Around the July 4th holiday, those certain times are from 4 to 11 p.m. June 28-30 and 4 to 11 p.m. July 3-7.

Heated arguments swirling on social media center around:

• Many residents ignoring Stow’s mandated 11 p.m. stop time, with fireworks blasts regularly rocking neighborhoods well into the wee hours of the morning.

• Explosives so powerful that residents report their windows rattling and houses shaking.

• Complaints that the Stow Police Department is not doing nearly enough to enforce the city’s own ordinance, thereby emboldening people to push the envelope with how late they shoot off fireworks and how powerful those explosives are.

At-Large Stow City Council Member Kyle Herman, who began his first term on council Jan. 1, tells The Spotlight that “since before I was sworn in, I’ve been contacted by residents expressing concerns: Fireworks are startling to people with anxiety or PTSD, especially veterans, kids, people on the [autism] spectrum, etc.,” he said. “Some people even talked about how they would have drugged their pets if they’d known their neighbors were going to shoot off fireworks some nights.”

Many residents also point to dangers inherent to letting amateurs set off fireworks in the middle of neighborhoods. Just this July 4, three houses caught fire in Cleveland — where fireworks are illegal — due to debris from fireworks, with two of those houses damaged so badly that they are no longer able to be occupied. A man in South Carolina was killed by a firework device that exploded on him, and of course there are the all-too-common accounts of people blowing off fingers and hands and catching themselves on fire.

The National Fire Protection Association reports that in 2022, fireworks started an estimated 31,302 fires nationally, including 3,504 structure fires, 887 vehicle fires, 26,492 outside fires and 418 unclassified fires. These fires caused an estimated six civilian deaths, 44 civilian injuries and $109 million in direct property damage, while U.S. hospital emergency rooms treated an estimated 10,200 people for fireworks-related injuries.

But if you expect things to change in Stow anytime soon, don’t. Herman explains:

“The previous Council had discussed a proposal to restrict fireworks after state law changed to allow them in 2022, but it died in committee on a 2-2 vote,” he said. “So Stow currently follows state law, which allows fireworks on [approximately] 21 days throughout the year, many on floating holidays or surrounding weekends.

“Earlier this year, I proposed a resolution to reduce and consolidate the days fireworks are allowed in Stow from 21 to 7 in order to provide more consistency for when fireworks should be expected so that residents could prepare to cope if necessary. [Stow Police] Chief [Jeff] Film agreed that this could help with enforcement. We spoke about my resolution at several meetings, but when we voted on June 13, John Baranek and I were the only two who voted for, and the other five voted against.”

Reader Spotlight

— From Daniel Mainzer: “Details missing from the proposed [$238 million, 35-year SMF Schools] bond issue… No details on which buildings are beyond refurbishing, schedule of replacement, effects of inflation on construction costs, numbers of students affected taking into account declining enrollment, overhead for administrative staff now vs a few years ago and projected in the future (who needs expensive DEI?), also how much of this bond issue will go to actual construction vs salaries for teachers by contract. Regardless, too much for us on fixed costs.”

— From Barbara Hobbs: “The paper recycling bins have disappeared from Lakeview, Highland and City Hall. When will they return? I know they are used a lot and benefit the city financially.” — The Spotlight reached out to Stow Mayor John Pribonic on this issue, and here’s his response: “The main reason the bins have been removed by the haulers at all locations is due to the exorbitant [amount] of cardboard in the market. According to the haulers that since this is the case, no one is accepting recycling cardboard. Also, people are throwing other items in that are polluting the cardboard. We cannot find any other haulers due to these reasons, [but] we are talking to another vendor that just contacted us.” Note: The Spotlight will provide updates as additional information becomes available.

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