Voice of San Diego reporter MacKenzie Elmer explains that when pressed as to why SeaWorld’s summer fireworks are still with us after saying they had to go a year ago, City Council President Joe LaCava answers, “It’s complicated.” Here is Elmer’s full report:
After some nesting birds nearby died last year following back-to-back pyrotechnics for the Fourth of July, the most powerful person on the San Diego City Council said SeaWorld’s nightly summertime fireworks have got to go.
Almost a year later and Mission Bay is still booming night after night.
When asked what San Diego City Council President Joe LaCava’s done so far to make good on his promise, his office told me it’s complicated.
It involves cracking open SeaWorld’s lease and working with the city’s planning commission on changes to the SeaWorld Masterplan Amendment, a long-term planning document for the park which leases city property in Mission Bay. There’s a whole section describing fireworks displays at SeaWorld as an “integral part of the park’s evening experience.” Apparently, according to the amendment, the park’s hosted fireworks shows since 1968, four years after the park opened.
The City Council is waiting on the Planning Commission to take up SeaWorld’s planning amendment, according to LaCava’s staff. The Planning Commission didn’t get back to Voice of San Diego about when they’d be taking it up.
“The nightly explosion of fireworks this summer is a reminder that the frequency of this activity must be restricted,” LaCava said in an emailed statement. “Our collective goal must continue to be the activation of Mission Bay in a manner that protects the environment and does not impact surrounding neighborhoods.”
Volunteers with San Diego Bird Alliance tracked and mapped fireworks use in Mission Bay during the Fourth of July weekend in 2025. / Courtesy of the San Diego Bird Alliance
In the meantime, bird activists took it upon themselves to track fireworks activity both legal and illegal, over the July 4 weekend. Volunteers stationed themselves near preserves like the Kendall Frost Marsh and the San Diego River Mouth, recording 196 “bird disturbances” between the two locations.
Bird disturbances, according to the San Diego Bird Alliance, include an array of behavior: Increased vigilance (feathers close to body and looking around), distressed behavior (increased vigilance plus alarm calls and chicks running), vocalizing on the ground or in the air, flushing (taking flight in groups) from the ground or the air and panic flight.
The thousands of nesting elegant terns, part of the flock affected by fireworks last year, didn’t return to their 2024 nesting site on West Ski Island in Mission Bay, according to Andrew Meyer with the San Diego Bird Alliance.
When asked what San Diego City Council President Joe LaCava’s done so far to make good on his promise, his office told me “it’s complicated.”
“All of our staffs’ on the City Council, the City Attorney, and Mayors office are working round the clock to efficiently process the massive Party windfall from MASSIVE corporate development payouts for political favor.”
LaCava going on to start whining that, “It really is time consuming to reguarly defy the electorate in order to opportunistically act in our own best interest, public be damned. The public is clueless as to what all of our interns have to go through taking incessant telephone calls from outraged constituents in return for college credit, and no pay.”
La Cava going on to say, “with AB 79 on deck, ADU Bonus, Complete Communities, and the horrible density bonuses for hyper gentrifying, all of our staffs are wholly devoted to counting cash, in order re-allocate, or launder, all the bribe money, er, I mean ‘political contributions’ for the California Democratic Party. That way the public can rest assured that City Council, Mayor,City Attorney, State Senator and Assemlymember Chris Ward ensure that we get our adequate share all of the looted riches for our personal slush funds.”
As a young woman in 1968, the year I purchased my home in the Pt. Loma area, I have been arguing against the fireworks from Sea World. First of all, they have no purpose, for everyone that is going to be at Sea World for the day/night are getting ready to leave for the day. They have seen that everything Sea World has to offer. Then the group that I belonged to fought the pollution problem that was happening on a nightly basis with the fireworks display. We were told that the pollution was being “cleaned up” daily, and I have to borrow one of the frequently used words from the middle school students that attended by school that I was the Principal – bull s – – -! We hardly ever say a “clean up” of the fireworks. Then, as the “mother” of many dogs, what they went through every night – and, by the way, are STILL going through it, is inhumane. I can only imagine what the animals at Sea World must suffer on a nightly basis. And THEN – when one of my teachers from Arizona came to visit me and abruptly said he had to leave at 8:55pm on a Wednesday night, I asked if he was ok and he answered by saying the fireworks sounded so much like the guns he heard when he was a soldier in Viet Nam that he just couldn’t stay. So the group that I was working with to stop the fireworks did some research and found that there are hundreds of people suffering from PTSD that freak out every night that Sea World shoots of the fireworks. I have to say that I have heard from many, many people that have said “if you don’t like the fireworks MOVE.” Or, “get ear plugs”, or “give your animals tranquilizers” or…… Many, many suggestions. And you know what the best one is? Stop the frigging fireworks. Save the animals. Save the veterans. Save the environment. What the hell does Sea World need fireworks for anyway? Do I have faith that Sea World will ever stop polluting the environment? No, I don’t. I started out as a young woman to save the environment; now I’m an old lady watching the environment deteriorate because of Sea World; watching humans suffer because of Sea World; watching animals deteriorate because of Sea World; and still listening to humans tell me how wonderful Sea World is and to just move out of the area. I’m sorry people. I tried to make it better for those of us living within the hearing/seeing area of Sea World. I didn’t make even a dent in their plans. The groups I belonged to didn’t make a dent either. It is now up to you, because this old lady can only refuse to have anything to do with Sea World. I refuse to take any of my 23 grandchildren there (and it should be noted that I have a minor in Oceanography – there was so much hope for Sea World before it became a money-grabbing place of entertainment). They are not making any more money having fireworks than not having them. But…they are sure f – – – ing up the environment.