Audio By Carbonatix
At this point, our favorite Miami New Year’s Eve tradition is the annual public reminder to not shoot your guns off into the air when the clock strikes midnight.
Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado, Police Chief Manuel Orosa, and Miami-Dade Commissioner Audrey Edmonson along with civic and religious leaders have bound together once again for the “Just Don’t Fire” campaign.
“These AKs, these choppers, start to go off at midnight and I hate to see a family wake up in the morning and a little kid, their little son or daughter has been struck by a bullet,” Reverend Jerome Starling told CBS Miami. “I’m begging and pleading that you will put down these guns, stop the violence and understand one mentality: what goes up will come down.”
Police meanwhile are asking anyone that hears gunfire on NYE to call 911 and are reminding citizens that firing your gun into the air is a crime.
When news happens, Miami New Times is there —
Your support strengthens our coverage.
We’re aiming to raise $30,000 by December 31, so we can continue covering what matters most to you. If Miami New Times matters to you, please take action and contribute today, so when news happens, our reporters can be there.
This is now the 16th year that officials have rolled out this campaign for both New Year’s Eve and Fourth of July, and yet the public still doesn’t get the message.
Back in Fourth of July 2012 two people were hit at the Biltmore Hotel by falling bullets. In 2010 a young boy visiting from Italy was struck by a falling bullet while dining in the Design District with his family.
Follow Miami New Times on Facebook and Twitter @MiamiNewTimes.
