Soddy Daisy 4th of July Fireworks Show Spot Causes Controversy

There's been fireworks over Soddy Daisy's July Fourth celebration.

After complaints last year, the city was going to shoot the pyro-technics show off from an island in Soddy Daisy Lake this year... But signs call the area a Bird Sanctuary, and that has some park-goers hopping mad.

Susan Perruso is an avid waterfowl fan.  "They have come in here and cut into their nesting sites and taken brush and tress away with no regard to the nesting birds or no regard to their habitat. And these birds have no other place to go, other than this sanctuary," she explained after the city came in and cleared brush off the island.

She and her husband Michael's goal to keep the birds safe started a wild goose chase...  Interim City Manager Sara Burris tells us the park was thought to be city property. But the fireworks fiasco let them discover the truth:  "The city of Soddy has been managing this access area for a number of years and as we recently found out, several of us just recently found out, the state of Tennessee owns this property," said TWRA Assistant Supervisor Joe Busch.

The TWRA ruled Monday afternoon there will be no fireworks on the island.

Busch says that has nothing to do with the bird sanctuary signs.  He says TWRA did not put them up.  "The Wild Life Agency never established this area as an access area or as a type of safety zone," added Busch.

TWRA officials say they will go back into the island and fill in the areas that were cleared out for the Soddy Daisy fireworks.

Michael Perruso remembers what the island looked like before it was cleared.  "The open water was crossing it. I think some of the vegetation needs to be put back out there on the bare ground for them. I think it needs to go back to the way it was."

Right now the city is trying to get a barge to shoot the fireworks from this Saturday.