The City of Atlantic has received a response from J&M Displays, with regard to the City’s inquiry as why the fire works show on July 4th was only 10-to 15-minutes long. In the e-mail, Susan Skalinski with J&M Displays, Inc., in Yarmouth (Iowa), said they will get to the bottom of the matter.

Skalinski said “We are as disappointed as you to hear about the short length and possibly less product. J&M had some issues with faulty firing boards this year and I have an email into Ted at Council Bluffs to talk to the lead shooter of your show. We will try to find out as soon as we can if he had equipment problems and if some of your shells did not fire. As soon as I hear back I will let you know.

“Regardless, because it was short in length and the community was disappointed J&M will be issuing [The City] a credit amount for 2022.” She stated that was “based on the amount of unfired product plus the amount of other issues. Once a full report is given to our CEO he will decide the credit amount…”

(Last Friday, the City Clerk Barb Barrick sent J&M Displays the following e-mail: “We have received many complaints that the show was extremely short (reports of 11-15 minutes). In addition, the Fire Chief noted that it didn’t look like the City received as much product as it had in the past. I am requesting that you look into the matter to ensure that there was not discrepancy between what the City paid ($6,000) and what it was supposed to receive ($6,000 plus 8% for early payment). If the City did receive all of its product, would you please explain why the show took such a short time?”)