Sorry to hear about your friend.
We had a battle with our HOA over fireworks. We live outside city limits, so it's legal to do fireworks and we have always had great shows and it's one of my favorite things about our neighborhood. But a new HOA management took over and "banned" them without even taking a vote on it. The potential fine is $500. Well, our little rural Texas community made it a point to show they are NOT ok with things being passed without the residents getting a say. They put on a show, just as great as ever. We'll see if anyone actually gets fined. One of the board members left the board because of this issue and he says the they won't be able to enforce this rule and no one will get a fine.
H was going to buy fireworks to do with the kids, but when I warned him about the possible fine, he didn't want to risk it. But we did have some little "poppers" left over from New Years, so the kids did those and then we sat and watched the show.