VIDALIA — Parish residents with excess leaves, garbage or limbs can finally get their fires ready to burn.

Thanks to rain showers over the weekend, Concordia Parish Police Jury President Melvin Ferrington said the burn ban has been lifted.

“We finally got enough rainfall in the parish to lift it,” he said. “We know people have some stuff to burn, so we lifted it as soon as we could.”

Ferrington said the ban, which has been in effect since June 1, was lifted statewide last week, but the parish was still too dry to lift it locally.

“We had some rain (prior to the weekend), but we didn’t have rainfall covering the whole parish,” he said. “There were some spots near Ridgecrest and Clayton that didn’t get any rain.”

Ferrington said this weekend’s showers brought 1 to 2 inches of rain that covered the whole parish.

“It was a very substantial rain, and every bit of it went to good use,” he said. “And we even have some more scheduled throughout the rest of this week, so things should be fine.”

During the near two-month ban, Ferrington said Concordia had no problems with residents burning at their homes.

“There were some minor problems we had just from it being so dry, but everyone really listened, and we avoided any major issues,” he said. “And I am very certain we can attribute that to the ban.”

Ferrington said even though the ban has been lifted, residents still need to be cautious when burning any items.

“We are still dry in a lot of areas, so remember to be careful when burning,” he said. “Always keep an eye on the fire.”

Ferrington said the rain scheduled for the rest of the week should help with the remaining dry land.