Usually, the Guilford County Board of Commissioners tries to make decisions that reflect the will of the people, but a lot of evidence indicates that board’s current mask mandate isn’t one of those decisions.
The board adopted the measure last month, making masks mandatory when people are indoors in public places like stores, restaurants and theaters.
Commissioner Justin Conrad, who saw the emails that came in to the Board of Commissioners and that came to him individually, said that, before the vote took place, public sentiment was overwhelmingly against the mandate.
At the meeting, several commissioners who voted for the mandate also pointed out that they had gotten a lot of feedback asking the board not to implement the mandate. They also, however, said they’d received responses from medical providers and other groups who were asking for the mandate.
One county staff person said staff doesn’t keep a running tally of for and against on issues like the mask mandates, however, the employee said that the calls coming in to the county were decidedly against.
While the Board of Commissioners did approve the mask mandate, there was opposition to the move from both parties. The board’s two Republican commissioners – Conrad and Alan Perdue – voted against it, and so did Democratic Commissioner James Upchurch.
Upchurch made the point that masks are just one strategy for fighting the virus.
He asked health staff whether a vaccine was readily available to those who wanted it and staff said it was.
“So, at this point,” Murphy said, “it is on an adult’s personal responsibility to get the vaccine or not to.”
He said he was surprised a new county health order only addressed masks.
“We’re not talking about social distancing,” he said. “We’re not talking about capacity limits; we’re not giving the public guidance on what masks you should wear because we know that all masks are not highly effective when it comes to the spread of this virus.”
Commissioner Kay Cashion stated recently that she had certainly seen a lot of opposition to the mask mandate, but she added that much of that seemed to be via form letters that were signed and emailed in. Cashion also said that, as the vote drew near, the support for the mask mandate seemed to pick up.
Cashion said she didn’t like wearing a mask, like most people, but said some small business owners had told her they wanted the mandate since it might help them keep their businesses open.
To show you the complete disconnect here, please have Cashion elaborate on how wearing a mask, or any other decision this board makes, keeps a small business open. And God help us if the business owner was dumb enough to look to the government for guidance.
Masks should be optional, unless mandated by the business owner. Then we can make our own choice, free from a Diktat from above.
We attended the Mountain Song event in Brevard last weekend. The auditorium was covered, but open air on both sides. People sat both inside or outside, with or without masks as they chose. There was no hassle with anyone, or with the police. My wife wore a mask, I did not. She is with her grandchildren often, so that was her choice.
We’ve had three Covid shots, and a flu shot. That was our choice.
The real issue is whether or not we allow Big Brother to dictate our lives, to live by their leave.
I wrote Cashion and it wasn’t a form letter. She never replied. I wrote Carly Cooke. She never replied. These people think they’re above the people they’re supposed to represent. I asked both of them which scientific studies they referenced before passing the mask mandate. I have to assume at this point that no studies were considered. This mandate is the result of fear and anecdotal evidence. We deserve better.
So has there been any actual enforcement of this mandate?
I don’t know a single person they did reply to – and I know of 9 others besides me who sent emails to both. All 100% opposed to the mandate. All include actual scientific data/ studies.
Cooke is not very bright. She seems incapable of understanding anything more complicated than a 2nd grade bubble test – this is from interacting with her several times long before she ran for county commission.
Don’t know about Cashion as she’s never responded to the numerous emails I sent and I’ve never interacted with her personally. She ignored the dozens of studies I sent. They all ignored the links to articles and calls for retraction showing the that PANS study the commission used to justify this crap has been widely mocked as an opinion with cherry picked data not an actual study. It was modified numerous times as the virus spread. Look at the dates the data was collected – it draws a correlation between early masking and reduced spread while ignoring other mitigation – and was proven nonsense by having those places experience outbreaks in the fall/ winter. RCTs remain the best form of experimentation and zero show a benefit to wrapping dirty cloth or tissue around ones face.
Anyway, western NC is free and beautiful. I highly recommend lots of day trips and weekend visits (not Asheville – no idea what’s happening there).
Yes. The county is sending a surprise inspectors once a week to the private religious schools this mandate was actually aimed at. Because we all know those 6 year olds learning to read snd about Jesus are a threat to humanity (eye toll). And the reason this is so broad was absolutely because they were targeting little kids at religious schools, and they could only enforce targeting them by targeting everyone.
Speaking of enforcement. Go into any major national chain grocery store and you will find the mask mandate is not being enforced on their customers in violation of the ordinance.
Legally, can the GC BOH pick and choose which part of their mandate they enforce? If it isn’t enforced consistently and fairly, is it enforceable at all? What is the standard here?
The answer: no it is not enforceable and there is no standard.
For the 2nd of the 4 weekends since Guilford County enacted this silly mask mandate my family is vacationing for the weekend in still free parts of the state. We enjoyed a wonderful dinner last night and graciously tipped our great waiter who smiled at the sight of young kids at a nicer place to eat. That $250 would have likely been appreciated in Guilford county, but the “county health board” does not care. They don’t care if there are 1,000 families like mine simply leaving the county spending money elsewhere to continue enjoying life, or 10,000. They only care about controlling those who don’t have the flexibility.
My only question – if even just 25% of us that can afford to leave continue to, short or long term, who will foot the bill for the predictable harm being caused to the future generation in guilford county? A generation that will be uneducated, radicalized, and socially incompetent compliments of our destroyed schools and moronic “county board of health.”
News flash – if we can afford to leave now whenever we want, realize many are planning to leave permanently long before the kids being destroyed get old enough, and desperate enough, to destroy Guilford County. Cashion and Alston won’t be around to suffer the consequences – of course they don’t care. Nor do the woke…….. they could simply stop imposing useless mandates, but then they wouldn’t get to feel extra important telling their neighbors what to do. Go woke go broke Guilford County.
Sounds good. We can get a lot for our house now. BUT, it’ll cost a lot to buy another one; or even to rent.
Traveling to Transylvania County to spend money there, cost-wise is a big loser. But that’s what we do now, we drive to any vacation we can take, no flying anywhere.
I’m pretty sure it’s a standard practice for politicians to forget about anyone other than themself or thier puppet master the very moment they’re certified as the winner of an election. Show me one that hasn’t & I’ll show you a damn good actor. Your letters and calls are just an inconvenience at that point. They’re too big to be bothered by the little people. Skip has to get tired of pulling all those strings and such on occasion.
Howard Coble was very responsive and available to all his constituents, even the ones who didn’t vote for him. We need several thousand more like him.
I knew Howard personally. And you are right.