If you had told people in March of 2020 that the pandemic was going to last at least two years, they probably would have thought you were nuts.
However, one clear sign that that government officials are not willing to give up on pandemic restrictions is that the Guilford County Board of Commissioners has gone back to virtual meetings after opening up their meetings to in-person guests in the second half of last year.
On Tuesday, Jan. 11, the Board of Commissioners announced that, in order to “ensure the safety of our community and staff in light of the surge in COVID-19 Positivity Rates in Guilford County,” the next regular meeting of the board – which will be on Thursday, Jan. 20 at 5:30 p.m. – will be virtual.
Some commissioners will be in attendance in the commissioners’ meeting room on the second floor of the Old Guilford County Court House in downtown Greensboro, and a limited number of people will be allowed to speak in person at the meeting. This is what the Greensboro City Council calls a “hybrid” meeting, but Guilford County calls it a virtual meeting.
At the Jan. 20 meeting there will be limited in-person participation for those taking part in two public hearings.
There may also be virtual participants in those hearings.
Registration of virtual public hearings participants will be on a first-come, first-served basis for a maximum of five in-person or virtual proponents and five in-person or virtual opponents.
Those virtual speakers, as well as those who register as virtual “Speakers from the Floor” on any topic, should join the Zoom platform at least 30 minutes before the start of the meeting. Registration for virtual “Speakers from the Floor” will be on a first-come, first-served basis for a maximum of 10 speakers. Each speaker always gets three minutes to share their two cents with the board.
Those who wish to participate in the meeting can contact Deputy Clerk to Board Jessica Wolf at jwolf@guilfordcountync.gov no later than 1 p.m. on Wednesday, January 19.
The rest of the county’s agenda that night won’t be made public until later in the week.
As usual, those wishing to just watch the meeting have a range of options. They can, for instance, use Zoom on computer, tablet or smartphone by going to https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81807438889?pwd=MDFicGkxUDN5UmFHTmwzUEJVZ0lNQT09 and following the instructions.
They can also view the live stream from the county’s “Meetings & Minutes” webpage at https://guilford.legistar.com/Calendar.aspx. There’s will be a video link for the Jan. 20 meeting.
Those who wish to watch the old-fashioned way, on TV, can do so by watching the live broadcast on Greensboro Television Network (GTN) – which is channel 13 on Spectrum, channel 31 on NorthState and channel 99 on AT&T U-verse.
“ensure the safety of our community and staff”
Translation: “We’re afraid of the public, and don’t want to take a chance on seeing how angry they are at us.”
Anything to hide from John & Jane Taxpayer and limit their input. Skip has become rather predictable. He & others have awakened a sleeping giant that will rear its head on election day. These clowns must go!
So sad everyone’s elected officials are choosing to continue to disenfranchise those folks without high speed Internet or the ability to use apps and websites. Elites have no time for the least among us. “Open meetings” I guess is at the whim of Skip and his cabal. So sad folks will let their ability to redress elected boards be usurped by seat of the pants every changing parameters.
Free to watch as long as you have a cable subscription only. What an affront to open democratic principles.
It certainly would be easier to have the County Board place paper bags over their heads. That would offer them the anonymity they want, the bags could be said they’re masks, and everyone would understand their true worth. In fact, when they tour schools and ask us for almost $2,000,000,000 perhaps they could do the same.
Not being accessible and accountable to taxpayers is just the tip of this Titanic sized iceberg.
At the risk of writing comments that are antithetical to the usual cabal frequenting this page, I remind everyone that there have been dire warnings about this pandemic since the outset in Asia and Europe. The NIH and other respected healthcare institutions published many articles and urged everyone to take this pandemic seriously. I have been on a soapbox cautioning my family, friends and colleagues since March 2020 they can expect the SARSCoV2 pandemic to be in this hemisphere at least into 2023. Vaccination, masking (not bandanning, or scarfing) and avoiding crowds remain the mainstays of getting out of our predicament. If 25-30% of our entire population refuses to be vaccinated, continuing into 2024 isn’t unlikely and another variant will have an opportunity to appear. Misinformation and the ignorant attitudes like that of Rodgers and Djokovic guarantee continuing threats to our hospital systems and more defections by burned out physicians and nurses.
‘Misinformation’? Would you be referring to the well-documented ‘misinformation’ of inflated Covid infection/death numbers? Perhaps you’re familiar with The Atlantic? Labeling it as ‘right leaning’ would be a tough case to make, yet this article debunks any claim of honesty in reporting Covid ‘information’. The Atlantic is not alone–others have reported the same.
‘Ignorant attitudes’? Methinks thee should look in a mirror….
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2021/09/covid-hospitalization-numbers-can-be-misleading/620062/
The photograph shows his lord and master with partitions on each side but open to the front. Skipply also is not wearing a mask. When was this photo taken? Was it during the time that there was a mask mandate? If the idiots at the front would wear the proper mask, and keep those in the audience a minimum distance of six feet, plus having a screen in front of the commissioners, why can the meetings not proceed as usual? Who are we trying to protect? After all, the omicron variant is just a “cold”. Get on with life!
I see the Skip-ah-dee-doo-dah is not wearing a mask in this photo. If he believes this mask B.S., mandate or not, why is he not masking up in this photo?
You can’t ‘splain that away.
Yep, Wayne is right. They don’t want to face the public and hear what we will say. As long as restaurants are wide open and fans are going to ballgames don’t start telling me about protecting the public, or anyone else about the virus. This is just our County Leaders playing their power card!