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Posted on 05/11/2020 6:55:13 PM PDT by lightman
Gov. Tom Wolf pushed back forcefully - and with some apparent success - Monday on a brushfire of opposition in central and eastern Pennsylvania counties to his ongoing coronavirus pandemic lockdown.
In uncharacteristically blunt language, Wolf accused local elected officials proposing to break out of the state’s phased reopening plan of “caving in” to the virus, and starkly warned any business owners temped to open ahead of his schedule that by doing so they are playing with liability issues and their customers and employees’ lives.
“We Pennsylvanians are in a fight for our lives. The enemy is a deadly virus, set on destroying us," Wolf said, adopting a war-like footing as he opened a mid-day briefing with an appeal to all Pennsylvanians to stay on a course that he said has been marked by real progress including 37 counties now starting or scheduled to start to reopen, and a hospital system that was never overwhelmed by COVID-19 cases.
“Over this past weekend, some have decided to surrender to this enemy,” Wolf said, adding “these folks are choosing to desert in the face of the enemy, in the middle of a war that we Pennsylvanians are winning and that we must win.”
The governor - with the momentum of federal and state court decisions in support of his emergency declarations at his back - also wielded the dual hammers of threatening to withhold federal pandemic funding from counties to stepped out of line, and threatening businesses that opened prematurely with licensing or other health department sanctions.
The response was not unanimous.
But PennLive’s sampling of county officials that had been openly threatening to unilaterally move themselves into the state’s initial “yellow” stage for reopening found several stepping back from the brink Monday afternoon, and others saying that they are re-evaluating and will make final decisions later in the week.
Several commissioners said, after looking at it more carefully, the risk of defiance simply seemed to outweigh the rewards.
Many of those represented counties, like York County, that now meet new case incidence thresholds for consideration to a move to yellow, where with a real chance to get there in agreement with Wolf, this doesn’t seem right the right time to fight over it.
In a Facebook Live meeting with constituents Monday, York Commissioners Chair Julie Wheeler commended residents on making considerable progress against COVID-19 cases in the past four weeks and declared York “ready to make the shift to the yellow phase.” But when asked by residents to clarify whether the county was moving into yellow or not, Wheeler said the board is just lobbying, not acting.
Others, after consultation with their solicitors, have concluded they don’t have the legal standing to do it.
“This move, we are advised, has no legal basis, and would not stand up, and could actually endanger the business licenses of those who defy the state of emergency declaration,” said Cumberland County Commissioner Gary Eichelberger, who said his board agreed - even before the governor’s tirade on Monday - to continue making their best case to Wolf while in compliance with the state regs.
Perry County commissioners discussed the possibility at a meeting Monday morning and decided to stick with Gov. Wolf’s phased-in plan, at least for now.
In Pennsylvania’s scheme, yellow is not a return to pre-pandemic normalcy, by a long shot.
Its conditions continue to require the closure of bars and restaurants, except for take-out orders; all entertainment venues like movie theaters, casinos and motor racetracks; and all public gatherings are to be limited to 25 or fewer. Personal services businesses like barbershops, tattoo parlors and nail salons area also to be closed, and organized sports are banned.
But it would allow many more retailers, manufacturing companies and commercial offices to re-open, and it is a prerequisite to a full reopening.
Some of the strongest resistance to the state’s plan, of course, is coming from counties that have had bigger coronavirus case counts, and may face longer waits to reopen, like Lebanon, Dauphin and Lancaster.
Josh Parsons, chairman of the Lancaster County board, said Monday he is still inclined to go forward with a county declaration of reopening for Lancaster, with or without Wolf’s approval, by Friday.
“Although he started out in the crisis with great reserves of good will," Parsons said of Wolf, “he’s squandered it all and I am now overwhelmed with calls and e-mails and other kind of contact from people demanding that we reopen, and understandably so. He’s provided them no hope. He’s provided in Lancaster County no course to get out of this.”
Lancaster is in a better position than most to act unilaterally - if it in fact does - because it is large enough population-wise that it received its federal pandemic relief directly from the Washington. Other counties will be more reliant on the administration as a pass-through for the funding, and “the reward for desertion cannot be that you’re just like everybody else and get the discretionary funding," Wolf said. "Discretionary funding will go to those places that are doing everything they ought to do to keep their citizens safe.”
That reality mattered to many.
“We know where are the (COVID-19) problems are, and where our problems are the state didn’t fix, but we’re not going to do a resolution,” said a perturbed Alice Gray, chairman of the Juniata County commissioners. “I mean, we’re very tiny, and for us to jeopardize the (business) licenses and the insurance for folks... that’s all I can say.”
In Lebanon County, where this mini-revolution started last week, Commission Chairman Robert Phillips said he’s re-evaluating in the wake of Wolf’s threats from Monday.
"We have hardships we’re trying to remedy and with the number of cases in our county, we thought this (unilateral county action) was justified,” Phillips continued, noting store owners are having trouble paying mortgages, and residents can’t finalize wills, settle estates or conduct real-estate transactions without some access to county row offices, which are currently closed.
Phillips said his county can’t move to “green” status until it gets to yellow and that commissioners wanted to make that move to yellow to give residents some hope.
“Saving face or saving the funding, that’s where we are,” Phillips conceded in an interview with PennLive “In the big picture, we may be right but if that’s the cost, we need to weigh whether that’s worth the price.”
Both the Lebanon and Dauphin boards are scheduled to meet Wednesday.
Commissioners in another central Pennsylvania county promoting revolt, Schuylkill, did not return calls for comment.
Many county prosecutors have said they would likely not prosecute citations issued under the business closure orders because of what they considered the constant changes in the rules out of Harrisburg.
But as Wolf noted Monday, enforcement has been left more to information and moral suasion than fines thus far. If necessary, however, he noted the state can also use its business licensing and other regulatory hammers.
Liquor licenses, building occupancy permits and the like all “depend upon you doing everything you can to keep your patrons safe,” Wolf said, addressing business owners directly, “and by opening before the evidence suggests you should you’re taking undue risks with the safety of your customers. That’s not only morally wrong. It’s also really bad business.”
County commissioners, as a whole, are still likely to get some support in the form of a proposed bill scheduled for a vote in the state Senate Wednesday that would specifically write into law their authority to make decisions about reopening their economies and public life on a county-by-county basis.
“They (the Wolf Administration) called it a balancing act, and there’s been no balance," Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman, R-Centre County, said after Monday’s session. "The governor has not looked at any of the (economic or emotional) carnage that’s been created by this shutdown... At some point you have to weigh in the other side that’s being created by the cure, and I don’t think the governor’s done that adequately, and that’s what we’re hearing from the local communities.”
With the battle lines so clearly drawn by Wolf Monday, it seemed hard to see a scenario where Wolf would sign that into law. Corman, R-Centre County, said it’s a question he feels Wolf should have to answer because people all across the state need economic help.
But on the whole, this seemed to be a day where the governor seemed to preserve some of his authority in largely uncharted territory.
Even where the county commissioners are still threatening action, mayors in their largest cities, like Lancaster and Harrisburg, have said they wouldn’t recognize such a county declaration.
“The city is still red until the governor declares it otherwise," said Lancaster Mayor Danene Sorace. “And we are doing everything we can to move out of that category as quickly and safely as possible and, definitely, please before June 4. But we will need the county’s cooperation to help us do that.”
As Cumberland’s Eichelberger put it Monday, he and his colleagues will certainly continue to make their best case for launching the reopening as soon as it can be safely done. But, “there is a huge difference between “taking action,” and taking effective action. We need to be smart, as well as persistent.”
Pennsylvania Ping!
Please ping me with articles of interest.
FReepmail me to be added to the list.
pennlive.
SIlive
njlive
all of these outlets seem to lean left. hell they practically fall left
i wonder why
‘County officials seem to be losing their ‘nads like the Secretary of Health.’
I knew they would; now this asshole will keep us in lockdown for the summer...
NOOO!!!!
Don’t cave now.
Fight him and let him expose himself fully as tyrant he is. Let him really go ballistic when people don’t listen to him.
Bastard leftist doesn’t leave a responce section.
...because the goalpost has always been November 3.
This is NOT about YOUR health...never has been, never will be.
Most businesses are not required to have a business license in PA. Now there is a reason why no business should.
Eichelberger is weak kneed. He doesn't have the guts to do the right thing. That barber in Enola did, and he is required to have a business license. People just need to say screw it, act like normal and go on with their lives.
It’s time to turn on the RINO country commissioners.
GOD forgiveme, this guy needs an ass king swarmy bastard.
If you’re talking about Penn live, the company that owns them owns numerous other news websites as I recall. I believe someone else posted a list of some of the other ones they own. A while back they announced they will no longer allow commenting a news article was posted, and instead post selected articles to the various Facebook pages and permit commenting they are only. They were getting way too many people calling them out on the terrible reporting on their very own articles, so they shut off comments.
“I knew they would; now this asshole will keep us in lockdown for the summer...”
Two questions:
(1) How many are there of “them”?
(2) How many are there of “the people”?
I told a buddy in Lancaster county that there’s a ship full of tea and a bunch of guys dressed like Indians in their future.
And PennLive is covering up the fact that Wolf called those that open up their businesses are “COWARDS”. He actually used that word to describe citizens of his state!!!!!
Watch Democrat governors in other states take the same hard line approach.
Yes. It’s no coincidence that this article left out the fact that he called business owners “COWARDS”. PennLive is another Democrat hack site.
I read an interesting comment yesterday about the states will buy these Kami democrat governor’s. As it now stands in Connecticut, I May 20 all “nonessential“ retail Mary open with numerous precautions in place and restaurants may open outdoor seating only at a certain percentage of capacity. Their site was that even if the stores reopen They will not go out in patronize them with these numerous restrictions in place as a form of protest to show the governor that we will not except this Game playing about “new normal”
I haven’t given much thought to it but it is a very interesting idea let them give people a little bit of freedom and see people refuse to give them their money in the form of taxes.
The FEARpers aren’t going out until their is a vaccine and they feel 100% “safe”.
They can go hibernate themselves but don’t expect the rest of us to subsidize such miserable existence much longer.
I won’t dignify cowardly existence by calling it “life”.
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