Adapting As Needed
The COVID-19 roller coaster turn another turn yesterday, as Gov. Kim Reynolds ordered bars and similar businesses to close for about a month in order to flatten the curve in college and university towns where positive test results have spiked since young people returned to campus.
I don’t mean to be flip, but truly…what did we expect? The age group with low risk, with less life experience, with the commonality of wanting “college life” and not having seen each other for six months all come back to the non-real world of a college campus…and we really think it will be all masks, all the time?
This is not to suggest we shouldn’t have had a return to college; we absolutely should continue to push for in-person learning at all levels as much as possible. But we also should be ready to take quick action, as was taken yesterday, to address hot spots as they come up.
Rough to be a bar owner, without question. That’s not an easy business in good times. But at least there’s the hope of reopening in a month with students still on campus, as opposed to doing nothing now and having a long-term shutdown face us sooner than later.
And I continue to support the governor’s refusal to order a mask mandate. Those city-by-city mandates are clearly not legal. A state mandate is of questionable legality, but regardless, of near impossible enforceability. Better to appeal to folks’ better selves, and to let businesses and city buildings set their own rules, and focus attention on bigger things than the silly city vs. state mask power play that’s going on.
I too long for the quaint times in early March, when we all still went about our business. But if 2020 has taught us nothing else, it’s to adapt quickly.News/Talk 1540 KXEL · Iowa Politics — Fri. Aug. 28, 2020
