Editorial: Put teeth in mask mandate, Governor

The Island Now

With the coronavirus raging in New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo issued an executive order on April 17 requiring people to cover their faces in public when not practicing social distancing.

But there was a problem with the executive order. It conflicted with state penal law, which characterized “unusual or unnatural facial alteration” as loitering subject to 15 days in jail.

The law was introduced in 1845 because farmers were dressing up as Native Americans and donning masks before attacking the police in response to fluctuations in wheat prices, Slate reported.

The 145-year-old law was quickly repealed, but Cuomo’s executive order had another problem: There was no penalty for violating the executive order – a problem that continues to this day.

“Nobody will be taken to jail for violating the mask order,” Cuomo said in April. “And as of now, there are no fines or civil penalties either, meaning law enforcement can’t do much other than remind offenders they must cover their face.”

Cuomo, the CDC and virtually every health official in America say that wearing a mask is essential to stopping the spread of the coronavirus and saving lives.

“Wearing a mask is a matter of respect,” the governor said in a tweet last week announcing an effort to educate people about wearing masks. “We launched a campaign to encourage every American to wear a mask. Stop the Spread. Save Lives.”

Getting celebrities to encourage people to wear masks, as the governor is now doing, is nice.

But if wearing a mask saves lives, why no penalty for not wearing them in public?

We don’t encourage people not to rob banks. We pass laws with heavy penalties for the act.

And is robbing a bank worse than spreading a virus during a deadly pandemic? With 3.7 million people in the United States infected and 140,000 dead, how does that make sense?

Heck, if you jaywalk in New York the cheapest ticket is $197 and if you park illegally the least expensive ticket is $65.

As for “encouragement” by law enforcement?

East Hills Mayor Michael Koblenz said that when village security staffers asked residents on the street to put on masks, “they’d get abused.”

“They’d do more than say no,” Koblenz added. This is a polite way of saying village security staffers were routinely told to perform an anatomically impossible act.

Koblenz said that after such abuse he told the staff to stop asking.

“My view is that people don’t take it seriously,” Koblenz said. “We don’t have any real enforcement power from the governor because the streets are the streets. I can’t protect people from themselves.”

Incredibly, the East Hills experience is not unique – even in Nassau County where more than 42,000 people have been infected and nearly 2,200 have died. Stories of people refusing to wear a mask are, in fact, common.

These are people who watched others burn their hands on a hot stovetop and are now reaching for the stovetop themselves.

Now let us stipulate a few points.

People in Nassau County are doing a better job of wearing masks than those in many other places in the country. And Nassau County’s rate of infection is now among the lowest in the country, at least in part, as a result.

Cuomo may have waited a week too long before closing the state in March and his handling of people in senior facilities deserves further scrutiny. 

But he has led an otherwise forceful, competent, science-based response to the coronavirus that has gained him a following across the country.

This is to say that there is a galactic difference between Cuomo and President Donald Trump, whose catastrophic failure in response to the coronavirus has cost tens of thousands of lives and cratered the economy.

This has included Trump’s refusal to wear a mask, other than during one recent visit to Walter Reed Hospital, and until Tuesday downplaying its benefits.

In doing so, Trump has turned wearing a mask into part of the culture wars — a tactic he apparently sees as his only path to victory in the upcoming election.

The result is people who see not wearing a mask as a sign of their personal freedom and support for the president.

One wonders whether to mention speed limits and drunk driving laws to these people for fear they will see them as further incursions on their liberty. 

The result of this behavior can be seen in coronavirus’ explosive growth in the South and Southwest.

Last week, 75,000 new cases were reported nationwide in a single day — the highest level seen since the pandemic began six months ago. At a time when European countries that initially had similar outbreaks to the United State are down to a few hundred cases a day.

Unsurprisingly, the rise in coronavirus infections is led in states with Republican governors in lockstep with the president.

There are also those who find wearing a mask can be uncomfortable. That may be true. But as doctors have noted it’s less uncomfortable than having the virus and far less uncomfortable than having a tube stuck down your neck.

Would any of these people want to be operated on if the doctors and nurses were not wearing a mask?

Cuomo did issue an executive order in late May allowing New York businesses to refuse entrance to anyone who doesn’t wear a face mask.

“You don’t want to wear a mask — fine,” he said at a news conference. “But you don’t have a right to then go into a store if that store owner doesn’t want you to.”

This is probably not so fine with store owners who now have to police people who don’t comply with their policy. We have all seen videos of people throwing tantrums and worse after being told they are not complying with the store’s policy.

To their credit, an increasing number of businesses across the country are barring people who don’t wear masks. In New York, they should have the force of law behind them.

Cuomo on Monday called out partiers gathering in large crowds to not be “STUPID” and told bars and restaurants that are not abiding by the rules that he may force them all to shut if the state has to “roll back” its reopening.

He also chided local governments and police departments for not strictly enforcing mask-wearing and social distancing.

But Cuomo said nothing of giving local governments and police departments the authority to do so.

We understand that Cuomo would probably be compared unfavorably by some to Josef Stalin and Adolph Hitler if he pushed for legal penalties for people violating the mask order. But that goes with the turf. And we are talking about people’s lives and livelihoods.

There is no comparison between Cuomo and many other governors in responding to the coronavirus.

But, Governor, you can and should do better. Put some teeth into the mask mandate. 

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