In a fast-moving, and somewhat confusing, week on the COVID-19 front, Milam County cumulative cases went up almost 50 percent and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott made mask-wearing mandatory in public under most circumstances.
As of Reporter presstime Wednesday morning, the county had recorded 133 total cases of the potentially deadly virus with 40 of them active.
That’s an increase of 48 percent in cumulative cases and 74 percent in active cases during the past week.
At presstime last Wednesday there were 90 cumulative cases, 21 of them active.
County Judge Steve Young said two persons are hospitalized and one is on a ventilator. “On Tuesday two persons came out of hospitals and two went in,” he said.
One of the new cases involves a five-year-old. Statistics released two weeks ago didn’t include any positive tests in the 0-9 age group.
Nine of the new cases came from Milam County nursing homes. The Reporter has learned only one of those nine cases was recorded in Rockdale.
The new totals don’t yet include any results from the 400 public tests last week.
How quickly has the new surge affected Milam County? As recently as three weeks ago there were 38 cumulative cases in the county. As of Wednesday morning there are two more active cases than that.
MASKS—There was lots of action on the mask front during the past week.
Young had ordered Milam County residents to mask up, essentially while shopping, on June 30. That placed the burden of enforcement on businesses who could have been liable for fines of up to $1,000 for allowing unmasked customers.
But Gov. Greg Abbott on Friday ordered a statewide “mask in public” order which shifted the responsibility to individual Texans and superseded county orders, including Milam’s.
Texans 10-and-older not wearing masks “in a commercial space or public building, or within an outdoor setting not allowing for six feet of physical distancing” were said to be liable for a $250 penalty.
However, a number of law enforcement personnel throughout the state, while supporting the concept of mask-wearing, have said they will not enforce the governor’s order.
They include Milam County Sheriff Chris White and Rockdale Police Chief Jerry Meadors.
White said, after consulting with the Texas Association of Counties for legal advice on how to enforce the governor’s order “without opening the county up to civil penalties or lawsuits that might start from possible civil rights violations,” he has decided his department will not enforce the order.
White pointed out the order itself states: “But no law enforcement, or other state officials, may detain, arrest or confine in jail any person for a violation of this executive order.”
He also told The Reporter there was “no chance” the Milam County Sheriff’s Department would issue any citations invoking the $250 penalty.
“The only action my office will take is to educate and suggest the use of masks.”
CITY—Rockdale Police Chief Jerry Meadors told The Reporter he is in “complete agreement” with Sheriff White.
“I’ve talked it over with the city manager and we’re in agreement the (governor’s) order is just contradictory,” Meadors said. “It specifies a penalty, but then it says law enforcement can’t detain anybody.”
“If we stop somebody because they’re not wearing a mask, we are detaining them,” Meadors said. “Even if we were going to write them a citation, we are detaining them while they are waiting for us to write it.”
Meadors said he shares White’s concern about opening up a governing body to litigation.
That doesn’t mean police won’t respond to a business owner plea to remove someone from a premises due to their refusal to wear a mask.
“That can be handled under already existing statutes,” Meadors said. “If the owner tells them to leave and they don’t, that can be grounds for trespassing.”
RESULTS—Young told The Reporter the nine nursing home positives were not from the recent state testing at two Cameron and one Rockdale nursing homes, but from previous tests done by the nursing homes.
Young said results from the 400 public tests in three Milam towns last week may be in as soon as this weekend. Those results have a potential to spike the numbers even further.
There were 103 tested in Rockdale, 107 in Milano and 190 in Cameron.
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