Jefferson County will be alone in its own private State of Emergency if commissioners approve its 13th temporary Covid-19 response policy emergency declaration at their October 24 board meeting. Meanwhile, Washington State and all its other counties (including neighbor Clallam) will have discarded their emergency declarations as of October 31.
County residents have been under the grip of multiple overlapping federal, state, county, and city emergency rules since both Jeffco and Port Townsend declared a State of Emergency on March 16, 2020, joining the February 29 state and March 13 federal declarations.
These unprecedented emergency lockdowns were originally sold by former Jeffco Health Officer Tom Locke and others as short-term measures to “flatten the curve” so it “does not overwhelm medical services,” which White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Deborah Birx recently admitted was an evidence-free deception to “make these palatable” while “I was trying to figure out how to extend it” since “I didn’t have the numbers in front of me yet to make the case for extending it longer, but I had two weeks to get them.”
A careful peer-reviewed cost/benefit analysis found the emergency “lockdowns have had, at best, a marginal effect on the number of Covid-19 deaths. … The costs were at least thirty-five times higher than the benefits. The reasonable conservative case is that the cost/benefit ratio is around 141 … Lockdowns are not just an inefficient policy, they must rank as one of the greatest peacetime policy disasters of all time.”
So the goal posts for lockdowns and emergency declarations kept moving as each old justification became discredited, eventually landing on little more than public health case-detection funding imperatives, perpetuation of Emergency Use Authorizations for the mRNA spike protein injections, and convenient ramping up for any future actual emergencies.
Public Comment About Extending Jeffco’s Emergency
That brings us to the County Commissioners’ October 17 meeting, whose agenda centered on discussion and potential action “In the Matter of Adopting a 13th Temporary County Policy Based on Emergency Response to the Covid-19 Pandemic”, about which I expressed the following Public Comment:
I saw that Jefferson County may be keeping its emergency orders even after the other counties and the state lifts them on October 31, and personally I would really urge you not to do that. For one thing, that would be putting you out there special doing this unlike the other diligence from the other counties.
I understand that according to our health officer, “Jefferson doesn’t have the level of population immunity that others do, because it did such a good job controlling the virus before.” And there may be cases now and there may be cases in the future, but I’m not quite sure that constitutes an emergency.
If things happen during the winter, then maybe at that point one could consider calling it an emergency. Part of it is, I really would like us to normalize.
Forgive me for putting it this way, but for your electoral prospects, a lot of information has been coming out that makes the wisdom of these lockdowns look suspicious. To the extent you’re standing out there as the only county doing this thing, that allows you to be saddled with this label of being the “Lockdown Commissioners” or having done it above and beyond what other counties have done. Whereas if you’re just following the same actions as everybody else, at least you’re acting in a more safe way about all of this.
Another thing… a lot of stuff has been coming out in the news, like the European Parliament hearing Pfizer say they hadn’t done any testing on transmission for their vaccine, which was obviously part of the original narrative about it.
You’ve got countries around the world — Denmark, Norway, Australia — abandoning a lot of these recommendations for kids to have this vaccine, so things are changing and the narrative is shifting insofar as what the appropriate guidance should be.
So you could almost say that this is becoming the emerging guidance.
Commissioner Responses to Emergency Comment
Commissioner Kate Dean responded:
One of things I’m most pleased about as we move into this endemic phase, we can start to heal some of the things that have cursed our country and communities. I think we knew all along this was a grand experiment; none of us had ever been through anything like this, and we’re all doing our best. I think it will be years before we understand what was effective and what was the right choice.I feel some hope that the things which have divided us for the last few years, that we can at least all say: we tried, we’re doing our best, we did well in this community. I don’t have regrets, but I’ll say we learned every step of the way.
Our conversation last week will be continued this afternoon regarding the emergency order. I have some concern about continuing it, mostly because I feel there’s a bit of a “crying wolf” situation: If we continue it, we perpetuate the sense of emergency, and then, where there actually is an emergency, it’s harder to rally folks to respond as such.
But I trust very much that the staff who are dealing with the administrative end of this think there’s a lot of benefit in keeping it in place to revisit in a few more months, in part because it’s hard to get stuff going again, so if we were to rescind it, then getting it back in place if we have a surge just takes capacity, when Public Health and the Department of Emergency Management have less capacity.
So I’m going along with staff’s recommendation. We’ll have more discussion about it today, but I anticipate we’ll go ahead with keeping it in place.
But I share your concern; I worry it’s a little disingenuous myself. But it’s a tool for administrative purposes, and we’re not doing any sort of lockdown. Obviously we’re all here today, and we’re glad to have the public back!
Commissioner Greg Brotherton responded:
I’m on the screen here today because covid is still with us. I’m on day 6 of my second positive test. While it was a very mild case, we still as a county have to deal with the reality that there is a lot of transmission, I assume over 400 per 100,000 in our community.
And some of the levers that emergency order for us are really critical to come up with extra pay for staff so we can maintain services, and also take care of them so they can stay home when they’re sick.
I’m also feel like it it’s a little bit disingenuous, and we’ll have a robust conversation I’m sure at 1:30, but I’m also like Commissioner Dean inclined to take the staff recommendation and just keep it on a little while longer, not as a lockdown, but to make sure we still have those levers available as we continue to deal with it, as I can attest with firsthand experience.
Commissioner Heidi Eisenhour responded:
I’m still evading covid, full stop, thankfully! … I was saying last week, we put all this stuff in place, so what happens if we rip the Band-Aid off now, with the potential cases happening in Europe, that Dr. Berry has been talking about, and how we’ve tended to follow the trend with our cases going up after cases in Europe in the past.
Personally, I know more people with covid right now than I ever have. And so, I don’t feel it’s time to stop having the precautions in place that we do, especially how the things we put in place affect the team here in the county for human resources issues. So It’s something we are going to have more of a conversation about this afternoon.
Health Officer on Emergency and Everyday Powers
Following Health Officer Allison Berry’s community update, Commissioner Brotherton asked her:
Where does the requirement to wear masks in health situations come from, could you remind me?
Berry answered:
It’s currently a mandate from the state. So there is an order from the Secretary of Health, and the Secretary of Health’s orders extend past the declaration of emergency.
That’s probably worth digging into a little bit. So health officers and secretaries of health always have the ability and authority and obligation to control infectious diseases regardless of states of emergency. Governors only have that authority when a declaration of emergency is in place.
So after October 31, the Governor doesn’t have the ability to issue orders around the pandemic, but health officers still do. We always have had that authority, we will continue to do so. Secretaries of health do too.
Many folks didn’t know we existed before the pandemic, but we have always been here! So if there was, for instance, a measles outbreak, we would issue health orders around that.
And so, as long as we’re still seeing high rates of covid transmission, we’re likely to see health orders related to that, but they’re more targeted now than they used to be, because we’re in a different phase of the pandemic.
And that one most critical space is health care. We need people to be able to see their doctors, and not get covid from that interaction. And so that’s where we are still requiring masking. Longterm care facilities also fall under that space, because people can’t choose whether or not they need to live there. And it’s really important to protect them in that space.
Brotherton followed up about the emergency resolution:
We’re going to be considering our 13th emergency resolution about covid this afternoon, and I’m wondering if you had a chance to look at it, whether you weigh in favor of keeping our emergency resolution or adding a 13th?
We’ve talked a little and had public comment today about it being disingenuous to call it an emergency as we move into an endemic phase. And it does seem a little strange, at the same time, there’s still a lot of important levers that it opens up to us to use. As I can attest, covid is still very high in our community.
Berry answered:
Yeah, it’s certainly a challenge to figure out how to move in a seamless way into this endemic phase and not lose all the gains that we’ve made as a community. And I think that’s where these kinds of emergency declarations come in.
The biggest thing that the local emergency declaration makes available is the ability to rapidly fund certain situations or make certain control efforts available.
But again, the emergency declaration doesn’t actually have a lot of bearing over whether or not, for instance, I can issue a health order.
And I think that’s where sometimes people end up having strong feelings about the emergency declaration is that thought that we would no longer have public health authority. And it actually has no bearing on that.
What it does is allow us to fund covid test, or potentially move forward something like the Department of Emergency Management responding to a covid outbreak. So it allows us a little more flexibility in responding to things.
I think it was appropriate, for instance, the federal goverment did just announce that they extended their emergency declaration so that we can continue to use some of the tools we need to fight covid through the fall.
It’s a complex decision whether or not to maintain it. But I think it’s useful to have those tools available and only use them when we need them, but it’s good to have that option.
Public Comment After Emergency Wordsmithing
Commissioners returned in the afternoon to wordsmith their potential 13th emergency declaration together with public health staff. That draft would then be taken to the closed County Covid Coordination meeting on October 21 for further work. Afterwards I gave another Public Comment:
I really appreciate you all wanting to honor staff, and if you stop these orders now, you’d have to ramp up and all — I grok that.
But what are the pluses and minuses here? I heard from the health officer that the big advantage was that the emergency declaration would allow getting funds, for example, to pay for additional covid testing and management.
I feel like a lot of this is sort of redundant stuff that is already being covered elsewhere. So there’s funds for more testing?
Why exactly is Jefferson County in a special condition compared to other counties, if we’re the only county that’s going to be doing this? I also heard that it was because we have more cases.
We also had one death recently, which I think was somebody in her 80s with lots of comorbidities who had been vaccinated and boosted but not fully. That’s also a situation in which who’s to say she died from the covid or died from all these other conditions.
So the main thing is the cases. Is this really an emergency any more? I do feel we’re in the endemic stage and not the pandemic stage.
I do feel like it’s disingenuous, as I’ve heard from others to try to be applying emergency things for something that is really just a casedemic here.
It’s not lots of deaths. It’s not the hospitals being overburdened. It’s just lots of cases.
And part of the reasons for all these cases is all the testing. So in a sense, if you had more funds from having this emergency order, then you could have more testing which could possibly provide more cases and make things seem to be more like an emergency.
So I’m concerned that we’re in this walking-on-eggshells mode, where — oh my gosh! — we just had a case, now we’ve got to shut down the whole workplace or have everybody be masking, changing, doing things in different ways.
In a way, I personally feel like it would be better to step back, not have it so easy that we’re just continuing the state of emergency.
Why not just basically say, like every other county is doing, say: Okay, it’s really not an emergency any more.
It’s a matter of concern that we need to be watching; it’s not an emergency. If it is an emergency in the future, then we can at that point make a decision and ramp up.
And then that’d be due diligence rather than it being this eggshelly thing, where on the turn of a dime, we’ll be back in this mode and you’ll never be able to feel you can normalize.
One other thing I’ll toss out: Jefferson County is different in one other way: I saw that there’s 22.6% bivalent boostering, which is more than twice the 10.2% in all the other counties in this state.
Who’s to say, I mean we have a correlation here, not a causation necessarily, between the boostering and the additional cases in this town. We’ve also been told by our health officer we don’t have the same level of population immunity as everyone else. So who knows?
But let’s take a step back and wait and see.
Commmissioner Dean responded:
I also came at this from the pluses and minuses, and like you heard me say earlier, I was afraid of the “crying wolf” scenario.
But what I couldn’t get to are what the negatives were. There are some positives that are potential positives, like not having to go through this whole process again.
Should we decide that we are in a state of emergency in a couple of months as we see numbers rise potentially, or if there are funding opportunities that we want to be eligible for, or just need to be able to respond in a true emergency fashion — you see that it takes us a long time!
Our process is very deliberative and includes a lot of people. On Friday, our staff will be meeting again. And so that’s where I felt like the negatives just aren’t there.
I appreciate that we’ve softened the language and really tried to not overstate things in this version, so I’m still happy to move it ahead at staff’s recommendation.
Commmissioner Brotherton responded:
I think you may be getting hung up on the word “emergency” like I did as well. And I think this is really just about the preservation of the temporary standards that we have.
I’m supportive of taking this to staff and seeing if everyone agrees, if we can get a consensus from the county coordination meeting this Friday.
I don’t see (as Kate said) any negatives from this. It just allows us to keep paid covid leave, which is critical for some of our staff. I’m in favor of moving this forward to county coordination.
Commmissioner Eisenhour responded:
I know covid has hampered all the departments, and now we’re needing to reduce the hours that the transfer station’s open because of capacity issues. It’s not tied to this policy, but it’s tied to people being sick and our county family.
I think taking away tools for managers to provide our team with what they need when they need it – it doesn’t feel like the time for that right now.
But the line of questioning that I had at the beginning of this session, where I was trying to unpack whether there was another place where we could take care of these policy matters … what I heard was that there’s not. So that further shores up my support for us continuing this conversation.
On October 19, Ben Montalbano asked County Commisioner (District 3) candidate Marcia Kelbon this question:
If you were the County Commissioner now would you vote to extend the Emergency Authorization Act, now before the board? Many of us voters are not sure about you stand on community imposed mandates.
Candidate Kelbon’s response:
I do not see a need or defensible justification for a continued state of emergency. There are continued county employee protections that best be addressed by permanent employee policies.
To elaborate, I am surprised that this is even being considered at this point and that the three commissioners have expressed support for an extension.
I highlight county employee protections such as extended sick leave because that is the reason they most discussed, but they acknowledge that this could be addressed through their employee manual.
The other reason stated often is that it is a lot of work to put an emergency measure back in place if there is a surge. Work avoidance is not a reason to limit liberties.
The deputy prosecuting attorney also noted that the current emergency ruling avoids the need for competitive bidding for OlyCap – indefensible.
If there is a surge, people can choose to mask and/or boost if they choose. We need to be out of a police state and get on with life, with individuals and businesses making their own health decisions.
This quarantine law provides narrow emergency detention powers to health officers for up to 10 days over infected persons posing serious and imminent risk, but only after a long series of provisions and recourses have been exhausted — none of which in any way applied to or authorized Health Officer Berry’s open-ended discriminatory regulation over restaurant/bar business practices, requiring them to demand HIPAA-protected private health information from their patrons.
Our counties’ restaurant vaccine mandate was a pure example of illegal emergency power overreach and the dangers of governance not by laws but by lawless “emergency” orders. Anything goes in an emergency — which is not a good thing.
Emergency declarations risk replacing everything good about our government — laws, rights, and due process — with lawless orders by unaccountable executives and unelected health czars.
They are meant for genuine short-term physical emergencies like earthquakes, and if used to replace normal government indefinitely under the pretext of long-term conditions like flus and climate change, such perpetual emergency takeovers are indistinguishable from totalitarian coups.
———————————
“In the end it’s very simple:
Emergency powers are just another name for lawlessness. You can be a nation of rights and laws, or a nation of emergency. You cannot do both.”
– el gato malo
Stephen Schumacher
Stephen Schumacher graduated with honors in Mathematics from Harvard College and programmed funds transfer systems between Wall Street banks and the Federal Reserve before moving to Port Townsend in 1983. He has served as an officer for various community organizations such as the Food Co-op, Jefferson Land Trust, and the Northwest Nutritional Foods Association. He co-created The Port Townsend Leader’s original online newspaper and programs ship stability software used by naval architects.
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22 Comments
Tammy G.
on October 24, 2022 at 3:30 am
Thank you Stephen and very well said! It sounds like the commissioners like staying home in their Jammies and getting paid to do so! This absolutely needs to stop. This is a vicious circle and a dangerous one at that. Continue testing and skew the numbers and around the merry go round we go.
I fully agree that this Emergency Status in our county needs to stop.
In regards to the health officer’s order to require vaccination status in bars and restaurants; that not only violated HIPPA laws, but was discrimination! The recently appointed Premier, Danielle Smith, of Alberta Canada has apologized to her citizens that were discriminated against, jailed, and fired from the jobs for not being vaccinated. She also is trying to get people back to their jobs and she is going ban private businesses from discrimination as well in regards to vaccination status.
I am ready for our apologies from our leaders, are you?
We need to stop this crazy cycle and live our lives freely and make our own choices for our well being.
This is supposed to be a free country and our leaders are not behaving that way.
Our BOCCs are simply demonstrating their smug, blind devotion to our local institution of health. It was always there at all levels, but now that the Feds, and the State have backed off, their semblance has narrowed in on their very own minuscule circle of power, though in light of actual science (“we believe the science”) an unnecessary power it is.
I appreciate your diligence and your patience addressing this issue.
These people have engaged in such an epic fail of leadership, I simply want them all voted out of office and replaced. Vote in some actual human beings who care about others more than themselves!
I just laughed about how they are concerned they may be perceived as “crying wolf” and the general public won’t trust them in a real emergency. Oh, we are way past any hope of “trust.” If there is ever another emergency, the last thing I will ever do is look towards local political leadership for guidance. In fact, their policies are pretty much worse than any emergency we might face and the root cause of all our problems.
Who is best for making decisions about our individual health and security? The BOCC think they are the only arbitrators of what is best in trying to stop the spread of a virus throughout the entire community. Even with lock downs and mask mandates the virus did what it does, it spread, because the science predicted it would but science was long forgotten when the virus hit our community. NONE of the mandates where justified by peer reviewed studies just opinions by our public health officer. When has Dr. Berry ever published a list of studies that prove her opinions??? Quoting the CDC or NIH isn’t the same as peer reviewed studies, especially when both agencies are political as they are partially funded by big PHARMA.
It suits the commissioners to divide a heavy Democratic community into the “vaxxed and the unvaxxed”. They serve the fears of the majority left at the expense of the free thinking minority. Critical thinking means you look at all the information to make an informed decision. This means that each commissioner should be doing all the research before they make a decision that will effect every citizen. When you are doing and saying what some fearful folks want you to do and say then your decisions are political.
The emergency policy needs to end because it hasn’t worked then and it sure doesn’t work now. So the answer to my original question about who is best to make decisions about my health and safety might be best summed with Marcia Kelbon’s statement, “If there is a surge, people can choose to mask and/or boost if they choose. We need to be out of a police state and get on with life, with individuals and businesses making their own health decisions.”
Thank you Stephen, for your ongoing coverage of the County Commissioner meetings here in Port Townsend, a city that has become known as the center of neurosis for the entire Olympic Peninsula.
To say I am disappointed with our county commissioners’ willingness to extend their emergency powers is an understatement. What I think I am hearing is that they need to do this thing so they can keep government functioning because their underlings keep testing positive every time they feel a scratch in their throat. A positive test means paid time off, and one less person to keep the bureaucracy grinding along.
May I remind the commissioners that those of us in the private sector, who went without paychecks for months because of the initial emergency orders, have moved on from this topic years ago. We never had the luxury of paid time off. If we don’t work, we don’t get paid. From this perspective, it is hard to have anything but disregard for what we are witnessing in county government.
It is really too late, but I suggest that if the commissioners don’t want to be ridiculed as hand-wringing Henny Pennys, hopelessly out of touch with reality, they should immediately restore our liberties. A formal apology would also be welcomed.
I find people’s comments here refreshing. I complained about these stupid mandates to my spouse and the reply was, “The stupidity will continue until the voters wise up.”, So my initial thoughts were, “yeah, you voted these Imbeciles into office; deal with it.”. But, there may be 1000 smart people in PT, and you are stating the obvious here, but the 5000 leftists [moderator edit] override your votes, so my heart goes out to you.
The quickest way to deal with future mandates is MASSIVE REFUSAL. They can’t arrest everyone.
Who is actually dying from covid? Where are the stats and what is the overall health of those who have died? How many vaxxed as opposed to unvaxxed are getting covid? Could it be that due to the faulty PCR tests people are showing as having covid when they really just have a cold or flu, because where did the cold and flu go for the past 2+ years. What about the 99% recovery rate for people who are basically healthy? What’s the big emergency? Anyone else sick to death of fear porn and faulty “science”?
Also– How many police officers, firefighters, medics, ferry personnel, etc. etc. etc. are still not able to work bc of vaxx mandates??? Vaxx mandates btw for vaccinations which have proven to do basically nothing they were promised to do, but with a whole lot of side effects with NO RECOURSE for the sufferers. What about ALL THAT?!
One thing for sure… Jefferson County will prove to be the area to watch. If, as they say, was the most locked down and vaccinated. We can watch for all of the health affect driven data. Just see the quality of that info. Good luck to you all. We’ll see the healtyest survive and if they permit find out why???
I highly recommend reading “The Psychology Of Totalitarianism” by Mattias Desmet. It has helped me understand how our country and county have gotten to such a place. How people, not just governing officials, not only permit, but applaud this type of government overreach. I believe that a portion of people in this county support this massive local tyranny, and a larger portion are just willing to go along and not push back. Some are willing to push back. (Thank you PTFP editors and readers!)
For example, I went to the dentist a few weeks ago. I went to the receptionist to check in, and after I did she told me that there were masks in the lobby if I needed one. I asked if I was required to wear one, she said yes. As I was walking to pick one up, another patient in the lobby – an elderly woman who was doubly masked – launched into an unsolicited lecture to me, demanding if I knew how many “cases” there were in the county at that time. I declined to engage and chose to wait outside until my time. I believe that this elderly woman is representative of the a great deal of residents in this county, who are part of a “mass formation” and willing to to just about anything to maintain the perceived social bond they feel as part of the formation.
Elected officials are just part of the problem. A big part of the problem are our neighbors.
From flattening the curve in Jefferson County to Kate’s permanent Emergency-
“ I don’t see (as Kate said) any negatives from this. It just allows us to keep paid covid leave, which is critical for some of our staff. I’m in favor of moving this forward to county coordination.” Says Brotherton
Rather than Brotherton create a policy in regards to sick leave for county employees -Brotherton wants to keep Jefferson County under permanent emergency. Unfortunately private sector workers/ businesses enjoy no such luxuries. Unlike an open-ended tax$$$ purse that Brotherton and Kate have access to- the private sector in order to survive must budget.
Disagreeing with Kate and Brotherton’s continued emergency measures seems to be the CDC and an army of experts such as Greta M. Massetti, PhD1; Brendan R. Jackson, MD1; John T. Brooks, MD1; Cria G. Perrine, PhD1; Erica Reott, MPH1; Aron J. Hall, DVM1; Debra Lubar, PhD1; Ian T. Williams, PhD1; Matthew D. Ritchey, DPT1; Pragna Patel, MD1; Leandris C. Liburd, PhD1; Barbara M Mahon MD.
CDC’s Greta Massetti PHD1- said in a statement.
“We know that COVID 19 is here to stay,” she added in comments during a briefing with reporters.
It also brings the recommendations for unvaccinated people in line with people who are fully vaccinated – an acknowledgment of the high levels of population immunity in the U.S., due to vaccination, past COVID-19 infections or both. “Based on the latest … data, it’s around 95% of the population,” Massetti said, “And so it really makes the most sense to not differentiate,” since many people have protection against severe disease.
CDC Summary
High levels of immunity and availability of effective COVID-19 prevention and management tools have reduced the risk for medically significant illness and death.
To prevent medically significant COVID-19 illness and death, persons must understand their risk, take steps to protect themselves and others with vaccines, therapeutics, and nonpharmaceutical interventions when needed, receive testing and wear masks when exposed, receive testing if symptomatic, and isolate for ≥5 days if infected.
The elected county commissioners must get a grip, follow CDC experts, and tell Kate to stop the ‘Fear Porn’ and needless anxiety. The time is now to normalize life for the Jefferson county citizens.
In the face of illogicality, deceit, arrogance, corruption and criminality, I see no benefit in debate, mincing words, entreaty or worse, giving credence to the propaganda and mentality of the perpetrators and accomplices by speaking in their fabricated terminology. The officers and commissioners must be held accountable, removed from office and replaced by a system of probity and moral individuals. https://www.porttownsendfreepress.com/2022/10/23/wheres-the-emergencyonly-in-jefferson-county/
Even though I don’t agree with this extension of the emergency orders that have no standing, I just found out that our State Attorney General is just now not going to allow any media in his news conferences without showing their Vaxx card. Here we go again because we should all be aware what soon shall follow here in Jefferson County.
I believe that you are exactly correct in your assessment! I saw the way Mr Choe was treated. I found it to be very indignant to try to state that he wasn’t considered media.
The pandemic was nothing but a once-in-a-lifetime get rich scheme for politically connected people like Brotherton and Berry.
Vote these hucksters out!
Every single person who was fired because they would not be vaccinated or not wear a mask, needs to be immediately reinstated and given backpay.
It has been well proven and the CDC fully admits, that the vaccines did nothing we were told they did. Nor did the masking. Both the vaccines and the masks have been disproved as vectors of wellness for healthy people. There is no reason why people should be forced to show vaccination cards when it has been well proven that vaccinations neither prevent nor cure Covid infections.
We must dispense with elected and appointed officials who resort to tyranny by way of special identification cards. That is the way to madness and totalitarianism, gulag style. Unfortunately much of this county seems ready to begin the construction of the gulags for those of us who don’t just go along to get along.
Today, a New York State Supreme Court Judge overturned the vaccine mandate for New York City public sector workers, ordered the city to reinstate all fired employees and grant them backpay, citing the fact that being vaccinated against COVID-19 does not stop an individual from catching or spreading the virus, and thus being vaccinated does not grant enough community-wide benefit to warrant a mandate. The health commissioner “acted beyond his authority” by issuing an indefinite vaccine mandate rather than a temporary one, according to the court. Justice Ralph Pozio stated in his ruling, “This is clearly an arbitrary and capricious action because we are dealing with identical unvaccinated people being treated differently by the same administrative agency.”
I hope our JeffCo PUD workers and any Port Townsend City and Jefferson County employee who was terminated over similar arbitrary and capricious mandates feel empowered to sue.
Unfortunately, Governor Hochul reinstated the vaccine mandate once this ruling came out as well as recommendations for children to mask again because of RSV and the flu. As she said they can wear those “cute masks” that she has seen and it shouldn’t be a big deal because the children are already used to it. How much more do the children need to endure? I am not for the mandating of masking children. This should be a parental decision especially if your child is immunocompromised.
Thank you Stephen and very well said! It sounds like the commissioners like staying home in their Jammies and getting paid to do so! This absolutely needs to stop. This is a vicious circle and a dangerous one at that. Continue testing and skew the numbers and around the merry go round we go.
I fully agree that this Emergency Status in our county needs to stop.
In regards to the health officer’s order to require vaccination status in bars and restaurants; that not only violated HIPPA laws, but was discrimination! The recently appointed Premier, Danielle Smith, of Alberta Canada has apologized to her citizens that were discriminated against, jailed, and fired from the jobs for not being vaccinated. She also is trying to get people back to their jobs and she is going ban private businesses from discrimination as well in regards to vaccination status.
I am ready for our apologies from our leaders, are you?
We need to stop this crazy cycle and live our lives freely and make our own choices for our well being.
This is supposed to be a free country and our leaders are not behaving that way.
Our BOCCs are simply demonstrating their smug, blind devotion to our local institution of health. It was always there at all levels, but now that the Feds, and the State have backed off, their semblance has narrowed in on their very own minuscule circle of power, though in light of actual science (“we believe the science”) an unnecessary power it is.
Excellent. They seem to forget that we, the people, have brains and rights too.
I appreciate your diligence and your patience addressing this issue.
These people have engaged in such an epic fail of leadership, I simply want them all voted out of office and replaced. Vote in some actual human beings who care about others more than themselves!
I just laughed about how they are concerned they may be perceived as “crying wolf” and the general public won’t trust them in a real emergency. Oh, we are way past any hope of “trust.” If there is ever another emergency, the last thing I will ever do is look towards local political leadership for guidance. In fact, their policies are pretty much worse than any emergency we might face and the root cause of all our problems.
Who is best for making decisions about our individual health and security? The BOCC think they are the only arbitrators of what is best in trying to stop the spread of a virus throughout the entire community. Even with lock downs and mask mandates the virus did what it does, it spread, because the science predicted it would but science was long forgotten when the virus hit our community. NONE of the mandates where justified by peer reviewed studies just opinions by our public health officer. When has Dr. Berry ever published a list of studies that prove her opinions??? Quoting the CDC or NIH isn’t the same as peer reviewed studies, especially when both agencies are political as they are partially funded by big PHARMA.
It suits the commissioners to divide a heavy Democratic community into the “vaxxed and the unvaxxed”. They serve the fears of the majority left at the expense of the free thinking minority. Critical thinking means you look at all the information to make an informed decision. This means that each commissioner should be doing all the research before they make a decision that will effect every citizen. When you are doing and saying what some fearful folks want you to do and say then your decisions are political.
The emergency policy needs to end because it hasn’t worked then and it sure doesn’t work now. So the answer to my original question about who is best to make decisions about my health and safety might be best summed with Marcia Kelbon’s statement, “If there is a surge, people can choose to mask and/or boost if they choose. We need to be out of a police state and get on with life, with individuals and businesses making their own health decisions.”
Thank you Stephen, for your ongoing coverage of the County Commissioner meetings here in Port Townsend, a city that has become known as the center of neurosis for the entire Olympic Peninsula.
To say I am disappointed with our county commissioners’ willingness to extend their emergency powers is an understatement. What I think I am hearing is that they need to do this thing so they can keep government functioning because their underlings keep testing positive every time they feel a scratch in their throat. A positive test means paid time off, and one less person to keep the bureaucracy grinding along.
May I remind the commissioners that those of us in the private sector, who went without paychecks for months because of the initial emergency orders, have moved on from this topic years ago. We never had the luxury of paid time off. If we don’t work, we don’t get paid. From this perspective, it is hard to have anything but disregard for what we are witnessing in county government.
It is really too late, but I suggest that if the commissioners don’t want to be ridiculed as hand-wringing Henny Pennys, hopelessly out of touch with reality, they should immediately restore our liberties. A formal apology would also be welcomed.
I find people’s comments here refreshing. I complained about these stupid mandates to my spouse and the reply was, “The stupidity will continue until the voters wise up.”, So my initial thoughts were, “yeah, you voted these Imbeciles into office; deal with it.”. But, there may be 1000 smart people in PT, and you are stating the obvious here, but the 5000 leftists [moderator edit] override your votes, so my heart goes out to you.
The quickest way to deal with future mandates is MASSIVE REFUSAL. They can’t arrest everyone.
This topic will be taken up today at 1:30. Please weigh in, people. Put your words in action. Stephen and I were the only ones who spoke to this issue at this morning’s meeting.
https://media.avcaptureall.cloud/meeting/0b927862-972b-432b-8629-46ddeeb72873
Who is actually dying from covid? Where are the stats and what is the overall health of those who have died? How many vaxxed as opposed to unvaxxed are getting covid? Could it be that due to the faulty PCR tests people are showing as having covid when they really just have a cold or flu, because where did the cold and flu go for the past 2+ years. What about the 99% recovery rate for people who are basically healthy? What’s the big emergency? Anyone else sick to death of fear porn and faulty “science”?
Also– How many police officers, firefighters, medics, ferry personnel, etc. etc. etc. are still not able to work bc of vaxx mandates??? Vaxx mandates btw for vaccinations which have proven to do basically nothing they were promised to do, but with a whole lot of side effects with NO RECOURSE for the sufferers. What about ALL THAT?!
One thing for sure… Jefferson County will prove to be the area to watch. If, as they say, was the most locked down and vaccinated. We can watch for all of the health affect driven data. Just see the quality of that info. Good luck to you all. We’ll see the healtyest survive and if they permit find out why???
I highly recommend reading “The Psychology Of Totalitarianism” by Mattias Desmet. It has helped me understand how our country and county have gotten to such a place. How people, not just governing officials, not only permit, but applaud this type of government overreach. I believe that a portion of people in this county support this massive local tyranny, and a larger portion are just willing to go along and not push back. Some are willing to push back. (Thank you PTFP editors and readers!)
For example, I went to the dentist a few weeks ago. I went to the receptionist to check in, and after I did she told me that there were masks in the lobby if I needed one. I asked if I was required to wear one, she said yes. As I was walking to pick one up, another patient in the lobby – an elderly woman who was doubly masked – launched into an unsolicited lecture to me, demanding if I knew how many “cases” there were in the county at that time. I declined to engage and chose to wait outside until my time. I believe that this elderly woman is representative of the a great deal of residents in this county, who are part of a “mass formation” and willing to to just about anything to maintain the perceived social bond they feel as part of the formation.
Elected officials are just part of the problem. A big part of the problem are our neighbors.
From flattening the curve in Jefferson County to Kate’s permanent Emergency-
“ I don’t see (as Kate said) any negatives from this. It just allows us to keep paid covid leave, which is critical for some of our staff. I’m in favor of moving this forward to county coordination.” Says Brotherton
Rather than Brotherton create a policy in regards to sick leave for county employees -Brotherton wants to keep Jefferson County under permanent emergency. Unfortunately private sector workers/ businesses enjoy no such luxuries. Unlike an open-ended tax$$$ purse that Brotherton and Kate have access to- the private sector in order to survive must budget.
Disagreeing with Kate and Brotherton’s continued emergency measures seems to be the CDC and an army of experts such as Greta M. Massetti, PhD1; Brendan R. Jackson, MD1; John T. Brooks, MD1; Cria G. Perrine, PhD1; Erica Reott, MPH1; Aron J. Hall, DVM1; Debra Lubar, PhD1; Ian T. Williams, PhD1; Matthew D. Ritchey, DPT1; Pragna Patel, MD1; Leandris C. Liburd, PhD1; Barbara M Mahon MD.
CDC’s Greta Massetti PHD1- said in a statement.
“We know that COVID 19 is here to stay,” she added in comments during a briefing with reporters.
It also brings the recommendations for unvaccinated people in line with people who are fully vaccinated – an acknowledgment of the high levels of population immunity in the U.S., due to vaccination, past COVID-19 infections or both. “Based on the latest … data, it’s around 95% of the population,” Massetti said, “And so it really makes the most sense to not differentiate,” since many people have protection against severe disease.
CDC Summary
High levels of immunity and availability of effective COVID-19 prevention and management tools have reduced the risk for medically significant illness and death.
To prevent medically significant COVID-19 illness and death, persons must understand their risk, take steps to protect themselves and others with vaccines, therapeutics, and nonpharmaceutical interventions when needed, receive testing and wear masks when exposed, receive testing if symptomatic, and isolate for ≥5 days if infected.
The elected county commissioners must get a grip, follow CDC experts, and tell Kate to stop the ‘Fear Porn’ and needless anxiety. The time is now to normalize life for the Jefferson county citizens.
Yeah they all need replaced asap, we need some sanity again please….
In the face of illogicality, deceit, arrogance, corruption and criminality, I see no benefit in debate, mincing words, entreaty or worse, giving credence to the propaganda and mentality of the perpetrators and accomplices by speaking in their fabricated terminology. The officers and commissioners must be held accountable, removed from office and replaced by a system of probity and moral individuals. https://www.porttownsendfreepress.com/2022/10/23/wheres-the-emergencyonly-in-jefferson-county/
Even though I don’t agree with this extension of the emergency orders that have no standing, I just found out that our State Attorney General is just now not going to allow any media in his news conferences without showing their Vaxx card. Here we go again because we should all be aware what soon shall follow here in Jefferson County.
I believe that “vaxx card” bs started because they’re terrified of reporters like Jon Choe:
https://mynorthwest.com/3661923/dori-king-county-antifa-tactics-block-reporter-covering-proposed-chinatown-international-district-homeless-shelter-expansion/
I believe that you are exactly correct in your assessment! I saw the way Mr Choe was treated. I found it to be very indignant to try to state that he wasn’t considered media.
The pandemic was nothing but a once-in-a-lifetime get rich scheme for politically connected people like Brotherton and Berry.
Vote these hucksters out!
Every single person who was fired because they would not be vaccinated or not wear a mask, needs to be immediately reinstated and given backpay.
It has been well proven and the CDC fully admits, that the vaccines did nothing we were told they did. Nor did the masking. Both the vaccines and the masks have been disproved as vectors of wellness for healthy people. There is no reason why people should be forced to show vaccination cards when it has been well proven that vaccinations neither prevent nor cure Covid infections.
We must dispense with elected and appointed officials who resort to tyranny by way of special identification cards. That is the way to madness and totalitarianism, gulag style. Unfortunately much of this county seems ready to begin the construction of the gulags for those of us who don’t just go along to get along.
Today, a New York State Supreme Court Judge overturned the vaccine mandate for New York City public sector workers, ordered the city to reinstate all fired employees and grant them backpay, citing the fact that being vaccinated against COVID-19 does not stop an individual from catching or spreading the virus, and thus being vaccinated does not grant enough community-wide benefit to warrant a mandate. The health commissioner “acted beyond his authority” by issuing an indefinite vaccine mandate rather than a temporary one, according to the court. Justice Ralph Pozio stated in his ruling, “This is clearly an arbitrary and capricious action because we are dealing with identical unvaccinated people being treated differently by the same administrative agency.”
I hope our JeffCo PUD workers and any Port Townsend City and Jefferson County employee who was terminated over similar arbitrary and capricious mandates feel empowered to sue.
Unfortunately, Governor Hochul reinstated the vaccine mandate once this ruling came out as well as recommendations for children to mask again because of RSV and the flu. As she said they can wear those “cute masks” that she has seen and it shouldn’t be a big deal because the children are already used to it. How much more do the children need to endure? I am not for the mandating of masking children. This should be a parental decision especially if your child is immunocompromised.