By John West
On Monday March 14, City Attorney Joseph “Mac” Tucker spoke to the LaFayette City Council regarding the city COVID mask mandate. Tucker took the time to lay out his case on why the mandate should be dropped. “I think it’s dubious that a mask be required in a public setting if
there’s no basis for it,” Tucker said. “You have CDC guidelines that say the mask mandate is not
required in a pubic setting and you have a low transmissibility standard which this shows at the
community level and the same thing should go for the city employees.”
The current mandate went into effect in January 2022 during a statewide COVID surge. It states all city employees must wear masks while on the clock, and both city employees and members of the public must wear a mask during all city meetings. This mandate went into place after a unanimous vote by the LaFayette City Council on January 24. The mandate had been suggested by Councilwoman Tammie B. Williams.
One caveat at the time of the original vote was that the mandate should be “…according to the
CDC rules and guidelines.”
Regarding the original January vote Tucker said, “Things were a lot different then than they are now.” Tucker presented multiple graphs and charts from the CDC and Alabama Incident Management System to back up his point. “Overall community transmission level is now low,” he said. “Pretty much everything in the entire state is low at this point.”
One of the charts Tucker produced showed Chambers County as being a “green” or “low” county according to the CDC. This is in line with most of the state. Out of Alabama’s 67 counties, 21 are considered “yellow” or “medium” risk. Only 3 counties are considered “red” or
“high” risk.
Tucker quoted mask advice directly from the CDC based off the same graph. “On low, it says
wear a mask based on your own personal preference,” he said. “If its medium, there is still no
mask requirement, but you are advised if you are immunocompromised or at high risk of severe illness to talk to your doctor about wearing a mask, or if you are in contact with someone with high risk.”
Tucker went on to say, “So, at this point, the CDC’s guidance no longer recommends mask
wearing in public situations, especially for Chambers County for the past month or so.”
While statewide COVID hospitalizations surged up to around 3,000 in January 2021, August 2021, and again in January 2022, total hospitalizations in Alabama are now down. According to one of Tucker’s graphs, there was a total of 290 COVID hospitalizations in the entirety of Alabama as of March 11, 2022. Tucker noted the number had gone down to 248 as of March
14, 2022.
A second graph Tucker produced showed the total number of positive COVID tests for Chambers County. “The bottom right-hand corner is the last three weeks,” Tucker said. “And if
you will notice, they are running right along the line of 0.” Tucker advised the city council to “At a minimum lift the mask mandate for the public that attends a council meeting.” He added, “I would also advise that the employees should not be required to wear masks either as well.”
While things got tense over Tucker’s own refusal to wear a mask, the council had mixed
reactions to the information he presented. Councilman Terry Mangram called it “good
information,” adding that his full time job did not have a mask mandate anymore. Mangram
said he had previously told the council “Let’s just go with whatever people feel like. At this
point if they want to wear a mask, that’s fine.” He said he was for removing the mandate. Mayor Vines also indicated mask mandates had been dropped from his full time job at AU two weeks prior. He did however call COVID an “Up and down situation.” He also indicated it was about time to open city hall again.
Councilman Shannon Hunter was still pro mask saying “Masks really protect other people more than it protects the wearer.” He added “I don’t know that we need a mandate at the moment, but we might need one in 6 weeks.”
Councilman Toney Thomas felt it would be best to table the discussion for the time being to give everyone time to think over the information. While Mangram made a motion to vote to remove the mask mandate, Thomas’ motion came first. Ultimately, the motion passed three to
two for it to be tabled. Mangram and Mayor Vines were the dissenting votes. Councilwoman
Williams was not present.
