Idaho health board "drowning in complaints" after mask mandate lifted

[jmowreader]

https://cdapress.com/news/2020/oct/24/PANHANDLECALLS/

The team at Panhandle Health District is drowning in complaints after its board voted Thursday to end Kootenai County’s mask mandate.

Katherine Hoyer, PHD spokeswoman, said district employees and staff received scores of calls after the board’s decision to rescind the mandate, which had been in place since late July.

The Panhandle Health Board of Directors voted 4-3 to rescind its mask mandate for Kootenai County. Board members Allen Banks, Glen Bailey, Mike Fitzgerald and Walt Kirby voted to end the mask mandate.

The health district has a call center set up to field inquiries about public health concerns, but the center’s employees are also handling irate and agitated residents criticizing the board’s decision.

(Necessary disclosure: I work for this newspaper but didn't write the story linked.)

Yesterday I was driving home from Seattle to Coeur d'Alene through a snowstorm after a week's vacation and called my managing editor using my hands-free phone system to find out if it was snowing there. It was. Then he produced the words you never want to hear from a newspaperman: "You are not going to believe this." He is NOT happy about this.

For my part, I've decided to stop shopping in Idaho until the pandemic ends. I can drive 30 miles to a state with a slight bit of common sense and buy everything I need...which, right now, means food and tile supplies.

[Nululu]

1. Idaho sending patients to Portland & Seattle

One hospital at 99% in Idaho. Covid is spreading out of control there.

Politicians caving to loud trumpsters puts everyone at risk. It's demented.

[jmowreader]

2. It's worse than demented

Something you are not appreciating: most of our politicians here ARE loud trumpsters.

[2naSalit]

5. At least you're in a border town...

I know Post Falls is in between but you can get to the armpit of Washington without having to drive over a couple high mountain passes to get to Missoula.

I had to jump the border to Montana a long time ago, glad I did. But we have over 30 inches of snow since last night down here in Yellowstone country.

[jmowreader]

6. Thirty inches? Pass.

[2naSalit]

10. We're supposed to get a little more before

the wind kicks up, then it's a whole new situation. Good thing I don't have to go anywhere until sometime next week when a bunch of it will be melting for several days. Bitter cold tonight though. Glad we got the heater set up in the water trough for the horses before it started snowing.

I'm thankful I have safe, warm shelter and plenty if food... nowhere to go is good thing at this point.

[jmowreader]

13. Wish I was in that situation

But since I can’t put the press in my house (because it’s bigger than my house) I have to go out.

[roamer65]

3. That's gonna spread it to WA and OR.

Get ready for the second wave.

[jmowreader]

11. More like the third wave

Idaho has a significant anomaly: a GOP governor who takes this seriously, or did until the Lege overruled him. Then came the second wave. Now that we have no mask mandate (which our boneheaded sheriff said he wasn’t going to enforce anyway), expect the worst wave of them all.

My publisher sent out an email right after we went from amber to red: masks must be worn at all times in the building. At amber we only had to wear them if we went to the building we don’t work in.

[LizBeth]

4. I absolutely love that area of the country. I read just yesterday their hospitals are over flowing

incases, having to buy beds, double up patients and they cannot handle what they have. Sounds like a fool move to me, by the people voting the mask mandate canceled.

[jmowreader]

8. CDA is only fun in the summer

The winter sports of skiing and snowmobiling can’t be done here because there are no mountains and no trails. The closest ski areas are Kellogg (Jackass Ski Bowl, which is now called Silver Mountain because the real name takes too long to explain), Sandpoint (Schweitzer, which is named for the family that built it) and Spokane (Mount Spokane and 49 Degrees North). As I tell Mike frequently, if you travel all the way from California to ski, you are not going to spend two hours of every day driving from CDA to a ski resort and back. And so, we have “alternative” fun things here like the stupid-sounding but outrageously popular three-day Mac n Cheese Festival. (Yup, it’s just what it sounds like: every restaurant in town sends a chef to the Resort to make their own take on Mac n cheese, and people go around sampling it.)

[LizBeth]

12. Love the mac and cheese thing and lots of places aren't close to ski places, lol. We have truffle

time where I live. I had forgotten about it but it should be coming around. And Mushroom fest, yum.... I want to play but do not know if they are having it this year.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. I'm going to guess that not a single member who voted to rescind the mask order

is any kind of medical professional.

[jmowreader]

9. You guessed correctly

There are three medical professionals and four laymen on the board. Guess how the vote went.