{"id":53569,"date":"2020-06-04T16:37:41","date_gmt":"2020-06-04T22:37:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/bayfield-takes-wait-and-see-approach-on-mask-requirements\/"},"modified":"2020-06-04T22:37:41","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T22:37:41","slug":"bayfield-takes-wait-and-see-approach-on-mask-requirements","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/bayfield-takes-wait-and-see-approach-on-mask-requirements\/","title":{"rendered":"Bayfield takes wait-and-see approach on mask requirements"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"During
During a meeting Tuesday, the Bayfield Board of Trustees chose to wait before making a decision about a face-covering order in response to the novel coronavirus outbreak.<\/span>Shannon Mullane\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The Bayfield Board of Trustees supported waiting on a decision about whether a mandatory face-covering order is the right move for the town.<\/p>\n

Face coverings are one way to reduce transmission of the coronavirus. Many communities, including Bayfield, debate requiring masks, with some questioning their effectiveness or describing them as an infringement of personal rights.<\/p>\n

While the board did not take formal action during a meeting Tuesday, most trustees agreed Bayfield does not need a mandatory mask order. They are keeping the option open for future discussion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have not heard one business ask us to do a mandate on this,\u201d said Ashleigh Tarkington, Bayfield mayor. \u201cEveryone feels very comfortable with \u2026 San Juan Basin Public Health.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the discussion, trustees considered feedback from businesses, Durango\u2019s recent mask order and future outbreak potential. It launched a feedback survey<\/a> on the town of Bayfield Facebook page Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just don\u2019t see it as something Bayfield needs to take on and regulate,\u201d said Mayor Pro Tem Kristin Dallison.<\/p>\n

Trustees spoke through masks, which muffled some of their statements, while sitting 6 feet apart during the meeting at Town Hall. The town limits the number of people in the room to comply with public health requirements and broadcasts the meetings online.<\/p>\n

The city of Durango issued a mandatory face-covering order in most areas of the city before an expected surge of tourists over Memorial Day weekend.<\/p>\n

\u201cBayfield is very different than Durango. We don\u2019t have a lot of tourism,\u201d Tarkington said. She talked to businesses, whose clients are mostly local. \u201cI felt very comfortable with not taking a stand on the mandate.\u201d<\/p>\n

While business employees have to wear face coverings, customers do not, under Colorado\u2019s safer-at-home guidelines. SJBPH has issued an advisory, recommending but not requiring masks. According to three Bayfield businesses, those guidelines are either manageable or a burden to business. None of the businesses, Bayfield Liquor, Tuning Fork Cafe and Highland Vision Center, supported a mandatory mask order.<\/p>\n

Trustee Lori Zazzaro, who helps lead SJBPH\u2019s response to the virus in her day job, said Colorado and SJBPH don\u2019t require face coverings, and if the community is fine with it, then a trustee\u2019s job is to represent the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll happily support wearing masks. I\u2019m wearing mine, but if you don\u2019t wear yours, I\u2019m not protected from you, you\u2019re protected from me,\u201d Zazzaro said.<\/p>\n

She and other trustees supported encouraging community members to wear face coverings.<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand everybody wanting to open things up and moving along. If we want to beat this thing, it requires all of us working together,\u201d said Trustee David Black. \u201cI think we might want to revisit this in a couple months.\u201d<\/p>\n

smullane@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Businesses seem to be on board<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":53570,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[731,685,29,668,686],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-53569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-bayfield","tag-coronavirus-covid-19","tag-newsletter","tag-public-health","tag-san-juan-basin-health-department"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53569"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53569\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53569"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=53569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}