With COVID-19 cases continuing to rise, State College Borough Council on Monday unanimously approved a temporary COVID-19 ordinance mandating businesses and other facilities open to the public within the borough require that masks be worn indoors.
The ordinance is in effect immediately and at any time Centre County is at the Centers for Disease Control high level of community transmission for COVID-19. It expires on Nov. 22.
Since Aug. 27, Centre County has been at the highest level of transmission on the CDC scale, defined as 100 or more new cases per 100,000 people and/or a testing positivity rate greater than 10% in the previous seven days. For three weeks prior to that, it was at the substantial level, the second highest on the CDC scale.
Last summer, State College enacted a COVID-19 ordinance that included masking requirements as well as gathering restrictions and remained in place in various forms until June, when the Pennsylvania General Assembly terminated the Department of Health’s emergency declaration.
The new ordinance — which does not include any gathering limits — aligns with CDC guidance recommending all people, regardless of vaccination status, wear masks in public indoor settings in communities at the high or substantial levels of transmission. It came after a recommendation by the State College Board of Health on Sept. 2.
The State College Municipal Building, Penn State campus buildings, State College Area School District buildings and CATA vehicles already require masking.
Councilman Evan Myers said that the U.S. Supreme Court twice ruled in the early 20th century that states and school districts can require vaccinations as “necessary to protect the public health and secure public safety,” rulings that support mask mandates.
“This is another step to protect the public health,” Myers said. “And it’s to protect our children because they can’t get vaccinated. They can’t get vaccinated if they’re under 12 because it hasn’t been approved yet. This protects them, so this is an unselfish act that helps protect the most vulnerable of our society.”
The ordinance requires anyone over the age of 2 inside any building open to the public to wear masks. Businesses and organizations are required to post notice of the mask requirement at all public entrances.
Individuals and businesses found to have violated the ordinance can be found guilty of a civil infraction and fined $300.
As with the previous COVID ordinance, there are exceptions. Face coverings are not required for individuals:
• Seated at a food or drink establishment;
• With a medical condition, mental health condition or disability that prevents wearing a face covering, if they documentation from a licensed medical professional within five days;
• Who are hearing impaired, or who are communicating with a person who is hearing impaired;
• For whom wearing a face covering would create a risk to the person related to their work, as determined by local, state, or federal regulators or workplace safety guidelines;
• Obtaining a service or treatment involving the nose or face or a medical procedure for which temporary removal of the face-covering is necessary.
Ten residents spoke during public comment, with five against and five in favor of the ordinance.
Though public health officials and experts have routinely cited the efficacy of masks, even cloth and paper ones, in helping to prevent the spread of the virus, most opponents who spoke framed the issue around how masks are not designed to protect the wearer from infection.
“The risk that people choose to take with their lives should be left with them and their loved ones, not the government,” said Avi Rachlin, a university student and founder of “Penn State Resistance,” which he described as “aimed at fighting authoritarian overreach from all directions.”
Geoff Landers-Nolan, who spoke in favor of the ordinance, explained masks are about protecting others.
“The whole purpose of masks is that my mask protects you and your mask protects me, because the respiratory droplets coming out of my mouth are caught much more easily by my mask than virus particles in the air are caught by the mask I’m wearing…,” he said. “The unfortunate truth here is that my risk of getting COVID depends so much more on the behavior of everyone else in this room than it does on mine… It means we cannot just simply stand on individual liberty to do whatever we want to do and expect that things will be ok, that they will go back to normal.”
Rachlin also cited Centre County’s low COVID-19 death numbers in recent months — since July 1, the county has had three deaths attributed to the virus, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health — and said “it’s just time to stop talking about COVID and move on with life as it used to be in 2019.”
Anton Aluquin, a Penn State student studying infectious disease, said viewing infections solely in terms of death or recovery doesn’t take into account the long-term effects suffered by those infected.
“They’re looking at it in black and white from death rates and those who didn’t get it and I think that they need to look at the gray area and see that the people who are positive don’t just get better and everything’s back to normal,” he said.
Gopal Balachandran, a borough council candidate in the November election, also said he believes low death numbers do not mean no measures should be taken.
“Maybe one or two deaths, it’s easy to think about that in the abstract but if that’s a loved one who has suffered and has died and it’s preventable because of a simple measure like masking, that can’t be looked upon lightly,” Balachandran said, adding that he appreciates the flexibility of the ordinance to be relaxed when the county is not in the high level of transmission.
Fueled by the more contagious Delta variant of the virus, COVID-19 cases have surged locally, statewide and nationally over the past six weeks.
In August, Centre County reported 639 new cases, four and a half times as many as in July. Through the first 13 days of September, the county has already had 681 new cases.
Mount Nittany Medical Center saw its average daily COVID-19 inpatient census rise from six in July to 14 in August to 17 so far in September. On Monday, 23 COVID-19 patients were hospitalized. The increase has resulted in the medical center rescheduling elective surgeries requiring overnight admissions and prohibiting visitations except in special circumstances.
“Masking is very important not just for our own health… but for the health of others and it’s one of the things we can do to reduce the spread of a deadly virus that has caused much pain and suffering in our country and in our community,” said Ezra Nanes, State College’s presumptive next mayor who has two children under 12 and an immunocompromised mother for whom he is the primary caregiver.
Myers noted that many laws and ordinances are in place for the common good that prohibit people from doing whatever they want, like those that require seat belts and prohibit drunk driving.
Councilwoman Theresa Lafer said it’s not infringing on constitutional freedom to protect others from the virus.
“I don’t care what statistics you use, we know that the Delta [variant] is extremely contagious and we know that our children or grandchildren or neighbors are not all protected from it,” Lafer said. “To say I want the freedom to not have a mask on my face is childish, selfish and just bad citizenship.
“You want to get sick? That’s your right. You do not have the right to make the rest of the world sick.”
