Over the objection of numerous people who testified at the Anchorage Assembly on Tuesday night, Mayor Ethan Berkowitz says he has prepared an ordinance that will mandate face coverings in Anchorage when people are in public places.
If he does, the Assembly likely will not be able to muster the two-thirds vote it would take to override the mayor if he pulls the trigger on the order.
Assembly member Meg Zalatel was prepared to offer a resolution on Tuesday to support a mask mandate, but she did not do so after the mayor’s announcement that he was on the verge of going ahead with his ordinance, which he can do with his emergency powers. The Assembly has voted twice on a mask mandate, and it failed both times, 5-6.
“We have prepared an ordinance that will require the wearing of masks under certain circumstances,” Berkowitz said. “That order is ready and could be implemented at any time.”
Berkowitz said he is likely to implement the ordinance week, depending on the number of new cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus. He would allow people a few days to acquire masks before the ordinance would go into effect.
Some 502 Alaskans are known to have recovered from the COVID-19 virus, which has, to date, infected 778 Alaskans. There are 264 known active cases among Alaskans as of Tuesday. Twelve Alaskans have died who were known to have the virus, although it’s not evident that they died from the virus itself. Those who died were already seriously ill or very old. Two of those 12 died while out of state being cared for because of other illnesses.
Last week, Berkowitz said it was “entirely at this point up to the public,” saying people either begin wearing masks when in groups or stores or he’ll enact a mandate.
Several people testifying at Tuesday’s Assembly meeting objected. Some said they felt masks were actually unhealthy because they reduced oxygen levels.
Margaret Anderson said she purchased a blood oxygen monitor at a pharmacy and discovered that after wearing a mask for 20 minutes her oxygen level dropped 5 points. She suggested that every Assembly member purchase such a device and try the experiment on themselves.
Another member of the public offered that since the Wuhan virus can get into eyes, people should also be forced to wear goggles, and since beards interfere with a seal on masks, men should be forced to shave their bears. She was being facetious to make her point that the mandate is a bad idea.
Others offered the “My Body, My Choice” theory on masks, referring to the pro-abortion arguments that people have the right to choose what is right for them — if it’s ok to choose to have an abortion, why is it not ok to choose whether to wear a mask?
One testifier said that there is a growing local trend of public shaming for those who cannot wear masks, such as her son, who has medical issues related to developmental disabilities. She warned the Assembly that the shaming is a real issue and there have been verbal attacks on people who have medical and psychological conditions that prevent them from wearing coverings over their nose and mouth.
