Gov. Pete Ricketts on Monday continued to challenge the authority of Mayor Leirion Gaylor Baird to mandate the wearing of masks in most indoor public settings in Lincoln, suggesting it is wrong to "bring the heavy hand of the government to tell people what to do."
Ricketts has directed state lawyers to scrutinize whether Gaylor Baird has the authority to issue such a mandate.
The action "seems to me overbearing," he said during a Capitol news conference.
Ricketts said he and the mayor had discussed the policy matter, and at that time, Lincoln's hospitals had plenty of capacity to care for the sick and the number of cases and positivity rate in Lancaster County had not increased dramatically.
"There really isn't a data-driven reason for more restriction," the governor said.
On Monday afternoon, Lancaster County reported 52 new coronavirus cases, with 15% of tests returned Monday showing positive, the Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department reported.
People are also reading…
Gaylor Baird and interim city-county health department director Pat Lopez announced the mandate Friday as a measure to stem a slowly rising trend of new cases and protect hospital capacity.
Ricketts, who encourages mask wearing, said he disagrees with this kind of mandated public health policy considering the sacrifices that people have been asked to adopt during the pandemic.Â
Nebraska residents have largely done what they've been asked to do without mandates, he said, noting the state achieved compliance without a strict stay-at-home order. Â
Nebraska has reported 22,847 cases and 313 deaths as of Monday. New cases include two more employees of the Department of Correctional Services who are self-isolating at home. One employee was between prison assignments; the second worked at the State Penitentiary in Lincoln.
The mandate in Lancaster County requires everyone older than 5 to wear a face covering inside a public space. The rule exempts people who are outdoors, exercising and eating or drinking in a restaurant or bar.Â
There are a number of other exemptions.
Cases in Lancaster County now number 2,482 since spring, with 817 confirmed recoveries and 14 deaths linked to COVID-19.
But as the number of new cases climbs locally, few are requiring hospitalization. As of Monday, 21 patients with COVID-19 were in Lincoln hospitals, including 15 from Lancaster County.
Gaylor Baird, a Democrat, said the mask mandate will help prevent Lincoln from wiping out progress made since businesses reopened in May and staves off further restrictions as the county works to recover economically.
The Republican governor believes in local control generally, but in this policy debate, he said he thinks state government needs to maintain consistency to avoid having "500 different rules" on the same issue across Nebraska.Â
"What we try to do is keep the state relatively together so people understand where we are," he said.Â
The governor dodged a question asking whether he and University of Nebraska Medical Center experts with whom he has consulted since arrival of the virus are in agreement about the issue of whether masks should be mandatory in most public settings as Gaylor Baird directed.
The question of mandating masks is "a public policy issue in the realm of elected officials," Ricketts said. Â
Over the weekend, Dr. Ali Khan, dean of the College of Public Health at the Medical Center in Omaha, tweeted: "Kudos to @MayorLeirion @LNKhealth for science-based policy. Hopefully temper their cases. Now to extend to the state."