mask mandates - News - The Coastal Star2024-03-29T01:18:53Zhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/feed/tag/mask+mandatesAlong the Coast: Six Republicans vie for three legislative seats in local primarieshttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/along-the-coast-six-republicans-vie-for-three-legislative-seats-i2022-08-03T17:07:53.000Z2022-08-03T17:07:53.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p><strong><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}10746158866,RESIZE_1200x{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10746158866,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="10746158866?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a>By Joel Engelhardt</strong><br /> <br />The party activist who said she instigated the local Republican Party’s censure of state Rep. Mike Caruso faces him for the Republican nomination for state House in the newly drawn District 87.<br /> A Highland Beach commissioner who has put $200,000 into her own campaign goes against a Russian-born adoptee who calls herself an “America-first patriot” for the Republican nomination in Boca Raton-area District 91.<br /> And two newcomers, one well-ensconced in the local Republican Party, face off in state Senate District 26, with the winner facing Democratic incumbent Lori Berman in the Nov. 8 general election.<br /> Those are the state House and Senate primary battles that appear on the Aug. 23 ballot for voters who live on the South County barrier islands. Several unchallenged candidates will move directly to the general election without a primary. Here’s a breakdown of the six candidates in the three contested races:</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;">House District 87: Mike Caruso vs. Jane Justice</span><br /> Caruso, 63, a Delray Beach resident, won his first state House seat in 2018 when he defeated Democrat Jim Bonfiglio by 32 votes out of nearly 80,000 cast. He beat Bonfiglio again in 2020, but this time by 11,000 votes.<br /> Then came redistricting, and the state split the South County barrier islands that he used to serve into three House districts. He’s running in Republican-leaning District 87, which starts at the Boynton Inlet and covers Hypoluxo, Lantana, Manalapan and South Palm Beach, as well as large swaths of West Palm Beach and Palm Beach Gardens, before ending at Marcinski Road in Jupiter.<br /> Caruso’s Delray Beach oceanfront condo, listed on his 2021 financial disclosure form as a $3.3 million asset, is no longer in the district, meaning he’ll have to establish residency to the north if he wins. In all, Caruso reported a net worth of $4.1 million.<br /> In the past few months, Caruso faced an uprising from within the Republican Party of Palm Beach County. The party executive committee voted to censure him and block him from running again as a Republican after he endorsed a Democrat, Katherine Waldron, in her four-way primary for the House District 93 seat covering Wellington. <br /> He said he made the endorsement because he and Waldron, a Port of Palm Beach commissioner, worked well together on Bahamas hurricane relief and he considered her a friend.<br /> But he said he casts party line votes 99% of the time and retained the support of the state Republican Party, which not only did not oust him but has given him $20,650 in staffing and polling assistance since June 21, according to Caruso campaign reports. <br /> In total, Caruso has raised $146,000 as of July 15 and spent $61,000.<br /> His opponent, Jane Justice, said she led the campaign to censure Caruso when she found out he had endorsed Waldron, whom she called “a radical Democrat.”<br /> “I question why Caruso is in our party,” Justice said.<br /> Justice, 66, says she’s a grass-roots activist, not a politician. Her campaign website says she will fight for election integrity, school choice, parents’ rights and against mask and vaccine mandates and inappropriate sexual material in children’s schoolbooks.<br /> “I’m a ‘We the people’ candidate,” she said. “People know who I am. When our constitutional rights are being infringed on, I’m going to stand up.”<br /> She spoke recently before the Palm Beach County Commission on election integrity, challenging the accuracy of machines that help duplicate damaged ballots so they can be fed through counting machines.<br /> She said she wants to severely limit voting by mail because it has ushered in “a lot of fraud” and ballots should be counted by hand, not by a tabulating machine that could be connected to the internet. <br /> Like Caruso, she supports the recently enacted 15-week ban on abortion in Florida. While he wouldn’t take a position on an outright ban, which may be proposed in the next legislative session now that the Supreme Court has removed the federal right to abortion, Justice said she believed there needs to be some exceptions that would have to be decided by a doctor and patient.<br /> She has raised $22,000 through July 15, about half in loans from herself, and spent nearly $10,000. She lists her 2021 net worth as $410,000, including her Greenacres condo, which is not in the district.<br /> The primary winner will face Democrat Sienna Osta in the general election.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;">House District 91: Christina DuCasse vs. Peggy Gossett-Seidman</span><br /> The Delray Beach woman competing with Highland Beach Commissioner Peggy Gossett-Seidman portrays herself as an “America-first patriot.” <br /> “I love America and I love the Constitution,” Christina DuCasse says on her campaign website. “I grew up in Boca Raton and I have spent the last 20 years invested in this city.”<br /> DuCasse, 29, a first-time candidate for office, does not mention that she was born in Russia, the birthplace listed on her September 2017 marriage license to Boca Raton firefighter Dustin DuCasse. <br /> Responding to a call about her birthplace, DuCasse said she had been born in Russia, adopted at the age of 7, raised in South Florida and is an American citizen. She declined to discuss her adoption further or to discuss the issues facing voters in District 91, but she agreed that her personal story made her more conscious of the importance of liberty. <br /> “I hope to be a voice to stand for freedom,” she said.<br /> On her website, she stakes out positions in line with Gov. Ron DeSantis on border security, mask and vaccine mandates and critical race theory.<br /> On elections, she supports ending early voting, limiting mail-in ballots to people in the military and “those who absolutely need it” and “paper ballots only — no machines!” It is not clear if she would support hand-counting of ballots.<br /> On abortion, she writes, she will “fight for the rights of all people, including the unborn.”<br /> Through July 15, she raised $12,300 and spent $7,200. She listed her net worth as $249,761, including the $430,000 value for her townhome outside the district in Delray. She reported her primary income in 2021 of $22,000 came from cleaning houses. <br /> For Gossett-Seidman, the triumph of getting three bills passed this year by the state Senate and House for projects in Highland Beach, where she has served as a commissioner since 2018, met the harsh reality of Gov. DeSantis’ veto pen.<br /> She understood his veto of the two biggest items, requests for $700,000 toward drainage improvements along State Road A1A and $400,000 for a new fire station, because the money is available in a different state program, one she and the bill sponsor, Caruso, are pursuing. <br /> Gossett-Seidman, 69, born in Michigan, has lived in Highland Beach since 1991. She first won her Highland Beach commission seat in a four-candidate race in 2018 and was re-elected to a three-year term without opposition in 2021. <br /> She has raised $275,000 through July 15, including $25,000 from the Florida House Republican Campaign Committee and $200,000 as a personal loan. She has spent $52,700. <br /> She listed her 2021 net worth at $22.2 million, including her Intracoastal-facing $4 million home. But the bulk of her fortune, $17.2 million, is in Apple stock, for which she credited her husband, a doctor, who bought it in the 1990s when the stock was selling for less than $1. <br /> Despite the money, the former sportswriter said she drove her 2005 Suburban until it conked out on a recent trip to Tallahassee, wears 2-year-old tennis shoes and clips coupons.<br /> “What can I say? I’m very Midwest that way,” she said.<br /> She supports the state’s 15-week abortion ban but said she doesn’t expect the Legislature to ban abortion entirely. “I’m flexible. I will look at all the facts.”<br /> She harbors some concerns about election integrity but said it really falls on the election supervisors in the state’s 67 counties. <br /> She is not a supporter of mask mandates, saying “in the beginning it seemed like a great idea but after a while the science wasn’t there to wear a mask.” <br /> She agrees with removing some books from classrooms, describing a kindergarten book citing the terms KKK and negro. “I don’t know why you need to teach a 5-year-old that. It makes no sense,” she said.<br /> DuCasse and Gossett-Seidman face off for the seat formerly held by Emily Slosberg-King, who is not seeking re-election. The district includes all of Boca Raton, most of Highland Beach and much of west Boca.<br /> The winner faces Democrat Andy Thomson, a Boca Raton City Council member.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;">Senate District 26: Steve Byers vs. Bill Wheelen</span><br /> Since 2015, Bill Wheelen has been volunteering with the local Republican Party. Earlier this year, he said he received the group’s Jean Pipes Award for volunteer service at a Mar-a-Lago dinner headlined by Donald Trump and DeSantis. <br /> While he contemplated a run for the congressional seat held by Lois Frankel, he saw the crowded field of Republican challengers and said he opted for the state Senate seat now held by Democrat Lori Berman. <br /> At the same time, Steve Byers decided to run, creating a two-way race for the nomination.<br /> While Wheelen answered questions and discussed issues with The Coastal Star, Byers, who appears on shared campaign postcards with DuCasse, did not respond to repeated phone calls.<br /> Both men live in the sprawling district, which extends along the beach from Boca Raton’s Red Reef Park to the Boynton Inlet and stretches west to Belle Glade. Wheelen, 68, lives in Wellington; Byers, who will turn 54 in August, lives off of Hagen Ranch and Lake Ida roads west of Delray.<br /> While Berman has raised $127,000 without a primary opponent, Wheelen has nearly $11,000, including $7,000 in loans from himself, and Byers has $5,000, including $4,800 he lent his campaign. <br /> Wheelen listed his net worth at $765,000, including $720,000 for the value of his home. <br /> Byers listed his net worth at $2.6 million, including a $210,000 Porsche 930, three properties in the Pittsburgh area and $1.3 million for his Wellington home.<br /> On the abortion issue, Wheelen, a practicing Catholic, admits to being conflicted.<br /> “I follow church teaching. However, I’m also more pragmatic than that. It’s really not my place to tell you what you should do. If science says 15 weeks, that’s where we stop,” he said.<br /> He has concerns about election integrity, particularly fraud through vote-by-mail ballot harvesting, and opposes mask mandates. <br /> His No. 1 priority is school safety, which he says requires hardening schools and spending whatever it takes.<br /> “Gun control has nothing to do with it,” he said. “The more gun control we have, the less law-abiding citizens have them.”<br /> He writes on his website about how his father barely had enough money to pay rent and wouldn’t eat until the children did. He took a job as a janitor on Wall Street and became a trader, putting two children through college. <br /> Byers calls himself a “serial entrepreneur” on his website. He parlayed success in Amway sales into a consulting business that he said worked on projects for IBM and the CIA. Among businesses he started since then is one as a beekeeper. <br /> “I’ve got thick skin,” he writes on his website. “I have taken the stings of the bees to put honey on your table. I will take the stings of politics to put honesty in your government.” </p>
<p><em>You can find a story online with House maps at <a href="https://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/along-the-coast-new-map-carves-barrier-island-into-three-district">https://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/along-the-coast-new-map-carves-barrier-island-into-three-district</a>. A Senate story is at <a href="https://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/along-the-coast-senate-seats-changing-as-well">https://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/along-the-coast-senate-seats-changing-as-well</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>For a sample ballot go to: <a href="http://www.pbcelections.org">www.pbcelections.org</a></em></p></div>Health News: Rules ease on masks, government meetings as vaccine rates risehttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/health-news-rules-ease-on-masks-government-meetings-as-vaccine-ra2021-06-01T20:13:03.000Z2021-06-01T20:13:03.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p><strong>By Charles Elmore</strong></p>
<p>Debates about how to grapple with COVID-19’s receding but not extinguished risks are hardly producing lockstep policies among Palm Beach County’s southern coastal communities as they sort through a dizzying flurry of federal, state and local attempts to shape the rules.</p>
<p><br />But thanks to a rising tide of vaccinations along the coast, a lot of things in June will look closer to normal than they have since the worst pandemic in a century hit with full force more than a year ago.</p>
<p><br />In June, Boca Raton’s City Council plans to return to meeting in person, though in the larger 6500 Municipal Building on Congress Avenue rather than City Hall. Council member Yvette Drucker, for one, won’t miss the “audio issues” and other glitches common to virtual gatherings.</p>
<p><br />“I am ready to go back,” Drucker said.</p>
<p><br />Mask mandates are being peeled away for people who have been vaccinated, in many public spaces and some but not all businesses — even if in practice that often means taking people at their word. Driving much of the change in the past five weeks, and not always without controversy, have been U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance and Gov. Ron DeSantis’ executive actions that sought to eliminate or restrict what safety rules local governments can impose.</p>
<p><br />Health officials cheered falling infection rates but warned the threat has not entirely vanished just because a lot of folks are ready to move on.</p>
<p><br />Less than half of Palm Beach County’s 1.5 million residents had received full or partial COVID-19 vaccinations by May 24, according to the state’s Department of Health.</p>
<p><br />County health director Alina Alonso noted county vaccination rates fell short of “herd immunity” — typically meaning at least 70% to 80% — and that children under 12, for example, have not generally had access to vaccines. She urged people to wear masks even after vaccination. Direct hospitalization and death are not the only COVID-19 threats for some age groups, with the long-term effects of the virus still under study, she said.</p>
<p><br />“We still have to be careful,” Alonso said. “We don’t want to slip and go backwards.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>High vaccine rates on coast</strong></p>
<p>Still, many communities along the county’s southeast coast have been getting shots at a rate above the county average, with ZIP codes in the region often achieving 55% to 85% vaccination rates by the end of April, government records showed. With May results expected to drive rates higher, some local officials saw encouragement to take action.</p>
<p><br />As of June 1, Delray Beach said it would return to in-person City Commission and board meetings without temperature checks for the public. Anyone entering a municipal facility will be asked to wear a mask if he or she has not been fully vaccinated, city policy says.</p>
<p><br />“Public meetings are a vital part of our representative government,” Mayor Shelly Petrolia said. “In-person meetings allow for a human connection and clarity of communication with those we represent.”</p>
<p><br />Meetings still are streamed live online, but the city’s pre-recorded public comment line will no longer be used. People who want to comment must do so in person.</p>
<p><br />Boca Raton was ready to ditch virtual meetings May 10, though officials put off enactment until June to allow more time for affected staff members to make sure they got second COVID shots.</p>
<p><br />Manalapan was one of the first coastal communities to go exclusively to Zoom meetings after the pandemic started, and it was one of the first to quit Zooming and resume in-person meetings late last year. During a Town Commission meeting on May 25, it was one of the first to relax mask and distancing restrictions.</p>
<p><br /> “If you’re fully vaccinated, you don’t need to wear a mask,” Town Manager Linda Stumpf said. “We’re following county health department and CDC requirements.”</p>
<p><br /> Public access for commission meetings increased from six open seats to 15. But Stumpf said Town Hall will continue to be closed for other business until October, with contractors and vendors entering by appointment only.</p>
<p><br /> “When the season starts and people start coming back, we’ll open it up,” she said.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Businesses ease protocols</strong></p>
<p>Towns and cities are not the only ones making changes.</p>
<p><br />Publix, Walmart, Costco, Starbucks and Trader Joe’s joined the list of retailers that removed mask mandates for customers who have been vaccinated. </p>
<p><br />Publix “will no longer require fully vaccinated associates or customers to wear face coverings, unless required by a state or local order or ordinance,” a company statement said May 14. “In accordance with CDC guidelines, individuals who are not fully vaccinated are required to use face coverings over their noses and mouths while inside any Publix store.”</p>
<p><br />Fully vaccinated, according to the CDC, means two weeks after a one-shot vaccine or the second jab of a two-shot vaccine. </p>
<p><br />Early in May, DeSantis made permanent a ban on vaccine “passports,” meaning businesses cannot require proof of vaccination from customers, though they can continue to require masks and distancing if they choose. </p>
<p><br />Not all movie theaters survived the pandemic, and those that did have reopened under varying schedules and precautions designed to reassure customers. As of late May, Cinemark Palace 20 and XD in Boca Raton, for example, continued to require people to wear masks except when eating or drinking inside the auditorium, according to its website. Reduced theater capacities and staggered show times were still in effect.</p>
<p><br />DeSantis also signed an executive order suspending COVID-19 restrictions imposed by city and county governments, which Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber likened to “spiking the ball on the 10-yard line.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Municipalities use caution</strong> </p>
<p>Despite the unease, mask mandates have ended in many local government settings.</p>
<p><br />By May 18, masks were no longer required in county government buildings for people who have received shots.</p>
<p><br />Ocean Ridge still requires people to wear face coverings in Town Hall, unless they are seated and properly distanced from others, Town Manager Tracey Stevens said. </p>
<p><br />“As you know, we have a very limited staff and still need to take precautions for those employees that are not vaccinated,” Stevens said. “It would be devastating to our operations if several employees became sick at once.”</p>
<p><br />Lantana officials said they were following the governor’s orders and CDC guidelines. </p>
<p><br />Most people who attended the May 24 Town Council meeting did not wear masks, although town staff did. Chairs were still set 6 feet apart in the council chambers.</p>
<p><br />The town’s Centennial Celebration at Bicentennial Park is on track for July 4 and social distancing will be adhered to for children’s games. All activities will be outside and masks will not be required.</p>
<p><br />Highland Beach has been holding commission meetings in person for several months but limiting public attendance while Town Hall was otherwise closed to the public.</p>
<p><br />Starting June 1, Town Hall was open again during regular business hours, with masks “strongly encouraged.” Zoom participation will continue for public meetings. The town post office and library are open again with regular hours but with restrictions on the number of people allowed inside at any given time, with masks encouraged.</p>
<p><br />Boynton Beach began holding commission meetings in its chambers in January. The chairs in the chambers are set up for social distancing, but face masks and temperature checks are not required.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Signs vaccines are working</strong> </p>
<p>More than 585,000 of Palm Beach County’s residents had received a full vaccination by May 24, with another 140,000 getting at least a first shot, state records showed. </p>
<p><br />While that represented only about half of the county’s total residents, the highest proportion of shots has been going to the most vulnerable age group, people 65 and over.</p>
<p><br />Coronavirus infections and hospitalizations have been falling, while positive results for people getting tested for COVID-19 were dipping below 6% by the middle of May. That was down from nearly 30% in the most virulent phases of the pandemic in 2020.</p>
<p><br />Vaccinations are clearly having an impact on infection rates, Alonso said, but that does not mean all risks have disappeared. On May 24, more than 2,400 Floridians were still hospitalized with the virus and 53 new cases and eight deaths were reported in the county.</p>
<p><br />“If you’re not vaccinated, masks are still recommended,” Alonso said. With family members she cares about vulnerable to infection, she said even after vaccination she plans to wear her mask for some time to come.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>Mary Hladky, Dan Moffett, Jane Smith and Mary Thurwachter contributed to this story.</em></p></div>