The Manchester City Council did the right thing on masks, sorta, after dumping the original proposal that would have mandated full-time mask-wearing in Manchester, all buildings, inside and outside.
Related: ReOpenNH: City-Wide Mask Mandate Defeated in Manchester!
Reformatted, emphasis mine.
Under the proposal, the city’s public health director and police and fire departments would have been responsible for enforcing the [original full time all time mask mandate] ordinance. An alternative ordinance drafted by attorney Greg Muller of the city solicitor’s office and approved by aldermen requires masks in city government buildings only.
…Alderman Roy asked how the rule would be enforced. “If there’s no enforcement, no discipline, I don’t see how it’s going to change anything,” Roy said.
“If you’re asking me if it has any teeth in it, in terms of enforcement, it does not,” said city solicitor Emily Rice.
Then why bother (except in neutralizing a bad one, which IS a good thing)?
Yep, it’s the bureaucratic version of “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”- exactly what Manchester just passed a week ago (my stack of stuff is rather deep with stuff I haven’t gotten to yet).
In the end, it’s a ‘feel-good that doesn’t do much’ type of deal along the lines of “Look! We justified our positions by DOING SOMETHING!!!!” No, you actually did nothing – and I’m fine with that. Enough of Government meddling in peoples’ lives in any way they can think of.
Sure, most people will go along with reasonable stuff anyways and most will probably think this is and wear a mask. That’s fine with me – for all the huffing and puffing, it comes down to the question of “Who Chooses” and in this case, it will be Individuals deciding for themselves instead of Government. Oh sure, there will be Mask Karens abounding about, both within and without Government but that’s life nowadays since people like Mindi Messmer decided they wanted to be Elected Mask Stasi / Snitcher-in-Chief.
So, in the end, Manchester just made kept things voluntary…
…which is what they had in the beginning. Roy is right – if there is no one around to enforce it, is there really an ordinance?
I would say no, but in this case, that’s a good thing.
