Chinks In The Lockdown

I think the main vulnerabilities for the restrictive lockdowns will be the clearly arbitrary distinctions beginning to emerge among adjoining states and counties. For instance, as the situation following the Wisconsin supreme court's overturning of the governor's emergency stay-at-home order clarifies, we see that most local authorities found it impossible to re-impose local regulations, and the whole state is now de facto open, with a few exceptions:

More than a dozen counties and several cities enacted their own stay-at-home orders after the Supreme Court’s 4-3 decision to strike down the state’s “safer at home” order.

However, the number of local orders, which ranged from mirroring the state’s former “safer at home” order to rules limiting large gatherings while allowing businesses to remain open, whittled down Friday, with officials expressing doubt in their authority to pass such measures.

Counties that rescinded their local orders include Kenosha, Manitowoc, Outagamie, Winnebago and Brown, which has had the second-most positive cases in the state with more than 2,000 as of Friday.

Kenosha County Health Officer Dr. Jen Freiheit announced the county’s stay-at-home order, which went into effect Wednesday, had been withdrawn the next day due to guidance from the Wisconsin Counties Association’s legal arm suggesting that the Supreme Court ruling also applies to local orders.

It appears that only a few counties and municipalities in Wisconsin continued their individual orders, including Madison-Dane County and Milwaukee. Otherwise, the state is open, and no orders prohibit bars, restaurants, businesses, or religious gatherings from being open. The Archdiocese of Milwaukee will reopen public masses at 25% capacity on May 31.

However, this creates a problem for Illinois, whose restrictions are among the strictest anywhere:

When the Wisconsin Supreme Court overturned the state’s "Safer at Home" order last week, several cities and counties, including Milwaukee and Dane counties, enacted their own orders.

Racine and Kenosha counties briefly issued stay-at-home orders but rescinded them Friday after receiving legal interpretations from their corporation counsels that showed the court's ruling also applied to county health officers.

But this meant Illinois residents who wanted to visit a bar or restaurant, or simply wanted a haircut, could drive north and get what they needed.

When Kenosha’s Brat Stop reopened at 2 p.m. Friday, there was a line of people waiting at the door. About 75 percent of the cars in the parking lot had Illinois license plates.

Owner Deb Glembocki says that’s not unusual.

Oregon Gov Kate Brown created a similar problem for herself when she allowed certain counties to enter an arbitrary "Phase 2" but kept others in "Phase 1".

In an article that highlighted the confusing and often contradictory nature of Brown’s lockdown orders due to the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic, The Oregonian reported:

Can I leave the Portland area to get a haircut in another county or visit the beach?

The governor said Thursday the answer is no, although it doesn’t appear she plans to enforce that. . .

Brown asked Portland-area residents to hold tight and resist the urge to drive to another county to get a haircut, dine out at a restaurant or visit a tourist sites.

Of course, Brown’s lockdown orders have confused Oregonians since they began. It turns out that many retail outlets shut down when they didn’t have to do so.

As we approach the tail end of the pandemic, and as Oregon has consistently ranked in the bottom five states in terms of infections and deaths, Brown’s scattershot approach to the virus has raised more questions than answers.

In California, Gov Newsom appears to skirt this particular problem simply by relaxing the stay-at-home order only in remote counties, so that it's nearly as inconvenient for someone in the San Francisco area to drive to a more open county as to drive to Oregon. However, as sheriffs in larger counties like Fresno and Riverside have announced they will not enforce the orders, the arbitrariness and inconsistency of enforcement become a steadily bigger problem.

Even in my local area, there are differences. I went out for the first time in weeks yesterday and saw that in Burbank, almost nobody wore a mask, and I didn't have the impression that those outside were on "essential" missions. Back in LA, where Mayor Garcetti has recently ordered that everyone wear a mask when outdoors at all, about half those strolling or walking their dogs wore them.