The Cape Elizabeth council decided Monday that a mask mandate was not needed for the town.
The topic made its way on to the town council’s workshop agenda amid action in nearby municipalities both for and against mask mandates. South Portland put a mandate into place Jan. 25, the Falmouth Town Council rejected implementing a mandate Jan. 31 and Portland repealed its mandate Tuesday.
Cape Elizabeth councilors based their decision on the town’s COVID-19 vaccination and case transmission rates.
As of Jan. 30, the town has a vaccination rate of 97%, according to the Maine CDC. There have been 784 probable or confirmed cases of COVID-19 among Cape Elizabeth’s 9,569 residents since the onset of the pandemic, resembling an 8.1% transmission rate, according to the Maine CDC. In comparison, South Portland has a transmission rate of 11.4% and Scarborough a rate of 11.7%.
“Cape Elizabeth has done very well by that,” Town Manager Matt Sturgis said at the workshop. “The other challenge … is the enforcement side of it would be difficult.”
Councilor Gretchen Noonan was also concerned with enforcement.
“I don’t know that our police department is probably interested right now in responding to calls for people not wearing masks,” she said. “I think businesses are certainly welcome to request it. I’d be shocked to see people not complying with a request from a business.”
Councilor Penny Jordan, an owner of Jordan’s Farm in Cape Elizabeth, said the vast majority of her customers wear masks already, voluntarily.
“As a business owner, I would say 99.9% of the people already wear masks,” she said. “We have a pretty compliant town already.”
No members of the council expressed interest in implementing a mask mandate; other arguments pointed out that very few tourists come to Cape Elizabeth in the winter and that the town has continuously followed the lead of the state and county.
“I am not hearing a lot of clamor for additional council action on this at this point,” said Chairperson Jeremy Gabrielson, adding that periodic “check-ins” on the topic of a mask mandate are still useful.
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