Board of Aldermen 02-22-2022 Page 38
Improvement Committee. I'm the liaison to that committee and the meeting in January | did not attend probably because it
wasn't on the calendar online like everybody else. | actually and for some reason my e-mail was off the distribution list for
the committee members even though I'm the liaison. So there is a huge mix up there to begin with. | think it might have
had something to do with the term changeover from the last Board to the new Board. | don't disagree that, you know, that
a mistake was made where it should have been put on the calendar. | agree with that.
I've been assured and reassured that all committee meetings and everything will be on that calendar moving forward,
people are going to check, double check that type of thing. | don't think that anything was done intentionally because |
know the people involved in this, at least on the committee. They’re volunteers. They're hardworking volunteers. They're
not out to hide anything from people. They're just there to do their job. They look at things that come before them. They
give their opinion on what comes before them and sometimes they advise the Board of Aldermen on different things
depending on what it is that comes before downtown.
In addition to that, they recommend different projects and things that have to do with the downtown. And of course,
everything that they maybe say yes, you know, we would want to do that, or no, or whatever, anything that's going to
come forward has to be approved by this body anyway. They have no real authority as to approving a plan, or not
approving a plan, or anything of that nature. So the real decision for anything like that is made here. That's not to
discount, however, the fact that public participation is important and | always encourage public participation and I'm
disappointed that that happened. That some people feel that they weren't able to go because it wasn't posted on the city
calendar. So | have been reassured that that will not happen in the future and | think that moving forward, | think for all
committees, | think we should have a much more transparency | think and | think we'll do that. | think that's going to
happen because the people demand it when the people want it and it's the right thing to do. Not only that, but it's also the
law. So but I, again, | don't think anything was intentional and | firmly believe that.
Alderman Jette
Thank you, Madam President. So we've rescinded the ordinance requiring wearing of masks. | just want to acknowledge
all of the e-mails that | got on this tissue. | Know that there are people that are very passionate about the number one that
they shouldn't be told that they have to wear a mask. It's a violation of their personal freedom. | understand that they
think that.
Secondly, a lot of people feel that the Coronavirus certainly was never a threat and is certainly not a threat now. | know
there are people who believe that and also that there are people that don't believe the masks work. In fact, not only do
they not work, they think that they're detrimental to their health. | understand that those people believe that and | respect
their belief. Alright, don't believe. | believe that masks are a useful tool along with the other things that have been
recommended. So even though we've eliminated the mask mandate - the ordinance requiring masks - the
recommendation - and | know there are people out there who believe as | do that the Coronavirus is a serious threat and
continues to be such. Even though our numbers have gone down, they are still according to the State table, we're still in
a substantial risk of community transmission. According to the CDC table, we’re in a high level. The State level of
substantial. There is no higher level. That's the top. If it's above 10%, you're in that substantial level as far as the State
is concerned and we're at almost 15% the doctor said.
The CDC has if it’s above 10%, that's the highest level. If it's above 8%, it's substantial. So they say that if it's above 8%,
it's not safe to be in indoor spaces with people that are not part of your family group and that you should wear a mask. So
we've done away with the ordinance so people are free to choose but | hope that most of us will choose to number one
get vaccinated and we've learned that vaccination does not it provides increased protection, but it's not absolute
protection. You continue to watch your distance with people that you're not familiar with. That you stay away from them.
That you wash your hands and that you wear a mask in indoor public spaces until the numbers continue to go down until
they reach a safe level. So | know a lot of people disagree with me on that and | respect their opinion. | hope that you will
respect mine and acknowledge, or | hope you understand that, you know, my vote tonight was | was doing what | thought
was the best for the interest of the public at large based upon | think what is acknowledged to be the consensus of the
medical experts out there.
On the barriers, I've also received a lot of e-mails about that. I'm on the Infrastructure Committee. The Infrastructure
Committee in December what was said before is accurate. There was a meeting - our meeting in December. There was
a group of downtown business owners, professionals, retail people and restaurants and the message they gave us was,
they want to come up with a compromise plan that is agreeable to everyone that doesn't hurt one business and doesn't
favor one type of business over another. We acknowledge that and we said that we were going to allow input, seek public
input, and come up with a plan that hopefully people will agree upon. I'm hoping that that the downtown businesses that
we give them a place to meet, that they can give us some input, and that they can come up with a plan that they all agree
upon. | mean what we're doing is we're trying to help downtown businesses. That's the reason that we came up with this
