August 6, 2020 at 4:43 p.m.
Legislature, governor need to work together on pandemic
Legislature, governor need to work together on pandemic
That said, it is also imperative that once the order is repealed, Republicans need to actually sit down with the governor and make a public health plan going forward. Many wanted that to happen after his Safer at Home order was struck down, but Republicans did not take the opportunity. They should now.
There's no question that the governor's state of emergency was a unilateral step by one person that short-circuited any attempt at bipartisanship and community participation. The fact that so many sheriffs and other law enforcement are refusing to enforce the order is the predictable outcome of such behavior. But it's no excuse for Republicans simply to vote it down and go home, either.
The two sides should finally sit down, roll up their sleeves, and get to work.
It's not for us to say what that plan would be. Would it include mandatory face masks orders for certain areas with high positivity rates? Perhaps. Would it simply be recommendations for face masks at certain levels of positivity, with each local community free to adopt or not? Perhaps.
And it's not just face masks, it should be for an entire plan going forward.
The point is not the outcome but the process. The pandemic has become way too politicized, and, while we are not naive enough to think the politics will disappear, some semblance of working together on a common and pressing problem is a step in the right direction.
The people must be engaged, and, on the state level, the Legislature and governor working together is the way to start.
Again, the state of emergency is not about face masks. If people want to wear face masks, they should feel free to do so without ridicule. If people can't wear face masks because of health conditions, they should not be ostracized for not wearing them. If businesses want to require masks, they should do so. The point is that the issue before us is not whether one is pro-mask or not - we are not against face masks ourselves - the point is the process, or lack thereof, that makes the issue about partisan gain, not public health.
The state of emergency is certainly partisan and it certainly provoked a partisan response. It gives the governor the same broad powers, through the end of September, that he had during the first state emergency. That unilateral power grab wrecked the economy, which is now rebounding, but it did not stop the virus, obviously.
Now we have another emergency declaration and who knows what will follow the face mask requirements. Sen. Nass, for one, thinks the order is a prelude to prohibiting schools from re-opening in person. That would be disastrous for our children, who are already falling behind because of the last school closures, and it would be especially disastrous for the many special needs students in our state and in our region. Even Bill Gates has called for schools to re-open.
Of course, the governor says he has no intention to mandate all virtual learning, but, as Sen. Nass pointed, the governor is a well known flip flopper, and right now teachers unions are pressing him to keep the schools shuttered.
Then, too, the governor could lock down the economy again, as some leftists are calling for, and that would deliver a crippling blow to the state and especially to northern Wisconsin. Lockdowns simply haven't proven effective, and the lack of them hasn't proven any more deadly. It's a tactic of political disruption leading to the November election.
All of which is to say the Republican leadership and the governor need to talk it over, and they need to include local communities.
Indeed, the proper place for public health decisions like these to start percolating are in our own communities. As state Rep. Mary Felzkowski and other lawmakers have said this week, constituents in their districts are overwhelmingly against the emergency declarations and face mask orders. Felzkowski says she has heard from small business owners and the elderly, from nurses and parents and law enforcement officers, and the message is clear: They don't want the order.
So let's put those assertions to the test, and let county boards, local town boards, and city councils engage their citizens and make the decisions they want and feel are appropriate. If they want mask mandates or other measures, let them enact them. Let them participate in the creation of a statewide plan.
There is also the question of the whether the governor's declaration is even legal. When lawmakers gave the governor emergency powers, the specifically limited the duration of those powers to 60 days.
They did that for a reason - to prevent the very overreach we have seen, and are seeing, Evers commit. And now we are seeing him try to end run the law with a "second" emergency.
For all these reasons, Evers latest power grab needs to be challenged. It needs to be overturned, but then dialogue needs to follow.
It's conceivable that such a challenge could succeed in court, but that is a lot riskier proposition this time around. The addition of a liberal justice has narrowed the conservative Supreme Court majority to one, and one of the conservatives, justice Brian Hagedorn, has proved to be constitutionally unreliable.
It's a lot simpler for the Legislature to convene, and simply pass a joint resolution ending the state of emergency and any accompanying orders. And it's the most democratic way to do it, through the people's elected representatives.
In fact, either way, whether lawmakers act or don't the people's elected representatives are making a decision.
If they don't put an end to this, they are as guilty as the governor.
Sen. Nass said it best: "Failure to act by either house would make the Legislature complicit in empowering Evers and (Andrea) Palm (secretary-designee, Wisconsin Department of Health Services), two of the most untrustworthy people to serve in state government, in my opinion."
In our opinion, too.
Still, they need to do more than merely throw out the governor's state of emergency. If they repeal the order and simply head home, they are also as guilty as the governor. Instead, they need to do their jobs, go to the table and give a voice to their constituents.
Citizens should look long and hard at what lawmakers do or don't do in coning weeks: Were they strong? Were they complicit?
Were they willing to work together?
Time will tell.
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