State College follows PA guidelines for masks but keeps COVID-19 ordinance, with some changes
State College loosened its mask mandate Friday to allow people who are vaccinated against COVID-19 to forgo wearing a mask in most places.
Borough Council voted 5-2 during a special meeting to make the change to its ordinance, and also to quadruple the outdoor gathering size limit at residences to 100. The indoor gathering limit at residences was doubled to 50. Gathering limits at borough parks and municipal property was doubled to 100.
Council members Janet Engeman and Katherine Yeaple voted against the amendment. Council President Jesse Barlow and members Deanna Behring, Theresa Lafer, Peter Marshall and Evan Myers approved the changes.
More than a handful of residents and business owners asked the borough’s decision-makers during the meeting to consider repealing the ordinance in favor of state Health Department regulations.
Downtown State College Improvement District Executive Director Lee Anne Jeffries termed the differences between State College restrictions and state restrictions as “confusing.”
“There is much confusion in the community as to what actually are the local guidelines and how they relate to the state and national guidelines,” Myers said after the meeting. “For those reasons, I believe that we should have repealed the current ordnance and enacted one that simply said we would follow the PA DOH guidelines.”
Some council members, however, felt State College-specific restrictions are still prudent. Repealing the ordinance would allow people to “play Russian roulette with an invisible bullet,” Lafer said.
“I would like to continue being on the cautious side. Our job is not to make people happy,” Lafer said. “It’s to try to keep them alive and well.”
Coronavirus ordinances elsewhere in the Centre Region are beginning to be phased out.
College Township voted Thursday to rescind its mandate, which includes requiring face coverings and limiting gathering size, effective May 31. The change is aimed at leading to “some semblance of order” by reducing and simplifying COVID-19 restrictions, township Manager Adam Brumbaugh said Friday.
“We no longer have a viable path forward to enforcement. That’s one of the primary reasons College Township created the ordinance in the first place,” Brumbaugh said. “It’s become difficult — if not impossible — to distinguish who has or has not had a vaccine. There’s just no practical way for enforcement.”
College Township might not be the last municipality in the Centre Region to do away with its COVID-19 ordinance.
Patton Township Manager Doug Erickson recommended the township rescind its coronavirus ordinance, according to the township’s agenda. Township supervisors are scheduled to meet Wednesday.
Ferguson Township may keep its ordinance around a bit longer. The township is considering doubling the amount of people who can gather outside or on township property to 100, Manager Dave Pribulka said.
A meeting to discuss the potential amendment is scheduled for June 7.