Miami mandates masks in public to curb COVID-19 spread. Violators can be fined
Miami issued a new emergency order Thursday mandating people to wear face masks in public or face a civil fine, a response to the alarming rise in COVID-19 cases in South Florida and across the state.
Miami Mayor Francis Suarez first announced the measure at a press conference Monday, pledging to require masks in public within Miami’s city limits to beef up enforcement. Before City Manager Art Noriega signed the order, city commissioners unanimously approved a series of civil fines for violations of the mask requirement, which allow Miami’s code enforcement and police officers to enforce the order.
The order, signed at 5 p.m. Thursday, took immediate effect and requires anyone in public spaces in the city of Miami to wear face masks, with a series of exceptions:
▪ Children under 2 years of age
▪ People with disabilities or medical conditions that prevent wearing of a face mask
▪ Someone obtaining service involving the nose or face for which temporary removal of the face covering is necessary (such as grooming at a salon)
▪ Someone doing outdoor work or exercise with appropriate social distancing
▪ Someone who is eating or drinking
▪ Someone who is hearing-impaired or an individual who is communicating with someone who is hearing-impaired
Commissioners broadly agreed the city needed to crack down on people not wearing face coverings while the novel coronavirus spreads through the community, but they debated the balance between stricter and lighter penalties, and they discussed how the city’s officers would enforce the rules. They instructed the administration to inform people and hand out masks before issuing warnings and handing out fines. Arrests are supposed to be a last resort.
After much discussion about how to fairly but firmly get people to cover their faces, commissioners agreed to set a minimum fine of $50 for a first offense, a $150 fine for a second offense, and a $500 fine for a third offense, but the city will not send collection agencies after people who don’t pay or put liens on people’s properties. For those who persistently fail to wear masks in public, police could make arrests.
Noriega said he intends to launch a citywide educational campaign to advise residents of the new rule and distribute masks. Miami is expecting to receive 93,000 masks from the state to hand out in areas where large numbers of people are getting infected. Miami officers will be expected to hand out masks when they issue warnings before any fines.
The city manager argued that due to the seriousness of the public health threat, the city needs a real enforcement tool for people who refuse to wear masks.
“The only way to ensure compliance in some way shape or form is you have to have a heavy hand,” Noriega said.
Commissioner Joe Carollo echoed Noriega, saying the fines are meant to change the behavior of people who don’t care about transmission of the virus to other people, and therefore don’t care about other people’s lives.
“The only way they’re going to change their ways is if they feel it,” Carollo said.
The fines will be akin to code enforcement violations, which can be appealed to a city board.
Apart from the state-funded masks, some wealthy donors have also stepped up. Auto magnate and frequent political donor Norman Braman gave the city 50,000 masks this week. SoftBank is donating 147,000 masks. SoftBank CEO Marcelo Claure is an investor in the Major League Soccer franchise Inter Miami, which is negotiating a deal to lease city land for a massive commercial, office and stadium park to replace Melreese golf course.
The state added 5,004 new cases to its dashboard on Thursday, the second highest number it has reported in a single day, just one day after it reported the highest number since it began releasing information on the new cases in March.
Gov. Ron DeSantis called what had been seen in recent days a “real explosion” of new cases among the younger demographic during a press conference on Tuesday, and attributed the increase to social interactions between them as measures have been relaxed.
During a press conference Thursday in Tampa, DeSantis acknowledged the increased positivity rate in recent tests.
“Obviously, we want to turn that in the other direction,” he said.
In Miami-Dade, the numbers have also been increasing. In the past seven days, 5,391 positive tests have been added to the county’s total count, where as of Thursday more than 28,000 had tested positive, indicating that almost 20% of all cases in the county have been registered in the last seven days. To combat the growing numbers, Mayor Carlos Gimenez, announced Wednesday that he would dispatch “surge” teams to educate residents about the dangers of the virus in the most affected areas.
The positive test rate dropped to 11%, according to Thursday’s figures in the county’s New Normal Dashboard. The previous days saw positivity rates of 27% and 26%, much higher than the county’s goal of keeping the rate below 10%. In the last 14 days an average of 14% of people who have been tested have given positive results.
Hospitalizations, which have also been increasing, are the biggest concern for local authorities, who cited the low figures when they started to open businesses in May.
According to the county’s daily report, more people were discharged on Thursday than were admitted for the second consecutive day. However, the total number of hospitalizations in the county broke the record for the third consecutive day. According to county data, as of Thursday, 885 people were hospitalized with COVID-19.
This story was originally published June 25, 2020 at 7:39 PM.
