To the editor,
As a concerned citizen of Jefferson and of Marion County, I am writing this letter asking why the COVID-19 case numbers are not being reported in a public forum by the Marion County Judge.
At the time of this letter, it has been almost two weeks since the last reporting. I understand there was an issue with the way the numbers were calculated and displayed, and he stated that he didn’t believe the numbers was so high.
Even if the numbers are inaccurate, it is the Judge’s responsibility to update our community with the data provided by Texas DSHS.
As of right now, we have 113 active cases with 24 fatalities.
To some that may not sound like a lot, but Marion County has a population of roughly 10,000 people. We have more active cases then Cass County and it has 20,000 more people.
I also don’t understand why there hasn’t been more said about the mask mandate and the restrictions for restaurants and businesses open to the public that is in effect because of the higher case count.
Now I know, people that are reading this are going to be thinking that those restrictions are hurting businesses but guess what COVID-19 is killing your friend, your neighbor, or even a family member.
There are too many people in this area treating this like it is no big deal.
We as a community as a whole need to do better. The first step should be the Judge and the elected officials of Marion County to provide the information we need to take the next steps.
Garrett Smith
Jefferson, Texas
This information has been reported by the County Judge on his FB page literally for a year now.