Moscow candidates talk mask mandates

Moscow City Council candidates on Wednesday took strong stances on the issue of mask and vaccine mandates at a League of Women Voters forum.

The forum was moderated by University of Idaho College of Law professor Richard Seamon and held virtually on Zoom. It featured Melissa Cline, Steve Harmon, Hailey Lewis, Julia Parker, incumbent Gina Taruscio and Kyrk Taylor. Shaun Darveshi and Jason Stooks could not make the forum.

With three city council seats open, the top three vote-getters will be elected. The election is Nov. 2.

Seamon asked about COVID-19 policies the candidates think are needed to protect residents, particularly children who are unable to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.

Taylor said he recognizes the right of individuals to make decisions for themselves, but he would highly recommend that people get vaccinated.

“Vaccines have been proven to be safe and effective and they really do help prevent the severity of the illness from encroaching on individuals’ lives,” he said.

Taruscio said she feels “very strongly” that the government needs to let individuals choose the health care they receive. Earlier in the pandemic, Taruscio voted in favor of a mask mandate and she said it was the hardest decision she had to make. She believes it was the right decision at the time.

Now, Taruscio said she would not vote the same way because she believes in individual rights and the divisiveness that resulted from the mandate.

“Now my responsibility is to try to help rebuild and to allow the citizens to be heard,” she said. “And I’ve learned that I won’t be able to sleep really well if I vote in favor of a mandate in the future, which I absolutely won’t.”

Parker, a registered nurse, encouraged people to get vaccinated and wear masks indoors.

“It’s hard for me to have a lot of sympathy for people who cannot do the simple thing of wearing a mask, because it’s really easy and it’s protecting your neighbors and it’s protecting businesses that want to stay open and it’s protecting our health care resources,” she said.

She cautioned that if hospitals are full of COVID-19 patients, then other patients cannot be admitted.

Lewis said that she would listen to school district leaders and hospital officials about the issue of a mask mandate. Lewis said data shows that masks are effective in slowing the spread of the virus.

“If our hospital tells us that masks and indoor mask guidance would be the difference between me getting in a car crash and seeing emergency services or not, I want them to feel heard and that recommendations be explored given the data at hand,” she said.

Harmon disagreed and said data he has seen shows masks do not make a difference.

“I do not believe that masks work and I do not believe they work for children,” he said.“I really don’t think children need masks and I also don’t believe that they actually need a vaccine.”

He said it has become a politicized issue and took aim at local school leaders and Washington’s vaccine mandate.

“Unfortunately we’re dealing now with things where it’s been politicized and it’s been put into laws that now make it so we don’t have a great coach at WSU,” he said. “And we see people like our leaders in the Moscow and Pullman school districts saying things like we think the masks are working, with completely no data, all anecdotal.”

Cline stated she is also against mask and vaccine mandates

“I think that it’s a personal choice and that we don’t have any business pushing those kinds of medical decisions on anyone,” she said.

Wednsday’s forum covered a variety of other issues such as affordable housing and anti-discrimination ordinances. Video of the forum will be posted on YouTube. Check my.lwv.org/idaho/moscow for more information.

Kuipers can be reached at akuipers@dnews.com.