IA Governor Discusses Local Face Covering Ordinances At Briefing

Governor Kim Reynolds says she has not given Iowa cities and counties authority to enforce local ordinances that require people to wear face coverings in public. Reynolds says that means the proclamation Muscatine’s mayor issued Sunday requiring face coverings is not appropriate, but the governor says if conditions change dramatically, she may adjust her public health proclamation.

The governor says she will elevate the message about the importance of wearing a mask to protect others.

In the past two weeks, 60 percent of the Iowans who’ve tested positive for COVID-19 were adults between the ages of 18 and 40.

The governor says there’s a worrisome increase in cases among young adults in Iowa’s college towns and larger cities. Reynolds says she would consider adjusting regulations on bars, perhaps ordering an earlier closing time, if that trend continues.

Reynolds says for the past two weeks, the Test Iowa program has far surpassed its targeted capacity of three-thousand tests per day. From Monday through Thursday of last week, more than 13-thousand-six hundred Iowans were tested through the program. Reynolds says a new Test Iowa site will open tomorrow (Wednesday) in Algona. An estimated 10-thousand motorcyclists from around the state gathered just outside Algona last weekend, raising concerns the virus would be spread in the community.