Mandatory Mask Enforcement Problematic; Voluntary Compliance Urged To Prevent More Closures
PACIFICA (CBS SF) -- Beaches will be closed and Californians are supposed to stay home and wear a mask when necessary. It's a sweeping set of coronavirus rules for the holiday weekend and on Thursday, Governor Gavin Newsom took a lot of questions about enforcement. He acknowledged that is not something he can't quite do himself, so what does enforcement look like?
"Look, we're not going to everybody's backyard and enforcing, you know that and they know that," Governor Newsom said. "People know what the right thing to do is. I encourage them to do the right thing, and to mitigate the spread."
Calling, again, on those 'better angels' the governor made another 4th of July plea for Californians to play by the rules.
"It's not my decision what we do, what we close, and what remains open," says Captain Chris Clements of the Pacifica Police Department. "I can tell you that when a decision is made that we're going to be closing beaches that it's our responsibility to enforce those orders. Our first step is really to get voluntary compliance."
Pacifica Police Captain Chris Clements says keeping people off a beach is one thing. Enforcing the mask requirement is something else.
"It's a tremendous challenge," Clements says. "To echo, I guess, what the governor said earlier today, people know what they need to be doing to help stop the spread of this virus. I think it's a challenge for everyone."
Given the difficulty of enforcing compliance, the next solution might have to be going back to no access at all.
"If people can't wear masks, as we are asking them to do on places like the pier, then the pier may not be open to the public," Clements says. "That might be the measure that the city has to take to prevent and stop the spread of COVID-19 in our community."
The Pacifica Beach closure begins at sunrise Friday.
