We must act responsibly – during and after the pandemic
Welcome to the great COVID-19 rebellion of 2020. Discussions of how our First and Fourteenth Amendment rights have been violated are commonplace around the commonwealth these days. We even saw citizens show up at a protest decked out in combat gear, armed, to protect their Second Amendment rights.
That one is puzzling. But this global pandemic seems to have flipped a switch, releasing long-standing tensions, revealing deep dysfunction and fragility in our government and our society.
We are living in remarkably interesting times in this state. Officials from several central Pennsylvania counties said they would begin reopening in defiance of Gov. Wolf’s shutdown order. And Wolf responded, calling it a “cowardly act” that could cost those areas not only lives, but federal stimulus money.
Four southwestern counties – Butler, Fayette, Greene and Washington – sent a letter to the governor demanding answers. Washington County followed up by voting to file a lawsuit against Wolf and Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine. And Republican state senators filed a brief Monday with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, asking the justices to enforce the subpoena they issued nearly two weeks ago for all Wolf administration records about coronavirus waivers for businesses.
On the business front, a recent poll showed 81% of small businesses believe COVID-19 could impact them for 12 to 16 months. By some estimates, half of small businesses could fold within six months, and laid-off workers could require years to find jobs.
And it is not just small local businesses that are protesting the COVID-19 shutdown. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has confirmed that he is reopening his company’s car factory in California in violation of a local shelter-in-place order. Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari said, “The worst is yet to come on the job front, unfortunately.”
Yet, despite historic unemployment numbers Friday, the stock market has continued to go up.
Interesting times, indeed. One thing appears certain . . . our lives have been changed. Many things can trigger a change: some local, some global, some seen and others only felt. But once a change occurs, the ripples that spread are almost always in the form of stories. It is up to each of us to speak and act responsibly.
We must support our local business community. The courageous entrepreneurs who put everything on the line for us are the lifeblood of our communities. We should not expect a restoration of how things were before COVID-19 spread to North America.
As we begin the recovery process, we must understand that recovery does not mean restoration. We cannot expect our lives to simply be restored to pre-pandemic conditions. Instead, we should lead each other to a new set of priorities and a new way of living.
Things like small grocery stores, pharmacies, hair salons and other quintessentially neighborhood-focused businesses must be allowed to open. We must understand that, for that to happen, we must act responsibly.
We have an amazing opportunity to rebuild our communities into places where people and businesses can thrive. Our communities are transitioning to something new, a paradigm focused not on what we have lost, but what lies ahead.
Jamie Protin is founder and principal of The Protin Group in Belle Vernon.
To submit business-related columns, email Rick Shrum at rshrum@observer-reporter.com.