{"id":2455565,"date":"2020-03-09T22:24:00","date_gmt":"2020-03-10T04:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/is-aspen-ready-for-coronavirus\/"},"modified":"2020-03-10T08:05:39","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T14:05:39","slug":"is-aspen-ready-for-coronavirus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/is-aspen-ready-for-coronavirus\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Aspen ready for coronavirus?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/02\/facebook-thumbnail-1200.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Without being alarmist, our city leaders should review any contingency plans that are already on the shelf and update (or create) contingency plans for this new epidemic.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Will public gatherings be restricted? What criteria will trier this or decision point? (Social distancing will be important but unpleasant and financially costly.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Are our critical services such as water and sewer treatment fully staffed, and do we have adequate cross-training of employees in the event that half of our city staff is taken ill at the same time?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Do maintenance staff and police have adequate personal protective equipment (PPE)?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Do public buildings have placards and adequate supplies for hand hygiene and non-mask respiratory etiquette?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Does the city have several months\u2019 supply of critical reagents, filters, lubricants, and parts to weather the supply chain disruptions that have already begun?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 How will our police balance public safety vs. individual rights with respect to virus containment, self-quarantine, or mandatory quarantine?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Are we prepared for a reduction in tax income when local tourism is affected as severely as international tourism is currently being affected?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u2022 Do we have systems for organizing volunteers to work together through the difficult times that may be coming?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Council members and city employees likely have their own written or mental lists for critical services and emergency response.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">I urge city leaders to set an example for a resilient and rational response to this very real outbreak. We need not live in fear, but we mustn\u2019t live in ignorance, either. There are many simple and powerful steps that our city leaders and individual residents can do. Time for action.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND Letter Name\">Kevin Padden<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND Letter Title\">Aspen<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/opinion\/letters-to-the-editor\/is-aspen-ready-for-coronavirus\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Without being alarmist, our city leaders should review any contingency plans that are already on the shelf and update (or create) contingency plans for this new epidemic. \u2022 Will public gatherings be restricted? What criteria will trier this or decision point? (Social distancing will be important but unpleasant and financially costly.) \u2022 Are our critical [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2455565","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-18 11:29:11","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley&#039;s Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2455565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2455565"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2455565\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2455585,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2455565\/revisions\/2455585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2455565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2455565"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2455565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}