Around Town

OP-ED: Sen. Brownsberger’s Survey Finds Most Agree with Mass. Social Distancing Measures

By |

State Sen. Will Brownsberger

State Sen. Will Brownsberger surveyed people about the social distancing steps that Massachusetts officials have taken, and found that the vast majority agree with them and expect it to be “a long time” before the situation returns to normal. Brownsberger — who represents Watertown, Belmont and parts of Boston — sent out the following write up about the survey, which was the second he has conducted about the state’s response to COVID-19 (see the first here). COVID-19 Check-in Survey II

Key Takeaways

95% support Massachusetts’ social distancing policies or feel we should go further.96% expect we will take a long time to get back to normal or will have to adapt to a permanent new normal. Summary of Survey

A total of 2,662 of people responded to an email and Facebook survey initiated on Saturday, April 25, 2020, with 85% responding on that day.As to Massachusetts’ COVID-19 response, only 5% of respondents stated “We have gone too far — the economic impact is not worth it.”Public support for social distancing remains strong: 65% felt “The balance is right at this time” and 30% felt “We have not gone far enough — people are still doing unnecessary and unsafe things.”As compared to the March survey which was completed mostly before the Governor’s non-essential business closures of March 23, the group feeling “We have not gone far enough” has declined from 54% to 30%, while the group feeling “We have gone too far” has increased slightly from 3% to 5%.9% reported that they were unemployed as a result of the epidemic while 3% reported they were previously unemployed. The newly unemployed were somewhat more likely to feel our response has gone too far (12%) than the respondents as a whole (5%), but 88% of them felt we have the balance right or have not gone far enough.The share of respondents currently behind on bills dropped slightly from 3% to 2%.

Coronavirus

OP-ED: Mass. Legislature Passes Bill for Moratorium on Evictions, Foreclosures

By |

State Sen. Will Brownsberger

The following piece was provided by State Sen. Will Brownsberger, who represents Watertown, Belmont and parts of Boston:

The legislature enacted (Friday) a moratorium on evictions and foreclosures. We should not put tenants or homeowners out on the street while we are trying to enforce social distancing. The bill is not a rent or mortgage holiday. It does not extinguish the obligations of renters or borrowers. Those lucky enough to avoid job loss during the COVID-19 recession should continue to make their regular payments.

Letters

LETTER: Full Time Forestry Supervisor Key to Protecting Watertown’s Tree Canopy

By |

On behalf of Trees for Watertown, I want to publicly thank our DPW, and in particular Bob DiRico — who is Acting Forestry Supervisor on top of his already-full-time job as Supervisor of Parks and Cemeteries — for the care they’re taking of our town trees during this extended period both without a full-time Forestry Supervisor/Tree Warden and now with reduced DPW staffing because of the pandemic. As we all know we had a very severe windstorm yesterday. Watertown’s tree canopy took a real beating. Our DPW did a tremendous job responding to this. Bob DiRico and his support team were up until 11:30 last night working on clearing the worst of the damage and already were at it again early this morning.

Around Town

LETTER: U.S. Post Office Using Social Distancing to Protect Mail Carriers During COVID-19 Outbreak

By |

Dear Editor:

During these challenging times, postal employees are working hard to ensure residents stay connected with their world through the mail. Whether it’s medications, a package, a paycheck, benefits or pension check, a bill or letter from a family member, postal workers understand that every piece of mail is important. While service like this is nothing new to us, we need our communities’ help with social distancing. For everyone’s safety, our employees are following the social distancing precautions recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and local health officials. We are asking people to not approach our carriers to accept delivery.

Around Town

OP-ED: What Do We Know and What Don’t We Know About COVID-19?

By |

State Sen. Will Brownsberger

The following piece was provided by State Sen. Will Brownsberger, who represents Watertown, Belmont and parts of Boston:

We all now know that the coronavirus is loose in the community and anyone could be unknowingly spreading it. We’ve all seen the terrifying exponential growth curves that project need for hospital beds peaking well above available supply. And we understand that by social distancing, we can bend the disease curve down, lower the peak hospital demand and gain time so that the hospital system has more time to prepare. What we don’t know is whether we have done as much as we should to check the spread of the virus and what the benefits of additional measures would be. Tomas Pueyo has written one of the more widely read analyses of our current uncertainties: The Hammer and the Dance. His basic argument is that we should be coming down as hard as we can on social distancing initially to buy time (the “hammer”), and that after a few weeks of maximal social distancing, we can let up some while doing widespread testing, contact tracing, and isolation to make sure we don’t reignite community spread (the “dance”).

Department of Public Works

LETTER: Residents Thankful for Quick Response by Public Works Employees

By |

A Watertown Department of Public Works snow plow. To the Editor:

We are writing to thank the Watertown Public Works Department, and to commend two of its workers for the outstanding service they recently provided to us. On Sunday, March 22 our sewer line became blocked. We attempted to unclog it with no success. About 6:30 p.m. we called the DPW to see if it would be possible for someone to come by the next morning.

Coronavirus

Council President Discusses Watertown’s Response to the Coronavirus, Steps You Can Take

By |

Town Council President Mark Siders at the inauguration in 2018. To the Watertown community:

I want to take this opportunity to give you a brief update with respect to the COVID-19 pandemic and how Watertown is managing our response to it. The Town Manager and Administration along with myself and the Town Council are staying on top of all measures being put in place at the state level, in addition to those regulations we have put in place locally. The Town Manager is meeting daily with the Director of Public Health, the Police and Fire Chiefs, and other Department heads to assess the effectiveness of recent state and local regulations, and to determine if other actions may be needed to best protect our community. Communications from the Town Manager are available on the Town’s website and are updated frequently.

Around Town

OP-ED: Cancel It if You Can – Taking Responsibility for Controlling the Pandemic

By |

State Sen. Will Brownsberger

Will Brownsberger is the State Senator for Watertown, Belmont and parts of Boston:

The pandemic will eventually touch many of us. What matters most is the speed of the pandemic. If the virus spreads too fast and too many of us are sick at the same time, we will overwhelm the health care system. People may not be able to get the care they need – for the virus or for any other health problem.  That’s what is starting to happen now in Italy. Doctors are discussing how to make brutal triage decisions effectively condemning weaker patients to die. We need to slow the virus down and since none of us are immune and there is no vaccine yet, we have only one way to protect our community:  To reduce unnecessary contact.