City of Dublin passes mask ordinance, requests statewide mask mandate

In an emergency meeting Tuesday afternoon, Dublin city council members voted to pass a mask ordinance.

Close contact should remain off campus ... for 14 days... or until they are cleared by the health department.

In laurens county-- dublin residents are now required to wear masks in public spaces.

This comes after dublin city council passed a mask ordinance... during an emergency meeting tuesday.

41nbc's peyton lewis has more on the ordinance.... and how it will impact the city.

0:00-0:07 0:30-0:48 1:14-1:31 if you plan on visiting the city of dublin anytime soon, city officials say you will need to be wearing one of these while you're out and about.

In a 6-1 vote dublin city council passed a mask mandate that will now require masks in public spaces.

This comes after laurens county was declared a red zone for covid-19 by the department of public health.

Melissa brantley, from the south central health district says the dph saw a shocking increase in the number of cases in july which led to an increase in deaths.

"unfortunately.

I think the saddest part is that we've seen a dramatic increase in our deaths.

For months we only had one death in laurens and it went from 1 to 16."

The mandate affects all businesses, stores, and non-profits... they must require masks in their buildings.

People with certain health conditions are not required to wear a mask and neither are children under the age of 10.

The mayor of dublin says he passed the ordinance to help their case numbers go down.

City councilman bill brown was the only person to vote against the ordinance and says he does not believe it is enforceable.

"certainly you know i feel something should be done, in my opinion i think it's going to be difficult to enforce a mask mandate, and more than anything.

I think what the city is trying to do is highlight the importance of mask wearing.

I think that it could have been done through other measures."

Dublin and laurens county law enforcement are helping enforce the mandate by giving fines to people caught without a mask.

The first time is no more than a $25 fine, the second time is $50, and the third time is no more than a $100 fine.

Brantley says the department of public health believes that the mandate will help decrease laurens county numbers and contribute to fattening the curve in middle georgia.

"we just want to see it start to go down and that's our hope is that this can start to lead to a decline in cases, and that hopefully people will start to see that it's an issue in our community and take