We are checking in with mayors from our region about how they are managing the new coronavirus crisis and we spoke on Monday, April 6th with Winchester Mayor David Smith.
He was asked to share his thoughts on three questions:
1) How do you see the state of things today?
2) What challenges do you anticipate in the coming weeks?
3) What in your community gives you hope?
Here’s what he had to say:
MAYOR SMITH: Hi, this is Mayor John David Smith of Winchester Virginia.
Regarding the state of things today in our city and our community... it is very... sad.
There's a lot of businesses that have closed because they don't have the ability to deal with this pandemic. We've had to close parks, we've closed all our city public buildings as of three weeks ago, almost a month now, providing services online, we do all our meetings through video communications... so things have changed quite a bit. We are still trying to make it known to people that this is a serious thing, and they have to change the way they do things, they have to stay at home.
Finally when the governor came out to enforce the stay-at-home order, it gave us some teeth where we could enforce that. Prior to that, it was only a recommendation, and so people started to take that a little more seriously. The restaurants for example, like in many states, they are only doing curbside, Door Dash, and Uber Eats. Some of the non-essential businesses that were open, that sort of considered themselves essential, through peer pressure they closed up. At this time, in the last three weeks, I probably have had more conversation with our State and Federal elected officials, and they have come together to assist us with this crisis.
Winchester Medical Center is one of the biggest medical facilities in our area, so when there is a situation, let's say in Page county or Warren county, where there's someone who may think that they're infected, they're sent to the medical center immediately because they have the resources to tackle that.
The Winchester Medical Center and Lord Fairfax Health District, they've been working hand-in-hand closely each day. They give us an update of what cases are in the area… so far, knock on wood, there hasn't been any deaths in the area. But there has been a slight increase of infected individuals, but it's not on the size that you would see in bigger communities than ours. And I don't know if that's because we don't have such a big population and we are somewhat spread out, and at the beginning I think many more people took heed to staying at home and taking precautions. That may have helped us somewhat. I'm hoping that's the case.
When you go out, if you have to go out to the grocery stores or Martins, I am seeing people with masks on and gloves. And people aren't in groups anymore. You might see one or two people together, they're still out walking around and exercising, but they're being very mindful of how they do things.
People are reaching out to each other through text messages and phone calls, so everyone is still keeping in contact and checking on each other, so there is light at the end of this tunnel. And still today people are reaching out and saying, "If there's anything that I can do please let me know." So we still have that going on in our community and there are ways that people can help each other at a distance.
The Winchester public schools, they had started providing meals to their students. And not just their students but to their families, so that someone has something to eat throughout that day. Even if a homeless person walks up to the bus, they'll hand them a bag. So our school systems have done a great job and they are in the forefront of this.
What we're asking many of our businesses to do is to put hearts on windows and doors to show those who are out there now, on the forefront, our police department, our firefighters and medical staff, to show them that we care for what they're doing. And the community has come out and they put so many hearts on their windows, and stores, and front doors, to show their appreciation. And I want to thank them all.
