Sheriff Daryl Wheeler Addresses the Panhandle Health District’s Mask Mandate
The Bonner County Sheriff’s Office will not be enforcing the mask mandate passed by the Panhandle Regional Health District.
When Bonner County Dispatch receives a complaint of a suspected violation of the mask mandate from a citizen, the complainant will be advised that the Sheriff’s Office will not be investigating or enforcing the mask mandate. Dispatch will close out the call and make a record of it. If the caller insists on speaking to a deputy, the deputy will call him/her back and state the same thing.
The three Police Departments in the county – Ponderay PD, Priest River PD and Sandpoint PD (who also provides services in the City of Kootenai) – will have to make their own decisions regarding if and how they will enforce the mask mandate. Bonner County Dispatch will forward the call to the Police Departments, and they are on their own to take it from there.
Governor Little, instead of calling up the Idaho Legislature, empowered the unelected Panhandle Health District with a legislative function. Please read what the Panhandle Health District wrote, and decide for yourself how it could possibly be enforced.
The Bonner County Sheriff’s Office is working at maximum capacity on real crime, and it cannot enforce the unenforceable mask rules. Most law enforcement agencies around the country are either passively or actively refusing to follow these types of directives. Any arrests/citations that have been made/issued in the past were related to high-profile targets (such as the Psalm Sing in Moscow, Idaho), and I believe they have nothing to do with public health.
Happy Thanksgiving!
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The Panhandle Health District’s “rule” is illegal anyway.
It cites four statutes in an attempt to justify its actions. Read the statutes.
Three of them: Idaho Code 56-1003(7), Idaho Code 39-415, IDAPA 16.02.10.065.09, authorize quarantine or isolations ONLY; not a word about anything else.
Therefore they are totally inapplicable and worthless.
The fourth, IC 67-5247, actually does give the health districts broad powers to make emergency rules, BUT with the requirement that REASONS be given that justify two things: That an emergency actually exists, and that the health board’s rule will actually help resolve the emergency.
There are ZERO reasons given anywhere in the PHD “rule”.
It’s all just a lot of so-and-so says, or even just bold affirmations with no authority cited at all. Read it and see.
The hack lawyer(s) that PHD consulted are either completely unaware of the distinction between an argument from reason and an argument from authority, or PHD did not even bother to consult a lawyer.
To be clear, an argument from authority is: “so-and-so said so, and he must know, therefore it’s true”.
An argument from reason is: “the data is thus and such, and from the data we must logically conclude that this or that is true.”
We are being ruled by fools or tyrants, or both.
AN OBVIOUSLY IRRATIONAL “LAW” IS NO LAW AT ALL, because a law is an order of REASON, given by the legitimate authority, for the common good.
The PHD “order” is not at all reasonable, nor is it for the common good.
Do not obey. If you do you support tyranny.
“Effective public health action must be based on respecting freedom and trusting our fellow citizens.”
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2267247/
I see our RINO governor is trying to follow in the footsteps of the leftwing dictator governors. I don’t care what the moron decrees, I WILL NOT WEAR A F@@@EN MASK.