Partiers ignore mask mandate with impunity
A tipsy bachelorette in white dances to live music along the open windows of Rippy’s honky tonk, twirling a surgical mask on her finger.
Dr. Michael Caldwell shouts to be heard over the music. He reminds her to wear the mask — it’s the law, he says.
She ignores him as she takes a sip of her mango-flavored White Claw and dances on.
With hundreds lining the streets with indifference to masks mandates and social distancing, the downtown Nashville tourist district of Lower Broadway has become the most visible battleground in the city’s fight against the coronavirus. It’s earned national attention, illustrated by a recent TMZ headline: “Nashville bars: Here’s why coronavirus is out of control.”
On Friday, Caldwell, the city’s top health official, walked the popular street himself, his arms full of face masks, in the latest attempt to gain some control over the crowds.
He is easy to spot in his new neon yellow shirt, designed to look like a safety vest — similar to the ones police officers patrolling Lower Broadway wear over their uniforms. His Metro identification card is clipped to his front pocket and on the back, bold black letters state “Public Health Nashville.”
A call for volunteers was sent to his department earlier that day asking for people to join Caldwell to support police officers and demonstrate a “partnership,” he said, on the public health issue.
Only two showed up Friday: a 15-year veteran at the department and a new contract tracer in her second day on the job.
Before Caldwell lugged over a box full of masks from the trunk of his car, police officers largely stood by watching tourists carry on with masks hanging around necks or over foreheads, some shoved into back pockets or dangling off purses.
Since July 15, Nashville police have been enforcing the city’s mandate, but have effectively only focused on education, not citations. The department on Friday said officers have given more than 15,000 verbal warnings to the public.
But there’s no methodical way it’s being tracked, as they bounce from one group to the next. Officers, the department said, are keeping mental track of the warnings “the best they can,” and a supervisor reports the totals at the end of each shift.
Some tourists put on their masks as they spot the group of officials in yellow heading toward them. Others jeer and laugh off reminders. One gets confrontational, drawing attention as he shouts at Caldwell and officers that masks are infringing on his constitutional rights.
Some people take the offered masks but the majority say “no thanks.” Many say they’ve already got one — just put away.
One woman declines a mask, but as Caldwell walks away she chases him down and says she’ll take it. He notes the letters “TN” stitched on the corners of the masks: “It’s like a souvenir,” he says.
But even if he’s able to convince a few to cover their faces, there will be many more that will party on unmasked. And the next weekend will bring another round of tourists for officers to educate all over again.
THE SAME BATTLE EVERY WEEK
It’s the same pattern playing out every weekend since the city reopened and crowds continue to flock to Lower Broadway, even as COVID-19 cases reached new highs in July.
Mayor John Cooper shuttered bars, including the downtown honky-tonks at the core of the city’s entertainment industry, as he singled out bars as an infection risk in the city.
Yet the city continues to be a draw for tourists that gather on the street as they dance to live music or wait to go inside businesses that have remained open because they technically qualify as restaurants instead of bars.
Caldwell on Friday insists educating the public is the route to go, as citations could cause “secondary impact” to the city’s court system.
Cooper has agreed, saying recently that the city couldn’t “cite our way out of this disease.”
“It is not up to the public health department or the police to catch people. It is up to the public to expect a level of safety from each other,” he said.
And despite growing calls to shut down Lower Broadway, the mayor has not yet decided to take the step. Instead, he says it’s “constantly being evaluated.” For now, there’s been improvement, Cooper said, with “many more people wearing masks” and engaging in better social distancing on Lower Broadway.
But every weekend seems like a reset on progress the city’s made. Caldwell, however, says he doesn’t necessarily see it that way. He also says he hasn’t lost hope.
“I’m not frustrated. Every day it’s a little more progress,” he says. “I would get frustrated if I didn’t see the progress.”
He says he believes more people are wearing masks, especially compared to previous weekends. Nashvillians, he says, are better than most other counties in Tennessee when it comes to wearing masks.
“From what I’m seeing, it’s not starting out new every day. And hopefully we’re continuing in the right direction.”
The city has recently seen what officials are hopeful is a start of a downward trend of COVID-19 cases. Friday’s numbers were the city’s smallest one-day increase since late June. But even if new infections are slowing in Nashville, cases in rural Tennessee are on the rise.
And those on Lower Broadway, for the most part, aren’t residents but visitors from out of town. While city leaders previously said they were working with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other state health departments on multistate outbreaks, there hasn’t been a dedicated way for officials to measure infections for tourists visiting the city, who may be taking the virus home with them.
Even with Friday night’s efforts seemingly ineffective, Caldwell enjoys himself at times. He dances as he passes street performers beating on paint buckets. He puts cash into a tin and keeps walking.
He thanks a group of women who quickly fix their matching bridal party masks to cover their mouths as he passes by. He applauds them as he crosses the street.
Dr. Michael Caldwell, director of the Metro Public Health Department, stops in to check on a business in downtown Nashville on Friday, July 31.
A tractor-pulled party bus passes by and officers ask Caldwell what they should do, as such “transpotainment” vehicles are banned. He tells them to take notes.
Several times an officer patrolling with Caldwell is asked to take selfies with bachelorettes. He agrees — if they’ll wear their masks. The selfie-seekers happily oblige, but once the photo is snapped, the masks are off.