Thanks to the Guard
During visit to food bank, Sen. Rob Portman says statewide mask order should still be on the table
Sen. Rob Portman said a statewide mask order should be considered if positive cases of COVID-19 continue to trend upward in Ohio.
“I agree with the mandates in the hot-spot areas. I think the statewide ban has to be something that’s considered going forward depending on where we are,” Portman said Thursday, a day after Gov. Mike Dewine, his fellow Republican, implored Ohioans to wear masks to slow the virus’ spread but did not issue a statewide order.
“We started strong in Ohio. We did a lot early on that other states didn’t do. That was smart, it turns out. We’re not among the worst states but we are a state that’s seeing an increase,” Portman said after a tour of the Mid-ohio Food Bank. “That concerns me a lot. We don’t want to be like Florida or Texas. I think it’s important that in those hot spots everybody wears a mask.”
Dewine’s administration is using a county-bycounty alert system with seven indicators to assess their risk levels and has ordered masks to be worn when a county reaches a step away from the highest level.
But he has stopped short of issuing another statewide order, as he and former Ohio Health Director Dr. Amy Acton did in the spring to shut down most activity throughout the state.
Portman, echoing Dewine, said Thursday that “the most effective thing in my view is to get the message out there loud and clear that the mask is not about protecting you, it’s about protecting others.”
Portman was in central Ohio on Thursday to observe a federally funded deployment of the Ohio National Guard that is helping to distribute food at the Mid-ohio Food Bank and to visit Columbus
Public Health for a briefing on how the city has used federal aid to expand testing for the coronavirus.
Guard members shepherded cars through the parking lot of the food bank’s Grove City headquarters and loaded shopping carts full of chicken, milk and other food into their trunks.
About 100 members of the Guard are deployed at the Mid-ohio Food Bank to help pack and distribute the food. They have been needed as the food bank’s regular volunteer base — made up mostly of older people and corporate volunteers — has evaporated out of fear of contracting the virus, said Matt Habash, CEO of the Mid-ohio Food Bank.
Between March 1 and June 30, about 27,000 new families across 20 counties have sought food through the food bank, he said. That’s up about 30% higher than during the same period a year ago.
“They have literally been a godsend,” Habash said of the Ohio National Guard.
The Guard’s deployment expires in early August, though, and Habash said the food bank has had to work on contingency plans as volunteers aren’t expected to return quickly enough to help meet what he expects to be a greater need once a $600 federal unemployment supplement expires near the end of July.
Mid-ohio already has started recruiting additional volunteers, but Habash said he also is trying to raise money to hire temporary employees to fill the void.
Portman said he plans to push for additional federal funding to extend the deployment through the end of 2020 in the next round of coronavirus relief that Congress will debate when it returns to work next week. That bill also should help National Guard soldiers activated for coronavirus relief to get access to transitional health benefits after regular benefits expire.
He also wants to press for a returnto-work bonus that would replace the $600 in federal unemployment benefits that Congress approved in the spring. Workers would have the choice to return to work, Portman said, and receive a $450 bonus, and those who remained on unemployment still would receive the additional $600.
“There does need to be a supplement. The question is what it should be and how it should be structured,” he said. rrouan@dispatch.com @Rickrouan