COVID cases fall, health official expects uptick
SHELBY — A top city health official noted a decline in coronavirus cases in Shelby during October but anticipates the number to begin rising.
“I do expect the cases to increase because of the holidays — Halloween, Christmas and New Year’s, all of the gatherings, gettogethers, parties,” Tiffiny Ellenberger, Shelby’s director of nursing, told Shelby City Council’s Safety Committee on Nov. 3. “We’ll keep an eye on that.”
Ellenberger spoke of the availability of coronavirus test kits.
“I still have home COVID-19 test kits available,” she said, adding after the meeting that the kits are for people who are symptomatic as opposed to people who are concerned about having been exposed to someone at a party, for example.
As of Nov. 3, the city of Shelby had reported 1,532 reported COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic in March 2020 with 1,448 of those cases recovered/resolved, Ellenberger told the committee. The city of Shelby reported 41 active cases as of Nov. 3, one hospitalization and 43 total deaths during the pandemic.
“I am looking at seeing it go up,” Ellenberger said of the death total.
On Nov. 5, the city’s coronavirus data update showed 45 active cases, 8 new cases, 4 recovered/ resolved cases. Two people were hospitalized. No additional deaths had occurred. The total number of Shelby cases during the pandemic stood at 1,540 with 1,452 total recovered/resolved cases.
In providing the October summary,
A look at the Nov. 3 meeting of Shelby City Council’s Safety Committee. Attending were City Councilman Garland Gates, Committee Chairman and City Councilman Derrin Roberts, Shelby Mayor Steve Schag, Tiffiny Ellenberger, Shelby’s director of nursing, and Shelby Fire Chief Mike Thompson.
Ellenberger noted 202 COVID cases in Shelby for that month, down from 280 in September.
“We averaged about 6 1/2 cases a day versus the 9.3 cases in September,”
she said in remarks to the committee.
In other comments, Ellenberger noted that the city of Shelby on Nov. 2 had secured passage of a five-year, 0.9-mill renewal levy for the Shelby City
Health Department.
The vote was 1,197525, according to final unofficial results from the Richland County Board of Elections.
“We are grateful that the levy passed,” Ellenberger told the committee.
Shelby Mayor Steve Schag expressed similar sentiments.
“We are very, very grateful to the voters of Shelby for providing funding for the Shelby City Health Department once again,” Schag said. “We will be good stewards for the monies we receive.”
In other business, Shelby Fire Chief Mike Thompson updated the Safety Committee on a Shelby Service Commission matter involving the fire department.
“We are offering a Civil Service test, looking to fill one position,” Thompson said. “This will be a written test at Shelby PD (Shelby Justice Center) on Dec. 4 at 9:30 in the morning.”
“To qualify, you have to at least have an Ohio volunteer firefighter card and an EMT basic card in Ohio, or higher, to take the test,” Thompson said in remarks. “Applications can be picked up at City Hall or on the city website, and they must be turned back into City Hall to be notarized.”
Chief Thompson said: “That is kind of exciting news, trying to get some more applicants in. The other side of that is we will be paying for training for them, depending on what they need… Eventually, they need to be up to professional firefighter and paramedic.”
“Hopefully we get some candidates and hire somebody out of that,” Thompson said of the effort.
In response to questions from Committee Chairman and Shelby Councilman Derrin Roberts, Chief Thompson said the paid training would involve those hired on by Shelby Fire. With Covid-related matters and scheduling issues, a timeframe of four years is being discussed to complete the training.
“If they do not pass, first of all, they would lose their job, and then they would owe the city back,” Thompson said. “We do want to put a disclaimer in that unavailability of classes, scheduling problems, something like that, that I could extend it. But we need to work that out between me and the union. We’re going to sit down, hammer that out and do an MOU (memorandum of understanding)...”
A link to the application and further information is available on the web at https://shelbycity. oh.gov/fire
An announcement from the city on its Twitter account summarizes the effort.
“The Shelby Civil Service Commission will administer an Entry Level Firefighter Examination to develop and certify a candidate list for current and future openings for the fire department,” it reads.