At the recent Squirm Night, I gave Pitkin County a 7 out of 10 in its response the pandemic. My opponent, Chris Council, appears to have an abrasive and negative-type personality, for he gave a 3 rating, and also called last spring for the county to fire our director of Public Health.

I have full confidence in the job that Karen Koenemann and her staff have done in fighting the virus. She has taken many steps before the state and other counties did to reduce group size and implement common sense steps like mask-wearing and social distancing to prevent the spread of the virus, and was very successful in flattening the curve of our virus cases.

The county has done an admirable job of combating this new virus, with our Public Health department, the board of health and Aspen Valley Hospital making the tough decisions regarding the epidemiological and medical efforts to combat the disease outbreak, and the commissioners providing the financial resources and guidance for the public health staff to establish a respectable contact tracing team, and our Social Services staff to deal with the social and economic fallout brought by the pandemic.

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We have distributed financial and food assistance to those who lost their jobs in the spring, and worked to help businesses reopen in a safe fashion. Our only negative has been the struggle along with the federal and state governments in communicating a clear message to the public and getting a larger testing program set up. Overall, I’m proud of the county’s proactive and successful pandemic response. The county has a positive team acting in the public’s best interest during this pandemic — there is never a good time to elect a negative-thinking person to the Pitkin Board of County Commissioners, especially not in the midst of this crisis. I believe I am the best candidate with a positive attitude to carry on our fight against this public health issue.

Steve Child

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Commissioner, Pitkin County