Kansas City Council extends mask mandate to November as efforts to vaccinate continue
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Masks in the Kansas City region
Here’s the latest on masks and the coronavirus in Kansas City and the surrounding areas.
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The Kansas City Council on Thursday voted to extend the city’s mask mandate another month as COVID-19 cases across the metro are on a downward trend.
The mandate is now in effect until Nov. 4, at which point city officials would need to vote again if they want to extend it.
Councilman Brandon Ellington, District 3 at-large, voted no. Council members Heather Hall and Teresa Loar were not present for the vote. Loar voted virtually earlier in the meeting against the airport concessions contract and against a luxury hotel proposal.
Due to new Missouri law, public health restrictions are required to be reviewed by the council every 30 days. Local and national health experts have pointed to masks and vaccination as the most promising path toward controlling the pandemic.
Kansas City’s mandate, which went into effect on Aug. 2, applies to those over the age of 5 in indoor spaces regardless of vaccination status, with some exemptions.
Frank Thompson, interim health director, told the Transportation, Infrastructure and Operations Committee on Wednesday that cases have seen a downward trend since the mask order was implemented.
The health department recommended the city maintain the mask order for all public places until it no longer is in the high risk threshold defined by the Centers for Disease Control. Still, the city is in a “much better” place than it was a month ago, Thompson said.
“And if this trajectory continues ... by the time (the order) expires, we should be at a point where we can look at beginning to pull back some of the mask orders for the public,” Thompson said.
After Wednesday’s committee, Mayor Quinton Lucas said the city is working with bars and restaurants who require vaccinations.
“If you require everybody to get vaccinated to go somewhere, then typically there’s a lot more people who got vaccinated,” Lucas said.
The Kansas City metro, including Kansas City and Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri and Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas, gained 525 new cases of COVID-19. The weekly rolling average for cases was 308, according to data tracked by The Star. One week ago it was 391 and one month ago it was 489.
Earlier this week, Jackson County legislators voted to extend the county’s mask order another 30 days.
“I’m very hopeful Kansas City is on pace enough that things will change,” Lucas said.
This story was originally published October 7, 2021 at 4:28 PM.
