Check out what was happening from newly discovered archives of the "News and Comments" from 1984

Vol 1. No.1

Vol 1. No. 2

Vol 1. No. 3

Voting - Friday, March 11, 2022 4pm - 8pm at the Community Center

Annual Town Meeting - Saturday, March 12, 2022 9am - 11:30am at the Community Center

Mask wearing is mandatory - see the town health officers note here

2021 Town Report here and the 2022 Town Warrant here

Is the Covid Pandemic Really Getting Better?

Feb 23, 2022

Dan Onion, MD, MPH

Mt. Vernon/Vienna/Fayette Health Officer

293-2076; dkonion@gmail.com

Everybody seems to be ecstatically deciding it’s time to celebrate by throwing masks in the wind and quitting all other Covid precautions. There are indeed some indications that the pandemic from both the Delta and the Omicron variant that replaced it in late December and January here, is subsiding. On the other hand, the Omicron strain #2 has not yet been found in Maine but is zipping through Europe and starting to be found in the US. It is even more transmissible than the Omicron #1 strain. 

However, the pandemic outcome measures are only relatively better and there is reason to fear that we could see those measures go up again in yet another surge, starting a week or two into March. The public’s fervent but perhaps premature hope, with the abandonment of precautions, the appearance of yet another, even more infectious Omicron strain, coming on fast in the US, increased transmissions during the February school vacations and basketball tournaments, and our March town meetings, could all coalesce to bring us one heck of a new surge in late March.

Granted, the recent improvements of Maine wastewater Covid loads, hospitalizations and severe disease as reflected in ICU/ventilator use, could well be permanent, but they could also still be only a transient change. I’d like to see us achieve real community immunity, with over 80% of the population fully immunized by then. We are close now, at 73.4% of all, and 77% of eligible people (i.e. age 5 and over),

If all those worries are still diminishing through the end of March, maybe further opening up will be reasonable. But the older you are, the greater the risk. Since January 2021 to today, almost half the Covid deaths are in those 70 and older. I, for one, plan to get any boosters for which I am eligible, and to stay masked with good KN95s, N95s, or doubled surgical and cloth masks when indoors with people not recently tested and negative for Covid, for several more months, no matter further pandemic easing here in Maine. Please be Covid-careful for yourself and your family!

Tom Jewett’s  compilation of our February 2022 anonymous survey 

Follow the highlighted links to see the survey summary and survey comments. 

Survey Summary – This is a count of the survey cards returned.  Cards are summarized in groups that had the same answers to the 5 boxes shown on the report.  For example, there were 4 people who reported that they have Internet, via DSL, are satisfied with it, want better Internet, and want to town to pursue it.  There are 9 who have a connection, via cellphone, are NOT satisfied with it, want better Internet, and want the town to pursue it.

• It is difficult data to summarize because there are so many different possible combinations of service type, satisfaction and whether they want the town to pursue something better.  If you have questions or concerns please shoot me an e-mail or give me a call.  207-242-7612
• SurveyComments – I found it interesting that 55 people included comments written on the card.  I have printed those on this report.  They are not sorted in any way and some of the comments may be hard to understand without seeing the specific responses to the survey and the comment at the same time.  In spite of that, I thought that if people felt strongly enough to make a comment, I should pass them along to you.

The last time I picked up the cards was on Saturday Feb 19th.  There were 5 cards in that batch.  I do not pick up my mail every day.  This was the smallest number of cards on one pickup since we sent the letter and survey.  I’m guessing there won’t be many more.

Regards,

Tom

The slides from the Feb. 15 Broadband Informational meeting are available here

Broadband Informational Meeting

February 15, 2022 - 7pm

The meeting will be held at the Community Center(Fire Station) on Kimball Pond Road at 7pm. 
Masks required. 

Alternatively you can attend via Zoom, provided your internet connection is sufficient. 
No masks required in that case. 

Here’s the Zoom link for the February 15, 2022 informational meeting:

Topic: Broadband Information Meeting
Time: Feb 15, 2022 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86758305152?pwd=WWdEM3ZIUjI3T0QyNnkyVTduVFE4QT09

Meeting ID: 867 5830 5152
Passcode: 432265
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