— from Russel Barsh —

Congrats, Visitors Bureau, your ad campaign went viral. How far-sighted you were to begin promoting a return of tourism to the islands weeks BEFORE the County Council asked the state’s approval to move to Phase III. Too bad that the Governor rejected the Council’s request just before the big July Fourth holiday. What bad taste.

But not to worry, ferry and lodging reservations were already booked, and thousands of tourists came to the islands anyway! Many of them even forgot their face masks!

Everyone knows that you cannot catch Covid-19 in the Disneyland Islands, even if you bring it here yourself. And if you did, how nice of you to share it on a major national holiday. And you brought your own fireworks, so that islanders did not have to pay to shoot a bunch of them off for you! Of course, we can’t really know how successful your VIRAL ad campaign has been for another week to ten days.

Just joking! The reality is that the Visitors Bureau, some of our Chamber of Commerce friends and even some public land managers declared the county “open” before it legally was—and in the midst of a spike in new Washington State cases. The first week of July, Washington State reported 50 new cases per day per 100,000 population. Statistically, that makes it likely that of the thousands of July Fourth visitors, several were contagious (and may not even have known it).

Or to look at it a different way, by increasing the number of people traveling daily between the mainland and the islands about tenfold, the July Fourth festivities increased the risk of an outbreak in San Juan County by an order of magnitude this week.

As for those tourism dollars, they won’t pay for a single life damaged or lost.

**If you are reading theOrcasonian for free, thank your fellow islanders. If you would like to support theOrcasonian CLICK HERE to set your modestly-priced, voluntary subscription. Otherwise, no worries; we’re happy to share with you.**