Healthcare heroes: The public-health workers who quietly slowed the spread of COVID-19
Updated May 07, 2021;
Posted May 07, 2021
Like many Onondaga County workers, Maria Mahar has taken on several new jobs during the pandemic. Among them, three days a week, is serving as COVID-19 rapid test site manager at the Oncenter in Syracuse.
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By Kathleen O Brien | Special Correspondent
There are few lawn signs thanking your local health department for its help during the pandemic. No free meals to boost the morale of exhausted employees. No applause from high-rise balconies in their honor.
Yet like their hospital counterparts, the 153,000 employees of the nation’s nearly 3,000 local health departments have been tested, tried, and sometimes exhausted by the pandemic.
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If you think the editorial board is more frequently tooting the horn for local journalism, you’re not wrong. We are making the case for the value of our work to subscribers and the community. We also are standing up for the role played by a free and independent press in a democracy, in the face of growing hostility to it.
Perhaps no one embodies that hostility better than Gov. Andrew Cuomo. The governor hadn’t met reporters in person for months, claiming Covid-19 prevented it even as he conducted large public events with supporters. As sexual harassment allegations mounted, and the Albany press corps broke story after story about the administration’s cover-up of nursing home deaths due to Covid, Cuomo faced unrelenting pressure from the media to answer questions in person from journalists not handpicked by his staff. Before we could pile on, the governor held a news conference Monday in Syracuse. He could not avoid addressing the various scandals that b
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The Onondaga County Legislature approved $600,000 for a body camera program for the county sheriff s department along party lines.
Public Safety Committee Chair Chris Ryan tried twice to postpone a vote. He says there’s no need to rush into what will be a long-term commitment just 22 hours after receiving the amount.
“$606,000 is the basement of what we’re talking about. This is going to be millions and millions of dollars. They’re always going to be with us, so there’s broader implications of just $606,000 in the years to come,” Ryan said.
Legislator Bill Kinne, along with other Democrats, admonished Republicans for not following their own advice and allowing the spending item to skirt the legislature’s typical vetting process.
Syracuse, NY – As the past year has shown us, reliable access to broadband internet is no longer a luxury. Covid-19 forced many aspects of our day-to-day lives online; virtual learning, working from home, online shopping, telemedicine, and simply staying connected with those we care about. It has also shown us how prevalent the digital divide is in our community. To address these issues, the Central New York Regional Planning and Development Board (CNY RPDB) is working with its member counties and asking residents and businesses located in Cayuga, Cortland, Madison, Onondaga, and Oswego Counties to participate in a survey that will identify areas that lack access to reliable broadband internet. (Please note a similar study was completed in Madison County in 2019).