Page last updated on September 7, 2021 at 1:29 pm
Hi, this is Mayor John Hamilton. It's Monday, August 10th, and I just wanted to check in with the community again, particularly related to the health pandemic that we're all still working through. Obviously some big changes happening. First, the university is just beginning to welcome students back. Just yesterday some of the on-campus students began checking in, and we know our off-campus students are moving in as well, headed toward the university's opening. That's going to change our community, it's bringing a lot more people in.
There's a lot of testing going on, both for arriving students and ongoing testing as students are here. But certainly, it's something we're watching that data every day, as the group of us that meet and many others are trying to just watch for signals to make sure we're okay. The overall health signals continue to be relatively positive in Monroe County compared to the state of Indiana and compared to the country. But, these are very concerning days and weeks ahead. I will let you know we're going to continue to monitor it.
I'll just note to encourage all of us who can to diminish unneeded interactions, and numbers of folks continue to wear masks under the order, of course, continue to follow all the guidelines. But just be aware that these next few weeks are really critical go-no-go weeks for how our community does as we go through these changes. The second change of course is the local school corporations beginning to do their teaching of our young people, many thousands of them in different ways, I know opening up this week remotely.
But that's changing family rhythms, it's changing circumstances of course, and that may evolve to over the just short weeks ahead. These are two really big changes happening in our community right now. They can be challenging to households and families, and I appreciate all of you hanging in there and trying to get through this. We can have safety fatigue, that's a real thing where we just get tired of trying to do the right thing. But these next few weeks are really important with those changes with continuous monitoring, and we're going to keep getting data however we can, even from the utility sewer system, which you can read about.
But keep doing the right things. Keep masking, keep staying separated as you can from individuals. Realize that anyone of us may be infectious when we feel great, feel fine, we still can be spreading the virus, so let's be careful. I hope we can get through this without a big resurgence. The next few weeks are going to tell us that. Thanks for all that you're doing. Please reach out if you have any questions to the mayor's office or to me. Keep taking care of yourself, please keep taking care of each other, and taking care of our community. I'll be in touch again soon. Thanks.
