Peterborough’s mask mandate for public town buildings was extended for another month by the Select Board on Tuesday night.
“Things haven’t changed much over the past several weeks,” said board member Bill Kennedy. “It’s still a dangerous environment.”
The mask mandate applies to the interior of all public buildings, with the only exceptions being for private offices and private meetings, events where the responsibility for health falls onto the organizer or for valid medical reasons.
The mandate has been in effect since Jan. 5, after the Select Board decided that the Omicron variant was too dangerous to not take action. At the time, board members said part of their motivation was to encourage residents and visitors to take COVID-19 seriously.
According to Town Administrator Nicole MacStay, the mask mandate has been successful and there haven’t been any issues implementing it.
“Most people seem to be more than willing to put on a mask when asked,” she said.
Board members examined some graphs of caseloads prior to voting for the extension.
“The number of cases across the state has been dropping so that’s the good news,” said Kennedy. “Bad news, it’s like three times what it was when we had our last meeting, so the number of cases is still very astronomical.”
The mandate will be revisited for potential extension in March.